12 minute read
LM&M - September 2023
Celebrating 70 years of NALMCO!
1950s- NALMCO Is Born
In 1953, the #1 rated television show was I love Lucy; the Best Picture Oscar went to From Here to Eternity, and Ernest Hemingway won a Pulitzer Prize with The Old Man and the Sea. In Washington, President Eisenhower authorized $60 million in aid to France for her “Indochina War.” On January 22-23, 1953, a group of 27 men met for one of the first planned lighting maintenance seminars ever held, hosted by General Electric at Nela Park in Cleveland, and the idea of a yearly meeting first sparked.
In Chicago that same year, two men met at the Industrial Plant Maintenance Show and started to compare notes about their new lighting maintenance businesses. Edward Creed (C&S Lighting) of Cleveland and Herbert Mendelsohn (Sun Ray Lighting Corporation) of Kansas City decided to form an association so that “all or any lighting maintenance companies such as ours could get together annually to exchange ideas and maybe even customers. Also, one of our goals was to get recognition from the lamp and ballast manufacturers as a viable business,” revealed Mendelsohn in a 2002 interview. “Ed also served as a Colonel in the Army Reserves and was a real forceful man. He assigned me to put together a meeting of persons known to be in this business from lists he had access to through his contacts at GE. That’s how NALMCO got started!”
Letters went back and forth, and an informal meeting was held at the Industrial Plant Maintenance Show in January 1954. Bert Osterman (T.L. Rosenberg Company) of Oakland, California, served as a temporary chairman. It was decided then to formally convene that Spring in Cincinnati, since it was central to most (but no lighting maintenance company existed there then, making planning challenging). Mendelsohn was placed in charge of all the logistics (but was unable to attend the first convention that he had so carefully organized since his wife had to undergo emergency surgery the night before).
The first annual convention of the National Association of Lighting Maintenance Contractors (NALMCO) met at the Sheraton Gibson Hotel in Cincinnati, Ohio, from May 19-21, 1954. Melvin Galbraith (Approved Lighting Service) of Cedar Rapids, Iowa, vividly recollected in a 2002 interview, “It was a very positive group of men. All were not lighting maintenance contractors but were associated with it and had a keen interest. A very congenial group it was.”
Creed presided over the first meeting with commanding authority, remembered Malger Gray (Fluorescent Service, Inc.) of Tampa. By a group consensus, Walter Fink (Senior Fluorescent, Inc.) was appointed the new association’s first President. Luther Nunnally, Jr. (Fluorescent Maintenance Co., Inc.) was named the first Secretary/Treasurer.
In the beginning, annual dues were $50 per company. The idea of The Main-Lighter newsletter first occurred in 1957 in the Milwaukee office of then-president Glen Shotola (Lighting Service, Inc.).
The Watson Brothers of Denver (Fluorescent Maintenance Company) produced the first issues. According to brother James Watson in a 2002 interview, his older brother Bob Watson did all the writing for the first few years. Member volunteers around the country handled all administrative duties. According to a history article by Elmo Irwin (Lighting Service, Inc.) published in the May 1971 issue of The Main-Lighter, he and Bob Watson collaborated on the first circular insignia for NALMCO, which was later revised by Malger Gray to included mercury and incandescent lamps. Cloth patches of the new NALMCO logo were also made available and became quite popular for member company employee uniforms.
Irwin wrote about the formative years, “Rules, regulations and by-laws had to be decided on. For example, one rule in the original by-laws called for one member to a town. In fact, one member kept another contractor 60 miles away out of NALMCO for almost two years until this segment of the by-laws was changed.” In addition to annual spring meetings, regional meetings were instituted to bring increased training and new information direct to members.
1960s The Association Grows
In early 1960, the Association’s first national office opened in Cleveland under the direction of its first paid staff member, Executive Secretary Will Carlton. In 1961, the National Accounts committee sent out its first direct mail letter to 38 prospective customers including Safeway, Kroger, W.T. Grant Co., S.S. Kresge, Texaco, Prudential, and F.W. Woolworth. Melvin Galbraith, committee chair, recalls making hundreds of personal sales calls to these firms on behalf of NALMCO.
Publications presented for the first time included the Management Guide and Operating Ratios Survey. A National Directory of Members By Region for business solicitation purposes was printed in 1967. The first Code of Ethics appeared, drafted by then-president Melvin Galbraith and his executive committee including Bob Watson and Ed Creed. Classified and display advertisements began being accepted in The Main-Lighter to increase association income. A new member solicitation packet appeared complete with brochures and leaflets in 1968. General member dues started at $160 per year at that time and were based on a sliding scale of business income.
1970s NALMCO Goes International
The first Labor Units Manual is published in 1973. A new thick blue binder containing supplier catalogs is presented as the first Buyer’s Guide in 1974. (Some members wonder if a specialty tool is required to open the bulky hinge.) In 1975, under the leadership of then-president James Watson, the association formally changed its name to reflect its expanding worldwide focus to “interNational Association of Lighting Maintenance Contractors,” and a new logo was crafted and put into use.
In 1976, the annual convention was held in Hawaii for the first time. In 1977, the annual was held for the first time outside of the USA – in Toronto. December 1978 is declared the last issue of The Main-Lighter due to increased printing and postage costs. Simple newsletters called “Updates” are issued until The Main-Lighter glossy version is resurrected by widespread demand in May 1979.
1980s NALMCO Members Get Certified!
The first Certified Lighting Maintenance Contractor (CLMC) pilot program test was given in Summer 1980 in Toronto (CLMC was changed to Certified Lighting Management Consultant in 1987). Nine members took the exam, and all triumphantly passed. The first official CLMC examination was held at the annual in New Orleans in April 1981 with 14 members sitting for the test – and all became certified.
The Labor Units Manual is updated in September 1984. Training, troubleshooting and safety manuals are written. In 1986, then-president Irwin Davis, CLMC (ABD Lighting Management Company) and his Board voted to discontinue the regional meetings in favor of one Fall Seminar, effective in 1987.
Following up on the efforts of past-presidents R. Harold Chappell, CLMC, and Davis, president Cary Mendelsohn, CLMC (Imperial Lighting Maintenance) oversaw another rebranding, as the association became the interNational Association of Lighting Management Companies. New articles of incorporation for the association are filed in Pennsylvania in 1988.
1990s More Certifications Added
Norma Frank, CLMC (Colorado Lighting, Inc.) spearheads NALMCO endorsement and participation in the EPA’s Green Lights program, launched in 1991. More importantly, in cooperation with IES and the EPA, Frank instigates, investigates, coordinates, and records the groundbreaking Luminaire Dirt Depreciation Study (LDD). The Updated Code of Ethics was issued in 1991.
Frank served as the first female President, from 1989 – 1991. She had three requests at the first board meeting:
1. No cigars during meeting
2. Agree to use Robert’s Rules of Order
3. Remove the pin-up girls in our training slides
The Main-Lighter newsletter retires and is replaced by the glossy Lighting Management & Maintenance (LM&M) magazine in July 1992. Record attendance of 297 members and guests graced the annual at Nashville’s Opryland Hotel in 1995. Additional certification programs for Certified Apprentice Lighting Technicians (CALT), Certified Senior Lighting Technicians (CSLT) and re-certification programs for the CLMCs are instituted. Michael Walls, CLMC (Master Lighting Service, Inc.) leads the effort to create CLMC preexam preparation and study materials.
Presidents Charles Ryerson, CLMC (Luminaire Service, Inc.) and Chris Boren, CLMC (Lighting Maintenance & Service, Inc.) gave direction to create a Business Plan and Marketing Plan resource materials for members. Ron Gilcrease, CLMC (Amtech Lighting Services) helped design a wide array of marketing materials and promotions for all members to use. Gilcrease and Jami Wilson, CLMC (Light Inc.) lent support to Douglas Townsley, CLMC (DEL-Electric/Primo Lighting) to create, design, and launch the NALMCO website in May 1998. Stephen Hatch, CLMC (Tri-County Lighting, Inc.) supervised preparation of the training video library.
2000s Continued Growth
The Illuminating Engineering Society, in conjunction with NALMCO, released the very first published document on maintaining a lighting system, Recommended Practice for Planned Indoor Lighting Maintenance, in 2003. This document highlighted maintenance as an integral part of a lighting system from design to installation and now maintaining the system to secure the integrity of the design as well as the performance of the design. The Recommended Practice has seen multiple updates as the industry continues to mature. RP-36 is now a recognized American National Standards Institute document and can be found for sale on the IES website.
The Association continued to grow in the 21st century and committed to its certification programs. They elected their second female President, Jami Hall (Stones River Electric), who served from 1999 to 2001.
Victor Frank (Colorado Lighting, Inc.), President from 2004 to 2005, focused his time in office working diligently on the financial structure of the organization which helped stabilize a strong foundation for NALMCO’s future.
2010s to Present Navigating a Changing Industry
Christopher Frank’s (Colorado Lighting, Inc.) presidency (20172018) marked the entrance of second-generation leadership into the NALMCO family. Following his mother, Norma Frank (1989-1991), and father, Victor Frank (2004-2005), Chris represented the sustainability of the Association, bringing both old tradition as well as new ideas to the table. Stepping in right behind Chris, Scott Mendelsohn (Imperial Lighting Maintenance) served as President from 2021 to 2022, following his father, Cary Mendelsohn’s (1987-1989) footsteps.
A decade into the LED revolution, NALMCO sponsored an important study of the useful life of LED exit signs and the potential conflict with their intended role to support navigation during an emergency. The study, Assessing LED EXIT Sign Brightness Degradation, was completed in 2021. The study was conducted by the Light and Health Research Center (LHRC), funded by the McClung Lighting Research Foundation. Results showed nearly 25 percent of the roughly 350 field tested exit signs showed luminance below the target threshold. Based on the Department of Energy estimates, an estimated 40 million plus exit signs are installed in the US. If even just 10 percent produced insufficient luminance, this represents millions of signs that are operational but not doing their primary job as related to safety.
In July of 2022, NALMCO partnered with EdisonReport to relaunch Lighting Management & Maintenance (LM&M), with the goal of bringing the most relevant and up-to-date information from the lighting maintenance world to its readership.
The Association continues to serve the lighting community by providing education, certification, and networking opportunities to its growing membership. NALMCO is in good hands, and the future is bright!
