Today we’d like to introduce you to Angela Reiner.
Angela, let’s start with your story. We’d love to hear how you got started and how the journey has been so far.
I’ve been riding for about ten years but it really started rising more when I attending women’s riding events. Babes Ride our in Joshua Tree was my first on my Harley 48 sportster then I quickly evolved to my 2019 Street Bob as the trips became longer.
My first solo ride was to Oregon to the Dream Roll where I met many amazing women with the same passion as me.
The idea for the shop sprouted when I was looking for comfortable, stylish riding pants. I waited for Atwyld to attend Born Free so I could try the pants on because I just didn’t want the hassle of ordering online and not fitting into them properly. I started thinking that other women probably had the same problem and by the end of the year, we were looking for shops in the downtown area.
We have expanded our brands and products to include outdoor wear to help supply the local towns and mountain communities. We also have extended our ship to other small businesses and currently have a silversmith that makes custom Dirtbag pieces for our shop.
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
Oh, it definitely has been rough! It started out nice and we were doing really well then COVID hit and we not only shut down but our grand opening event/bike show was canceled. Since we were only open for three months when we had to shut down, we didn’t have a big online presence so we really suffered during those months.
Luckily my first career as a respiratory therapist was in demand due to COVID so I was able to work to support us through those months.
The other unfortunate happening was the local coffee shop shut down within a month of us reopening. We didn’t really have to do a lot of advertising because of all the foot traffic from the coffee shop but now that is gone too.
So let’s switch gears a bit and go into the Dirtbag story. Tell us more about the business.
We specialize in custom leather bags and accessories. We hand make and assemble all of our leather products that is the Dirtbag name. Everything is created by us so it unique to our shop.
We carry the full selection of Tobacco Motowear for both men and women as well as a full selection of Atwyld for women. We recently added Bike Shed and we are the first retail store to carry their merchandise in the U.S.
We also feature other small brands and businesses in our store such as Modern Luxxe all-natural.
Has luck played a meaningful role in your life and business?
Well, I am very lucky to have Aaron, my other half. He is a graphic designer and has opened and managed several businesses so he knows how to negotiate and obtain accounts for the shop. He is also a great designer so he builds all of our displays and designed the layout for the shop. Any logos or designs we need for custom pieces are no problem for him.
It has just worked out really well that as we started to grow out of our home business, we easily transitioned into retail sales.
Contact Info:
- Address: 206 E. State Street, Redlands, CA 92373
- Website: Dirtbagshop.com
- Phone: (909)289-7324
- Email: [email protected]
- Instagram: @Dirtbagshop
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