National Trench Safety, a Houston-based trench and traffic safety equipment rental specialist last week announced the acquisition of certain operating assets of US Shoring’s Miami and Tampa, Fla., operations.
“We are very excited to be entering the Florida market,” said Ron Chilton, president of NTS. “While Florida has suffered from the economic downturn, we believe there is a significant amount of potential in the market. Both Miami and Tampa are large metropolitan areas with a diverse mix of highway and utility construction. We also anticipate increased market share through the introduction of new product lines to capitalize on and expand existing opportunities and customer relationships in the Florida market.
“Expansion into Florida has been a priority for NTS for the last few years and this further expands our nationwide footprint.As part of the transaction we are acquiring a significant amount of rental fleet that will be used to support our new Florida operations. We will be optimizing that fleet in the coming months and anticipate making a significant investment in additional rental fleet assets and will also be introducing several new products to the market.”
The transaction also allows NTS to gain some highly experienced personnel who have many years operating in the Florida markets. Ernie Perez and Richard Hearn will continue to manage the Miami and Tampa locations respectively.
“Ernie and Richard are both trench safety veterans with significant experience in the industry,” Chilton said. “Ernie, Richard and the Tampa salesman, Sam Manna, have all worked with the principals of NTS at our prior company. We are very excited to have all of them back on the NTS team.”
The Florida locations are the 17th and 18th branch locations for National Trench Safety in the United States. NTS now has operations in Arizona, California, Florida, Illinois, Louisiana, Nevada, North Carolina, South Carolina, Texas and Utah.
NTS plans to open several new branch operations in 2013 with additional branches planned to follow in 2014. For more information about NTS, visit www.ntsafety.com.
