GT Mid Atlantic held a grand opening May 25, 2023, for its new Essex, Md., facility, outside of Baltimore. Contractors from around the area helped the equipment dealer celebrate the achievement and were treated to facility tours, lunch and more.
In early 2023, GT Mid Atlantic decided to combine two of its Maryland stores into a brand-new main location in the Baltimore suburb of Essex. The company shut down its store in Halethorpe, near Interstate 695 — the Baltimore Beltway — southwest of downtown Baltimore, at the beginning of December, as well as its Aberdeen store and opened the new location on Jan. 2, 2023.
GT Mid Atlantic now has eight total dealerships, with three in Maryland, another three in New Jersey and one each in Delaware and the Philadelphia area.
Eric Marburger, vice president and general manager of GT Mid Atlantic's sales territory in Maryland, Delaware, the District of Columbia and northern Virginia, described the decision to close the two branches as one the company did not take lightly.
But Marburger said that GT Mid Atlantic has overcome its initial fears about how the changes would affect its customers as most have lauded the new facility.
"People are coming in here and telling us that they enjoy such a nice facility, that it is welcoming and conducive to their doing business," he said. "They also say that the drive is not too cumbersome and does not take up as much time as they thought it would. They are used to coming here now; it has become a secondhand thing for them."
Marburger enjoys hearing his customers comment on the new 20,000-sq.-ft. Essex branch being so nice and clean because that was exactly why the decision was made to replace the Halethorpe and Aberdeen locations in the first place.
"All of the buildings that we moved out of were old and antiquated, and, quite frankly, they were not designed for what we are doing anymore," he said. "We were more geared toward smaller machines at one time, but we are now more of a full-size equipment dealer in addition to utility-size pieces. In fact, the Halethorpe facility was not set up for anything having to do with construction equipment; rather, it was more of a freight transfer station built in the 1930s or '40s.
"So, the new Essex branch is an upgrade for us all the way around in the sense that we now have a state-of-the-art facility that is useful in terms of service, parts and sales. It is better suited for doing business."
He noted that the company worked 20 months to design, build, staff and move parts and equipment from the other now-shuttered Baltimore-area branches to the new location.
The building and equipment yard at GT Mid Atlantic's new dealership occupies five of the company's 7.5 acres at 8404 Kelso Dr. in Essex.
Although the new dealership has been open for six months, the official grand opening for the GT Mid Atlantic headquarters and dealership took place May 25.
Approximately 40 people work at the branch, Marburger said, with five employees in the parts department and another 15 service technicians and support professionals in the shop. In addition, the company keeps seven service trucks at the ready for whenever its customers need help on the job site.
He describes the new service compound in the Essex store as "massive," and well suited for both large and small machines.
"It is really so much larger compared to our other locations," Marburger said during the grand opening. "There are eight service bays out there, along with one 5-ton overhead crane. We also have the service department quartered off into a utility equipment side and a heavy equipment side."
He added that with larger shop space at GT Mid Atlantic Essex, the dealership's service techs could handle many more machines at once, if needed. For instance, he said it would be possible to work on as many as 20 of the smaller pieces — compact loaders and mini-excavators — on the utility side of the service area.
"As far as the larger machines that we have, we could easily fit two off-road trucks inside the one overhead door," Marburger added.
The roster of equipment that GT Mid Atlantic is led by Case Construction, which Marburger regards as the company's "linchpin" product line. Another of its more prominent product lines is Takeuchi.
"In our yard, you will also find milling and paving equipment from Astec Industries, which we are happy to partner with because of all the road building happening right now," he said, adding that the dealership carries each of its manufacturers' full line of available machines.
GT Mid Atlantic also sells and services machines made by:
- Rubblemaster
- Epiroc
- Etnyre
- Terramac
- Avant Techno
- Robak
- Sakai
- IROCK
- Towmaster
- Tana Landfill
- Terex Ecotec
- Strickland
- Stanley Infrastructure
- FAE Group
- Midland
- Eager Beaver
- Spaleck
- MGL
- CBI
- LaBounty
- Superior Broom
- Transtech Systems
- Leica Geosystems
- Bagela
- Virnig
Now that GT Mid Atlantic has settled into its streamlined Essex dealership, Marburger said he feels a profound sense of satisfaction with what the company has accomplished in creating it.
Additionally, he is excited to see what the future holds for the branch and is certain it will enhance GT Mid Atlantic's customer experience in the Washington-Baltimore metropolitan area.
"The long and short of it is we invested into the company and to the benefit of our people," he said. "We thought that our employees and customers deserved a better facility than those we had. So, we designed a building with an atmosphere where customers can visit and feel welcome in a nice environment, and our employees can take care of their needs more efficiently with a larger service space and parts warehouse."
For more information, visit www.gtmidatlantic.com. CEG
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