A cycling shop has said it has run out of bikes following a surge in demand during the pandemic.

Doctor Wheelgood in North Walsham saw a massive upsurge in sales between April and May, but eventually saw its stockists run out of just about every bicycle it had.

The shop has been riding the wave of a cycling boom, with Transport secretary Grant Shapps saying in June that there had been a 100% increase in weekday cycling since lockdown and a 200% weekend increase.

Owner Tom Hill said repairs are keeping the shop going, however he has now began to struggle to order components and accessories.

He said: “We had two really ultra busy months between April and May at the height of summer but now everything is depleted.

“We were ordering bikes like crazy, our shop was full of boxes and I was relentlessly building one after another, I’ve never seen anything like it.

“But then at a certain stage customers were coming in and saying ‘I want that one’ and I’d have a look if I could find it. I’d look on my business to business website, and I kept seeing ‘out of stock’.

“First certain models began to go out of stock and then eventually within a very short time all of them were out of stock.

“When I contacted the suppliers they would tell me there was ‘nothing on the horizon’, so it was really freaky and it was also quite frustrating because we still kept getting the numbers of customers coming in.

“So from then until now we’ve had to say ‘none available, I am afraid’.”

Mr Hill is hoping bikes will start coming in again in October, but he says some cycles still won’t be available until the start of next year.

He added: “We’re still nice and busy and firing on all cylinders, and we feel very lucky, but there is also an adder in the grass which is the supply of components is also drying up so we’re now struggling with helmets, inner tubes and wheels, because suppliers are selling them at a rate that they can’t keep up with.”