Shockingly, venerable Swiderski Electronics has suddenly closed its doors. The Itasca-based provider of systems integration, engineering and equipment sales and rentals ended its 57 years of business March 3 and let its staff go.
But according to a former employee, Swiderski is being reorganized into a far smaller and leaner company and will be run by a core management group.
Since the Swiderski office is closed and it’s impossible to reach any of the principals, it is not known if the company has sold certain assets to a group of former employees or if it is reorganizing as a smaller and perhaps different company, or if it is gone forever.
What toppled the company has competitors scratching their heads.
Fletcher Chicago’s Tom Fletcher opined that clients were unwilling to pay for the high quality and design capabilities of Swiderski services.
“We live in a Wal-Mart society where the value of the Swiderski team and what they brought to the industry were less valued than a low price,” he said.
Roscor’s Mitch Roston, who called the closing “a sad end of an era,” agreed that the closing might have been a “reflection of economy and ways things are done today.”
Another competitor who asked not be named, felt that the company “lost its teeth in the integrations business” and that “they never embraced top technology which has enabled other companies to grow their business.”
Still, Swiderski Electronics represented hundreds of manufacturers and introduced them to the trade during an annual September equipment expo that also featured hands-on demonstrations and expert-led seminars.
The company had as many as 3,000 clients. Most recent installations included Oprah’s studio, the Village of Mt. Prospect, Sox Park, and the vice presidental debates last year at Case Western Reserve University.
Joe Swiderski II founded the company in 1948 as an electronics store over his parents’ Northwest Side bakery.
As the company grew, Swiderski’s nine sons and daughters came into the business and held key positions. Joe III ascended to company president about 20 years ago.
In 1997 the company moved to its 64,000-square-foot facility at 800 W. Thorndale, in Itasca after 21 years in Elk Grove Village.
