City Wide Facility Solutions
History
City Wide was born out of the need for a solution to Frank Oddo’s small family business in 1961. Tired of attempting to find reliable cleaners, Frank launched City Wide Maintenance. What started as a janitorial service company grew to address additional client requests and broadened its approach to become a sales and management company focused on the building maintenance industry.
Today, under the leadership of Frank’s son, Jeff Oddo, City Wide manages a myriad of maintenance services required by commercial facilities. This has allowed leadership to spend time focusing on and representing its client facilities rather than counseling, interviewing, and hiring employees to perform janitorial services. As a result, the company rebranded from City Wide Maintenance to City Wide Facility Solutions in 2020. City Wide has successfully replicated this model through franchising and now operates in nearly 70 locations across the United States and Canada.
A Unique Business Model
By managing building maintenance services, City Wide sits at a unique position in the industry. They are able to provide facility operators with one point of contact to simplify the process when janitorial and maintenance issues arise for building owners, operators, or management companies, saving their clients time, reducing stress, and minimizing the resources needed to oversee a facility. This has helped the firm partner with clients in the industrial, medical, education, auto dealership, general office building, trucking/logistics, non-profit, government, and entertainment sectors, to name a few.
City Wide assigns an employee account manager, known as a Facility Solutions Manager (FSM), to each client. This account manager proactively inspects the building and checks in with clients regularly based on the client’s preferences. The FSM works closely with an assigned Night Manager, also a City Wide employee, who monitors the crews at night to ensure the building is serviced to the levels City Wide has committed to each and every time. Due to its unique business model, City Wide can provide this high level of professionalism and service at the same price or lower than others in the industry. The FSM strives to understand the client’s building(s) as fully as possible to become an extension of the client’s management team, not just another contractor.
The firm is also equipped to succeed among the growing trend of vendor consolidation in client industries, handling the management of more than 20 services, including cleaning, COVID-19 disinfection, landscaping, HVAC cleaning, and carpet cleaning. As more firms look to simplify their process and cut costs, City Wide is positioned well to become the partner of choice by supplying specialized and experienced personnel in-house to exceed client expectations while helping clients’ bottom lines.
The Cleaning Industry Takes Center Stage
Before COVID-19, janitorial services were more about the impression of clean when people walked into a building, and overnight these services had a direct impact on the health and safety of the employees and public that used these buildings. Keeping a clean and well-maintained workspace that is pathogen-free is now vital to keeping clients’ employees working and businesses running. City Wide was already well-versed at being the client’s eyes and ears. Now they have begun taking on a more active role for their clients by presenting preventative solutions that foresee needs before they become problems. With their locations across the U.S. and Canada, City Wide has been able to keep a pulse on industry trends and provide a network of idea and solution builders that equip every client with the latest and most efficient products and services. This proved extremely helpful in dealing with the ever-changing needs of the pandemic.
The firm is striving every day to help life in client facilities return to (almost) normal through enhanced cleaning and sanitation, disinfection methods that deliver healthy spaces, and encouraging Facility Solutions Managers to speak up when they identify workplace hazards that can cause sickness, impaired health, or significant discomfort for client workers. They are helping clients to return safely, navigate change, and deliver assurance by demonstrating trustworthy cleaning and disinfection. City Wide’s “Here to Help” motto has never been truer than it is in today’s environment.
Milestones and Next Steps
City Wide celebrates 60 years in business this year and looks forward to celebrating their long and rich history together all year long through various means. In looking towards the future, the firm anticipates continuing to support clients as the world adjusts to its “new normal,” though facility needs may forever be held to a higher standard.
When asked what advice he’d give other middle market firms, Samuel Kovachy, co-owner and VP of City Wide Facility Solutions in Cleveland, said, “Always be prepared to pivot because as an executive and business owner you will be thrown into situations that will require you to act quickly, but with caution. Always bring professionalism and honesty to the table.”