Three months after stepping down because the CEO of three corporations, together with used bike vendor The Professional’s Closet and boot retailer Freebird, Jonathan Czaja now owns them.
Czaja purchased the businesses — the third of which is Jane, a ladies’s trend e-commerce website — final week from Yasser Elshair of Elshair Cos., an Arizona non-public fairness agency. Phrases of the deal weren’t disclosed.
“Bikes and boots are very completely different, however the similarities are sturdy model followings, massive prospects and dependable audiences,” Czaja informed BusinessDen.
Elshair had rolled up the businesses over the previous two years.
He purchased and rebooted TPC within the fall of 2024, shortly after the enterprise introduced it was closing after elevating almost $100 million from traders. He acquired Jane out of receivership in 2024. And he paid $500,000 in August for Denver-based Freebird, which had shed dozens of shops in receivership.
Czaja had led TPC earlier than its closure. After Elshair’s buys, he tasked Czaja with main all three corporations.
In September, nevertheless, Czaja wrote in a LinkedIn publish that he had stepped down as a result of he and Elshair “disagreed on easy methods to transfer ahead.” Czaja declined to offer extra element on that in an interview, or how he ended up shopping for the businesses a short while later by his funding agency Freewheel Capital.
“They simply had monetary difficulties that had nothing to do with the model,” he mentioned of the businesses. “So we’re making the most of all these good issues they beforehand had.”
TPC has achieved $12 million in gross sales thus far this 12 months, in keeping with Chief Income Officer Justin England, who expects that determine to double in 2026. He’s been with the corporate 16 years, and Chief Working Officer JP Gage has been there for 13.
“We’ve been right here from the start and grew it slowly over time, so we simply had this crash course in doing all of that once more final 12 months,” Gage mentioned.
The pair mentioned they’re aiming for sustainable development. Whereas TPC as soon as peaked at 2,500 bikes concurrently on the market, Gage mentioned the corporate has 300 obtainable proper now and figures its peak is 800. The corporate has 26,000 sq. ft in Thornton, down from the 135,000 it as soon as had in Louisville.
Whereas most bikes are bought on-line, TPC’s area does embody a retail storefront. The corporate hopes to develop its hours by subsequent spring past the present 9 a.m. to five p.m. weekdays.
“We’re attempting to determine easy methods to take the associated fee construction of the zero-interest-rate COVID days, which was extravagant, and proceed bringing these down,” Czaja mentioned.
With a smaller funds and concentrate on profitability, there’s much less capital to spend on advertising. However they determine they’re nonetheless benefiting from the campaigns of earlier years. Czaja mentioned TPC is breaking even for the primary time within the firm’s historical past.
“In some methods we’ve benefited from the tailwinds of all the cash that was spent to boost consciousness,” England mentioned. “The assumption that JP, Jon and I all have is in what TPC means to the biking base and trade, and that was what finally allowed us to convey enterprise again.”
Freebird, in the meantime, is newer to the turnaround. However Czaja thinks the early returns for the corporate are encouraging.
The corporate has opened a 3rd retailer at Park Meadows mall in Lone Tree. It joins shops in Nashville, Tennessee, and Charleston, South Carolina, which survived the model’s mass closures.
Freebird additionally introduced three new kinds of shoes final week, Czaja mentioned, with the assistance of Freebird’s founding designer, who’s again in her function.
Czaja mentioned Freebird is fulfilling 7,000 orders every week and expects over $20 million in gross sales subsequent 12 months. He hopes so as to add two extra retail shops in 2026 and to steadily develop past.
“We hope to convey it again to its former glory, and the plan is to slowly construct again to that scale,” Czaja mentioned. “I’d say we’re steady now.”
With Jane, the story is analogous. The net market was based in 2011 in Salt Lake Metropolis, Utah, earlier than elevating $40 million and foundering thereafter. Czaja mentioned most of its 10 workers work remotely.
Czaja, a former worker of Walmart and eBay, mentioned he plans to purchase extra e-commerce companies and centralize finance, human sources, advertising and expertise underneath one umbrella.
Nonetheless, he mentioned he desires to have trade experience inside every enterprise, very similar to he’s discovered with Gage and England at TPC. And, the Denver resident hopes to maintain an area tie.
“Ideally,” he mentioned, “we purchase manufacturers which have a Denver presence.”
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