Web exclusive: Impounded and unregistered bikes on sale tomorrow

If you are wondering where your unregistered Huffy disappeared to after hibernating on campus all winter, the MSU Surplus Store might be able to help.

The MSU Surplus Store, 1344 S. Harrison Road, receives many of the abandoned and impounded bikes from the MSU police, and tomorrow the store will hold a bike sale clearing out about 200 used bikes. The sale begins at 7:30 a.m. and will run until 3:30 p.m. or until the bikes are sold out, said Tom March, a sales attendant at the Surplus Store.

The Surplus Store sells the impounded and abandoned bikes in a range of conditions, and the bikes will be priced from $25 to $50 based on condition, age and model, March said.

The store holds a number of bike sales throughout the year, but the summer sale is typically the largest. One of the reasons for the sales is to keep old bikes out of landfills and promote reuse and recycling, March said.

“We really try to reuse the bikes in any way, shape or form that we can to keep them out of the landfill and keep them out of the scrap,” he said.

Recently, Surplus Store employees began using social networking tools to inform shoppers about sales and inventory, said James Ives, sales and marketing specialist at the Surplus Store.

“We are really trying to hit the social networks just to make things easier for people to know we are here and let people know what’s going on with the sale,” Ives said.

Online sales associate Aaron Cookingham said he will be posting updates on tomorrow’s sale at MSUsurplusstore.blogspot.com and on Twitter for MSU_Surplus.

“I would predict that we will sell out pretty quickly,” Cookingham said. “We will try to keep people up to date on how many we still have and what the conditions are of the bikes we still have left.”

Revenue varies at each sale depending on turnout and the number of bikes sold, Ives said.

“The money goes back to the university, but what we really like is that it brings in new faces, and it really just creates a lot of energy for the store,” he said.

MSU police hold bikes for at least 30 days before handing them over for resale, and March said the Surplus Store doesn’t want to steal bikes. If a customer recognizes their impounded bike and can provide legitimate evidence of ownership, they should talk to Surplus Store employees.