CompressAir, a leading provider of compressed air services and products, marks its 20th year under the leadership of the Crowl family this March. Since March of 2005, Andy Crowl and his family have worked to grow the company into a cornerstone of the industry around Northern Indiana.
Andy has been in the industry for around 15 years at that point, and was looking for an opportunity it leave the corporate world. The opportunity to buy out CompressAir came to him. He made the leap and took the helm, steering the company that, at the time, had nine employees.
“With our continued growth, we have added several more service technicians, Crowl said. “Now we have 31 employees, with a combined experience of 210 years in the compressor industry. Over half of our team has been working at CompressAir for over ten years.”
A few years after he purchased CompressAir, Crowl made another big decision – switching its supplier and becoming a Sullair distributor. Founded in Michigan City, Sullair is one of the largest and most innovative compressor manufacturers in the industry.
“Since becoming a Sullair distributor, the new product line allowed us to grow over 10 times in our market shares in our territory,” Crowl said. “Becoming partners with Sullair and the reliability of its products has really helped our business grow.”
CompressAir’s success earned the company a number of awards from Sullair: 2015 Sullair Distributor of Northern America, 2017 and 2019 Spirit of Sullair, and in 2024 a Platinum Sullair Distributor for North America being awarded the Sullair Cup.
“I feel there are two reasons for my success, one is the passion that I have for the compressed air industry and taking care of customers,” Crowl said. “The other is knowing that failure isn’t an option. My employees are part of my family, and their families rely on the business’ success as well.”
Two of those employees are Crowl’s sons, Tyler and Maverick Crowl. Tyler, his oldest son, joined the team in 2010, while Maverick, his youngest, joined in 2015.
“The addition of my sons joining the business full time were great turning points in the business,” Crowl said. “I’d like to say thank you to my wife and kids for supporting the risk we took in 2005, and for being a part of the everyday business and making it as successful as it is.”
It’s not just his sons, though, according to Crowl. Every employee is critical to the business. What he points to as his greatest accomplishment is not a set of sales figures or a cabinet of awards; it’s our customers and our people.
“My biggest achievement is that I have been able to find the next generation of employees to not only help my business grow, but to help them grow in their careers,” he said. “I make daily decisions that not only affect me. I also have to think about how they will affect my family, my employees, and their families. The risks and decisions that I make for my business have the next generation’s best interests in mind.”
Always keeping the customer in mind is one of Crowl’s main thoughts. Crowl loves the work he does, and still reminisces about some of his favorite jobs and how they’ve helped customers.
“Over the years one of the jobs I feel most proud of would be installing new equipment for a customer in the auto industry, he said. “We installed three 400 hp compressors and two 6,000 cfm refrigerated dryers. We did reconstructions of their air piping systems and a revamp of their compressor room.”
He also thinks back to two of his mentors, Ron Bober and Walt Lentine. They started him in the industry, seeing him as a young man who would be successful – and he has done everything he can to meet those expectations.
“’The ease of doing business’ is the motto I run my business on,” he said. “The easier you make it for customers to do business with you, the more likely it will be that they’ll continue to do business with you. Taking care of the customers is always a top priority for everyone at Compressair, we wouldn’t be successful without our customers. I never imagined CompressAir would grow to where it is today, and I want to shout out to my employees and customers for helping to make it as successful as it is.”
To learn more about CompressAir and its full lineup of products and services, visit compressair.net.
