SIDNEY — The year 2015 was a one of growth for Air Handling Equipment reported Kurt Barhorst, president.
“As we reported in last year’s release, 2015 included a new location in Cincinnati, an expanded product offering with Gardner Denver, and additional service technicians. All three of these areas provided growth for Air Handling this past year.” reported Barhorst.
His report continues:
Jeff Minks is the sales engineer heading the Cincinnati operation. Jeff has 12 years of compressed air industry knowledge. This experience has allowed Jeff to transition quickly into the day to day operations at Air Handling. Air Handling had a solid base of existing customers in the Cincinnati market. Opening the new location allows them to respond more quickly to those end user needs, as well as, expand their market share.
Air Handling primarily focuses on their four core areas of business. They include, new and used equipment sales, air compressor services, service parts and rental air compressors. Operations Manager Jeff Pleiman monitors these departments. Air Handling’s mission is to eliminate lost production relating to compressed air system downtime and inefficiencies. Jeff oversees this operation making sure that Air Handling meets their mission in a safe and professional manner.
Air Handling has been a distributor of the CompAir & LeROI brands of air compressors for 38 years. Gardner Denver now owns those brands, and in 2014 Air Handling signed an agreement to sell and service the Gardner Denver brand of products as well.
The Gardner Denver acquisition has been a very good thing for Air Handling and our customers. It has been good in that they have fully integrated the CompAir product offering under the Gardner Denver brand. This integration has increased our customer support for our current customer’s needs. It has included product improvements and an increased product offering to support future customer requirements. We feel this new offering provided for nearly a 30 percent increase in compressor sales in 2015.
Our sales department has been led by Aaron Lacy for 13 years. This department experienced another successful year of total unit sales. Air Handling’s focus to provide innovative, efficient solutions to our customers compressed air needs, has led to this increase. This effort was once again acknowledged by DP&L as Air Handling was recognized as one of DP&L’s top channel partners in 2015.
The parts department exceeded the record levels reached in 2014. Lynette Caulfield lead this area for her 10th year. Her commitment to customer service and attention to detail continues to create a very loyal customer base. The focus of this department in 2016 will be to improve inventory control systems and increase sales in the Cincinnati market.
Jon Freistuhler led the service department for his 21st year. This department saw growth in service calls and total revenue in 2014. One of the areas that saw the most growth in 2015 was the compressed air piping installation crew. Led by Steve Reineke, the group completed a record number of projects in 2015.
The employees in our service department continue to be the backbone of our company. We had our highest technician utilization percentage in the history of the company in 2015. That speaks to the commitment of these employees in meeting our mission!
Technology will be the largest area of growth this year in this department. Compressed air system sequencing, internet based system monitoring, and tablets for all of the technicians, will be several of the items expanded on in 2016.
Air Handling’s vision is to be recognized as the provider of the most reliable compressed air systems, and all of our daily efforts are focused towards that result. We are looking forward to 2016 with optimism and to the challenges that it may provide.
