Mid-America Security moves to bigger digs

CLARKSVILLE, Ky.-Alarm company Mid-America Security has relocated to a new facility, nearly double the size of its current digs to accommodate the growth of its commercial security business and that of its sister guard company. Mid-America, formed three and a half years ago, has seen its customer base grow a steady 25 percent each year, said Stan Moore, a founding partner and the company's treasurer. Moore is also the president of 10-year-old Moore Security, a guard company with 400 employees that serves the Louisville, Ky. and southern Indiana market from its new location here. A 20-year veteran of the guard business, Moore said Mid-America was born after receiving so many requests from potential Moore customers looking for electronic security services instead of or in addition to security guards. Many of the requests Moore sent along to Eddie Pile, who worked for some of the different national companies. Pile is now Moore's partner in Mid-America. The two companies together have annual revenues of about $10 million. "We've capitalized on that customer base," Moore said. "Mid-America was in a sense almost supported in the beginning by Moore Security, and (Pile's) past relationship with other customers, but it's really grown into its own entity now." Moore said Mid-America and Moore Security will share 3,500 square feet of the new 6,000 square foot building, and will lease the remaining 2,500 square feet to other commercial tenants. The purchase price of the building was $300,000. The company's old location, also in Clarksville, was about 1,900 square feet. Quarters are already tight at the new facility, so Moore said the company will look at expanding into more of the building over the next few years. Although Mid-America's headquarters is its only sales and service location, the company services about 400 installations throughout the country and in Canada, through a series of relationships with subcontractors, Moore said. The company's relationship with its contract monitoring station in Louisville was so solid that it decided against opening its own because of the relationship, Moore said. The company's business, which is about 99 percent commercial, Moore said, has been aided since the company's inception by the acquisitions and consolidations of the larger companies in the industry. "We've realized a lot of success through (Mid-America) because of the way the national firms keep merging and buying one another," Moore said. "It's developing into a real niche for a locally owned company that focuses on customer service," he said.