LANSING, MI — Back in 1997, during a period marked by numerous acquisitions of contracting firms by publicly traded consolidation groups, Gary Doty saw a good exit strategy for leaving the HVACR service business — at a very handsome selling price.
Group Maintenance America Corp. (GroupMAC) came calling, and Doty became a happy seller of his business, A-1 Mechanical. He stayed on as president of the Lansing, MI, company to run it for GroupMAC. In fact, Doty and his wife Peggy signed a three-year agreement to stay on and run the company. When the contract expired, they renewed the agreement.