Protection One and BellSouth extend their joint venture

ATLANTA and TOPEKA, Kan.-The tag team of Protection One and BellSouth has extended its reach into three more Southeast markets. The co-branding alliance, through which BellSouth offers its residential customers Protection One services, was announced last spring. Last month, three Florida cities -- Orlando, Pompano Beach and Fort Lauderdale -- were added to the four cities in Georgia and North Carolina that were covered in the program's initial roll out. At that time, Protection One branches in Atlanta and Charlotte, N.C., were re-named BellSouth Security Systems, and new BellSouth Security branches were opened in Raleigh and Greensboro, N.C. "We rolled out more cities because we were pleased with how it was going," said Richard Ginsburg, president and chief executive officer of Protection One. "The plan was to start with test markets and go from there." As the program was announced last spring, the companies planned on establishing a presence in 10 major Southeast markets by the end of this year. To date, the "BellSouth Security Systems From Protection One" name has been extended to just seven cities. Ginsburg credits this slight shortfall to the current economic recession and also to the fact that the uniqueness of the offering made it difficult to plot its course. "This is an alliance that really has never been done before, but I think both sides bring a lot to it. At Protection One we're great at what we do, but we're a relatively new name - four or five years old. The reputation of BellSouth is definitely an asset."