“Communications” is not just a name, but the key to success.
by Michael Puente
It has been quite a year for Daniel Schmidtendorff and Communications Company of South Bend.
In June, Schmidtendorff, who serves as president and CEO of Communications Company of South Bend (CCSB), was named Small Business Person of the Year by the U.S. Small Business Administration Indiana District Office. That allowed him to travel to Washington, D.C., to attend a dinner where he was a finalist for a nationwide honor. While Schmidtendorff didn't receive the national award, he says it was still an honor just to be able to mix and mingle with top-notch business types from across the nation.
“The people who won it were well-deserved for sure. It was a phenomenal event. They treated you with utmost respect and made you feel really important,” Schmidtendorff says. “In talking to some of the other business owners, we swapped some ideas, talked about market share and how people got to where they are going. They had some great presenters. They had Angie from Angie's List. The whole experience was just fantastic.”
In business since 1976, CCSB has been designing, installing and servicing communications systems not just in the Michiana area, but also as far away as Chicago, Fort Wayne and Grand Rapids, Mich.
CCSB provides state-of-the-art life safety, security, audio-visual and communications systems to clients in the health care, education, government, industrial commercial and entertainment markets.
Sometimes the company offers services that can include something as simple as the cord connecting to your desktop computer, but also can provides intricate systems for sports arenas, hospitals, schools and businesses.
“We provide the phone on your desk but we also do the fire alarm system that protects your building, the paging or intercom system in your children's school and the code blue patient/staff communication system in your hospital,” Schmidtendorff says. “We also provide the security camera and the card access system to your building.”
Schmidtendorff says his company's system allows administrators to be able to monitor their building's security system from areas even off-campus.
“We might do a mass notification system that ties all that together and allows you from multiple locations or from anywhere to see the cameras on the campus to unlock a door, to do a mass notification of a message that a tornado is coming,” Schmidtendorff says. “So you can have a district of schools that can have 15 or 20 schools and we can tie them all together.”
Schmidtendorff started working at the company in 1996 and a decade later, in 2006, he purchased the business with partner Barry Schleiger. At that time, the company barely had a dozen employees. Today, it has grown to more than 40 to keep up with demand.
“I would say in some areas the demand has slowed down but there are areas where it has increased. In each of those industries there is change. Overall, the demand for security and a company's awareness has increased,” Schmidtendorff says. The projects and clients Schmidtendorff and his company have been involved with is a list of who's who in Northern Indiana among hospitals. For example, CCSB installed the nurse call, paging system, televisions and security at the new 633,000-square-foot St. Joseph Regional Medical Center in Mishawaka.
“The hospital was able to merge their wireless telephone system with the nurse call, giving the nursing staff the ability to answer patient calls immediately. Thus patient care is delivered faster and hospital satisfaction scores continue to grow,” says Schmidtendorff. CCSB has also been a longtime partner with Memorial Hospital of South Bend working on a variety of projects. The latest project was on the hospital's new surgery center (also known as South Pavilion). In this latest project, CCSB expanded the existing nurse call system as well as completed upgrades to its closed caption television system with more than 150 cameras and a dozen networked digital video recorders.
Another project occurred at the Community Hospital in Munster, where CCSB provided a nurse locating system for the hospital's new emergency department and West Tower projects. This project also included installation of a wireless phone system that allows for real time data on the amount of time nurses are providing to patients.
In 2011, CCSB assisted in the design and engineering of the renovation to the Stanley Coveleski Stadium, home of the South Bend Silverhawks. The company upgraded a video scoreboard and enhanced other park amenities, including the installations of new JBL speakers and Crown amplifiers. “They have a phenomenal sound system,” says Schmidtendorff. “We provided them with a quality sound system.”
The company also worked with installing a Siemens fire alarm system to the entire campus at Valparaiso University. “We have integrated the system throughout the campus, tying in all the buildings to a main station for centralized monitoring of the system,” Schmidtendorff says. “This ensures the students, faculty and staff are well protected.” CCSB has also worked a number of safety projects with the University of Notre Dame.
According to Schmidtendorff, CCSB's philosophy is not just about the quality products provided, but more about customer services. “It's not about the product, it's about the customer. What is going to fit their needs,” Schmidtendorff says. “We're not trying to push a product. We really lead with what their needs are and spend a lot of time trying to discover what their challenges are and how we can help them with technology.” Schmidtendorff says much of his company's success is because of how strongly he feels for his job.
“I'm definitely very passionate about what we do. I'm passionate from a security standpoint in all of our schools,” Schmidtendorff says. “I'm also very passionate about helping people. I enjoy going into a hospital and look at the process to increase their patient satisfaction.”
Schmidtendorff sees only bright skies for his company for the future. “I see us growing and expanding our territory,” Schmidtendorff says. “We're better now than we've ever been. We have plans to expand our business. We're definitely going to be growing over the next couple of years.”
While 2013 has been an award-winning year for CCSB, it's just the latest in a string of honors in the past few years. In 2010 and 2011, Inc. magazine listed CCSB as among the fastest-growing private companies in the U.S. In 2010, the company was on the list of Indiana Companies to Watch.
“I really enjoy what we do,” Schmidtendorff says. “And I'm really proud of all the accolades that we've received over the last three to four years. It's just been phenomenal.”
