Ted Kieper
I began my business career in in 1967 when I rented an old service station on
South 22nd and Greenfield Avenue in Milwaukee to have a place to work on
my racing motorcycles. I named it Competition Cycle Center. To support my expensive
motorcycle racing habit I began fixing
motorcycles for the public. I was traveling to races all over the mid-west and
it was getting hard to make ends meet. I had just left my two year (1965 -
1967) position
at Harley-Davidson Motor Company
so I needed to earn some money. Through
the fall of 1967 and winter of 1968 I drove a taxi cab at night 7 nights a week. I
operated the motorcycle shop 6 days a week. In
March of 1968 I placed a radio ad on WRIT radio in Milwaukee for motorcycle and tune-ups and became the 1st Milwaukee area motorcycle
business to advertise on the radio. It brought me instant credibility and
business and by fall I was looking for a larger building which I found on South 27th
and National. By 1972 I had to build an addition on to the building to house
my 21 employees.
In 1971 and 1972 I traveled with my
Death Riders motorcycle thrill show doing county fairs and
racing events. A movie was later produced that was based on my show named
Death Riders. I was not in it.
In the fall of 1982 I purchased a Texas
Instruments Home Computer for my children for Christmas and I was curious about
it so I decided that I needed to set it up and test it so the kids
wouldn’t be disappointed if it didn’t work. After a week of sitting up late
playing with the computer connected to our TV in our bedroom after the kids were
in bed, I decided to take it to the shop and play with
it there. About two weeks later I began selling computer products at my
motorcycle store under the name of Competition Computer. At first I specialized in printer sales selling over a hundred
a month after a short time.
In the late seventies I became
an FAA certified Flight Instructor. Mostly to be able to fly airplanes and have
my students pay for the airplane rental. That was a real adventure. Imagine
riding on the back seat of a MX bike flying through the air trying to talk the
rider on the front seat into making a safe landing without hurting himself, the
bike or you. But I loved the speed- well over 200mph some times. I am still an
active pilot flying several airplanes. It's a big part of my life.
In spring 1985 I went to a service school in
Boston for Leading Edge computers to learn how to fix printers and computers.
By fall 1985 I began assembling my own PC brand. Most people thought I was
crazy. I was told no one would consider buying a computer without IBM’s name on it and I
was wasting my time. I did it anyway. The rest is history. IBM no longer builds
PCs and I do.
There are now thousands of computers in
existence I have built. I am very proud.
In 1990 I sold the motorcycle business.
As of June 1, 2000 the company name was changed to Computer Doctor Wis
LLC.
Ted Kieper owner
Est. 1982
