US Signs Sold to FM Facility Maintenance

FM Facility Maintenance (Hartford, CT) has acquired the assets and some liabilities of US Signs Inc., formerly of Houston, which provided outsourced fabrication, installation and maintenance. The company’s president and CEO, Lee Clark, will lead the US Signs division at FM Facility Maintenance.

In a press release, FM Facility Maintenance President and CEO Jim Reavy stated US Signs’ management structure would be preserved under his leadership and that the company’s two facilities in Houston and Denton, TX would continue to operate.

FM Facility Maintenance is a privately owned provider of outsourced facility-maintenance services and will continue to employ all former US Signs employees. The company manages more than 30,000 customer locations nationwide with approximately one million annual service requests.

US Signs was founded by Ronald Farmer in 1980 as a full-service sign company and changed its business model in 1987 after rapid expansion. The reason for the sale was not publicized.

Update (June 16, 2011): Ron Farmer, founder of US Signs Inc., explained in an email that selling the company was a difficult decision due to his close relationships with employees who had worked with him for decades. He hopes that FM will provide increased market access for US Signs.

He also noted that the sale would help clarify the separation between US Signs and another company he founded, US LED. In an email, Farmer wrote: "The main reason we sold was to clarify the separation of our two companies. US LED has always been a separate company from US Signs but some in the sign business refrained from doing business with US LED due to the common ownership of the companies. ‘I don’t want to do business with a competitor’ was the refrain. So that objection was removed for any reasonable LED product buyer. We don’t have any ownership in either US Signs or FM at this point."

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