Back in 1987, Francesco Therisod was asked to open a safe in a Rhode Island home. Family members of a recently deceased patriarch were hoping to find his will.
The safe, an in-the-wall Diebold safe, took about 55 minutes to crack and didn’t have the man’s will in it. Instead, it was filled with “gems and jewels, a stack of $100 bills.” It was a pile of loot worth about $3 million, Therisod, the co-owner of Clark the Locksmith, said recently while sitting in the backroom of his Providence office.
“Nobody expected that,” said Therisod, who owns the business with his wife, Linda Clark Therisod. “I didn’t get any of that. I just did my job and charged for it.”
While situations like that are what some people might envision when they think of the locksmith and safe-cracking business, it’s not usually that exciting, he said. These days, 90 percent of safes are empty. “Something as exciting as that is not an everyday event. Lately, I open the safes and there’s nothing.”
Founded in Providence in 1901, Clark the Locksmith sells personal and business safes, makes keys and installs electronic and manual locks and security systems. On Washington Street in the Mercantile Block recently bought by AS220, it has moved from its original location on 87 Westminster St., but hasn’t grown much. Therisod said he intentionally keeps the number of employees low because of the nature of the lock-and-key industry.
“I don’t want to be too big and hire more,” he said, “because they are all trusted. When you call up a locksmith and they come to your house, they have to be trusted.”
Because that trust is important, Therisod prefers employees looking for long-term work. Most of his locksmiths have been with him for years.
Therisod, who married into the business and started at Clark in 1977, said the late founder Elbert V. Clark had been a “jolly old fellow, although I never met him.” Clark was a personal friend of Harry Houdini and had made break-away locks for the famous magician.
Much of what the company’s locksmiths learn comes from on-the-job training and from trade magazines.
“We have got to keep up with what the changes are. I didn’t know anything about locks when I got into this business,” Therisod said. A native of Italy, Therisod lived and worked in Bermuda for 10 years before meeting his wife. “I was in the hotel industry in Italy. And I was in the cruise industry, working on a ship.”
He got into the business years ago, when brass locks were the most widely used. Now much of what the business handles is electronic.
“It’s not easy to work in a trade like this. At one time it was all mechanical and … today there are so many changes and so many electronic parts,” he said. “Electronics change so quick and manufacturers change it so quick because they want to sell new stuff.”
The automotive-key business, for example, has changed dramatically over the last 25 years. Much of the key-replacement work is now down with computers. A roughly $1,000 system that the company invested in allows it to program keys with chips that access cars’ computer systems. But each year, manufacturers come out with new keys and new programs. Just the key blanks for some brands can cost up to about $30, Therisod said. So while a key might have cost $5 just a few years ago, some now run between $35 and $60 for a replacement. “And that’s just a duplication,” he said.
As for large-building security systems, the repair business picked up this year. During a recession, many companies decide to fix their existing systems instead of installing a new system.
Therisod said a normal week brings a variety of jobs: changing 200 locks in a recently bought housing complex, installing 14 electric “strikes” for security-card access at a business, switching security codes at a restaurant where someone had just been fired and fixing the fire-door, emergency-open panels at another business. And that was just during a two-day period a few weeks ago, he said.
The company used to handle the vaults of several Providence banks, including Old Stone Bank, but now many of those companies have in-house locksmiths. And because of the nature of his business, Therisod is wary of giving away too much information about his customers and installations.
“You can’t print some of this – you just can’t,” he said. “But that’s what we do. It’s our job. It’s high security.” •
COMPANY PROFILE
Clark the Locksmith
OWNERS: Francesco Therisod and Linda Clark Therisod
TYPE OF BUSINESS: Full-service locksmith
LOCATION: 127 Washington St., Providence
EMPLOYEES: 9, including owners
YEAR ESTABLISHED: 1901
ANNUAL SALES: Between $500,000 and $1 million
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