“My dad wanted to help him get started and bought him a locksmith correspondence course,” Lang said. “My brother became a pipe fitter and I became a locksmith.”
Lang said he did the work part time for many years while attending classes at Miami University and working at Fernald.
In the late 1980s, he and his wife moved to Batesville, Ind., where he met a local locksmith who was more than 80 years old and wanted to sell his business.
“I bought it and had him continue working with me for three more years,” Lang said. “It was a very valuable experience.”
He and his wife moved themselves and Lang’s Locks to West Chester Twp. in 1990 when he was downsized from Fernald and he went to work with a large locksmith company in Cincinnati.
Throughout Lang’s Locks’ four decades in business, the locksmith industry has changed in some ways, and remained the same in others, Lang said.
“The auto industry had the most changes with the new transponder keys,” he said. “When I started, I could easily change a key or make a new key for cars. Now you need to be a computer technician to even start. When I started, people wanted to fix their locks, now they want to replace their locks, which is sometimes much less expensive.”
Lang said he enjoys that Lang’s Locks is “a full-time business working part time hours.”
“It is very flexible, so if I have family obligations, I can always refer customers to other reputable locksmiths in the area,” he said.
The business’ main customers are based in Butler, Warren and Hamilton counties, but Lang said he has traveled to Louisville, Ky., Indianapolis, Ind. and Columbus upon clients’ request.
In December, Lang bought a shop inside building 12 at Trader’s World in Monroe, where he works on weekends selling custom keys and keys featuring team logos, Disney characters, movie icons, comic book heroes and music legends.
“As an independent locksmith, I can only be at one place at one time,” he said. “Trader’s World allows me to keep my mobile service during the week.”
For more information, visit www.langslocks.com or call 513-860-0222.
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