Around-the-Clock Solutions
Priority Rental provides heating and cooling for every situation
Luke Mulholland, Gerry Frey and Rob Johnstone have been in business together since 1994. Gerry and Rob were roommates in college, and they met Luke just out of college. After successfully launching and growing two businesses together—a transport company called Priority Express and a record storage company called Priority Archives—the three partners decided to found Priority Rental, a continuation of the Priority family of businesses. Priority Rental offers short-term rentals of dehumidification, heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) units for remediation, commercial use and institutional properties or outdoor events.
The company offers 24/7 services to tackle temporary, and in many cases, emergency temperature-control issues. If the air conditioning breaks in a large building, Priority Rental offers an immediate, temporary solution until a new permanent system is installed. Or if the weather suddenly turns cold and heat is needed at a construction project, nursing home, a wedding or a sporting event, Priority Rental is ready to help.
The business operates out of two warehouses servicing the metropolitan area from New York City to Washington, D.C. From the company’s 140,000-square-foot Philadelphia warehouse, Priority Rental provides quick services throughout much of Pennsylvania, Maryland and Delaware, including Philadelphia, Allentown, Reading, Hershey, Baltimore, Wilmington, Newark and Washington, D.C. Their New Jersey warehouse serves clients in New Jersey and New York City, including Jersey City, Atlantic City, Trenton and Princeton. Unlike many of their competitors, Priority Rental has enough warehouse space to keep all of its equipment stored indoors, and by doing so, ensures its units are protected and well maintained.
A Clear Focus
Priority Rental started with the owners and one employee. Five years later, the business now has 15 employees working out of its two warehouses. Luke, the operating partner, oversees all of the daily operations, while Gerry and Rob contribute to strategic planning and purchasing. While the plan is to continue to grow, Luke is focused on ensuring that in that growth the company maintains a clear aim for the future.
“It’s been a challenge to stay focused on just HVAC and to not try to rent everything. We want to be able to focus so that we’re the best in the market,” Luke says. “We really strive to provide the best service we can by thinking hard about how the equipment works and how it can solve our client’s problem.”
This dedication to problem solving was apparent on a recent job for a local Philadelphia hospital that was having its magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) unit renovated. The hospital had a temporary MRI unit set up in an outdoor trailer located 50 feet away from the doors to the main hospital building. To avoid patients having to walk outside to get to the unit, Priority Rental set up a tent to connect the building and the trailer, which they then heated and cooled to maintain a comfortable temperature.
“That was an unusual but good solution that we found to solve that problem,” Luke says.
Seasonal Activities
Since so much of the demand for their products is based on the weather, Priority Rental is a seasonally driven business. When it’s hot, clients need cooling, and when it’s cold, they need heating.
In order to maintain a full-time staff all year and to raise the bar on the quality of the service they provide to their clients, the company has developed a seasonal routine. In the busy season, most of the staff is out in the field, doing deliveries and installations. In slower seasons, the company invests time to train its team to a technician-level standard. The staff is taught to maintain the company’s equipment by two of the company’s certified HVAC technicians and operating managers, Rob Eganey and Harry Fassett. It is also during the slower season that the company hosts staff barbecues on Fridays.
In the autumn, Priority Rental receives back air conditioning units that have been rented out over the summer. The team breaks down, cleans, repairs and, if needed, repaints every piece of equipment, a tremendous and challenging undertaking. To motivate the team during these maintenance exercises, the company throws impromptu barbecues, training sessions and a variety of competitions for cash prizes.
The team is also trained to work hard, stay positive and to maintain a customer focus. Chris Morrison, an installer and estimator for Priority Rental, was one of the company’s first employees. He sets a strong example of this work ethic for the rest of the team. Outside of his day job with Priority Rental, he works actively with the charity Operation First Response, which helps wounded and disabled war veterans and their families to meet their personal and financial needs. The charity holds annual events in Philadelphia and Atlantic City. Priority Rental donates transportation vehicles and generators for these events every year.
A Diverse Set of Clients
Priority Rental provides services for retail and office-space property management companies, and local hospitals and nursing homes—organizations that are consistently in need of temporary HVAC solutions because of the ongoing renovations that they undertake.
Mechanical contractors often come to Priority Rental when they’re in the middle of changing HVAC systems and they need a temporary solution, or if they don’t want to contaminate new permanent equipment during the construction period.
The company is also called upon in certain types of disaster recovery situations, particularly during the hurricane seasons, to dry out buildings that have been subjected to flooding. In these cases, Priority Rental provides equipment to a remediation company that specializes in disaster cleanup.
The business even partners with their competitors. Priority Rental will work with major rental companies, such as Sunbelt Rentals or United Rentals, on projects where they may secure a contract but they need additional equipment.
“One of the things that was different for us in our other businesses was that other industries are much more competitive. In this one, we work well together and have a great relationship with our competitors,” Luke says. “We work with them on jobs, and we’ve both rented from one another. Everyone we’ve dealt with has a lot of integrity, and we haven’t had any bad experiences.”