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After 35 years, family's business gets makeover
Orlando
Business Journal by Noelle Haner-Dorr, Staff Writer
Date: Monday, July 24, 2000, 12:00am
EDT
APOPKA -- Fryling Electric Inc. just
got a makeover.
The family-owned and operated
electrical contracting company has changed its name and logo. Now known as
Cable Electrical Services, the business is working toward a more corporate
image, while maintaining its family-business roots.
"We have expanded our services,
and we wanted to reflect this by replacing the founder's name," explains
Harrie Crowley, the president of Cable Electrical who runs the company with his
sons, Duane and Donald.
Mel Fryling launched the Michigan
company in 1963. Harrie joined Fryling in 1969, eventually purchasing the
business from Fryling in 1981 through a stock buyout.
When the construction market in
Michigan took a dive in 1983, Harrie took his wife, his children and his
business and transported them all -- the Crowley family and the Crowley
business -- to Florida, where the weather, and the market, was warmer. "I
had lived in Jacksonville at one time, but it was still too cold for me,"
says Crowley. "I chose Orlando for its central location in the state and
its weather."
It was the right move. Today, Cable
Electrical is a $10 million a year enterprise with such name clients as Post
Properties and Beers Construction. The company has wired more than 25,000
apartment units in Florida and completed work for Disney Imagineering, Universal
Studios Florida, the United terminal at Orlando International Airport and
Winter Park Memorial Hospital.
The state-certified firm specializes
in three areas: new multifamily residential structures, new
institutional/educational buildings and electrical service work for commercial,
industrial and institutional facilities.
Now, it has expanded its management
structure into a two-pronged approach with a new construction division and a
service/small commercial division. And it recently unveiled its new Web site at
http://www.cableelectrical.com.
"Growth has never been a
goal," notes Duane, secretary and treasurer of Cable Electrical. "It
is merely the byproduct of the attention provided to our clients."
The company is attracting some
attention of its own: The Crowleys receives almost-weekly overtures from larger
electrical companies to purchase Cable Electrical and blend it into their
corporate structures. The family, however, has been able to resist this temptation
-- because of its biological succession plan.
"Companies that have sold out
didn't have the legacy we have," says Harrie. "I was lucky enough to
have two sons who wanted to be a part of the business."
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