From an industrial park in Westlake Village on a recent Saturday afternoon, Linda Coburn led a group of biking enthusiasts on a ride around the Conejo Valley city. While that may not be all that unusual, the type of bicycle the group rode was. They were electric bikes, fitted with a motor powered by a lithium ion battery and controlled by a throttle on the right handlebar. Coburn and husband John Tajiri own Pedego 101, an independent dealer of electric bikes made by Pedego Electric Bikes, in Fountain Valley. They recently relocated their sales and rental shop to the Westlake Village Industrial Park from a retail center south of the 101 Freeway. Coburn said her mission was not just to get people to buy an electric bike but to get the public to understand these are a legitimate form of alternative transportation. Many of her customers at Pedego use the e-bike to commute to work. While the distance may not be far, it still takes a car off the road during rush hour. “It gets them where they want to go and by the time they get there, they are happy and refreshed and had a nice time,” she added. The price of a Pedego bike ranges from $2,200 to $4,000, while electric bike prices in general can go from less than $1,000 to as high as $10,000, Coburn said, adding that mountain bikes with an electric motor can be in the $5,000 range. Pedego 101 brought in about $350,000 in revenue last year. Frank Baird, a therapist for Kaiser Permanente, is among those who uses his electric bike to get to work. Patti Dengler, his wife, a therapist in private practice, uses hers to run errands and for short trips. “I never got home in my car and felt like I’d like to spend another half hour in my car,” Baird said. “But I ride to work or ride back and I will be like, ‘I am not done yet.’ So, I will just ride around and explore.” Baird, Dengler and Coburn represent the leading edge of a new technology that is still gaining traction in the United States. Electric bike manufacturers include such names as Trek Bikes, in Waterloo, Wis., Giant Bicycles USA, a Taiwan company with offices in Newbury Park, and Rad Power Bikes, in Seattle. NPD Group, the Port Washington, N.Y. market research firm, said that through July of last year, U.S. sales of electric bikes had reached about $65 million. E-bikes represented 7 percent of all bike sales last year, up from 1 percent in sales in 2016, NPD Group reported. But, according to, Morgan Lommele, the e-bike campaign manager for People for Bikes, a biking advocacy group in Boulder, Colo., there are three main barriers to get over when it comes to getting people to buy an electric bike – confusing state laws, the price point, and infrastructure. There are 20 states that regulate electric bikes as they do mopeds or motorized vehicles, and they can have confusing requirements on licensing and registration, Lommele said. In 2015, California became the first state to pass a three-class e-bike law that treats them the same as human-powered bicycles. People for Bikes advocated on behalf of the bill. The price point barrier is one that is solving itself as the average price is coming down. Infrastructure, such as bike lanes and paths, is also being addressed because it has been shown that people will not ride bikes in area where they do not have a safe place to do it, Lommele said. “We are working on better infrastructure and connected networks of bike riding,” she added. It was Coburn’s husband John who got the couple started on e-bikes. He had been commuting on a motorcycle and wanted to use a greener vehicle. This was in 2013, and electric cars were not prevalent and there were no electric motorcycles. So Tajiri went the electric bike option and bought a kit to convert a bicycle. Coburn, as an avid road bicyclist, was scornful at first, thinking it was the lazy way to ride a bike. After 10 seconds on the bike, she was convinced. She used it for a year to commute to her job as office manager for a martial arts supply business. “I could never do that on a regular bike because it was too much work, and I’d get sweaty and hot and I couldn’t wear my dress clothes,” Coburn said. The couple opened their Pedego store in November 2014. They fell for the brand’s bicycles while on a vacation. “They are so easy for people to get on and ride,” Tajiri said. “You don’t have to figure out how to build one.” Having a bigger space – 1,900 square feet versus the 800 they had been in, will allow Coburn and Tajiri to offer more models. Her plan also is to offer classes and seminars on taking care of an e-bike and how to ride out in traffic. She finds that customers are older and have not ridden a bike in a while and so are concerned about riding among vehicles, Coburn said. “We are going to do some classes on how to safely ride your bike in traffic,” she added.