Night Rider Jewelry to expand, add jobs in Chandler

The Story Recently

Night Rider Jewelry to expand, add jobs in Chandler Nov 13th 2012, 03:26 By Weldon B. Johnson The Republic | azcentral.com Mon Nov 12, 2012 8:36 PM If you see a bold, striking piece of silver jewelry on a prominent biker, rocker or athlete in the future, take a closer look if you can. It just might be made in Chandler. NightRider Jewelry, which started as a garage-based operation to make a few high-end pieces for friends, is expanding and soon may add as many as 50 jobs to Chandler’s workforce. The company began in 2006 in jeweler George Ganem’s garage. As the company’s creations began to catch on, it expanded to a small shop in Tempe. Last year, NightRider opened a retail outlet at Scottsdale Fashion Square, and next month, the company will move into a new location, a 15,000-square-foot production facility near Kyrene Road and Chandler Boulevard. Nick Ballantyne, who handles jewelry design and is among the founders of the company, said the new space will increase NightRider’s efficiency. “We’re working out of a pretty tight space right now,” Ballantyne said. “This year, even though we’ve experienced a good amount of growth, we’ve been really bottlenecked as far as adding new bench jewelers and adding different equipment we need. Based off our design, we’ve modeled it around doing 10 times the production we’re doing now.” Ballantyne said the increased production could result in the company adding as many as 50 employees. “It just depends on how it shakes out to as who we need and when with the new positions,” Ballantyne said. “I think there will be a lot of efficiency that comes out of the new facility. Doing 10 times as much production doesn’t necessarily take 10 times as many jewelers.” The idea for NightRider began when Ganem, who is Ballantyne’s father-in-law, asked him to sketch some designs for jewelry for some of his motorcycle-riding friends. Ballantyne was studying graphic design at the time. “I did, and it went pretty well,” Ballantyne said of the jewelry designs. “We realized there was a demand for a quality product in the marketplace. There really wasn’t anything like that out there. Most things that bikers wear, the big bold stuff, was cheaply made with foreign manufacturing.” Ballantyne scrapped his plans to be a graphic designer and began learning everything he could about jewelry making. That, combined with Ganem’s connections in the jewelry business â€" he owns Ganem Jewelers â€" helped get the company off to a strong start. Ballantyne’s brother, Thad, came on board to handle the casting and manufacturing of the pieces. They started showing their creations at places like the Barrett-Jackson auctions, motorcycle events and tattoo expos. They sold jewelry in Sturgis, S.D., site of a huge annual motorcycle rally, and other locations where people were likely to be interested. The store at Scottsdale Fashion Square exposed them to yet another clientele. Now, their creations are owned by celebrities such as Johnny Depp, Kenny Chesney and Alice Cooper. “We’ve been fortunate getting into Scottsdale Fashion Square,” Ballantyne said. “We’ve been pleasantly surprised with the amount of celebrity clientele that goes there, purchases our product and becomes fans of what we do.” Information: nightriderjewelry.com. Source: http://www.azcentral.com/business/consumer/articles/20121112chandler-jeweler-night-rider-expand-add-jobs.html

You are receiving this email because you subscribed to this feed at blogtrottr.com. If you no longer wish to receive these emails, you can unsubscribe from this feed, or manage all your subscriptions