Big Buy for Local Engineering Firm

This story has been updated with a correction. Please see the editor's note at the bottom.

In mixed news for the Odenton business community, a local electrical contracting company has successfully completed a major expansion of its operations, but is also outgrowing its current home base and looking to relocate.

Rommel Engineering & Construction Co. – currently based at 1177 Patuxent Rd. – disclosed last week that it had the completed acquisition of a major competitor, L.H. Cranston & Sons Inc., of Hunt Valley. Both companies are electrical and building contractors active in central Maryland and beyond.

Financial terms of the transaction are not being disclosed by the privately owned company, said Don Limburg, president of the closely related firm Rommel Capital Management. However, in terms of the number of employees involved, the deal will more than double the size of the Odenton company, he said.

Limburg said the purchase was undertaken just as Cranston, which has operated in the region for 65 years, faced bankruptcy and liquidation.

Indeed, Cranston filed a notice Aug. 22 with the Maryland Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation informing the agency it intended to close its doors and dismiss all of its employees.

The rescue by Rommel succeeded, however, in saving the jobs of almost all the Cranston workers, Limburg said. About 200 Cranston employees were hired by Rommel, with only about a dozen senior Cranston managers and others actually losing their jobs, he said. About 150 workers were hired in Rommel's construction division, with another 50 in the company's service division.

“We had some very happy people here when we were able to announce we would be hiring almost everybody. Cranston had some of outstanding people on the staff and we feel lucky to be able to keep them,” Limburg said.

Among the senior managers who are no longer associated with the company are former president A. Norman Hatmaker and former sales and marketing chief Brian T. Hatmaker. Members of the Hatmaker family were formerly part owners of Cranston, Limburg said.

For the purpose of more efficient marketing and administration, the Rommel-Cranston combination is being reorganized onto two new separate entities, Limburg added.

The elements of the company that are primarily concerned with new construction of buildings and other structure will be combined into Rommel Cranston Construction LLC, while the servicing of electrical and mechanical systems will be handled through Rommel Cranston LLC, he said.

An example of the kind of work being done by Rommel construction personnel is a major electrical sub-contracting job at the new University of Maryland Baltimore County performing arts center in Arbutus, Limburg noted.

Reorganization will also mean relocation, the Rommel executive said.

Neither the Odenton nor the Hunt Valley offices are well located or the right size for the two new companies, so a search for more suitable quarters is underway, he said. He declined to specify where Rommel intended to establish its new facilities, although he said a number of good sites had already been scouted.

Relocation will not be immediate, however, and the management ofthe two new companies will operate out of the old Cranston office in Hunt Valley until full relocation plans are developed, he said.

One competitor commented that the merger of Rommel and Cranston would have little effect on the business climate in the electrical contracting sector.

“I don’t see this having a lot of impact. There is always a lot of competition in our business, and I don’t know how this changes any of that,” said Martin Knott, president of Timonium-based Knott Mechanical.

Knott’s comments notwithstanding, the Cranston deal is a major development for Rommel Cos., which is a growing network of related companies in the area, Limburg said.

In addition to the electrical contracting business, owner David Rommel also controls Harley-Davidson motorcycle dealerships in Annapolis and New Castle, DE, he said. Combined employment at Rommel Cos. enterprises currently stands at around 500, according to Limburg.

Editor's note: A previous version of this article incorrectly stated the total number of Cranston workers hired. Rommel will hire a total of 200 workers, with 150 added to the company's construction division and another 50 in the service division.