Security Sales July 2021 - 64

Management
2021 Integrator
Exec Roundtable
Our staff
realized how
important our job
is and I think that's
the important piece.
We may not have
been recognized as
first responders
but we definitely
were supporting
them.
- Fabiola Francisco,
Director of Client Success
Condortech Services
Fairfax, Va.
Diversification was a key for a lot of
integrators during this time. Were you
able to lean on recurring revenue some,
and how did that experience change how
you view recurring revenue?
Boulgarides: Yes, it did help with the cash flow
through the pandemic process. When I came to
Ollivier, there was zero recurring revenue. The
past three years we grew our recurring base to
10% of our revenue. Obviously that won't support
the business but it creates a little bit of a flow.
From our customers' standpoint there's still a
lot of economic pressure on them and it's part
of why I focus on holistic security. One of their
biggest expenses is personnel. Having a security
program that's efficient for them is going to be
very important. Using systems to reduce their security
spend and continue to have it be effective
is really the best place for us to position going
forward. We need to help our clients get through
this, as costs are going up and nobody wants to
pass those costs through. Everybody's in this together
to try to manage costs. That's how we're
approaching security programs with folks.
Bert Bongard: We had to be very flexible managing
through the pandemic. We had to shift
gears, with the health guidelines, protocols,
managing illnesses, job shutdowns, delays, go-tomarket
strategies, all of it was in flux. We were
lucky in that I had started an initiative before the
pandemic where we did our business continuity
plans. Part of that was what happens in emergency
or pandemic situation. So we were somewhat
prepared. However, we had a lot of unexpected
costs such as hiring extra IT staff and had to
work more with our HR staff because things were
coming at us fast and furious. Costs were up and
revenues were down compared to budget.
We've been growing year over year and although
we didn't hit our aggressive budget we had a record
year in 2020, which was amazing. It was really because
of our diversification in so many different
disciplines, including security, fire, cabling, sprinkling
and a very large service department. We'd like
to think of ourselves as recession-proof and we've
proved we can be pandemic-proof, so to speak.
Between all of that we're able to weather the
storm, which being in the Minnesota market also
includes the social issues we also endured last year.
I wouldn't say 2021 started out gangbusters but
we're not far off our weighted budget. One thing
I would say about last year is we had some work
that was carried over. Because of the pandemic we
don't have as big a backlog as I would like to see.
There's been much talk and hype about
pandemic-related security solutions
such as contactless access control,
thermal temperature checking, etc. To
what extent have you seen that as
reality for your business? What
realistically is the opportunity?
Bongard: A lot of these things have been
around for a while. Thermal was a hot bucket
button, of course. We looked at it and did some
vetting, but between HR and legalities we chose
not to jump into that pond. And now we're
seeing their demand go down quite a bit. AI
has been a hot topic for years and we're seeing
that really increase in how we can deploy analytics.
Cloud-based and managed services have
really come to the forefront. We have a decent
amount of that in our business but now we actually
formed a team two months ago to go after
it a little harder. I think it's going to be nothing
but grow, grow, grow. I would encourage any integrator
to get onboard with managed services.
Ollivier's Louis Boulgarides says the work his L.A. firm does with movie studios
has returned to business as usual, and that pharmaceutical companies and
medical facilities are now moving from COVID response to normal operation.
Boulgarides: We scrambled around researching
thermal and were ready to go. I sold none. I
got one request for a thermal kiosk yesterday for
a high-rise building that's going to potentially be
reopening and they're looking at some solutions.
To Bert's point, there is a lot of liability around
all of that and how it gets managed. Once people
started to go down that road, they were like, " Yes,
um no. " The biggest demand we got has been
for cardless credentials. Phone-based credentials
means recurring revenue for companies like us.
It's low maintenance. You design it. You build it.
It takes care of itself. We saw a tremendous increase
in demand for Bluetooth credentials.
Again, to Bert's point, we're really focused on
utilizing analytics and video technology to help
augment the staffing spend for these properties.
64
Security Sales & Integration JULY 2021
securitysales.com
http://www.securitysales.com
Security Sales July 2021

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Security Sales July 2021
