Ivey’s Plumbing and Electrical Company was founded in 1947 by Mr. Kermit Ivey in Kosciusko, Mississippi. The small repair shop focused on residential and small commercial construction. The company continued on a steady growth pattern with annual sales that approached a half-million dollars by 1958.

It was in this year that the founder’s son, Marlin, joined the partnership with his father. The partnership was based upon
an agreement to shift the marketing focus from residential to commercial projects.

The first major commercial job the company acquired was the electrical contract for the new East and West Side Elementary Schools in Kosciusko. During the sixties, the company was a major player in mechanical construction throughout the state of Mississippi. Ivey’s participated in numerous major projects, including the Twin Towers construction on the campus of the University of Mississippi at Oxford in 1968. Ivey’s was building a quality reputation, which later served as the key value that led to progress and expansion.

The name Ivey’s Plumbing and Electrical Company was changed in 1969 to Ivey’s, Inc. shortly after Kermit Ivey’s death. By this time, the growth mode had been well established. In the early 70’s, Ivey’s took a new direction when the local markets dried up. They secured a major project with the federal government for barracks work at Keesler Air Force Base in Biloxi, Mississippi.

This proved to be a significant turning point for the company and a beginning of geographical expansion. Marlin Ivey began
to shape the company’s philosophy of going where the work was, which eventually led to opening offices throughout the Southeast in order to be able to better service customers through a more local approach.

In the seventies, contract work with the military began to decline. Ivey’s responded by obtaining a number of government contracts in several states performing mechanical work on a variety of government buildings.

In 1973, Ivey’s took on their first V. A. hospital project. Through the mid-seventies, Ivey’s work was approximately 90%
government work. Through this work, Ivey’s became associated with a number of prime contractors for medical facilities.
By the late seventies as government work slowed. Ivey’s was positioned to move toward private hospital contracting.

In 1990, J. Marlin Ivey stepped down as Board Chairman and his son, Joe Ivey, took over controls of what had become one of the largest mechanical contractors in the country. The daily operations were managed by President Larry Terrell. The name of the company was changed to Ivey Mechanical Company, Inc. to facilitate the change in management and ownership. During the nineties, the company grew in revenue from $50 million to over $140 million. With the late nineties came a wave of consolidations within the industry. Ivey Mechanical Company was one of the first mechanical contractors to consolidate as part of Building One Services in September of 1998. Joe Ivey became President of the mechanical group and several months later became CEO of Building One Services. Larry Terrell continued to serve as President of Ivey Mechanical Company, as a Building One Services Company.

In February of 2000, Building One Services Corporation and Group Maintenance America Corp. merged to create Encompass Services Corporation, a $4 billion company. Joe Ivey served as CEO of Encompass Services Corporation. Larry Terrell continued as President of Encompass Mechanical Services Southeast, Inc., which included the Ivey companies plus nine additional mechanical operations in the southeast.

Due to a slumping economy and too much internal debt accumulated from acquisitions, Encompass filed chapter 11
bankruptcy in November of 2002.

In January of 2003, Larry Terrell along with key management successfully acquired Ivey Mechanical Company from
Encompass and now operates as Ivey Mechanical Company, LLC. Today, Ivey operates with a healthy balance sheet and  budget revenues exceeding $200 million.