It’s a cold, late night and you run to your pickup to warm up. Suddenly, you realize the keys are in the pickup. This situation has happened to just about everyone at some point. In the last 45 years in the Bakken, Emry’s Locksmithing has answered that midnight freezing call to let people into their cars and homes.
Now, Emry’s has an updated purpose alongside ensuring the retrieval of keys from a vehicle. People’s ideas of security have changed in the last few decades and as technology advances, security does as well.
Jennifer Kierig, employee and specialist at Emry’s locksmith, has been learning all about those new technologies at special training courses that take place all over the country. She was recently able to start the automotive and key fob exchanger aspect of Emry’s which includes new vehicle rekeying, an incredibly complicated procedure nowadays.
Kierig also attended a course on security lockdown solutions for classrooms. The news can sometimes fill us with dread, sending our most beloved and fragile members of our community to school, but it’s a comfort to know this tried and true local company is sending it’s best and brightest to learn the newest ways to keep kids as safe as possible while still allowing them to live healthy and social lives. Not only that, but some security tech companies field the opinions of locksmiths and other security technology departments to make the best and safest products possible.
Kierig’s mother and right hand woman, Marge, has been in locksmithing since 1988. She began her career at $4 an hour, which then was 60 cents over minimum wage. The original owner, Emry Slaamot, started the business in 1981, and by 1988 Sid Hauge was the owner and taught Marge all about locksmithing.They worked together and ran calls for about 25 years until Dave Stevens bought it out. Now the newest owners want to remember Emry’s historical roots.
Although Emry’s Locksmithing has moved locations at least 6 times since it’s conception, the familiar faces coming to the rescue were faces the Bakken trusted. Their newest location at 118 First Ave. West offers a large storefront filled with fun keys, digital door locks and a wall of Kierig’s most recent accomplishments. In back is a spacious workshop where Marge and her daughter work away, securing the Bakken one lock at a time.