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The community may know Innovative Air Solutions as the Greater Orange Chamber of Commerce Business of the Year and one of the go-to stops for HVAC and air quality solutions, but many don’t know how the company began.

“We started in 2008,” said Robert Currie, founder of Innovative Air Solutions. “I lived in Bridge City; Hurricane Ike wiped me out. I took seven feet of salt water in my house. 43 years old, everything was gone. I was working for another air conditioning company out of Beaumont.

“The phone started ringing, the entire town of Bridge City flooded with Ike. After several of these phone calls, I got to thinking—there’s an opportunity here.”

Currie said that at first, he wasn’t sure what he wanted to do. He also didn’t know he would take a risk that would change his life and the community he serves.

“I took a chance, I quit my job,” he said. “I had a six figure a year job at that time, and I had two kids in high school and one in middle school. I quit my job and started out of my garage, working doing flood remodels and things like that. As the years went on, we started to grow, and we got clipping along pretty good.”

Despite some setbacks and problems that Currie cleared up, he said the business has been on a path of strong growth.

“We had been growing ever since the last two and a half, three years now — (the business) has just exploded,” Currie said. “We have four interviews scheduled the next two days, we’re about to hire some more people. We have expanded from residential into commercial and from commercial into industrial. So, we’re kind of doing everything.”

Robert Currie said with the amount of growth the business has been receiving, there has been challenges. It’s all part of the process of being one of the best in the industry.

“The intent all along is to be the biggest and the best, and our coverage area will be from Lake Charles to Beaumont,” he said. “Our intention is to be the biggest air conditioning company between those two points and to deliver the best service.”

Currie said the business is rooted in a love for Orange County and the local people.

“I’ve always had a servant’s heart, I feel like we’ve been given a lot,” he said. “We’ve been blessed beyond anything. I feel like I owe this community, because this community has supported me and my family for many years. We love the people in this community. You could not find a better place to live.

“I was in the service. I have lived in Europe; I’ve lived in California. I lived in Kentucky and kind of been all over the place. There’s no place like Orange County’ there’s just no place on Earth that’s like this.”

This love for the community is embedded in all of Robert’s staff, he said.

Marketing Manager Ashla Taylor said when she started working at the company almost three years ago, what caught her eye was the community involvement.

“They were very deep rooted into Orange County,” Taylor said. “I was born and raised here. We know this community and the people that run it and it’s fun. It’s fun to be involved with people to kind of just see what everyone’s doing in their business, personal and family life. We get to keep up with that.”

Taylor said the greatest thing about Orange is everyone is always there to lend a hand.

Innovative Air Solutions wants to be one of the servants in the community.

Taylor said the company loves to be involved through volunteering and donations.

“Anything that we can do to help, it’s just our heart,” she said. “Robert always tells us the air conditioners are just the products that we sell, but we sell comfort. At the end of the day, our mission is to help people.”

Innovative Air Solutions is located at 2435 Martin Luther King Drive in Orange and the business can be reached at 409-217-5229.

— Written by Tim Cohrs