Gone are the days when a home security system was simply an alarm mounted near the front door.
Today's homeowners can use a cellphone or a laptop to control an alarm system that has door locks, thermostats, lights, garage door openers and video cameras.
“It's all about technology interacting with one system to make the home more livable and secure,” said Pamela Petrow, president and CEO of Vector Security in Marshall.
Sales are up at Vector, in part because of increased demand for comprehensive security systems at homes, schools and other public buildings, said General Manager Bob Bronder. Vector's sales increased 4 percent to $245 million since 2013 and are expected to be $252.3 million this year.
Vector, a subsidiary of a Philadelphia insurance company, also sells fire protection systems and energy management and home technologies.
A recent study by The Freedonia Group, a Cleveland market research firm, and the Security Industry Association in Silver Spring, Md., found demand for electronic security products is growing because of concern about security risks. And with a strengthened construction industry helping to drive sales, that demand is projected to rise 7 percent annually through 2019 to $16.2 billion, the report said.
It's a challenge to offer products whose security cannot be breached, Petrow said.
“We want to be very careful about all the technology that is coming out and making sure that it is vetted,” she said.
The company's information technology professionals pull in consultants when needed and attend trade shows to stay abreast of technology, Petrow said.
“Our biggest expense is people,” she said.
Of the company's 1,283 full-time and 49 part-time employees, 210 workers are in the Pittsburgh region.
About three-quarters of Vector's 300,000 customers are residential. Yet about 75 percent of the company's sales revenue comes from commercial customers, which include UPMC, Comcast, Lowe's, Sunglass Hut and Toys R Us.
Most commercial customers seek video systems, Petrow said.
Store cameras, once used primarily for loss prevention, are linked to software that tells retailers where customers are in the stores, in what direction they are moving and what merchandise they stop to see, she said. That can helps retailers respond to shopper preferences.
Carl DellaPenna hired Vector six years ago to upgrade security in the 29 NAPA Autoparts stores owned by his Fayette Parts Service Inc. in Brownsville. He liked Vector's consistency, as opposed to the “hodgepodge” of security cameras that used hard drives to store videos in his stores in Ohio, Maryland and Pennsylvania, he said.
“We used to have so many camera systems in stores, and then, six months later, they're obsolete,” DellaPenna said.
Vector supplied a cloud-based system that enables managers to see live camera feeds from cellphones or laptops. That means they can monitor employees.
DellaPenna said thefts are down and the stores' insurance rates fell because Fayette Parts can successfully counter customers' false claims of falls in parking lots or other liability issues.
Vector has avoided consolidating its 30 branches in Pennsylvania, California, Delaware, Ohio, Kentucky and other states. That gives it the resources of a large company with the culture of a local business, spokesman Art Miller said.
In the Pittsburgh area, for example, Vector's niche market is health care, Bronder said.
But Vector has grown through acquisition. In September, the company acquired Pelican Security Network Inc., an alliance of security providers, fire protection companies, alarm dealers, and system integrators based in Baton Rouge.
The acquisition moved Vector into Louisiana and Texas, and expanded its Florida presence, Miller said.
Tory N. Parrish is a Trib Total Media staff writer. Reach her at 412-380- 5662 or tparrish@tribweb.com.
