Marshall Excelsior Company (MEC) employees said perhaps the company was partially named after Marshall, Michigan, where it is headquartered. Others have heard its nomenclature also derived from Chicago’s 1907-1931 motorcycle manufacturer Excelsior, which MEC Founder Jeffrey Begg was supposedly a fan of.
Regardless of the name’s history, Begg started MEC in 1976, making hoses, brass fittings and pigtails from the basement of his dad’s veterinary clinic. After graduating from Michigan State University in business, Begg worked in engineering, then materials management, before quitting to focus on Marshall Excelsior full-time in 1998.
“His original vision was to get into propane applications and get into the RV industry that way,” said Pat Donovan, current CEO of MEC. When Begg’s nephew Franco Domingo joined the company in 2000 as office manager, Domingo helped grow the business, finding niches in the propane and RV markets and growing them by listening to customers.
Marshall Excelsior grew 12 times its annual revenue over the next 15 years, with over 200 employees selling gas equipment for bulk plants, transport trucks and RVs in 26 nations around the world.
“What really carries the weight around here are valves for propane bobtail delivery trucks,” said Donovan on Marshall Excelsior’s best-selling products. With plans to soon expand more into the RV market, Marshall Excelsior also targeted cryogenics in 2021, acquiring Florida-based CPC-Cryolab’s assets.
In 2017, Beggs and Domingo, who was then company vice president, sold Marshall Excelsior to private equity company Harbour Group Industries.
