News

On Thursday, June 15, 2023, the Hunton family was honored by the Houston Business Journal as being one of the “Best Family-Owned Businesses” in Houston. Mr. R.O. Hunton started the Hunton Group in 1981, and we’ve been growing and making an impact on this community ever since!

Across our divisions, we provide residential, industrial, and commercial Trane HVAC systems, comprehensive building services, and innovative and cost-effective solutions for building owners and operators. Consisting of five companies working in concert to serve the residential, commercial, new construction, and existing building markets, we are uniquely positioned to help you face the challenges of providing safe, comfortable, and sustainable indoor environments. Whether it’s HVAC, security, fire and life safety, building envelope issues, or even AI for HVAC, Hunton can help you create and maintain “High-Performance Buildings for Life.”

Read the HBJ’s post.

We are proud to be a division of Hunton Group.

Did you know that June 22 is National HVAC Technician Day? Since June 21st is the first official day of summer, it is a perfect time to show our appreciation for our highly skilled, hardworking HVAC technicians that keep you and I cool and comfortable even on the hottest of summer days. Across all Hunton Group's divisions we have just over 200 technicians!

During the summer, HVAC techs and Controls Techs are working in building basements and roof tops that are 120 degrees or hotter. This can be very dangerous; HVAC technicians must know how to keep themselves hydrated and avoid heat stroke to do their job of keeping us cool (dive deeper by reading Hunton Cares blog post, “Working in Hot Weather”).

Why we love our HVAC Techs 

An HVAC Technician job is anything but routine and predictable. Rather than going into the same office every day, an HVAC Technician may find themselves traveling all over the city and beyond. Every day, HVAC Techs are going to new places, meeting new people, problem solving, and facing new challenges. 

HVAC Technicians find ways to help people stay safe and comfortable in buildings and in homes. 

This often means that an HVAC Technician job does not just happen during the 9-5 Monday through Friday work week. Technicians are typically on call at all hours to make sure their customers are happy and helping in emergencies.

Here is what one of our highly trained technicians had to say, “I love being a technician because it gives me the opportunity to help others and troubleshoot issues to solve problems. I really enjoy the comradery of working with our group to accomplish specific goals and tasks.” – Ty P.

Why we love National HVAC Tech Day

• They go where we would not dare. Roof tops on buildings and houses, crawl spaces, attics, basements, and all places in between are no obstacle for HVAC Tech and we think that is very brave.
• They deal with extreme conditions constantly. There is no doubt you have had a broken AC before, so you know how brutal it can be, now imagine working in that heat every day. They have a tough job and we respect them for that.
• They can save you money! When an HVAC/Controls professional helps you select and maintain efficient heating and cooling systems, they also help you reduce your carbon footprint in your building and in your home.

Show your appreciation to an HVAC Tech!

• Give your HVAC Tech’s a shoutout and use the hashtag #NationalHVACTechDay and show some love for all their hard work.
• Treat them to a nice meal. At Convergentz, we sent them a gift card from Chick-fil-a, you can too!
• Maintain your building’s controls by having regular preventative work done on them. At Convergentz, this is our passion, our technicians are the finest in the city.
• Call us at Convergentz so you can meet the best techs in town, 713-267-5790.

CHECK OUT PICTURES OF OUR TECHS FROM ALL OF HUNTON GROUP.

Convergentz is part of The Hunton Group and we exist to radically improve the environments in which people live, work, and play, and our local schools are very important to us. 

Since 2019, The Hunton Group has partnered with HPD to provide backpacks and school supplies to thousands of students across the Greater-Houston area. This year we took it upon ourselves to personally deliver over 1,500 backpacks with supplies to six different Title 1 schools across five separate school districts. It is truly an honor to impact so many young lives, and we wish all our students the best for this upcoming 2022-2023 school year. 

We also host our annual Cool Rides Hot Rods car show to raise money for our backpack drive. This family-friendly event is always a ton of fun and benefits a great cause, so mark your calendars now! This year’s show is scheduled for October 29th and is set to be our biggest one yet!

Visit https://huntongroup.com/carshow/ today to learn more and register your ride for the hottest, coolest car show in town!

PRESS RELEASE

Houston, TX – August 2021

CONVERGENTZ EXPANDS CAPABILITES TO FIRE & LIFE SAFETY

Convergentz, a technology leader and master systems integration, is proud to announce the addition of the Fire & Life Safety sales and service to their extensive list of capabilities.

Mr. Kyle Jarnagin is heading up this team and brings over 40 years of experience to the team. 

NOW IS THE TIME FOR AN UPGRADE OF YOUR LEGACY NIAGARA AX SYSTEM TO N4:

On July 1 2021, Tridium’s entire AX product line will be obsolete. The legacy AX hardware (JACE), software, and licenses will no longer be sold or supported.

In most cases, existing software migrates, making the upgrade cost effective. Convergentz has partnered with Distech, which uses the latest Tridium technology in their products.

BENEFITS OF UPGRADING TO N4:

• Faster and easier to use
• Less reliant on browser plug-ins (java)
• All new user interface (HTML5, rich UI features)
• Powerful security
• Easier integration capabilities

Then

Richard O. Hunton, the forerunner, founded the Hunton Group in October 1981 as a subsidiary of the Trane Company. Houston Trane was then located in southwest Houston on Landsbury Drive and consisted of three divisions, Commercial Sales, Service, and Parts. However, from the start, Mr. Hunton envisioned that the Company would ultimately become the dominant supplier in the HVAC market for Southeast Texas. 

The Company started out with 75 associates and total sales in the first full year of operation of $28 million. Early 1983, the Building Controls division was formed and on January 1, 1984, the Company was purchased by Mr. Hunton as an independent operation. During the early years (1983-1989) the Houston economy was in a downward spiral and sales of commercial equipment decreased sharply; however, revenues from service and parts continued to grow in each succeeding year. As a result of unfavorable local economic conditions, management had to develop long-term growth strategies to reposition the Company for opportunities that would develop when the economy turned around.

The Company continued a pattern of slow steady growth during the mid-eighties by prudently increasing its resources (financial, manpower, and technology) to match the growth it was experiencing, revenues more than double by 1986. In 1988, the Company began planning for a new acquisition into the residential market and in 1990 Houston Trane acquired the exclusive distribution for Trane Residential & LCU products in S.E. Texas and constructed a new headquarters in Westchase in order to consolidate all divisions.

In 1993 the Existing Building Systems division was added and in 1994, an in-house financing company (Vical Financial) was formed. At the end of 1994, total sales exceeded $60 million with 115 associates, and the original vision of being the dominant HVAC force in SE Texas had been realized. Hunton Group is the only major supplier of HVAC equipment in Southwest Texas that remained intact from 1981 to the present; all others either had major reorganizations or ownership changes.

In 1997, due to its significant amount of international business involvement, Hunton Trane changed its name to Hou-Tra International and established a Specialty Products group to supply major non-Trane components for central chilled water systems. In 1998, HVAC Mechanical Services, Inc. was purchased by Hou-Tra International and merged with Hou-Tra’s aftermarket services division to form a new division – a full service, turnkey solutions provider for commercial, institutional, and industrial markets.

In 2002, Hunton Distribution was formed as a separate company by merging Residential equipment sales, Parts, Supplies, and Vical Financial. At the same time, Hunton Distribution expanded its territory to included West Texas, Oklahoma, and Eastern New Mexico with distribution locations in Houston (2), Lubbock, Abilene, Oklahoma, and El Paso.

Beginning in 2004, Hou-Tra International changed its name to The Hunton Group, consisting of Hunton Trane, Hunton Trane Services, and Hunton Specialty Products on the Commercial Solutions side; and Hunton Distribution and Vical Financial on the Distribution side. By 2006, sales were $250 million with over 350 employees. Hunton Group then formed Hunton Energy, a development company for coal gasification production using emerging and tested technologies. Then in 2007, Hunton Distribution built a new 121,000 square foot headquarters and warehouse. In 2007 and 2008, Hunton was the #1 Evapco distributor in the United States. It was also in 2008 that the Company sales increased to $300 million with over 400 employees.

For the years of 2006, 2008, 2009, and 2012 the Company received the Trane Pacesetter award for being #1 in sales for Trane in both applied commercial and residential products. Hunton Energy received the TCEQ permit in 2009, for its Freeport gasification plant (one of only two permits issued in the USA for gasification plants) and 2010, marked the birth of Convergentz, an independent controls company specializing in building integration with open protocols.

In 2012 the Company completed Houston’s first “Smart Building” retrofit at Pennzoil Plaza and acquired Advanced Home Technologies (AHT), a design and installation contractor for home entertainment and security systems. In 2013, Convergentz sales exceed $15 million and received a contract to renovate controls for the National Archives in Washington, DC. Hunton Services and Convergentz completed the renovation of the third high-rise office building in downtown Houston along with a $2 million retrofit of the George R. Brown Convention Building Open System Controls.

In 2017, Hunton Distribution consolidated locations in response to changes in the market. We closed our offices in El Paso, Lubbock and Amarillo so that we could more fully serve the Houston and Oklahoma service hubs.

Now

In 2018, Hunton Distribution proudly opened our 3rd location in the Greater Houston Area. This facility is an impressive 76,000 sq./ft of warehouse space conveniently located in southeast Houston and goes a long way toward providing more efficient and more convenient ways for our customers to do business with us. In 2019, Hunton Distribution sold the Oklahoma City office to keep its focus on southeast Texas.

To this day, it is the continued goal of Hunton Group to be the preferred provider of efficient and sustainable indoor environmental systems and services for commercial, industrial, and residential customers and to earn this trusted position through understanding, innovation, and technical and operational excellence.

“Our ultimate goal throughout the family of Hunton Group companies, is seamless service and 100% customer satisfaction,” says R.O. Hunton, Chairman & Founder. “We have structured our organization to better coordinate our considerable knowledge and people resources to help make our customers’ jobs easier and to bring real added value to the table.”

In 2019, Hunton Trane and Hunton Services won the Trane Pacesetter award and in 2020, the Hunton Group won the Houston Chronicle’s Top Workplace Award for the 8th year and won National Top Workplace. Convergentz is proud to be a part of Hunton Group of companies since 2010.

For more information: www.huntongroup.com

Article by Industry Era Magazine, June 2020, page 14-15.

Convergentz was born out of a need for Building System Integration Solutions and Internet Protocol (IP) based control systems. As early as 2005, Hunton Services started to notice that Chief Engineers were, increasingly, losing control of their facilities. What they also observed was a (Competitors and Customers) Customers wanted to move their control platforms into the IP World. After getting tired of losing projects to small “Open” control shops in town, they had to find a way to compete using IP technology. “As this was a new direction in the market, away from the portfolio of control product technology that we had within the Hunton Group at that time, we created Convergentz,” says Richard Hunton, Jr., the CEO of The Hunton Group, the founder and president of Convergentz. He has always been a true visionary and instilled the same vision in the company. Convergentz was ahead of the Internet of Things (IoT), starting when it was just a buzz word. “What we had envisioned simply wasn’t possible with the Systems and Sensors we had to work with, at the time, despite all the articles and marketing materials we read,” adds Richard. “So, we focused on what we could do, HVAC, Security, and Systems Integration, and concentrated on delivering dependable and economical open systems and building system integrations.” Now, ten years later, IoT technology has caught up with the earlier vision allowing the Convergentz team to design even smarter buildings...

Continue reading full article at Industry Era Review.

NOW IS THE TIME FOR AN UPGRADE
Beginning July 1, 2021, legacy JACE hardware, AX downgrade options, and AX software will no longer be sold and Tridium is phasing out the entire Niagra AX product line. Now is the time to upgrade your legacy AX system and save money in the process!

We (a company of The Hunton Group) are honored to be named a Top 10 Intelligent Building Consulting Company.

“An intelligent building can be thought of as the epicenter of safety, security, energy, efficiency, and comfort. We can bring all of the different control systems in a building onto a single pane of glass, thus visualizing a multitude of functionalities at the fingertips of the users...”

“The Hunton Group: The Elixir of Infrastructural Intelligence,” Article by Construction Tech Review, read more here.

Download PDF of article here.

The Hunton Group is proud to announce that with several strategic key partners, 1225 North Loop West is the first office building in Houston, Texas to close a PACE project. PACE stands for Property Assessed Clean Energy, essentially a long term, low cost loan for commercial building improvements. Convergentz and Hunton Trane consulted with Stellar International in designing the building automation, lighting, and central plant. The upgrade includes two Earthwise Trane CenTraVac Chillers’, as well as a Tracer Ensemble Web-based Enterprise System integration solution including air handler and central plant optimization.

“The Tracer Ensemble Building management system will empower the building owner to run his building more efficiently and securely at the same time. We’re very proud of this collaborative project, a great example of enhancing energy management to provide positive building outcomes.” – Kurt McCulloch, General Manager of Convergentz.

Convergentz, Hunton Trane and Moore Mechanical partnered to bring an outside the box solution to 1225 North Loop West. Stellar International acting as project manager, also teamed with PACE Houston, Petros PACE Finance, and Xtralight to bring the project to fruition. Certification was completed by Riehl Engineering indicated that this PACE project will create an annual savings of over 1.5 million KWH and 2.9 million dollars in savings over 20 years. This project began November 15th, 2017 and is expected to be completed by the middle of 2018.

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The Hunton Group, founded in 1981, is a conglomerate of synergized companies delivering energy efficient HVAC products and systems; factory certified service; turn key financial solutions and advanced building integration and control systems. Please visit the Hunton Group to learn more.

Please visit Texas Pace Authority or Green Houston to learn more about PACE or visit www.PACEHOUSTON.com for professional consulting. To learn how Stellar International can help you through the PACE process, please contact them at info@stellaricre.com.