When you click on links to various merchants on this site and make a purchase, this can result in this site earning a commission. Affiliate programs and affiliations include, but are not limited to, the eBay Partner Network.

George Garner Valley Cyclery Schwinn 17730 Sherman Way Shop

#eBayPartner    Most Recent BUY IT NOW Items Listed on eBay
eBay Auction Picture
eBay Auction Picture
eBay Auction Picture
eBay Auction Picture
eBay Auction Picture
eBay Auction Picture
eBay Auction Picture
eBay Auction Picture
eBay Auction Picture
eBay Auction Picture
eBay Auction Picture
eBay Auction Picture
eBay Auction Picture
eBay Auction Picture
eBay Auction Picture
eBay Auction Picture
eBay Auction Picture
eBay Auction Picture

sarmisluters

Finally riding a big boys bike
I love using Street View in Apple Maps on old bike shop locations.
This one is of the famed George Garner Valley Cyclery Schwinn shop that is forever immortalized in this stylish midcentury design photo. The second picture is of the same location today.

If you look closely you can see the same brick pillar on the left and the vertical grooves of the same sign above the shop.

That Schwinn shop image is my favorite, it would be neat for someone with deep pockets to buy and make old Schwinn shop locations into bike shops again with their old Schwinns on display as hybrid bike shops/museums.


IMG_3679.jpeg


IMG_3680.jpeg
 
Last edited:
Look I agree with your excitement. George Garner (and his first wife Shirley) were the "originators" of what became Schwinn's Total Concept store design program. The store fixtures and interiors were custom built to each stores size by Ralston Cabinets in Southern California and shipped all over the country for installation, and all had the "trademark" gold carpeting. You will still see the black and white fixtures in stores today.

But I'm not certain the two photos you have above are the same location. George had two stores in the San Fernando Valley, which is why it was called Valley Cyclery. After he and Shirley split up, he moved to Chicago bedroom village of Northbrook, Illinois and opened more Schwinn stores under the same Valley Cyclery DBA business name. Altogether he had seven or eight stores at one point in time in two states. Dealers never appreciated that all of his combined store Schwinn sales counted together for his Number One Schwinn Dealer in the nation each year.

All of George's stores looked alike, or at least "very similar", it was almost like "a franchised look" that he developed. The store picture you see most often is the original California Reseda Store. I can still see Shirley sitting in her glass office, and Ken her manager working his butt off.

It would be a great resource for the CABE to have a resource library of all of the Schwinn Reporters. A lot of the Total Concept photos were shot at Georges stores to show other Schwinn Dealers what they could do in their stores. The late 1950's, to early 1960's Reporters reported George's progress. Schwinn, with George's help used his stores to try out new ideas and they freely shared the results with all Schwinn dealers. George Garner, and Ray Burch were "worked very close together". The last time I saw the two of them together they signed my Schwinn Fifty Yearbook.

John

Edited, it was the Van Nuys store that was his large store. It was there "before" the Reseda store, and after the Reseda store had closed.

The San Fernando valley was a huge bicycle market, larger than some states during the 50's, 60.s and 70's. Bert Straub had a couple of Canoga Park Schwinn stores. Gus Dandos was not a Schwinn Dealer, but he sold a ton of bikes in the Valley "right between the George Garner and Bert Straub stores". Russ Okawa was a store manager for Bert Straub at his second store. Schwinn hired Russ and he was made the manager of the Schwinn Professional BMX Team, known as Team Schwinn. It all started in the Valley.

John
 
Last edited:
Outstanding!
But, it’s kind of sad looking now.
I do believe that is the same location as the picture above.
I even think that the sign posts on the far left are the original pillars that once held the Schwinn Bicycles sign.
Although they look like they may have been cut down a bit to hold the Leon’s Auto Body sign now.
Great sleuthing on that, Sarmis!
 
Look I agree with your excitement. George Garner (and his first wife Shirley) were the "originators" of what became Schwinn's Total Concept store design program. The store fixtures and interiors were custom built to each stores size by Ralston Cabinets in Southern California and shipped all over the country for installation, and all had the "trademark" gold carpeting. You will still see the black and white fixtures in stores today.

But I'm not certain the two photos you have above are the same location. George had two stores in the San Fernando Valley, which is why it was called Valley Cyclery. After he and Shirley split up, he moved to Chicago bedroom village of Northbrook, Illinois and opened more Schwinn stores under the same Valley Cyclery DBA business name. Altogether he had seven or eight stores at one point in time in two states. Dealers never appreciated that all of his combined store Schwinn sales counted together for his Number One Schwinn Dealer in the nation each year.

All of George's stores looked alike, or at least "very similar", it was almost like "a franchised look" that he developed. The store picture you see most often is the original California Reseda Store. I can still see Shirley sitting in her glass office, and Ken her manager working his butt off.

It would be a great resource for the CABE to have a resource library of all of the Schwinn Reporters. A lot of the Total Concept photos were shop at Georges stores to show other Schwinn Dealers what they could do in their stores. The late 1950's, to early 1960's Reporters reported George's progress. Schwinn, with George's help used his stores to try out new ideas and they freely shared the results with all Schwinn dealers. George Garner, and Ray Burch were "worked very close together". The last time I saw the two of them together they signed my Schwinn Fifty Year Book.

John

John
These are the three George Garner addresses in the Valley.

Here are street views of the other two locations. One shows a huge building and the othe shows a small building.

Im positive my pic is a match but that sign could have been lowered or the camera angle made it look that tall.


IMG_3695.png


IMG_3691.png


IMG_3692.png


IMG_3693.png


IMG_3697.jpeg
 
LOL, pretty cool information on the tube. You have forced me to go back and look at the "all knowing Source", the one that never changes, never improves. The resource that my kids say will be in my casket, so I know how to navigate around in my next life. The Original GPS, THE THOMAS GUIDE, dated 1998.

The Valley Cyclery located at 17730 Sherman Way (City of Reseda) was not the large store you see in all of the old Schwinn Reporters. Their large store was located on Van Nuys Blvd, "just off of Sherman Way (City of Van Nuys/Panorama City border), approximately 14400 west. So, your address of 8235 Van Nuys Blvd is the correct address for the large store that was widely photographed and talked about. My guess is that the third address is from past information on one of his prior store locations. They moved several times before they built their first large store. In the past 50-60 years a lot of changes have changed the San Fernando Valley. I'm surprised anything is still standing after the earthquake.
John
 
Hi,
Im following up on this thread of the George Garner Cyclery. I recently acquired a 1968 Schwinn Dealer Sales Manual that is quite interesting. Here is one photo that has likely never before been seen online. If you look and notice the young palm tree in the photos and then the later picture with the mature palm tree trunk. You might notice it could be ? the same location.

Marty, Perhaps you can identify the young palm tree ?

IMG_3947.jpeg


IMG_3948.jpeg


IMG_3680.jpeg


Photo758409439667_inner_77-78-665-142-67-924-677-869.jpeg


Photo758407466777_inner_56-460-460-460-56-789-460-789.jpeg


Photo758407466777_inner_63-103-455-93-63-414-457-414.jpeg
 
Last edited:
Hi,
Im following up on this thread of the George Garner Cyclery. I recently acquired a 1968 Schwinn Dealer Sales Manual that is quite interesting. Here is one photo that has likely never before been seen online. If you look and notice the young palm tree in the photos and then the later picture with the mature palm tree trunk. You might notice it could be ? the same location.

Marty, Perhaps you can identify the young palm tree ?

View attachment 2170720

View attachment 2170721

View attachment 2170722

View attachment 2170723

View attachment 2170724

View attachment 2170725

This is a picture of the Garner's Reseda, CA store. Per page C-14 in the Schwinn manual.
The Van Nuys store was the main Valley Cyclery store in the San Fernando Valley.

What is really cool in looking at these old photos is how sixty years in time has changed the way business owners and property owners have different views today on "how to pay the bills". George and Shirley Garner understood putting forward the best looking store and location.
Not only are they the originators of Schwinn's Total Concept store look, but they also promoted the Schwinn dealer to leave their showroom lights on until midnight every night to promote their store to drive by "future customers" in the evenings. Just look at the tall outdoor neon Schwinn signage visible from down the street at night.

Sixty years later, the tall neon Schwinn sign has been lowered, and you can clearly see the property owner has leased the property over his store to an Outdoor Sign Company for a large Billboard sign. Depending on the location and traffic counts property owners get paid $5K, or more in lease payments to permit these signs to be erected on their property. Making $60K or more each year for doing no work is hard to pass up today, but I can assure you George Garner would have never considered a large Billboard sign over one of his beautiful store locations as an option.

The San Fernando Valley was like Maybury, or Leave it to Beaver in the 1950's and 60's. It's no longer the same. At some point it was inevitable that these properties would change.

John
 
Back
Top