To Sarah

I just found an email from 8 days ago (it got caught in my spam filter) from Sarah, who recently had her bike stolen and is asking what she can do to try and find it. Right after I finished typing up a reply I discovered that she hadn't left a return email address so I'll just post my reply here. Maybe someone else can benefit from it too.

Hi Sarah,

I'm sorry for my late reply - your email got caught in my spam filter.

Do you have your bike's serial number? You'll need it to identify your bike in case it would get found (even if your bike is found, you won't get it back unless you can identify it). If you bought your bike new, you should be able to get it from the store where you bought it (that's how I retrieved mine).

Check craig's list daily to see if anyone's trying to sell your bike there. Also, you might want to do a search here: http://www.jaxed.com/cgi-bin/mash.cgi?cat=cpbike You can subscribe to the RSS feed from jaxed.com for your particular search criteria and you'll only get alerts when posts that fit those criteria are added to the various sites that jaxed.com subscribes to. Also, check ebay daily (you can sign up for email notification of your search criteria) and keep an eye on craig's list for surrounding areas (like New Jersey, Delaware, Washington DC). Also, post about your bike being stolen on Craig's list (that's how I got my bike back).

Visit local pawn shops. Make a flyer, print it, and hand it out to every shop you visit. Also, visit local bike shops with your flyer. Someone might come in with your bike to have it repaired.

You might want to check out this thread on Phillyblog: http://www.phillyblog.com/philly/center-city/63318-bike-stolen-desperate-get-back-bianchi-brava-2006-a.html
I think several bike shops are mentioned there. You can also just google for bike shop philadelphia and you should get a map as the first result with a list of bike shops.

Don't give up looking for your bike if you still haven't found it. The people who took mine hold on to it for nearly a month before they sold it to the pawn shop that I retrieved it from.

I really hope you get your bike back. Good luck!