It started with a bike in the trash

Andrew Weiner’s parents used to buy him bikes unassembled and leave the box on the floor. He’d build them himself — and there was nothing like riding something you put together with your own hands.

In 2014 he found a beat-up bike next to the trash, hauled it home, and restored it. That was supposed to be the end of it. Instead he couldn’t stop: first bikes for friends, then bikes for friends of friends, a living room that slowly turned into a workshop, and finally a real shop — First Gear Bicycles.

Today people come from all over Florida for his custom builds: stretch cruisers, lowriders, twisted chrome forks, frames cut and welded into something nobody else is riding. The repair side runs on the same principle as that first trash-find: almost any bike is worth saving, and it deserves to be fixed right.

The shop runs by appointment, which means when you show up, your bike is the only one on the stand. And if you buy a bike here and something goes wrong — bring it back. Andrew fixes it free.