Minnesota company expands into Richmond area

By: John Reid Blackwell | Richmond Times-Dispatch
Published: February 14, 2012

A Minnesota-based maker of electrical control panels has opened its first East Coast location in Henrico County.

Design Ready Controls Inc., based in Minneapolis, opened in January in about 13,500 square feet of leased space at 4211 Carolina Ave.

The privately held company is investing $300,000 in the new operation, which builds electrical control panels used for heating, ventilation and air conditioning systems.

"These are not the control panels you would see outside your home," said Patrick Conley, the company's director of operations. "These are for hospitals and schools and business centers."

The Henrico site now has 15 employees and expects to increase its staff to 25 in the first quarter of this year. The company is hiring electrical wiremen, electrical testers, quality inspectors, office staff and warehouse personnel.

"What we are looking for are people with some electrical wiring background" and computer skills, Conley said. "The ability to read a schematic would be an added bonus."

Conley said the company chose the Richmond region because of its central location on the East Coast, its workforce and its universities.

The company, which has about 180 employees, also recently expanded in Portland, Ore., and saw sales growth of about 48 percent in 2011.

"As the economy rebounds, we are seeing an increase in new construction, and we are seeing an increase in refabs of buildings that were built in the '80s," Conley said. "There is a big push in the market today to become more energy-efficient."