Brian Riley got into the bike business by accident. Two decades ago his grandfather was cut off by a car, grabbed the front brake and flipped over the handlebars. Riley and some college classmates later developed a different brake they call SureStop, which brakes front and rear together with a single lever to prevent that kind of accident.
When Riley began pitching SureStop to bike makers, he found the industry was mostly overseas. For decades nearly all bicycles sold in the U.S. have been imported, with classic American names like Huffy and Schwinn largely manufactured in China. Riley decided to reverse that trend and opened the Guardian Bike Company in Seymour, Indiana. Now he has asked the Trump administration to extend its 50% steel and aluminum tariffs to metal used in bikes and parts built overseas — aiming to level the playing field for U.S. manufacturers. That request has become a test of using import taxes to revive domestic production, and has drawn strong opposition from retailers and importers.
Riley chose Seymour, a town of about 22,000 between Indianapolis and Louisville, for its central location, good road and rail links and a local workforce experienced in manufacturing. The town’s industrial base includes nearby mills that can supply steel for frames. Guardian started by assembling imported components but last year moved to making “Made in the USA” bikes from the ground up, filling several buildings in an industrial park.
To compete with low-cost Chinese factories, Guardian uses automation: robots, high-powered fiber lasers and welding machines do much of the frame work. Riley points to a $1.2 million laser and says small teams are highly productive; four workers can produce four- or five-hundred frames a day because robots handle the hard welding work. Wages at Guardian start around $22 an hour plus benefits, and the company keeps its supply chain short — the steel tubing comes from a mill in Columbus, Indiana, about 20 miles away — which allows faster adjustment to demand shifts, like a sudden spike in pink bikes after a Barbie movie.
Guardian focuses mainly on children’s bikes, sold direct to consumers through its website so it can highlight safety features like SureStop and avoid retailer markups. Prices range from about $150 to $400, two to three times what many imported bikes sell for at big-box stores; a nearby Walmart was selling imported kids’ bikes for roughly $88. Riley says tariffs that raise the cost of imports would give U.S. producers a “tailwind” and help Guardian grow faster and possibly encourage other American bike makers.
Imported bikes already face varying tariffs by country, but Riley asked the administration to add a blanket levy equivalent to the steel and aluminum tariffs. The administration may be more receptive now that the Supreme Court has struck down many of its other import taxes, creating pressure to find new trade remedies.
Retailers and importers have pushed back. More than 2,500 bicycle retailers and importers wrote to the Commerce Department opposing Riley’s petition, arguing higher tariffs would raise prices and put bikes out of reach for some families. Matt Moore, policy counsel for the trade group People for Bikes, says the kids’ bike market is “very price sensitive,” and higher costs could discourage purchases. With families having fewer children, the industry already faces pressure; if kids don’t learn to ride when young, the sector risks losing future customers.
The tariffs Riley seeks are framed as national-security measures, and opponents scoff that children’s bicycles merit that protection. Riley counters that it’s not the bikes but the manufacturing know-how that matters: keeping skilled production onshore preserves the ability to “spin up” an industrial base if needed for genuinely critical national-security items.
Guardian’s factory occupies buildings that once housed other industries — the final assembly line sits in an old ironing-board plant. Dozens of workers mount tires, brakes and handlebars and perform final quality checks. The company employs about 250 people and expects to sell roughly half a million bikes this year. Positive reviews on sites like Wirecutter help sales, though not everyone is sold on SureStop.
Riley says Guardian doesn’t depend on new tariffs to survive, but believes they would accelerate growth and spur others to manufacture in the U.S. The company already creates local spillovers: a Seymour plastics firm now makes Guardian’s training wheels. Whether Guardian needs tariff “training wheels,” or can keep pedaling without import protection, is the central question as it seeks to expand domestic bike manufacturing.