Best Buy Co. Inc. is launching a new lineup of electric bikes, scooters and mopeds online and in stores in a handful of markets outside of Minnesota.
Products from companies including Bird, Segway-Ninebot, SUPER73, SWFT and Unagi are already available on Best Buy's website. Beginning in October, they'll be in stores in Austin, Texas; Los Angeles; Miami; New York; Orlando, Florida; Puerto Rico; San Francisco; Seattle; and Tampa, Florida.
The Richfield-based company's Geek Squad will also offer at-home assembly and tuning of bikes for about $100.
“There’s been incredible innovation in the e-transportation space, and we know more customers are looking for ways to efficiently and sustainably commute,” Best Buy Senior Vice President Frank Bedo said in a press release.
This is not the first time Best Buy (NYSE: BBY) has made a run at the electric transportation space. It initially started selling e-bikes in 2009 and even invested in Brammo, a maker of electric motorcycles. But it scaled back sales of those products in 2011 due to low interest from consumers.
The market has changed a lot since then. Makers of electric bicycles have proliferated as battery technology has advanced, and sales surged during the Covid-19 pandemic. (In June 2020, with offices shut down across the country, sales of e-bikes rose 190% over the year-ago period, NPD reported.)
