American Residential Services (ARS) is a United States network of plumbing, and home and commercial heating and air conditioning (
HVAC
Heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) is the use of various technologies to control the temperature, humidity, and purity of the air in an enclosed space. Its goal is to provide thermal comfort and acceptable indoor air quality. HV ...
) businesses, operating under the trade name ARS/Rescue Rooter. The trade name came from the acquisition and merging of ARS and Rescue Rooter by their then-parent company
ServiceMaster. They have locations in 24 states.
The company is based in
Memphis, Tennessee. The ARS mascots are Dandy and his sidekick Pronto.
History
ARS was established in 1975. The name "Rescue Rooter" was trademarked in 1976 by the California-based Rescue Industries Inc. It was a family-owned West Coast plumbing and drain cleaning company. In 1996, ARS was founded to consolidate local and regional HVAC service companies. Shortly after,
The Servicemaster Company, based in
Downers Grove, Illinois, acquired both Rescue Rooter and ARS, in 1998 and 1999 respectively, and brought them together under the "ARS/Service Express" brand. The company eventually dropped the "Service Express brand and the parent brand was known primarily as “ARS/Rescue Rooter.” In 1998 the company had around 5,000 employees.
In October 2006, ARS/Rescue Rooter was then acquired from ServiceMaster by two private equity firms,
Caxton-Iseman Capital
CI Capital Partners (formerly Caxton-Iseman Capital) is a private equity firm founded in 1993 by Frederick Iseman and based in New York City that specializes in middle market leveraged buyouts. It is estimated that CI Capital Partners manages a ...
and Royal Palm Capital Partners, for $100 million. In May 2014, ARS was acquired by Charlesbank Capital Partners from Caxton-Iseman Capital and Royal Palm Capital Partners.
References
Further reading
* {{cite news, url=http://www.bizjournals.com/memphis/stories/2006/10/02/daily13.html, title=ServiceMaster finds buyer for American Residential Services, date=October 3, 2006, work=Memphis Business Journal, publisher=American City Business Journals, Inc, access-date=2009-03-25
External links
Official websiteRescue Rooter website
Heating, ventilation, and air conditioning
Companies based in Memphis, Tennessee
Plumbing
Service companies of the United States
Privately held companies based in Tennessee