The Fulton Companies to move commercial heating division to Cicero

CICERO — The Fulton Companies — a business based in the Oswego County town of Richland that engineers, manufactures, and sells commercial and industrial heat transfer equipment — is moving its commercial heating division to Onondaga County.

That division, known as Fulton Heating Solutions, Inc. (FHS), plans to shift many of its services to a building it recently acquired in the town of Cicero, situated at 6288 Running Ridge Road, according to Erin Sperry, director of commercial heating products at FHS. The division’s management, engineering, sales, customer service, marketing, and aftermarket service functions are expected to make the move, she says.

More FHS activities will eventually be moved to Cicero, including a product demonstration center sometime in 2016. Sperry says she can’t be more specific on these plans at this time.

The Fulton Companies hopes manufacturing operations will begin in the Cicero facility within five years, according to the minutes of a June meeting of the Cicero planning board.

About 60 employees will transfer to Cicero, Sperry says. The Fulton Companies employs more than 300 people in New York, and about 800 globally, she adds, with facilities in Canada, England, and China.

The Fulton Companies doesn’t have plans to hire more workers, although that could change later this year, according to Sperry.

An added benefit to the Cicero location is the ability to recruit from the large Syracuse workforce, she says. The company was having difficulty recruiting, first, because most Syracuse–area residents don’t want to commute that far, and second, because the company has nearly depleted the local talent around its Richland headquarters.

Company owner, president, and CEO R. Bramley Palm, Jr. — whose grandfather, Lewis Palm, founded the company in 1949 — purchased the Cicero building, according to Sperry.

Palm bought the one-story, 35,000-square-foot building in February 2015, for $1.7 million, according to Onondaga County’s online property records.

Moving much of the FHS services to Cicero is intended to provide some separation between the commercial and industrial elements of the company, and will create additional office and manufacturing space at the company headquarters — situated at 972 Centerville Road in Richland — for other company divisions to grow, according to Sperry.

The Fulton Companies tailors products for several industries, including laundry dry-cleaning, gas processing, and craft brewing.

“Bram [Palm] knew it would be smart to divide the commercial from the industrial because they are so different,” she says.

The two divisions offer different product types, as well as sales and marketing methods.

“There are distinctive features to the commercial product types, such as specialized alloys of stainless steel in the commercial boiler heat exchangers, that is not found in the industrial products,” Sperry explains in an email to the CNYBJ.

In addition, the two divisions have different customization needs. “On the industrial side, Fulton will often not only provide the boilers, but also an engineered 

system to accompany the equipment. This approach is less common in the commercial market,” she says.

No major modifications are planned for the Cicero building. The interior will be partially renovated to update the office space, including the installation of IT  infrastructure.

The Fulton Companies received approval from the Cicero planning board in June to begin working on the building, although interior work in not currently underway, according to Sperry. She declines to say what contractors have been hired, or to provide financial information about the project or the company.

The building’s previous owner was AMM Properties, which was leasing the building to Terax Hair Care, a shampoo manufacturer that has since moved its operations to Florida, according to Marco Musumeci, president of Terax Hair Care.

CICERO — The Fulton Companies — a business based in the Oswego County town of Richland that engineers, manufactures, and sells commercial and industrial heat transfer equipment — is moving its commercial heating division to Onondaga County.

That division, known as Fulton Heating Solutions, Inc. (FHS), plans to shift many of its services to a building it recently acquired in the town of Cicero, situated at 6288 Running Ridge Road, according to Erin Sperry, director of commercial heating products at FHS. The division’s management, engineering, sales, customer service, marketing, and aftermarket service functions are expected to make the move, she says.

More FHS activities will eventually be moved to Cicero, including a product demonstration center sometime in 2016. Sperry says she can’t be more specific on these plans at this time.

The Fulton Companies hopes manufacturing operations will begin in the Cicero facility within five years, according to the minutes of a June meeting of the Cicero planning board.

About 60 employees will transfer to Cicero, Sperry says. The Fulton Companies employs more than 300 people in New York, and about 800 globally, she adds, with facilities in Canada, England, and China.

The Fulton Companies doesn’t have plans to hire more workers, although that could change later this year, according to Sperry.

An added benefit to the Cicero location is the ability to recruit from the large Syracuse workforce, she says. The company was having difficulty recruiting, first, because most Syracuse–area residents don’t want to commute that far, and second, because the company has nearly depleted the local talent around its Richland headquarters.

Company owner, president, and CEO R. Bramley Palm, Jr. — whose grandfather, Lewis Palm, founded the company in 1949 — purchased the Cicero building, according to Sperry.

Palm bought the one-story, 35,000-square-foot building in February 2015, for $1.7 million, according to Onondaga County’s online property records.

Moving much of the FHS services to Cicero is intended to provide some separation between the commercial and industrial elements of the company, and will create additional office and manufacturing space at the company headquarters — situated at 972 Centerville Road in Richland — for other company divisions to grow, according to Sperry.

The Fulton Companies tailors products for several industries, including laundry dry-cleaning, gas processing, and craft brewing.

“Bram [Palm] knew it would be smart to divide the commercial from the industrial because they are so different,” she says.

The two divisions offer different product types, as well as sales and marketing methods.

“There are distinctive features to the commercial product types, such as specialized alloys of stainless steel in the commercial boiler heat exchangers, that is not found in the industrial products,” Sperry explains in an email to the CNYBJ.

In addition, the two divisions have different customization needs. “On the industrial side, Fulton will often not only provide the boilers, but also an engineered 

system to accompany the equipment. This approach is less common in the commercial market,” she says.

No major modifications are planned for the Cicero building. The interior will be partially renovated to update the office space, including the installation of IT  infrastructure.

The Fulton Companies received approval from the Cicero planning board in June to begin working on the building, although interior work in not currently underway, according to Sperry. She declines to say what contractors have been hired, or to provide financial information about the project or the company.

The building’s previous owner was AMM Properties, which was leasing the building to Terax Hair Care, a shampoo manufacturer that has since moved its operations to Florida, according to Marco Musumeci, president of Terax Hair Care.