from the company web site:
Evans Electric was formed in 1954 when Myron Evans and his son, Charles M Evans, decided to quit their jobs and go into business for themselves. They formed a father-son partnership, hired one employee, Frank Coker, and put their wives to work doing all of the office work. In the early days of Evans Electric, it was not uncommon for Myron, Charles and Frank to spend all day soliciting business, load their pickup trucks with the jobs they were able to get, bring them into the shop and work late into the night completing the jobs and then deliver completed jobs as they made their sales calls the following day. The business grew and they added employees, some of whom are still with the Company today. In 1968 Myron Evans was approaching retirement age and decided to sell his interest in the partnership to his son, Charles Evans. After acquiring the total business, Charles operated Evans Electric as a sole proprietorship until 1972, when the Company was incorporated under the laws of the State of Oklahoma. In 1996 the Evans Electric Motor Company changed its name to Evans Enterprises, Inc. and now runs with the involvement of third and fourth generation members of the Evans' family. With 10 plants spread across 5 states, the legacy of integrity, hard work and superior quality continues to thrive at Evans Enterprises, Inc. Today, Syndy Evans-Thrash chairs the Board of Directors as CEO and President, and Rusty Thrash brings years of experience and know-how to his position as Senior Vice President of our Northwest Region.
Plant Expansions
The Company has expanded it's market area by adding plants in Tulsa, Oklahoma in 1974, Rogers, Arkansas in 1978, Wichita Falls, Texas in 1982 and Fort Smith, Arkansas in 1985. In 1992 the Tulsa Plant manager proposed establishing a small plant in the Mid America Industrial Park in Pryor, Oklahoma. Pryor is about 45 miles east of Tulsa and the manager wanted to only hire technical people at the Pryor location and do all of the invoicing, payroll, purchasing and similar administrative activities in the Tulsa Plant. The concept was approved and the first Evans Electric Satellite operation was established in Pryor, Oklahoma in April of 1992. Since that initial effort proved to be so profitable, Tulsa added Satellite operations in Coffeyville, Kansas, in 1994 and Rogers added a Satellite operation in Nixa, Missouri (suburb of Springfield, Missouri) in 1995 and Fort Smith added a Satellite in Conway, Arkansas in 1995. Our newest location in Waco, TX was added in 1997.
General Information
Evans Enterprises, Inc. primarily derived its income from sales and repair of electric motors and related equipment for many years. Anything that involves starting, operating, controlling or is driven by an electric motor falls into the realm of expertise offered by Evans Enterprises, Inc. Historically, about 52% of our revenue is generated by the repair operations and 48% is generated by apparatus sales. In recent years, it became evident to Evans management that the market place we serve was undergoing some drastic changes. It would be only a short time before these changes would significantly impact the way most EASA shops do business and most smaller shops, depending solely on electric motor repair, would cease to exist. Many factors caused this change, such as the advent of solid state controls, lower costs of new motors vs. repairs, fluctuations in the economic climate of the markets we serve, extreme competition for a declining repair market, and emphasis on improved preventive maintenance techniques.
Evans immediately undertook the challenge of redefining how we would expand, diversify and better serve our customers in order to meet our growth projections in a declining industry. The Oklahoma City plant was the first to diversify into the new market of AC Variable Frequency Drives. Since then, all Evans plants have become leaders in the field of applying, supplying, commissioning and servicing AC Variable Frequency Drives. Oklahoma City also expanded into the Air Compressor market by selling and servicing many brands of air compressors as well as establishing an Electronics Service Department. The Tulsa plant followed suit by acquiring large motors and developing a Re-manufacturing Operation that provides Rebuilt and Guaranteed equipment to customers around the world. Tulsa and other Evans plants have established Hoist Service Departments that provide inspections, load tests, and service for a wide variety of hoists and accessories. Most of the Evans plants have recognized the importance of Predictive Maintenance and have trained dedicated technicians that provide these services to our customers. By gathering critical data, trending and analyzing the results these Predictive Maintenance services have allowed our customers to prevent catastrophic failures and correct problems. These are only a few of the many ways Evans Enterprises, Inc. has expanded and diversified in order to remain a viable company and allow us to better serve our customers.
With this kind of demonstrated progressive management attitude, the general market place of Evans Enterprises continues to expand into areas not normally serviced by electric motor repair shops and as a result, the future success of Evans Enterprises is not only assured, but has very exciting probabilities.
Competition
The business of sales and repair of electric motors and controls is highly competitive and is becoming more so all the time. Equipment developments in recent years in the area of dynamic balancing, insulating and impregnating windings such as the vacuum pressure impregnation system, core loss testing equipment, load testing equipment and other similar items are being used to establish a competitive edge, not only in the selling process, but in the actual quality of the work being produced. Evans competes with both national and local concerns which serve substantially the same market areas, with the same kind of service. National concerns (such as General Electric and Westinghouse) are significantly larger than Evans Enterprises, however excluding the national concerns, Evans, with its 250+ employees is a giant in an industry where the average motor shop, on a nation wide basis, employs approximately 8 to 10 people including the owner.
Evans' principal methods of competing are integrity, service, quality, pricing and staying abreast of state of the art equipment, materials and processes. In addition, the diversification activities, are for the most part, into market areas where the competition is not nearly as intense as it is in the electric motor repair business.
Although we strive to know what our competition is doing and where emphasis is being placed in their day to day activities, we welcome competition because it is only through the continuing battle to surpass our competitors that we can and do continue to improve.
Customers
Evans Enterprises, Inc. has approximately 7,900 regular customers spread primarily over the five state area of Oklahoma, Arkansas, Texas, Kansas and Missouri, however, we currently have customers located in 46 different states, and sell large, remanufactured motors throughout the world. No individual customer accounts for 10% or more of total sales. Evans customers include a variety of businesses, primarily involving manufacturing or other industrial production. On a regular basis, work is done for steel mills, extruding plants, rock crushers, cement plants, glass plants, oil refineries, pipelines, electric generating plants, municipalities, state and federal governmental entities, poultry processing plants and a myriad of other business types. Evans' customer list has been described as a "Who's Who" of Businesses and includes such well known names as Goodyear Tire and Rubber, Michelin Tire, Oklahoma Gas & Electric, Entergy Corporation, Kansas City Power & Light, Lower Colorado River Authority, Tinker and Sheppard Air Force Bases, Fort Hood Army Base, The Federal Aviation Administration, The US Department of Defense, Quanex Mac Steel, Nucor Steel, Structural Metals Inc., Cemex Cement, Lone Star Cement, St. Gobain, Anchor Glass, Pittsburgh Plate Glass, Planter's Peanuts, M&M Mars, Ford Motor Co., Holly Industries, Shell Oil, Diamond Offshore Drilling, American Airlines and many more.