I like to incorporate actual items into a build to add authenticity. As we were nearing completion of the Fire Bike, I purchased firefighter equipment that included gauges, an ax, and a (very loud) siren.
An interesting situation developed with the outside contractors we had hired to help with the bike. Mike Stafford, DaVinci Performance Carburetor of Texas, Chuck Wendt and Rowe Machine Inc., and painter Justin Barnes all went above and beyond once they learned of the project’s aim. And, of course, my right-hand man in the shop, Vinnie DiMartino, gave his standard yeoman’s effort. The opportunity to honor the 343 firefighters personally impacted everyone who worked on the project.
The finishing touch came courtesy of a member of the NYFD who visited our shop. He gave us a Nelson stud—which holds concrete to steel—from the Twin Towers and asked if we could integrate it into the bike. The Nelson stud was the perfect size to mount on the center of the diamond plate that would go on top of the gas tank, and we decided to make the Nelson stud the final piece and add it at the unveiling.
We scheduled the unveil to be held outside of Rescue 3 in New York City. Al Ronaldson was in Rescue 3 before he died in 1991, and his son and our friend, Al, had joined Rescue 3 when he entered the department. With emotional firefighters looking on, including Al, I said a few words of thanks and attached the final piece with the Nelson stud from the towers. I take tributes extremely seriously, and I believed it was important to attach the last piece in place in front of the firefighters because those guys had lost brothers on 9/11.
The firefighters appreciated the efforts of everyone involved in the project. The unveil resonated with viewers, too, and that episode was one of the most watched of the entire series. People around the world were profoundly affected by 9/11, and a year and a half after the attacks, the world—and especially New York City and surrounding areas—still mourned and grieved.
From the massive feedback we received after the show, viewers loved the fact that we were able to apply our creativity to a motorcycle that paid respects to the 343 firefighters who put their lives on the line and died in 9/11. As we’ve said many times, those firefighters were going up while everyone else in the Twin Towers was coming down.
The tribute bike was the least we could do to use our position to honor the ultimate sacrifice made on behalf of thousands and thousands of people.
“Never forget.”
The realization that our lives were changing came at the Louisiana Bike Expo in early May 2003. Two previous public appearances had indicated that we were becoming popular: Our bikes drew more attention at Daytona’s Bike Week in late February, after the two pilots had aired. Then after the first episode, we made an appearance at a bike show at the Javits Center in New York City. More people seemed to be checking out our bikes at that show, and for sure we sold more OCC merchandise.
But the first crazy came at the Louisiana Bike Expo at the Louisiana Superdome, the home of the NFL’s New Orleans Saints. The first Fire Bike episode had aired the previous Monday, and my father and I were invited to be part of a tribute to firefighters and veterans. I rode the Fire Bike and my dad rode the Black Widow. The reception for us and our bikes was huge.
When we sat down at our table to sign autographs, I couldn’t see the end of the line. And that was true all three days that we signed. We moved so much merchandise that we had to scramble to find someone in New Orleans to print more T-shirts. Event organizers were shocked. From New Orleans, we traveled to a bike show in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. We signed for five consecutive days there.
The “Are you serious?” moment came at the thought that so many people were willing to stand in line for so long just to say hello, get an autograph, buy a shirt or hat, shake our hands, or pose for a photo. We knew that we had struck a chord with the general public that had not been struck before—at least not in our industry. We were standing on the front edge of a phenomenon. We had not aspired to be famous, but that was exactly what we had become. The quick path—two pilots and five episodes—amazed us.
It still does, in fact. When I look back at those days now, I can appreciate that we landed in a unique and fortunate situation.
Our show attracted far more than just the stereotypical motorcycle crowd, and there seemed to be no limits—age, gender, background—to our fan base. I would look at someone and think, There’s no way he watches a show about motorcycles, then, sure enough, he would walk up and say, “I love your show.”
We signed for lawyers, doctors, and ninety-year-old women. I remember in one autograph line, I met a man with an IV catheter in his arm. He had checked himself out of a hospital to come see us. (Not recommended.) But one group stood out to me more than the others: families. Tons of families.
Countless times, we heard, “Yours is the only show we watch as a family.” That was a really big deal to us, especially if their children were a little older, because families with teenagers don’t watch television together like they used to.
I think from the earliest episodes our viewers related to our show, both the family dynamic and the creativity. Fans told us they weren’t big into bikes, but they loved our show anyway.
Our business changed almost immediately because our bikes were suddenly a hot commodity. We sold more bikes and for more money than before. More than that, though, merchandising changed our business. We learned quickly that we could make a lot more money selling merchandise than motorcycles. A licensing company approached us, and we signed a deal with them to manage our merchandise. People who have worked in the licensing industry for years told us that we were one of the greatest phenomena in licensing. Our licensing was bigger than MTV’s at one point, and it was huge for six or seven years.
We licensed a wide variety of products: T-shirts, hats, baby and children’s clothing, shorts, popcorn tins, die-casts, motorcycle jackets and gloves, glasses, key chains, shoes. There aren’t many things that we did not put our name on. T-shirt sales rocketed. Anything with “Orange County Choppers” printed on it was in demand.
We intentionally branded ourselves right out of the gate, knowing that a demand could develop for what we wore on television. We were strict about what we wore on the show because we wanted to be branded at all times.
We filmed a few episodes before we had a contract for the series. We did the pilot and initial episodes basically for per-episode fees. That worked out in our favor in a huge way because when long-term contract talks started, we were ultrahot.
Once we started negotiating, one of Discovery’s attorneys wanted the network to own a good chunk of OCC. We said we wouldn’t sign that deal. Discovery needed more episodes, and fast, so they dropped that demand. The attorney did, however, want the network to own the American Chopper brand. Her attitude was that American Chopper was the main brand and OCC was a side brand. But we wore OCC stuff so much that the viewers were more interested in merchandise with the OCC logo than the American Chopper brand.
We parked a small trailer at the top of a hill near the shop and hired someone to sell merchandise. That trailer had a steady stream of business all day. Eventually, we had to upgrade to a semi-sized trailer that could be hauled everywhere we went.
Before the show aired, we had been competing with other builders who were years ahead of us in terms of brand recognition. But almost overnight, we soared to become the largest custom motorcycle brand. Our market was global, too.
We hired more help in the shop to accommodate the increased demand for bikes. Vinnie was one of the first hires. We had hung out together during high school and I knew he was a good mechanic, so I asked him to join us. Vinnie became the go-to guy to make an idea work. Rick Petko, a great sheet metal guy, came aboard pretty early on, too. My father hired Rick, and he fit in nicely with the rest of us as the quiet, even-tempered good guy. Vinnie and Rick became popular as soon as their first episodes aired. We brought in a manager to help oversee the operations and a parts guy to take the load off us when it came to ordering and keeping up with parts.
We also had to move our shop upstairs to a larger location.
From a business standpoint, OCC completely changed in mere months.
DEALING WITH SUCCESS
My personal life changed so dramatically that it wasn’t even funny. In fact, the first season or two, I experienced a bit of anxiety. Going out in public got a little freaky. I would go to the mall on weekends and be overwhelmed by fans of the show. (I soon had to stop going to the mall.) As we left work each day, we were inundated with people. We kept the shop doors locked so people could not walk in on us, but morning, noon, and night, people waited for us outside. All they wanted was to talk to us, take pictures, and get our autographs. I enjoyed talking with the fans, but we learned that we had to keep moving as we talked and signed because if we stopped walking, a crowd would swarm us and we’d be stuck there. My father, Mikey, and I also began receiving appearance fees to sign autographs at events.
Over time, I learned to manage situations so that they remained enjoyable, but when those experiences were new, I was like, What the heck is this? I knew it was good, but it also was overpowering.
There was no magical formula for dealing with this newfound celebrity other than simply dealing with it. I wanted to be as friendly and kind as possible, and to entertain the people. For the large majority, they just wanted to meet us. Keeping that perspective in mind, it wasn’t difficult to give people a piece of my time. They had made us successful, so it was the least I could do to repay them with a smile, a photo, and an autograph.
For the most part, I still had my space in Montgomery because I already knew a lot of people around town. I’m not going to say I stayed humble, because that would not sound humble! But I tried to stay grounded, and I hope I accomplished that. Living in my hometown helped. So did the environment around the shop.
Yes, we had become celebrities—and practically overnight—but we were the same people we had been before the show. And as was evidenced on the show, the shop’s environment would not allow for one of us to get a big head. Not that it didn’t take work. Accolades flowed in for our show and our work. But for me, I had to be careful not to put too much stock in the press we were receiving. Sometimes I struggled to maintain perspective, but all in all, between the guys in the shop and living in my hometown, I was able to stay grounded most of the time.
One of the biggest factors was that I had worked really hard since I was a teenager and I continued to work hard on the show. I came from a blue-collar background: I was a guy who worked hard, got his hands dirty, and had been burned a few times. I did whatever I had to do to make a living.
I think people with that type of background, when they do come into some level of success, possess a deep appreciation for the success and the path required to get there.
As someone who is mechanically inclined, I understand the importance of nuts and bolts. And as an alum of a reality TV show, I understand why the nuts and bolts of making a show are so important to viewers.
The amount of time from when we agreed to do the first pilot until we began filming was so short that we had to learn how to do television on the fly. Having a camera—and then, later, cameras—at our shop all the time required a major adjustment. Because of the nature of our show, everything was filmed. When we were at the shop, the crew was at the shop, filming daily from 8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. The crew feared that a bike would fall off a lift and a camera would not be there to film it. We just feared a bike falling off a lift and being damaged. Because the crew was committed to filming everything, they were able to catch some really funny exchanges that made for great content.
At times, having a crew around slowed our work. For example, I would want to return to a part I had been working on and have to wait for the camera guys to get set up. Or we would have to allow the crew time to get microphones hooked up or white-balance the cameras. After a few weeks, we knew what to expect and what we needed to do to help the crew.
We also learned to open up to the camera, or to turn to make sure our faces were in view of the camera before we spoke. I would start to say something and remember, I have to open up first. We learned not to start conversations unless two cameras were nearby so the cameramen could cross-shoot the conversation. Even when not talking, we had to make sure we positioned ourselves so that the viewers could see our hands.
Walking in and out of doorways became a challenge, especially when we had only one camera or had two cameras but one was busy shooting B roll of the current build. The cameraman shot us walking to the door and then through the door. Then he reset on the other side of the door, and we did it all over again. That was just life in the shop for ten years.
We wore out film crews with the number of hours we filmed, but the nature of the business also contributed to high turnover. In the film industry people move around constantly. Camera guys, especially, seem to have a difficult time finding consistent work. Plus, with our proximity to New York City, there were probably more crew members moving in and out than if we had been located elsewhere. We became friends with the crew members; they were like coworkers. As far as I was concerned, I worked alongside a mechanic, a welder, and a cameraman. Having them with us was cool.
We started with a shooting crew of three. Eventually, we grew to an eight-member crew with four cameras. We filmed crossovers with other reality shows that came to our place, and one show’s crew consisted of twenty-three people. They showed up but had forgotten the video tape because their crew was so big that the right hand didn’t know what the left was doing.
Our crew was pretty thin compared to other production companies, but I believe they gave us the right-sized crew because we always seemed to get the content we needed.
One interesting note about our show is that the content was all ours. My father and I received producer credits, and we created the content. Sometimes the crew would say they needed an outside event for an episode, and we would come up with something fun for them like paintball wars or scooter jousting. We probably broke a few laws during filming.
Viewers got a kick out of us doing crazy stunts, so we came up with fun ideas for each episode, ranging from playing volleyball to jumping a Hummer off a snow hill to blowing up things. We loved explosions. The stunts were good stress relief for us. Building bikes was intense and the hours were long, so we needed moments like going up on the roof for water balloon grenade wars. Plus, since we were in the steel business, we were a little nuts to begin with!
From builds to goofing off, we came up with the ideas, and that made the content natural for us to do. Now it would be difficult to run a reality show the way we did, because today the networks want to know everything ahead of time, from what will be in each episode to what the twelve-episode run will look like. With us, Discovery (and TLC in the two-and-a-half seasons it aired the show) did not know day to day what they would be getting from us. I think that spontaneity was a huge factor in our show’s success, but the reality TV business no longer works that way.
I can tell just by watching reality shows today how scripted they have become. Production companies want to keep the crew’s hours down to save money. We filmed twelve hours a day for eleven months out of the year. That would be too costly to pull off now. I see some benefits of scripting, like the talent could be on camera for what was needed and then be done filming, meaning the crew wouldn’t always be around. But I am convinced that part of our show’s success was the raw reality that came from not knowing what would happen next.
THE STEPS OF A BUILD
The first step in a build is determining the subject matter, the theme. If we are building for a corporation, the theme usually involves a logo and products that are important to that company. In most cases, that means putting a lot of thought into the frame type.
The framework makes up the overall lines of a bike, and there are numerous questions to consider. Should the frame be tall, long, and curvy? Should we use a heavier tube? A square tube? A frame can be short, wide, or long. Tire sizes vary, and we ca
n build a trike if the theme calls for three wheels. Much has to be taken into consideration when it comes to what the front end will look like. All those possibilities factor into which frame we choose.
We bring all the components together and order what is needed because the frame has to be made before anything else happens.
I’ve had times when 90 percent of the bike was built in my head before the frame arrived because I knew which direction I wanted to go. There also have been times when I’ve had 90 percent of the build in my head and only 50 percent would end up applying. At other times, the frame has sat on the lift for three days before I could figure out how to work with it. Then that aha moment arrived and off we went. The second build-off bike was like that, with the frame just sitting there for a couple of days until I figured out what my creative direction would be. And with that particular build, there was added pressure because we were defending our title from winning the first build-off.
Once we have the frame ready, we get the bike up on the lift and start integrating the product when and if appropriate. More often than not, we have to scale down the product to fit the bike. Then we begin fully integrating the creative process that is being pulled from the theme. At this point, the build becomes an expression of that theme.
After I decide where to go with the frame, we build the gas tank.
When the fabrication is done and we’re confident the theme is telling our client’s story, the bike gets broken down and we decide where to paint and where to chrome, and whether we’ll do any plating—gold, nickel, or chrome.
I tell the painters what I want, but I also give them a little freedom because the painters we work with are so good at what they do. They’re the ones who put the paint on the canvas. In fact, I tend to operate that way in general with all aspects of a build. I’ve learned that not micromanaging people with proven skills usually leads to a better result.
The Build Page 6