Zipping through the country with Creekside Ebikes

A row of Magnum electric bikes is seen at Creekside Ebikes in Kalona on July 27. Victor Yoder opened the business on his dairy farm last fall. (Caleb McCullough/The Union)

A row of Magnum electric bikes is seen at Creekside Ebikes in Kalona on July 27. (Caleb McCullough/The Union)

A Magnum electric bike is seen in the service shop at Creekside Ebikes on July 27. The business offers both sales and repairs for the e-bikes. (Caleb McCullough/The Union)

A row of Magnum electronic bikes is seen at Creekside Ebikes in Kalona on July 27. The shop carries several different models and styles of bike. (Caleb McCullough/The Union)

In a barn on a dairy farm in rural Kalona, Victor Yoder is running a popular new shop that sells electric bikes to both the area’s Amish community and the general public.

Yoder started Creekside Ebikes, at 5592 Sharon Center Road SW, in October 2020, mostly catering to fellow members of the New Order Amish community in Kalona. The Old Order Amish, a more conservative group which is more prevalent in Kalona, don’t use bicycles, but the New Order use them and some forms of electricity.

The business has quickly expanded to the general public, he said, and now most of his customers are from outside the Amish community. He said he gets customers from all over Iowa and even neighboring states.

Yoder got interested in the products when he used a conversion kit on his own bicycle. He had been dealing the bikes locally, he said, without a retail shop for about two years. As demand grew, he decided it was time to open a shop and increase outreach and advertising.

“We just decided there was enough demand in the public, we’re going to open a retail shop,” he said. “Business seems to keep growing.”

Yoder deals the Magnum brand of e-bikes, and carries about 12 models, he said. Some have a screen display on the handlebars and have varying levels of maximum speed. One model can fold up to make it more portable.

The bikes vary from Class 1 to Class 3 designations, with the highest level able to reach speeds up to 25 miles per hour. Yoder said he can set a cap on bikes for people who don’t want to reach higher speeds.

The bikes have six settings with varying levels of assistance, so people can choose how much they want to pedal and how much to leave up to the battery. Most have hydraulic brakes and adjustable handlebars as well.

Many have a display between the handlebars which shows battery voltage, miles per hour, trip miles and miles left in the charge. The bikes get between 30 and 60 miles in a charge.

“It’s just a nice little diagram, you can see all the diagnostics right there,” he said.

Creekside Ebikes gets interest from a variety of customers. Some are elderly people who can’t exert themselves as much as they used to, others are hobbyists who want a more relaxing ride.

He said the style is great for commuters who want to bike to work but may not want to be too exhausted by the time they get there.

“They can just go so many more places and so much farther, and see so much more versus a regular bike,’ he said.

Business has picked up since opening last fall, Yoder said. Though the shop is out of the way and not in a commercial area, Yoder said word has been getting around through word-of-mouth, local shopper’s guides, advertising and Google.

As word has spread of the e-bikes, he said he’s been selling more and getting customers from all over, including Minnesota, Illinois and Missouri.

“It’s a little bit more of a far-reaching business, being it’s more of a niche of its own, it’s not just like I’m a local hardware store,” he said.

Yoder said he’s sold about 40 bikes since opening in September. The showroom floor, inside a barn, has slowly filled with dozens of bikes. Yoder said he isn’t planning on moving out of his property into a commercial district, but he’s not opposed to expansion if the opportunity arises.

"I prefer to just specialize more in a small country business,“ he said.