Motorcycle Ministry Rooted in Mitchell 

Why a worldwide multimillion-dollar company chooses small town South Dakota

 

By Megan Luther

The morning sun lights up the Klock Werks showroom, bouncing off the bikes. Big engines, shiny chrome, record speeds, each bike has a story cemented in the company’s history. They are the bikes that built Klock Werks.

Surrounding them this morning are two dozen Klock Werks employees. This eight o’clock morning meeting is a tradition. Every morning. It’s a way to communicate, but also set a tone, create unity.

It’s Thursday. And every Thursday each employee gives a compliment to one coworker. Sometimes they choose randomly, other times, like today, it’s the sixth person to their right.

It’s Hunter Mulligan’s turn. He’s impressed with Aaron Maxwell’s performance at Sturgis last month. “I mean, you were just the most polite. Everything was sir, ma’am, to all the customers. And you didn’t shy away from anything.”

Most compliments are work-related, some are not. Every employee gets and gives praise. Then, Klock Werks founder Brian Klock bows his head and leads the group in prayer.

They pray for a community member fighting cancer.

They thank God for the distribution team that hustled yesterday.

They pray that they pick the right solution for more space.

“We pray this in Jesus’s name. Amen. Alright let’s have a good morning,” Brian concludes the meeting.

Building in a garage

Klock Werks, the spelling a nod to Brian’s German heritage, was born in 1997. There were no distribution centers or marketing teams, just Brian and his friends building bikes in a garage.

For the next decade, the crew slowly grew the brand, traveling to shows and rallies throughout the U.S. They became known for customizing bagger motorcycles, a bike with saddle bags known as geezer gliders or road sofas. Think a slow, cushy ride for old people.

Klock Werks took those road sofas, added bigger motors and customized them into racing bikes, cementing their spot in the motorcycle world.

It wasn’t an easy road for the company. Brian’s candid about the many lows from begging banks for one more loan to praying that a maxed-out credit card would miraculously swipe one more time at the gas pump. It did.

“We were robbing Peter to pay Paul. I was bouncing probably more checks for my employees and to people around town than anybody could even imagine because I suck at money. It’s never been my thing.”

In 2006, the company took off after winning Discovery Channel’s reality show Biker Build-Off. The bike, a bagger of course, went on to set a national land speed record clocking in at 147 mph. The rider, Brian’s then-fiancé, Laura noticed the front end started lifting.

On a drive back to South Dakota, Brian brainstormed how to keep her safe. He stuck his hand out the window noticing how the wind fluctuated when his hand was at an angle.

The shop pieced together a prototype with a bend at the top of the windshield that kicked the air up and over. The Flare Windshield was born.

Now more than 20 patented windshields make up 80% of Klock’s multi-million worldwide business and the success has now created a problem.

The Distribution Center, kitty-corner to the shop, is overflowing. Now most mornings the crew moves pallets of product, some towering over employees, outside the 6000-square foot building to make room to work. Essentially playing Tetris with boxes and pallets, as one employee points out.

Klock Werks delivers direct to consumers and dealers all over the world. They ship more than 100 packages to customers daily. That doesn’t even count the pallets of product destined for Europe, Canada, Australia, Japan, and the rest of the U.S.

The company could relocate to a bigger location, a more populated urban area. They’ve been recruited to Southern California, Texas and even Sturgis. There’s been offers including a free multi-million-dollar building, but Brian chooses to stay.

“People in Mitchell have been good to me. I like to prove that you can be a small-town person and you can make it from wherever you are,” Brian says

He’s one of the city’s biggest hype men. Brian serves on the Mitchell Area Development Corporation board of directors, working the last five years to convince businesses to move to the area.

He’s also a big recruiter of residents.

Brian has repeatedly convinced motorcycle enthusiasts to relocate and work for him.

They’re from all over the U.S., from Connecticut to California. They bring their accents, eclectic personalities and a sense of family.

It’s by design, really. If you ask Brian what is Klock Werks, “my answer generally is it’s a wayward home for boys and girls. But truly, it’s a place where creative people get together and we collaborate on things that make people happy.”

The team support employees as they navigate addiction recovery or go through a divorce.

Brian and his wife Vanessa even open their home to those without one, at times for months.

“I’ve been gifted this house, and if there’s a room available and people need help, then I’m there to help them because God didn’t put them in my path unless he intended for me to step up, step out, step in, do something,” Brian says.

Motorcycle Ministry

On Brian’s right wrist is a black rubber bracelet with “I Am Second” in white letters. He never takes it off. The message is to put Jesus Christ first, a movement started by Norm Miller, CEO of Interstate Batteries.

Norm, now a friend, inspired Brian to run a faith-based company.

“When I hire people, I say, ‘Hey, just so we’re clear, we’re going to pray. You can look the other way. You can look right through me. You don’t have to bow your head. You don’t have to believe what I believe, but this is how this company works.’”

Not every employee believes and so far it hasn’t been a problem.

If you think perhaps, you can learn something from Brian and the Klock Werks story, he’s working on a book right now. Part memoir, part self-help, part thank you, Brian fears he will leave someone out.

“Every person along the way has played an important and historical part in every chapter of Klock Werks. We wouldn’t be here without any one person who’s ever contributed,” Brian says.

There are times he wishes he never attached his name to the brand.

“I wish it was Motorcycle Werks, you know because now it’s tied to me. And I don’t want it to be tied to me. It’s not about me. It’s about, ‘Look at these people. They’re so good at what they do,’” Brian says.

This founder knows his weaknesses and finances are at the top of the list. His wife whole-heartedly agrees. As the CFO of Klock Werks, Vanessa meticulously keeps track to keep the company in the black.

“I don’t even know how much money I would have in the bank. I could care less. What do I do then? Just making cool stuff for people.” Brian says.

Doodles

On Brian’s business card, next to his title “President” his marketing staff added “Visionary.” (He’d rather not have any titles at all.)

Brian’s a big dreamer and a doodler. When he gets an idea in his head, he grabs whatever’s closest, at times a bar napkin and draws.

Sometimes those doodles are actually designs. Vanessa remembers him drawing one of his next builds, a chopper on a napkin “And then he’ll just throw it away. Because to him, he’s just doodling.”

Vanessa wants to frame the napkin, showing how the bike build started. She asks him to keep it.

If you know Brian, that’s not a hard ask. Just look around the shop or his office, he collects a lot, but as his stepdaughter Karlee Cobb will tell you “Oh, but it’s not hoarding when it’s cool.”

Nostalgia is important to Brian and the cool stuff triggers stories and pauses him to reflect.

During a shop tour around the modern, gray-toned building, Brian stops at an out-of-place old door. The blue paint is peeling and on the bottom half, an old metal Squirt soda sign is screwed in. It originally opened into his dad Roger Klock’s gas station in Emery. Now it serves as a Klock Werks’s closet door.

Across the way is a big picture window, inside sit the company’s two engineers. Brian rescued the 6 feet by 8 feet window from the demolition of Chef Louie’s. A reminder. “I did more business over there than anybody even knows,” Brian says.

Blessings

It’s midweek and the crew is singing Happy Birthday to Karlee over bagels and cream cheese in the shop’s kitchen. Afterwards, as they do every Wednesday morning, they go around the room and say a blessing they experienced in the last week. Some are work-related, most are not. One employee celebrates spending extra time with her young children. Another, who’s a transplant, was amazed at watching children play in pools filled with corn.

And then it was Gene Slater’s turn. His blessing was small-town America. This past weekend he discovered water in his basement, a hole in his water pressure tank. He called Mitchell Plumbing, on a weekend, and got a new pressure tank.

Brian smiles.

“I love that when people say, “You know what? I’m gonna pump my fist for the city too.”

Megan Luther, a lifelong storyteller, has called Mitchell home for more than 30 years.