After declaring bankruptcy about a year after opening its 57,000-square-foot production facility in Burton Township, Engineering Endeavors Inc. was sold at auction Aug. 6 by Cleveland bankruptcy attorney Thomas Coffey.
After declaring bankruptcy about a year after opening its 57,000-square-foot production facility in Burton Township, Engineering Endeavors Inc. was sold at auction Aug. 6 by Cleveland bankruptcy attorney Thomas Coffey.
The winning bidder, V&S Schuler Engineering Inc. of Canton, paid more than $4 million for the new building, its contents and more than 18 acres situated on Kinsman Road.
EEI’s sister company, P&G Capital, was also sold, according to Tom Coffey, EEI attorney.
“We had 34 rounds of bidding at the auction, resulting in a $6.4 million sale price for the assets of both companies. The initial bid had been $2.6 million,” Coffey said in an email Oct. 1.
The sale allowed recouping of a $451,000 loan for the Geauga County Revolving Loan Fund, among other creditors, said Geauga County Economic Development Director David Favorite.
The process took two or three hours before V&S Schuler won the bid over five other bidders, Favorite said.
He credited Coffey with organizing the process speedily, running the auction and getting the money back to the loan fund so it can become available to other Geauga County businesses.
“Obviously we were very happy V&S bought the business out of bankruptcy. Coffey told us at auction he wanted to move it quickly. It was a very robust auction,” Favorite said.
The facility was built by EEI co-owners Pat Deloney, president, and Jeff Syslo, vice president of sales, and Gerry Truax, chief operations and fiscal officer, in order to consolidate their business on one site.
The operation moved from Mentor to the Frohring Building on state Route 87 in Burton Township in 2009. The market for its products — cell phone towers and other big steel structures for the wireless industry and electric utilities — grew so fast, EEI was storing materials in several locations around the township at different times.
EEI moved to its new location in late 2017 with about 50 employees, expecting to hire another 20 in the next two years to keep up with demand for its products.
County Commissioner Tim Lennon said the industry is on a roller coater and the material costs can fluctuate a lot.
“It’s unfortunate (the bankruptcy) happened,” he said, adding the county avoided a big loss due to the quick sale of EEI. “(GCEDD Assistant Director) Kelly (Conrad) and Dave (Favorite) jumped on it quickly. We really dodged a bullet.”
One of the many agreements put in place when EEI planned its new building was a 10-year tax abatement that Favorite said would not be passed on to V&S.
The abatement is relinquished and normal taxes will be assessed on the structure, he said.
V&S purchased the facility, at 15175 Kinsman Road, on Sept. 17 for $4.25 million, according to the Geauga County Auditor’s Office website.
The V&S website says the company has 51,000 square feet of fabrication space and modern equipment with the ability to provide a wide range of structural steel projects, including transmission and distribution lines, substations, simple bridges, building steel, conveyor systems and concrete imbeds.
The purchase of EEI more than doubles its production space.
Geauga County Commissioners, in a press release dated Sept. 27, announced the collection of funds owed to the fund from P&G Capital LLC/EEI Acquisition Corporation was completed due to collaboration between Geauga County Prosecutor Jim Flaiz, assistant prosecuting attorney Laura LaChapelle, Conrad and Favorite. Attorney Kirk Roessler was also credited.
“The name ‘Engineered Endeavors’ was one of the assets sold, and the company originally known as EEI or Engineered Endeavors has now changed its official corporate name to Old Pole Co., Inc. so that the buyer can use the Engineered Endeavors name,” Coffey said. “We are working on collecting money still owed by customers and hope to make additional distributions to creditors.”
