If you’re looking for a bike, Bob Lincks is your man. The Westbury resident owns Williams Cycle in Hicksville, which has been helping locals pedal around Long Island’s roads, parks and pathways for more than 40 years.
According to Lincks, Williams Cycle has just about anything you’d ever need when it comes to the sport of bicycling.
“We’re a full, family-type shop. We don’t get into the high-end, pro stuff. We do anything from kid’s tricycles all the way up to mountain bikes, hybrids, road bikes…we even do adult tricycles,” he said. “We do sales and service and we can repair basically any bike. And we also sell all the accessories, anything from replacement parts, bags, helmets, locks, water bottles, pedals, lubricants. Whatever you need, we pretty much have everything.”
Williams Cycle was started in 1957 on South Oyster Bay Road in Hicksville. The original owners ran the shop for more than 20 years before selling it off to a man that owned it for another decade. Enter Lincks, who then purchased the shop, and has been running Williams Cycle for the past 18 years.
However, this purchase on Lincks’ part was made on no idle whim. The business of bicycles, it could be argued, is in his family’s blood.
“I used to own a bike shop in Queens. My father had worked in the business since he was a teenager and when he was 18 years old, he borrowed money from his father to buy the store he was working in. That was in 1939 in Woodside, Queens, and that store is still there today,” Lincks said. “I worked there as a teenager and a young adult, and when my dad retired, I took over. But we moved out here in 1994 and the commute was a bit too much, sometimes it would take me two hours to get home. It was nuts.”
Looking for something closer to home, but still wishing to stick with what he knew so well, Lincks jumped at the chance when he found out that Williams Cycle was on the market. Since taking over, he has established a reputation for running a square business and for knowing his stuff.
However, Lincks said that the one—and biggest—problem any neighborhood bike shop has to contend with is competition from so-called “big box” stores…and the poorly-made products they peddle.
“We do a lot of repairs on those cheap toy store bikes. Those things really are not bikes and they always fall apart. The repairs often cost almost as much as the bike did,” he said. “These stores have really ruined the bike industry. The things they sell are not made to bike specifications or standards. They have the cheapest components and parts imaginable. People come in and say they saw a bike for $120 at Walmart and ask why mine are $400, but mine are real bikes. Ultimately, it comes down to what you get is what you pay for.”
Lincks noted that business, while having its ups and downs, has nonetheless remained consistently good, and that he really loved the feeling of being a small, neighborhood bike shop serving his community with quality product and service.
“I enjoy doing this, although being self-employed is tough. Big stores have a bookkeeping department, a customer service department, a sales department. I’m all of those,” he said. “But I still enjoy the work, and I love bikes and biking.”
Williams Cycle is at 83 Woodbury Rd. in Hicksville. Find out more by calling 516-822-6235.
