Chris Gatto began dumpster-diving...
Chris Gatto began dumpster-diving for used motorcycle parts outside his family's dealership as a child. Today, he's amassed one of the country's largest, most eclectic collections of bikes and parts.
Like most of us, Chris Gatto was into motorcycles as a child. Growing up in the Pittsburgh suburb of Tarentum, his youthful hobby was supplemented by the fact that his parents owned Gatto Harley-Davidson-a large, multi-brand dealership. "I was maybe 10, but I loved the smell of leather and rubber and oil in the shop," says Gatto, now 42. "I wasn't old enough to own a streetbike of my own, so I'd hang around the shop, asking if I could keep the parts people were taking off their bikes and going through the dumpster." From there, he began purchasing broken bicycles from neighborhood kids for $5, repairing them and re-selling them at a 400 percent mark-up.
There are people in Chris Gatto's life who wish he would have stopped asking customers for spare parts and flipping bicycles because, 30 years later, his hobby is a full-blown, dyed-in-the-straitjacket obsession. Launched in 2002 as a small Internet and retail operation proffering used and NOS parts for American V-twins, Gatto's business, Cycle Warehouse, now occupies five floors of the old Troutman's department store on Main Street in sleepy Butler, Pennsylvania. As if Fred Sanford were a motorcycle nut, every inch of the place is packed to the rafters with motorcycle ephemera, hard parts and hundreds of bikes in various states of (dis)repair. Like the archetypal general store of rural America, Cycle Warehouse is part pawn shop where customers can hock or trade bikes and parts when times are hard, and part museum-quality curiosity shop filled with rare and collectible machines like the 1926 Indian Chief in the front window. In an age of look-alike, smell-alike dealerships, Cycle Warehouse may be the last of an endangered breed of shops more concerned with stocking what customers want rather than what the OEMs demand.
Gatto is a whirlwind of physical activity, so capturing his attention during business hours is difficult at best. The first-floor showroom is typical Rust Belt biker emporium, occupied by aging longhairs with Willie Nelson hair and their default choice of motorcycle on their tattooed sleeves. These customers, Gatto says, are Cycle Warehouse's base; the people who come offering everything from automatic weapons to cars and horses for motorcycle parts. "I didn't know it when I was a kid, but you can always re-sell Harley parts," Gatto claims. "Maybe it's just our location, but everything from chrome parts to whole motors will sell all day."
 If it involves grease and...  If it involves grease and two wheels, Chris Gatto will buy or sell it. Ancient OEM parts, service manuals and ephemera are stacked to the rafters and beyond. |  The old Troutman's department...  The old Troutman's department store still looks the same from the outside. But inside, British classics fill the beauty parlor and early V-Twin engine parts occupy the bridal salon. |  One man's trash being another's...  One man's trash being another's treasure, Gatto can see the purpose in new old stock. What doesn't fit on the shelves occupies several railroad boxcars and two additional warehouses. |
These walk-in clients are mostly unconcerned with the treasures lurking behind the chromed primary covers on the walls, such as parts for every Triumph motorcycle ever made or 1970s Maico motocrossers. "The people who come for the British and German and Japanese stuff really know what they want," Gatto confesses while making inventory lists in his head. "They understand how hard it is to find certain things and they have the patience to stick around until they find exactly what they need. They fuel an entirely different part of the obsession."
Our tour begins in the cellar room known as "The Dungeon" for its cobwebs and endless rows of chopper front ends. Next to those, rows of tin shelves as long as a J.C. Penney sporting goods department are piled with carburetors, cylinder heads and jugs. The clank of metal being wrenched apart competes with the sounds of classic rock and several phones ringing at once, creating a symphony of the absurd. Add some hallucinogens and this place could be what Hunter S. Thompson dreamt of when he thought of the hereafter.
Forget the fringe and leather,...
Forget the fringe and leather, Cycle Warehouse staff can identify and locate everything from a vintage Fonzie doll to a BSA Ligtning cylinder head within seconds.
In spite of the shop's greasy, high-mileage charm, Gatto's six employees utilize the latest computer technology to maintain their Internet sales site, and resident software expert Brad Cowen has a college degree which comes in handy when shipping globally. "We have requests from Russia, from the Middle East, Australia-basically everywhere except North Korea," he jokes. But if there are old motorcycles or parts to be had in Pyongyang, Gatto will likely ferret them out as he has quite the nose.
Urban legends of ancient motorcycles resting beneath dusty tarps in barns may be as common as oil leaks under an Indian, but Gatto can attest to hundreds of such finds. "It's all word of mouth. One of my customers has an aunt who remembers her husband kept a bike in the shed, and the next thing you know I'm trucking home a vintage bike that's rough but can be made to run," he proselytizes. "They're still out there; you just have to look." Like a two-wheeled Indiana Jones, Gatto's career unearthing motorcycling's detritus provides a rare, inside view of an industry rife with waste. Many dealerships erecting new buildings will scrap or bury small fortunes in non-current stock. Old-school, family-owned shops often shutter their doors permanently, lacking the wherewithal or manpower to sell off rooms full of dusty parts. "I've had to pass up whole warehouses full of stuff I just didn't have room for," Gatto laments.
Still, I get the impression there's no way one man could remember the precise location of so much, well, junk. "Trust me, when it comes to inventory, it's all in here," Gatto says proudly, scratching his shaved head.