SIDNEY — The year 2018 was a banner year for Electro Controls as the company achieved all-time record sales. Company ownership changed hands at year end from long-time owner Tim Geise to his three sons, Chris, Kevin and Jason Geise.
As Tim Geise eases into retirement, he commented “The run I had with Electro Controls was truly amazing and the wonderful team there made it all possible. Since the last recession ended in 2009, we have had phenomenal growth, quadrupling are sales volume since then. The challenges we faced and the changes required for that growth are too numerous to list, but the company is well positioned for the next midterm and beyond. For me, it was the right time to retire. I want to personally thank all our employees, clients, suppliers, and the local business community for many wonderful years working together.”
The new owners are excited about the future and have seamlessly taken the reigns. They each echoed the same message “Dad hired the right people and pulled the right levers at the right time and built a top notch company.” While the new owners are planning to continue to operate with the underpinnings of the successful recipe that their father developed, the sons are also ready to adapt as necessary to the ever changing economy and global market and are focused on investment and employee development for continued growth.
The owners’ report follows:
Our record sales volume in 2018 was 11.1 percent more than 2017 and 2.6 percent more than budget. Our largest markets in 2018 were food and beverage, metal forming, robotics, compressors, specialty manufacturing equipment, recreational vehicles, and agriculture. Our biggest challenge continues to be finding the right labor resources in an economy that has such low unemployment. In addition, new trade tariffs that were established this past year have affected some material price points and, while most of this is pass thru in our industry, the administration costs add up. Our employees continue to do a fantastic job adapting, creating, improving, and finding ways to stay competitive and relevant. We finished the year with 106 full time employees and we have 75,000 square feet of operating space. We are budgeting 5.2% sales growth in 2019.
Electro Controls launched a new solar renewable energy division this past October. Electro Green Energy Solutions (EGES) has been established to be a turnkey solar solution provider working closely with clients to optimize the combination of renewable energy, energy efficient technology, and federal, state, and local incentive programs to significantly reduce the customer’s operating expense and energy consumption and maximize the customer’s return on investment. This division will be providing solutions to the commercial, industrial, agriculture, education, healthcare, and municipality markets and two new senior staff positions were added to operate the division. Growing our business for our employees, clients, and community is our passion and commitment. This new venture is some proof of that and we are very optimistic it will boost us forward promptly and help sustain us in the long term.
We are ready for the future and we continue to pledge to offer best-in-class solutions for automation systems, control panels, wire harnesses, and solar renewables. We are proud to be serving a wide range of clients and industries across North America from Sidney, OH and we are grateful to all of our stakeholders including employees, clients, suppliers, and our community.
