Avalon was first start as a side business in 1993 by Lance Williams while he was still living in Wheeling, WV. The original name was Avalon Innovative Technologies or AIT for short. Lance had a small support contract with the Northern Panhandle office of WIC to do PC support and did some freelance work as a Biomedical Equipment Technician for some local physicians and clinics. Lance and some other friends were trying to grow Avalon into an Internet Service Provider. Things were looking good until one of the people involved ended up getting divorced and moved out of the area. The idea was pretty much given up after that.

So, I’m sure you’re wondering where the name came from? The idea behind the name was to think of a mythical place that doesn’t really exist.

Since that’s what the Internet is in many ways, we wanted to find something to parallel that idea. If people could really see what the Internet is, they’d be a little disappointed. A bunch of computer hooked together with cables to form this vast network that we surf on everyday. Lance looked toward mythology to find a name. A few names were looked at, Valhalla, Olympus, Avalon and a few other obscure places. He ended up deciding on Avalon; after all he was already named after a Knight of the Round Table. What’s that? Oh, for those that didn’t know, Avalon means Isle of Golden Apples, it was the place King Author was taken after he was mortally wounded to sleep till England needed him again. The Isle of Apples is also the reason we have an apple in our logo.

Avalon went dormant for a few years when Lance first moved to Pittsburgh. In 1997, while still a technology consultant for Deloittle and Touch, he started doing a little web development work on the side. This was also when the name was shortened to Avalon Innovations. Working with his sister-in-law, Jennifer Deihl, they thought Innovative Technologies mislead the customer who was looking for web design.

In 2002, Lance made the decision to leave his full time job to pursue Avalon as a full time venture. He had big client in Cincinnati and thing were looking up. Of course as luck would have it, the client went belly up within 3 months. But our little ship would not be sunk. Lance and Jen contracted with Blanc Printing to help them out and to look at building a stronger strategic alliance with them. Jen, being mostly a print designer made the move to stay with Blanc. Not being able to reach agreeable terms in an alliance contract, both Avalon and Blanc remained as separate businesses.

Since then Avalon has experienced a slow, but steady growth. Danielle Rutter was brought on board in 2003, a talented designer and programming wiz. There are several other people involved with Avalon on a more contractual basis. When their services and talents are needed, the call is put out and they come running to help. Well, maybe walking, but you get the picture!

For some time now we have been looking around for a building to move into and expand our business. Well, we finally found one! OK, technically its just land right now, but there will be a building on it soon. By the end of summer or early fall of 2004 we will be moving to St Clairsville, Ohio's Fox Commerce Industrial Park. In the new building we will have a full showroom to see all of out services. We're very excited about our move and look forward to inviting everyone to the grand opening. As the project progresses, we will keep you posted.

In the winter of 2004, we started our grand adventure of planning the construction of our very own building. In January of 2005, we broke ground and actually started construction of building in Lots 9 & 10 of Fox Commerce Park. <Click Here for Pictures> It's been a year and we are just about ready to offically open the building to the public. We are in the building with our equipment, but we're just waiting to finish up some of the state inspections to call it done.