Althoff industries: THE DIFFERENCE IS CUSTOMER SERVICE

Family-run Althoff Industries was founded by James Althoff in 1961, providing service to residential heating and air conditioning customers in the northwest Chicago suburbs. Soon, plumbing, piping and electrical services were added to the Althoff resume, followed by small business and commercial clients. In the 1990s, building automation and controls were added to round out the extensive solutions Althoff can perform for clients, making them a one-stop-shop for quality work and customer satisfaction.

The Althoff “mothership,” as the management team calls it, is located in Crystal Lake, with a satellite office in Hillside that supports the contractor’s downtown accounts. At the helm are CEO Tod Althoff, CFO Tom Les and Executive Vice President Chris Bennett.

“Tod knows every angle of his business,” said Steve Kloss, HVAC Senior Estimator. “He’s involved and we see him every day and ask questions. He does a really good job of running us and running the crew.”

The 150-person crew includes skilled tradesmen and women from both SMART Local 265 and SMART Local 73 to cover Althoff’s large service area throughout Chicago and the surrounding suburbs.

“Start to finish, our guys are the best,” said Blake Wiltshire, Residential Division General Manager. “What’s unique about our journeymen is they can do all the electrical, gas piping, sheet metal — everything required to get a furnace installed and commissioned. And our quality of work is what sets us apart from our competitors. I’ve had quite a few people come in from other companies and they can’t get over the attention to detail that our guys put into a residential install.”

Whether a customer is looking for a residential or commercial solution, the Althoff team is all about versatility while maintaining its commitment to the three pillars of the business: people, customers and quality.

“We’re willing to stretch our creativity a little bit and use the expertise of our craftspeople to take care of more challenges than just ductwork,” said Patti Althoff-Siwicki, Sales and Business Development Manager. “We’re not cookie cutter. It’s wonderful to have the capabilities of specialty sheet metal and make it do exactly what it needs to do for all different customers.”

“Any shape, size or form — we can fabricate it,” Kloss said.

Because of their reputation to continually innovate new solutions, Althoff is considered a partner by most customers — not just a vendor. Pre-COVID, Althoff performed a lot of high-end stainless food-grade ductwork and fittings for Smithfied Foods. During the pandemic, the Althoff team switched gears to fabricate shields and disinfectant holders to continue to help the meat producing facility meet strict safety standards and avoid shutdowns. Exceeding expectations, one challenge at a time.

“If Tod sees something that looks interesting, he lets us try doing it once to see what we learn, what we like and don’t like, and evaluate it to see if it’s a type of job we want to continue pursuing,” Althoff-Siwicki said. “Sometimes we find that it’s one-and-done, but other times we get a standard process going and it tends to work out well.”

A shining example of a unique project that became award-winning is the company’s recent collaboration with Pedigree Ovens in Harvard, Illinois. The dog treat facility, which sits within the flight path of the Chicago O’Hare airport, worked with Simpleray, OMCO Solar and Althoff to complete a complex, ground-mounted, dog bone and paw-shaped solar array. The several-million-dollar project is projected to save Pedigree Ovens $119,000 on energy each year, not to mention contribute sustainable clean energy to the grid. The undertaking became a 2020 Project of the Year winner as voted by the readers of Solar Builder Magazine.

Althoff has also become a trusted partner in the world of sports by developing a device to roll out the in-ground hose that keeps professional fields warm for practices and games. Halas Hall, the training facility for the Chicago Bears, was among the first to utilize the technology, followed by Soldier Field, Denver’s Coors Field, Toronto’s BMO Field and others. Althoff also performed drainage work at New York’s Citi Field.

From maintenance and repairs to specialized services, Althoff is proud of the 60+ years they’ve dedicated to cultivating long-term customer relationships and providing innovative solutions to Chicago-area clients and others throughout the country.