LAWRENCEVILLE, NJ – City Electric Supply values every employee and their efforts to support their communities and customers. A perfect example of these efforts is that CES Lawrenceville Driver Dave Hansson recently drove an hour to deliver a home standby generator to the Jersey Shore after seasonal storms caused countless power outages. His job was to simply deliver the generator to Professional Electric, a small, two-man crew owned by one of Scannon’s long-time friends and customers, David Carabelli. The thing is, he didn’t just deliver the generator. He decided to stick around and help install the generator — that was eight feet off the ground.
“You don’t see something like that every day,” said CES Lawrenceville Branch Manager Bill Scannon. “Dave saw these guys could use a set of extra hands, and he rolled up his sleeves and got to work. That’s the sort of attitude you want on your team and the culture you want at your branch.”
The work was more than installing the generator, which was eight feet up because of seasonal flooding issues. The work also consisted of wedging a Bobcat in a tight alleyway to raise the generator onto a small platform. It was a hard task, but Scannon didn’t hesitate for a second. Because of the number of New Jersey storms in 2020, Scannon has sold over 100 generators and seen just about every situation. “Summer storms cause a lot of power outages in New Jersey and along the shore, but this year, it seemed like generator demand was higher than ever with everyone working from home,” Scannon said. “It didn’t matter if it was a portable or permanent generator; everyone wanted one.”
Today, with millions of Americans working from home and students attending virtual classes, power outages were a big threat to residents. Fortunately, Dave Hansson and the rest of CES Lawrenceville are there to help — like they did with Professional Electric. “David Carabelli, the owner, is always telling people about this job,” Scannon said. “He’s always showing it off and talking us up, and it all happened just because our driver saw they needed another hand.”
“This is why we go above and beyond for our customers,” he added. “You don’t hear every day about a driver helping to install a generator. A lot of people say they’ll do whatever it takes, but we really mean it. We’ll stay late; we’ll help longer.”
And it was a team effort — from Operations Manager Dave Donahue, who helped size and quote the correct generator, to Counter/Warehouse Associate Kevin Sullivan, who helped load it up, to Dave Hansson, who delivered and helped install it.
“It doesn’t matter if it’s a contractor, end-user, or a little old lady who needs a lamp; we’ll do anything we can to help,” Scannon said. “We did it last year when it was more challenging than ever, and we’re looking forward to helping even more people this year.”
City Electric Supply will continue praising the branch as it continues to go above and beyond for its customers.
City Electric is a family-owned electrical wholesale distributor headquartered in Dallas, Texas.
