H&K Equipment, a Pittsburgh-based forklift and material handling equipment distributor, has launched the H&K Equipment Group. H&K Equipment, the company said, is the flagship business of an affiliation of eight independent companies united under common ownership. The H&K Equipment Group brings each of these companies together for the first time to showcase the full reach and scope of their products and services. The company unveiled the new designation at AISTech 2019 at the David L. LawrenceConvention Center in Pittsburgh.
"We have eight companies operating in overlapping markets," Peter Cicero, vice-president of H&K Equipment said. "Each of our companies has carved out their niche, but we haven't had a good way to talk about how they intersect. Taken together, our companies comprise one of the biggest and fastest growing material handling businesses in this part of the country."
The group, which includes two material handling and industrial floor cleaning equipment dealerships, an overhead crane manufacturer, an industrial electromagnet manufacturer, a full-service terminal tractor dealership, a transportation and logistics service, and a granite countertop fabricating company, maintains 10 locations throughout Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, Baltimore, upstate New York, and Pennsylvania's Lehigh Valley. The companies employ a combined workforce of 325 and service nearly all the Mid-Atlantic United States.
Kevin Koch, vice-president of Taylor Northeast, which became H&K Equipment's first affiliate company in 1989, added that the purpose of the H&K Equipment Group was to better communicate how the companies complement each other.
"You might have a customer renting a forklift from me, and that same customer is using a bridge crane that our crane company fabricated to run an electromagnet that our magnet company designed and built," Koch said. "Plus, everything was delivered to the customer's location by our own transportation team, and that customer has no idea that it all came from us, that together we provide all these services."
Cicero noted that the structure of H&K Equipment's corporate network is not changing but added that he expects the H&K Equipment Group concept to be a valuable cross-promotional tool.
"There's almost nowhere we do business where there isn't a wide range of equipment and services that our companies can provide that customer. It's never just one truck or one service call. Educating the public about our full capabilities is going to be extremely beneficial," Cicero said.
