My First Tattoo – Perewitz Style

by Craig Glab, Central Regional Manager



Dave Perewitz and I went to Acme Tattoo the Saturday of Donnie Smith’s show in St. Paul, MN last month. Nolan, the owner of Acme Tattoo, measured my arm with wax paper. When that was complete he handed it over to Dave, the King of Flames.

Dave began to draw out the flames on the paper that would eventually make it to my arm.

But it didn’t happen that Saturday because Nolan was pre-booked with all the Hamsters that were in town. Nolan is known all over the United States for being the best. A lot of the Hamsters will only have Nolan tattoo them. Dave got a new tattoo as well as Susan, Kory and Jody.

I had to come back Tuesday, April Fool’s Day. There was non-stop joking in the building. It took three nights to complete. On Tuesday night I sat for 2 hours, Wednesday night I sat for 1 ½ hours and Thursday night Nolan finished it in 1 ½ hours.

Don Shipman sat with me for a couple of nights. Talk about team support.

Tim Remus was there Tuesday and Wednesday night, too. He was shooting for a new tattoo book that he’s doing. I think mine will make the book!

When I left Nolan’s his wife gave me a bunch of temporary tattoos for my boys. We had a great time with them this past weekend. They had tattoos all up their arms, too.

I love my first tattoo. Right now it is scabby so it doesn’t look as bright and vivid as it did those nights, but it will be ready to add to it when I go back up that way in June.

Photos by Craig Glab, Don Shipman and Tim Remus

Road Warrior Powerhouse

What do you get when you combine 60+ years of action sports industry experience with a great product line? A dynamic Kryptonite road team! We are completely tickled to announce our brand new sales team to the world. Ok, so I'm excited, and I think I can speak for everyone else here, too.

One is very familiar to all of our dealers and distributors and to you blog readers – Nadine Fallon-Nassif. She describes herself as a “Jill of all trades”, but I like to think of her as just born into the bicycle industry. She couldn’t help but be a lover of bicycles since, I believe, her dad at one time had 20+ in their house. I’ve got a bad memory – could have even been more; the guess is probably on the low side.

Not only does she love bicycles, she’s had extensive experience in retail, too. She’s grown to love motorcycles and works with us at a lot of the Perewitz Bike Nights and other distributor events.

I don’t remember being at Kryptonite where I didn’t know Nadine either as someone working at one of our dealers or working side by side with her. She’s got great passion for this industry.

We don't have a photo of Nadine right now as she was on the road when the photos were taken - we'll capture her soon and post one up!

Nadine is now being joined by 2 new ‘top guns’ of their respective industries. Craig Glab is our new Central Regional Manager. What a firecracker! He’s spent just about 20 years in the powersports industry and is in the process of building his own custom motorcycle. Let’s keep our fingers crossed that it is ready for Sturgis. He can’t wait to start meeting all our dealers, including the bicycle dealers. When he walked in to our home office for the first time last week he was a little timid about the bicycle side, but by the time he left, he was on his way to pick out a bicycle and wanted to talk to me about racing an allycat. Oh boy….

Craig Glab fits right in here at Kryptonite

Don Shipman is our new Western Regional Manager. He is so dialed into the bicycle scene around northern California it’s just wild. He’s been in the industry for about 25 years, too, and even founded Blazing Saddles, a bicycle rental company in northern Cal. He’s pretty excited to start diving into the powersports piece of our business, too. I think he’ll dazzle them with his shear enthusiasm for all things two-wheeled.

Don Shipman at Kryptonite last week

Although you’ll be hearing from all our reps here soon, I think Don may check in more than most. I can’t wait to hear what he has to say. And, San Francisco, you’ll be seeing him at some of the events with bike valet service – he can’t wait to start showing his passion for all things Kryptonite.

When you see this great team on the road, please feel free to stop them, ask questions, welcome them to the Kryptonite Krew.

*photos by Neil McDaid

I Spy....

At the end of last week we had a full team meeting where most of the guys who work out of the office were in. It was like old home week - and lots of fun.

Since you hear about the gang here often, I thought I'd snap a few pictures and post them. I'll preface this with saying that none were too happy about my being a shutterbug, but hey...it's all in good fun.

Don Shipman and Craig Glab came in and went right to work in the cube across from me.

Gustavo and Roger saw each other for the first time in 5 years! How is that possible? Roger is our Director of Sales for our residential & commercial sales based here in New England. Gustavo was head of action sport sales in Europe until the end of the year. He's now in the States again, working to develop some different areas for us. We have a new, fantastic guy, Paul, in Europe. You'll be meeting him here soon....

I tried to sneak up on Neil McDaid and Craig, thinking they were working hard. Turns out Neil was practicing for the Kryptonite beauty pageant and Craig was giving him pointers. Hmmm...maybe one pointer would have been to decide which NASCAR driver he's going to be a fan of...he's a little confused (Stewart or Montoya?). But, as an aside, congrats to Juan Pablo Montoya for his win in the Rolex 24 Hour this weekend!

Sandy, Donna, Joe, Eric and the jokesters gather for a meeting. Let me just tell you, if the jokesters on the right are ever in a meeting you are conducting...beware...heckling will ensue. But, it's all in good fun.

It was good to have the gang in the office. It was kind of festive and fun. Come back again soon, gang.

Craig's Theories 101

by Craig Glab, Central Regional Manager

Donna seems to have posted a lot about the NASCAR race, but not the shenanigans that went on behind the scenes.

After leaving the track on Friday, and visiting the Bass Pro Shop in Concord, we picked up Nicole and headed out to Dick’s to get a cooler for the next day and apparently, Donna wanted some candy and ended up with Hot Balls.

Then we went to dinner where I had to explain my broccoli theory to Roby, Nicole and Donna. My theory is that every restaurant uses broccoli as the filler vegetable. It’s the cheapest vegetable to buy so they offer it with everything. Have you noticed that restaurants offer it with steak, fish, chicken…whatever. They will throw it on every plate, unless you ask for something different. Why is that? Because the restaurant makes the most money from broccoli. I love broccoli, but I refuse to get it at a restaurant. I always ask for a different vegetable or side.

We even explained this to our waiter who then arrived at the table with a birthday treat for Roby because I told them it was his birthday at the beginning of the evening. The treat? It was a little dessert dish with a candle in a middle of 2 pieces of broccoli. Roby didn’t know exactly what to make if it all since it really wasn’t his birthday, it was a prank.

Roby, Nicole and me at the tent

The next day at the races, I decided to mix the Hot Balls with my beer. Why? Because the Hot Balls are hot and the beer was nice and cold. Donna didn’t seem to get that logic.

Got my first piece of NASCAR apparel, which was a Dale Jr. hat. Makes me enjoy my Mountain Dew that I drink every day! It made me part of Dale Junior’s crew/posse/fan base. Since I’ve spent so much money on Mountain Dew over the years I must have one little, tiny piece of the quarter panel of his car. Do you know that in convenience stores, Mountain Dew is the number 1 pop seller? At least it is at the corner store near my house.

And there you have it. We all had a great time.

Craig's Bobber Project - Part 2

by Craig Glab, Central Regional Manager


I’ve been working on my house so much throughout the cold winter that I haven’t been working on the motorcycle as much as I’d like. I’ve been painting and carpeting the inside of my house this winter.

But here are some updated photos of the Bobber Project. As you can see, I switched the motor and transmission to all ready polished Altima 113” motor and polished 6-speed transmission instead of an 80 cu inch Satin Harley Davidson motor. So now I have more performance in that little bike. I’ll peel the tires off of it. I just sold the other motor.

I just put the rims and tires on this last week. They are from Roland Sands and Metzler white wall tires. I mounted them last Friday after work.

I’m switching out the gas tank because it looks too tiny on that bike. I’m going to get a Sportster tank when I get back from my next 2-week trip. Drill some holes, take it apart and send it off to be painted this time…really.

My goal is to have it done by May.

Internal Team Kryptonite

It was pointed out to me recently that the folks posting here haven't been putting their job titles on their posts. You all know who Bob Roll is and Dave Perewitz but, it was pointed out to me that we said in the beginning that you'd get to know the internal team Kryptonite, too, through this blog. However, if readers don't know these people already they would not necessarily know who someone is or even if they worked for Kryptonite or were just a guest.

So...with that being said, we'll start adding people's job titles to the posts and, I'll reintroduce those that you've met already....

Dwight Gibson - he's our GM...expect to see lots of posts on our new Justice League locks in the coming weeks from Dwight.

Karen Rizzo - she's our director of marketing and a little shy, but don't worry, she'll get there.

Tim Clifford - he's our director of sales for action sports. He doesn't like fireworks in the middle of the night so much, if you remember....but he's a good writer. I want to see him here more often (hint, hint).

Roby Holland - our national sales manager for action sports. He started riding earlier this season and posting here, but we haven't heard from him in awhile. I know he's riding, though, since he's training for the Cycle for Life.

Dave Miller - he's our machinist and just loves the 4th of July! He's always in such a great mood that I call him "smiley".

Melissa McPherson - she's in customer service and lead the charge in protecting the turtle laying her eggs here earlier this spring.

Craig Glab - our newest poster here....Regional Manager, Midwest. You'll be hearing from Craig often as he's putting his bobber together.

And me...the chatty one...but you know me already.

I've got a few more people lined up for you to meet, too. We aren't a shy bunch, but sometimes new products, catalogs and trade shows get in the way doing some posts. But, you'll be meeting more of us soon....

Craig's Bobber Project - part 1

by Craig Glab

The beginning of a new project....

We all start out with goals in our heads - then you must take them and transform them into reality. I started by opening the Drag Specialties catalog and made a list of the products and parts that I wanted to use. Next step - I called up some of my close friends in the industry and ordered what I needed for this project.

Chopper Guys built my frame the way I wanted it. Next I called Lima H.D. of Lima, Ohio, to purchase my power plant. I will use a 80 cubic inch motor and a 5 speed transmission. I will also use American Wire Wheels for my 16 inch spoked wheels that will get painted.

I have alot of black anodized and chrome on this bike. I purchased a lot of the black anodized parts from Pro-One through Drag Specialties. I will be using a BDL drive system. HHI makes a braking system which is really killer on the rear of the bike. It is a sprocket and a brake disc all in one. The front caliper is also HHI and they are both anodized black.

Now comes the fun stuff - drilling holes in the right place to hide wires, welding brackets in the right place to put turn signals and the licence plate frame and so on.

Then it must all come apart for the painter to do his job. The painter will be Dave Perewitz. The motor and trani will get show polished. I will send that to our friend Donnie Smith and his crew. They will dismantle and polish them and put it back together. There are plenty of polished parts that go to the chrome platers!

Then it just needs to get all put back together and go to Daytona for Biketoberfest!

Devastation Can Happen Anywhere

by Craig Glab, Regional Manager (Central)



I was in Minneapolis on September 13, to visit Erik’s Bike Shop in Dinky Town. They have more than one store, but the one I visited is right there in the U of M campus area and they are a great Kryptonite dealer. I went to the store and conducted business and then drove across the bridge that is the closest bridge to the I-35 bridge collapse.

When I was driving, I decided as a former Minnesotan I wanted to capture the view to show other people what I saw. The destruction was phenomenal. I had been there just a couple of months before the bridge collapse. And, in the past, I’d driven across the I-35 bridge many times – anyone who has driven it can probably still remember all the pot holes and where they were, I know I do.

I guess it is different for all of us – we’ll all have our own thoughts on this tragedy. If you don’t live in the Twin Cities area think of it this way - if it was a tunnel in Boston or a bridge in San Fran or wherever you live, it would mean more to you, I guess, especially if you drove it every day and then all of a sudden it wasn’t there any more. You might even think it could be you. It could be any one of us. This is particularly devastating for anyone who lives in, or has lived in, Minneapolis.

It really brings to my mind the question, “how short is life”? In a split second this could happen to you…or me. It could be any one of us. This huge bridge was there once and now it is gone…amazing. I guess I still have a hard time with it.

Here are some interesting photos of what I saw last month.

V-Twin Show 2008

by Craig Glab, Central Regional Manager


I would have gone to the VTwin Show anyway, but it’s nice that it’s only 11 miles from my house. I went to the show all day on Saturday. It seemed to be as busy as in past years, but some of the booth spaces seemed to be smaller. There didn’t seem to be any booths upstairs, unless I missed something, so the whole show was on the main floor. There were some companies I couldn’t find, too. This all may have to do with the lull in the industry. We’ve seen a little hiccup in the industry, but it will come back soon.

Here’s Dave Perewitz and myself in the PPG booth. We stood and talked for a little bit, but he was busy.

He was there to do what he does – talk to dealers about motorcycles and paint.

I left Dave’s booth with a dealer friend of mine. We walked by the Ness booth and saw people taking photos. I told Rod that I wanted to get my photo with Arlen and Cory Ness so we stopped in their booth.

Then I spent time in Ed’s booth from Cycle Sounds which builds the immobilizers. It’s always good to check out what other people in the industry are doing. I know Ed from way back when I was at LeMans.

The motorcycle dealers are true believers in their industry to take the time out of their shops and money to get to the show. It shows me that they are still invested in the industry. The people who have been in the industry for years and years (like myself) were still there supporting the industry, too.

I’m sure I’ll feel the same way about the Dealer Expo when we get there in a couple of weeks. I’m looking forward to going to that show and seeing people that I haven’t seen in awhile because I haven’t been to that show in 4-5 years because I was more involved with the VTwin side of the business which isn’t as well represented at the powersports show.

See you all there!

Slack in the Line

by Roby Holland, National Sales Manager



Back in August we had our 3 new regional managers in the office for a visit. We took this opportunity, after a hard week of work, to go fishing in Duxbury Bay. August is not the most productive time for striped bass fishing but it was all about bringing the team together and doing something other than talking about sales of locks.

We left at grey light (that’s a fishing term) and set out for Gurnet Point to look for stripers working the surface or the possibility of blue fish. On our way out, we saw some birds working and took our chances at throwing some rubber shads - four inch and five inch. The fish weren’t taking it; it seems like they had other prey on their mind. So we continued our adventure on out to the point.

Upon arrival to the point we noticed that there was no activity on the surface; no birds working. We decided to drift along the outgoing tide and see what luck may strike. We only had 2 rods so we had 2 people on while the others dodged sloppy casts and rubber shads wizzing by our heads.

It was quite a spectacle to watch 3 people who had different levels of fishing experience try to catch striped bass. But the real payoff was not necessarily the fishing, but the bringing together of a new team.

While the fishing was not productive we did catch one fish and that credit goes to Craig Glab as much as it bothers me to say so, being the local, of course. After returning from fishing we washed down the boat and headed out to Arthur & Pat’s at Brandt Rock for a breakfast of omelets, bacon, pancakes, steak & eggs and home fries. The best part of the day!

All of you blog readers will be hearing from the new team soon with blog posts about their own adventures on the road.

Sturgis 08 Bike Week - Chapter 1

by Craig Glab, Central Region Manager

This chapter begins with my two day road trip (towing my bike) from my home around Cincinnati OH to Sturgis SD. I got there Saturday night just in time to hang with my Hamster friends at a block party..(priorities in order). Sunday, I got up and went for a ride through Spearfish Canyon to Deadwood. Great scenery and strange looking motorcycles too. Check out this one...

During the week I got ready for two Custom bike shows. One, that we sponsored, was the Dave Perewitz custom paint show, held at Thunder Road. The show was in a large tent where I set up a booth to show off our product line. I was placed right by the entrance where people would come in and go out of the tent. What a great spot! I talked to tons of people about our locks and proper lock up. A custom motorcycle was parked in the booth for "show and tell", to show them the best place to attach a lock. I gave away goodies like stickers and lanyards...funny how much these tough riders love the free stuff!

I helped Dave Perewitz hand out the winning trophies for a bunch of really cool custom paint jobs. You'll have to come back to the blog another day for more about that. I also worked out at the Top Fifty Rally Park bike show. We gave locks to the winners of the show. We also mixed things up with the crowd giving them crazy questions to answer for a chance to win a lock from us. This was alot of fun. While the crowd was a bit more thin this year than in the past because of gas price sticker shock, the spirit of the event was as strong as ever!

Newest "Shop" in Texas

by Craig Glab, central regional manager

Holy smokes! The newest bicycle repair shop is in Wal-Mart. I went into this brand new Texas store, which happens to be in my region, last week and ran into some folks that looked like they were scouting the new store, too. I think they might have been from a big, red competitor.

The whole store was only open for a week when I went in. The bikes ranged from kids bikes at $65 to $1,800 for adult’s bikes. It was a clean, bright store and bike shop. The bike shop was in the back corner and the signage was pretty good.

During my scouting, I snapped a couple of photos.

The life of the traveling salesman

by Craig Glab, Central Regional Manager


The four weeks. The whole month. It’s just about over and I’ve been gone all month.

Week 1 – Minneapolis/St. Paul. After the fine experience of my first tattoo, Don Shipman and myself traveled with the Tucker Rocky reps in Minneapolis/St. Paul. We went to both motorcycle and bicycle shops, sharing our experiences and fine tuning each other.

Week 2 – I drove down to Chicago, IL and Roby Holland, might I say, our National Sales Manager, came out and traveled with me that Monday and Tuesday. He was showing me the city of Chicago through his eyes. We also did a Lexco open house (one of our distributors) that Tuesday night while we were there.

Week 3 – I was in Portland, Oregon to meet with a potential new customer. We’ll be excited to bring them on board! Flew to Charlotte, NC to attend Ingersoll Rand’s internal school – IRU. I was sharpening up my skills to be a better salesman.

Now I’m home; it’s 80 degrees out but I’ve got emails to read and mail to go through. I can’t wait for next week. I’m on vacation! I’m turning my cell phone and everything else off. I’ll be working on my custom motorcycle.

See you in May – I’ll be back in Charlotte, NC for the May 17th race at Lowe’s Motor Speedway where we are the official motorcycle parking area of the speedway.

Daytona Bike Week

by Craig Glab, Central Regional Manager


I worked out at the Daytona Speedway at the Broward Motorsports' tent. Eric worked at Daytona Fun Machines and then we’d switch every other day so we each worked both places. I saw less attendees than ever before – maybe even by thousands. It wasn’t like it has been in years past.

The weather was great – it rained only twice – Tuesday it was yucky and Friday it was really terrible. It poured so much water was running through the tent. It was a monsoon all day – it was unreal.

The people that did attend Bike Week looked at product, but there weren’t a lot of spenders. Jennifer from Broward Motorsports mentioned that they weren’t selling anywhere near what they’d done in the past across lines, including helmets. Overall, attendance was really down.

Destination Daytona had a lot of vendors and looked like the place to be all week.

One night I took Eric to three casual spots that more of the locals frequent. I’ve been going to Bike Week since 1986 and have found these places throughout the years. We went to the Lighthouse, a place I call Sharky’s (I don’t really know it’s name, but there is a big shark out front) and the Ocean Deck. The Ocean Deck is a great place for live entertainment – I’m talking about bands now. We listened to bands all one night; that was fun.

We went to Main Street and walked around one night down there, too. The best thing I saw on Main Street, though, was the women serving the beer.

There you have it. That was our trip to Daytona.

Sturgis Trip

by Craig Glab, Central Regional Manager



My little rascals on the motorcycle as I was getting ready to leave for Sturgis.



Here's the hotel - Holiday Inn Spearfish. It's the official Hamster hotel for the week.



Main Street in Sturgis.



This is only one block and there's got to be at least 10 blocks. They all look alike, with hundreds, no thousands, of motorcycles on each block.



The Stugis bike was designed and built by Sabers Specialties to be the official Sturgis motorcycle. It was raffled off in Sturgis.

The Sturgis bike was just off Main Street. Check out the lock hanging from the tent.

Thursday the Hamsters USA hold their annual ride for Hamsters and invited friends. We road from Spearfish into Sturgis which is 17 miles out.

I think there were about 350 motorcycles in the ride. The mayor of Sturgis came out to talk to us all before we left and he was asked to pick his favorite motorcycle of the bunch. Keith Terry, owner of Terry Components, has the nicest bike, according to the mayor.

Thursday was a busy day. After the Hamster ride, I rode out to Jesse Jurens' Top 50 Rally Park to see what was going on.

Dave Perewitz and Jody and Susan were there. Dave was signing autographs.



The Annual Bike Show was Thursday. They also had a motocross exhibition that could be seen from the freeway, too.

Giving away Kryptonite locks to people at the Top 50 Park with my friend Rob Buydos who announced at the Top 50 Park all week.