The city’s first electric bike rental company Electra Bike has been getting a lot of interest according to one of the co-owners.

Gary Holland says the company he founded with his girlfriend Dana Marcano will fill a need in the city, noting he’s got six iGo bikes to rent, with four more on order.

Holland says Marcano and he got the idea after the pair bought a pair of bikes for themselves last year, noting it was a no-brainer to start renting bikes with the number of trails in the city.

“I mean you could also rent them for the day and take them up to Sun Peaks or to the Shuswap,” he noted. “It’s a fun thing to do. We always enjoyed bike riding when we were kids.”

Holland says last weekend they took the bikes out to Scotch Creek and rented it to both locals and tourists, and he says there was a lot of interest.

A 2.5 hour rental will set you back $50, with additional hours costing another $10 each. The batteries take four hours to charge, and it can last on average about 65 km.

Holland says that e-bikes are a great way to exercise, adding the batteries will give riders a boost when they’re getting tired.

“We’re going to go up to the hotels and put flyers there, and when people ask what is there to do today, hopefully they’ll realize that there are bikes here and they can go tour the town,” Holland added, saying the bikes can make it to a top speed of about 32 km/hr.

“We’ll drop them off and pick them up if we have to until we get the store up and running. We’re just kind of winging it at first and learning as we go.”

That store will likely be in downtown Kamloops if all goes well with the plan is to sell and rent the bikes from there, so people have easy access to Rivers Trail.

Holland says he’s ordered another 20 bikes which he hopes to sell, or rent, if there isn’t a demand for people to own the bikes.