President Jason Meyer and Vice President Chrissy Meyer are all smiles next to an American Architectural Glass, Inc. van. The couple is the company’s fourth owner as AAG celebrates its 60th year in business in 2020.

In 2018, the American Architectural Glass, Inc. team, led by Project Manager Alan Frilling, completed work on the National Veterans Memorial and Museum, marking one of the company’s largest radial glass projects to date.

Jason Meyer always dreamed of owning his own company—especially managing a team and being his own boss.

That goal was accomplished Dec. 30, 2009, when he and his wife, Chrissy Meyer, purchased American Architectural Glass, Inc. (AAG).

Jason had been working at the company as a project manager for a decade when the prior owner, James Moore, who happened to be a family friend, approached him about the opportunity. He remembers he couldn’t say yes quickly enough.

“I liked the versatility of the job. I saw some office time and some field time,” says Jason, now president of the 60-year-old commercial and industrial glass and glazing contractor firm. “Once he offered me the opportunity to buy the company, there was no doubt we wanted to make it happen.”

Chrissy, who worked as a technical service representative at the time of the purchase, was swayed by the growth of AAG to change careers. She started with the company in 2012 in estimating, stepping in temporarily as office manager as well. Today, Chrissy serves as vice president.

Taking the Reins

As the decade dawned in 2010, and AAG celebrated 50 years in operation, the Meyers stepped in as the firm’s fourth owners.

Prior to the Meyers’ stewardship, AAG was founded in Cincinnati in 1960. Twenty years later, it was purchased and moved to New Carlisle, Ohio, 70-plus miles northeast. In 1985, James Moore, Jason’s former boss and family friend, took over as the third owner and oversaw AAG’s move to an 8,000-square-foot fabrication facility in Clayton, Ohio.

In 2016, six years after the Meyers purchased the firm, they moved it to Fort Loramie to accommodate for increased fabrication needs. Today, the business operates out of the 17,000-square-foot Fort Loramie facility, which sits roughly 90 miles northwest of Columbus where, along with Cincinnati and Dayton, the majority of AAG’s projects are located.

AAG changed hands less than two years after the onset of the Great Recession in 2008. Calling the early days of entrepreneurship “difficult,” Jason says: “You could call me a fool at the time, but it was a buyer’s market because of the economic downturn.”

The Meyers negotiated “a reasonable offer” and hit the ground running as the economy righted itself. They’ve grown the business from a four-person operation to employing more than 25 skilled, union glaziers and fabricators, a workforce that fluctuates with the seasons.

Thankfully, that early momentum has paid off in repeat clients and consistent projects. Jason said the pandemic hasn’t hit the business too hard. One of their projects—a Facebook data center in Columbus—was delayed a few months but there are still jobs to bid on, although the process for awarding projects seems to take much longer.

“Getting [a project] off the ground has been slower than normal,” he says of the once bustling construction sector.

Considered an essential business, AAG’s operations were not stalled by Ohio’s declared state of emergency. The company did not lay anyone off; in fact, they’ve grown through this tumultuous time, hiring a handful of new glaziers between April and July.

A Clear Expertise

While the couple took ownership of the business in the middle of the Great Recession, over the past decade, AAG has experienced a windfall as a result of an economic boom in the Midwest—particularly in higher education, retail, museum, residential and recreation construction.

“We were fortunate to land some pretty lucrative contracts with The Ohio State University (OSU) and the University of Kentucky. We had more work than we’ve ever had and it was coming in all at the same time,” Jason says.

AAG’s portfolio showcases the growth of the company and their plans for the future. Highlighted therein is everything from glass entrances to mirrors, glazing services, glass repair and replacement, to radial curtain wall facades designed to encircle a structure.

Jason points to the FC Cincinnati training facility in which “virtually every piece of glass was set by our glaziers” including the entryway, windows, interior glass, handrails, walls and the team’s logo—as one of the more recent shining examples of AAG’s thorough work.

The eye-catching, spiraling glass facade of the National Veterans Memorial and Museum in Columbus proved a creative endeavor for the AAG team as well.

“A lot of what we do is rectangular, square and flat,” says Jason. “The uniqueness of that project was that the entire glass is on a radius. It’s round.”

AAG glaziers stacked rectangular pieces of glass on top of and beside one another acting as a shield beneath a crossed, X-shaped ring. Extending beyond the spiral-shaped building, the glass reaches out into the garden and grounds.

Next among their most-praised projects is the OSU Wave Wall. What made this project “unique and challenging,” and allowed AAG to showcase its skilled workers, says Jason, “was that nothing is straight, it is an entirely round project as well.”

Strong, professional relationships founded in a quality product produced in a timely manner are, for the Meyers, the pride of their business. When he moved up from project manager to president of AAG in 2009, one of Jason’s goals was to improve the fabrication work done at their facility thereby easing the installation process and shortening their on-site time.

Prior to when he owned the business, he surmises: “We did very little in the shop and there was a lot more work that had to be done in the field.”

A few tweaks were made by the new president, including the investment in a programmable RazorGage saw stop system as part of their metal optimization system. The team is now “two times as fast” on the production end of jobs, per Jason’s calculations.

“When our frames leave the shop, they’re ready to be installed,” he says. “We don’t have to do the groundwork in the field now” and can often speed up a project’s timetable.

Jason is proud of their team’s reputation and intelligent bidding practices.

“We don’t nickel and dime construction companies and contractors,” he says of the finished project they present at the construction site. “That helps build a relationship that guys in the field remember. AAG’s quality and consistency stand out.”

Community Involvement

AAG’s commitment to quality doesn’t peter out off-site. When he moved the company to Fort Loramie, then a less-than-1,500-person community, the couple prioritized giving back.

Looking to maintain a high quality of life for employees and town residents alike, Jason says investing in local people “shows the citizens that local companies do care about you.”

As a “family-oriented business,” in a “small community,” says Chrissy, “we do a lot to give back to the kids.”

Funding local fireworks shows, advising prospective Eagle Scouts, supporting youth sports, donating to the Dayton Children’s Hospital, formerly the Children’s Medical Center of Dayton, engaging with local Big Brothers Big Sisters activities, serving the Sidney-Shelby County Chamber of Commerce and involvement in local festivals are all actions taken to buttress the Fort Loramie community, she explains.

“We were lucky to have Fort Loramie welcome us with open arms when we came here and it’s our duty to give back to the village,” Jason adds.

AAG’S Next Chapter

As AAG’s fourth owners usher in the company’s seventh decade in operation in Ohio, they say building trust is the secret to the company’s success and longevity. Expanding their bandwidth and creative ability is the key to maintaining the ground they’ve gained.

“We’ve honed in over the past five to 10 years on certain contractors and are really appreciative that they keep coming back to us” for new and different projects, says Jason.

Reflecting on the appeal of projects like the OSU Wave Wall and the veterans museum, Jason says the focus in this decade will be propelling the company forward.

“In my first 10 years, 90% of the work we did was storefronts and 10% curtain walls,” he says. In the past 10 years, Jason has put an emphasis on bidding for, and winning, increasingly larger, more complicated projects. Today, that breakdown is 50-50, he estimates.

His ideal is a focus on fewer, albeit larger, projects such as 10- and 20-story (sometimes rounded) curtain walls, or large glass facades, in cities like Dayton, Columbus and Cincinnati.

As the pandemic dissipates, Jason says AAG will look to higher education jobs—“what’s really helped build our business”—to support AAG through this economic downturn.

In Ohio, he says, “there are a lot of older buildings at local colleges and universities that need to be renovated, torn down or repurposed.” He’s positive AAG will play a role in that rejuvenation.