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The Ballymore Profile |  |
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World
War II had just ended and the nation - and industry - began to tool
up for the pent up demand for consumer, commercial and industrial products
and services.
Taking a page out of Henry Ford's philosophy for successful business,
"find a need and Like everyone coming out of the war, John Colgan was looking for opportunity. In 1945 he bought an Iceberg frozen food franchise and rented space for a small store and frozen foods lockers. Because household refrigerators did not yet have freezers, housewives would buy their frozen foods at the special store and keep them in rented freezers in the same building. Colgan was concerned that the wooden A-type ladder customers used to access the upper lockers was cumbersome and unsteady. Armed with his background in wartime shipbuilding, he designed a rolling stairway with handrails and casters which were supported by springs that would compress with weight and "lock" the legs to the ground. Iceberg liked his idea and began offering the "safety step" ladder with every franchise. Meanwhile, the president of the local bank came in to pick up some frozen vegetables and thought the ladder was just what the bank needed to access their safety deposit boxes. Colgan began marketing to banks. By now he was spending more time making ladders than selling frozen foods. He sold the franchise and started his own company. The year was 1946. The company was Ballymore. By 1950, the company had outgrown the rented garage behind the frozen foods store and moved to Wayne, PA. In 1956, the company acquired its current West Chester location to accommodate a growing list of national material handling and safety distributors. Since then the company has undergone four major plant expansions in order to meet growing market needs In addition to being the first manufacturer of rolling safety ladders, Ballymore was one of the first companies to make hydraulically powered personnel lifts, having started in the 1950's, and since its inception has been known for making custom access stands, platforms and systems. Today, more than 30 major catalogs display Ballymore products. Over 1800 distributors turn to Ballymore for their conventional and special access needs. Throughout the years, Ballymore's reputation for high quality equipment, manufactured in steel, aluminum and stainless, has resulted in contracts with virtually all of the corporations, government agencies and institutions you are familiar with. Today,
as part of the Osage/RAF organization, Ballymore is gearing up to the
21st century.
A re-engineering process is underway to incorporate robotics
and cellular manufacturing in order to develop a more efficient manufacturing
environment. |
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fill it," a small company opened its doors in Bryn Mawr, PA to fill
industry's need for ladders to access shelving, production machinery
and hard-to-reach areas requiring maintenance - safely.