Increasing Reach for Our Customers
(Editor’s Note: This is Part III in a series on the history of H&S Protection Systems.)
After Sentra Protective Services and Horgan Sales joined forces to become H&S Protection Systems, the question for the business was: What’s next? The year was 2007. The nature of the security industry was about to change.
Until that time, the home security market boomed. Many businesses were modeled on providing home and business security, as well as fire alarms and perhaps carbon monoxide protection. H&S was not the exception. In 2008, the major recession hit, impacting security services along with nearly every business in the United States. Your “typical” security company had to change.
H&S was ahead of the ball, looking at how to increase our reach and determine what came next in terms of our customers’ needs. That’s always been our focus, and because of the nature of the security market and the national economy at the time, we looked at how to complement our expertise as we became one company, and also how to best share that with customers.
With strengths in sales, finances and operations, as well as similar types of customers and equipment from the two initial companies, H&S was able to interlock our customer base. This allowed us to respond quickly to any service issues, and focus strongly on our local bases in the communities we served. We hang our hats on this – being there on-time with answers that make sense, then delivering effective and intelligent solutions.
Yes, we’ve grown. We’ve added services, like a stronger video platform, as customers seek additional technologies to protect their homes and businesses. But in many ways, we’re still the same as we were before the merger: Knowing our customers, being accessible and finding out what you want before proposing how we can help.
When Ed Horgan ran the business, he got out of the fire protection service when it became clear that it was not viable for our model. He looked into alarms and other areas for growth. He changed the business in a good way, one that helped put us where we are today.
We will continue to change in a good way for our employees and our customers. We look forward to serving our Wisconsin customers many years into the future, and hope you let us know how we’re doing.