Emmons Metro headquarters in Albany, N.Y.
Metropolitan Industries celebrates the one-year anniversary of its acquisition of Emmons Metro (previously Emmons Pump & Control). Based in Albany, N.Y., Emmons Metro has provided Upstate New York with a wide variety of pumps, pumping supplies, and repair services for nearly 30 years. Now as part of the Metropolitan Industries family, Emmons Metro has been afforded an opportunity of investment, new growth, and the promise of a bright future for their employees, project partners and end users.
“The trajectory of both companies is not that far off,”” said Kochan. “Both Metropolitan and Emmons started as small businesses while working towards a single focus, and have grown to expand their capabilities and services for their respective regions. At Metropolitan, we’ve demonstrated how to transition from being just another pump supplier to becoming a manufacturer that provides complete and custom pumping and control system solutions that no competitor can match. We are going to apply the same model with Emmons.”
In the first year, Metropolitan has invested many resources to expand Emmons’ reach throughout the state of New York. The hiring of additional sales staff allows Emmons to better serve their existing territory while also providing opportunities to expand. The addition of several new service trucks has also allowed for Emmons to deploy their field service capabilities more efficiently while also increasing its coverage of the state.
“As great as the acquisition has been for both companies, the real beneficiaries are our project partners and end users on the East Coast,” said Kochan, who believes they have been underserved by the one-size-fits-all model commonly available throughout the pumping industry.
“One-size-fits-all may provide adequate results for municipalities and commercial buildings in the short-term, but that model also tends to leave a lot on the table,” said Kochan. “When our people are consulting at such job sites, they usually identify several missed opportunities. Our custom based packaged systems model provides far more streamlined solutions from the beginning all the way through installation that saves time, saves energy, and reduces long-term costs for end-users.”
Moving into year two, Metropolitan will continue to invest its engineering and manufacturing expertise to further aid in the growth of Emmons. As the Albany based company becomes more involved with developing its own packaged systems, the opportunity exists to also expand its capabilities from water and wastewater to also include temperature control, hydronics, and reuse in a variety of applications in municipal, commercial, and industrial settings. Plans to extend MetroCloud, Metropolitan’s custom based cloud SCADA software to Emmons is also on the horizon.
A key component to the future growth of Emmons is their staff members, all of whom were kept on following the acquisition. While there is plenty of room for growth with Emmons, their brand heritage, which includes the people who have helped make the company what it is, will be paramount when it comes to providing continued solutions and services as it expands throughout the East Coast.
Though the acquisition officially brought our two companies together just last year, the relationship between the two businesses date back to the 1980s. Through their respective associations within the pumping industry, Kochan has previously collaborated with Kim Emmons, who continues to run the day-to-day operations of Emmons Metro, on specific projects. A key example was Stratford Farms, a project which was first conceptualized in 2005. Even through a slowdown in the housing market and a major economic downturn, the project’s aspirations survived before eventually resuming, resulting in its completion at the start of this year.
Despite the long-term uncertainties of the pandemic, Kochan says the demand for water movement and management engineering and the solutions provided by Metropolitan and Emmons will always exist.
“There is plenty of work and projects ahead. The future for both companies remains bright!”