Monday, Aug. 25, 2003 | 11:45 a.m.
It's 116 degrees in Palm Springs, Calif., and Craig Littleton is cool with that. Sitting in the large outdoor patio of Sherman's Deli, Littleton is quite comfortable indeed.
That's because the busy patio is enshrouded in a fine mist of water emanating from an arrangement of pipes and nozzles that surround it.
The misting system, made by Palm Springs-based MicroCool Inc. where Littleton is the operations manager, can lower the temperature on the deck by 20 or more degrees.
"To be in business you have to have one," says Littleton. "Most of the new businesses that try to get by without them usually end up calling us half way through the summer."
Deli owner Sam Harris, who had the system installed five years ago, said it works like an advertisement.
"People see the fog when they drive by, and they say, 'I'm going to go in there,'" said Harris, who plans to install a second system at his Palm Desert location . "The customers love it. I'd have no one on the patio without it."
MicroCool, which was founded 22 years ago, is the oldest of three established firms that make up the majority of the desert's misting industry.
Walk by many Southern California restaurants, hotels or attractions during the sizzling summer months, and you'll likely see fog rolling out of misters built by local companies including Koolfog Misting System, Inc., Creative Mist Systems or MicroCool.
But all three companies also install or supply misting systems around the world and with and endless variety of applications, from wine vaults in Australia to rice patties in Thailand to royal palaces in Saudi Arabia.
"Las Vegas, Phoenix and Palm Springs are the three biggest misting areas," said Eddie Knox, the sales manager for Creative Mist. "But it's hot somewhere in the world all the time."
Misters are also used to suppress dust and odors, to reduce static in volatile manufacturing plants or foundries, to cool animals in farms, zoos and ranches, to moisten and cool the air in greenhouses, to cool armed services training centers and even fight fires.
The systems are based on pumps that force water through nozzles loaded with tiny holes. The water droplets -- one-tenth the width of a human hair -- evaporate into the air, which means misters work better in drier conditions.
"It's the evaporation that gives you the cooling, not the fog or the mist," said MicroCool general manager Mike Lemche, who oversees 10 employees at MicroCool. "You are not supposed to get wet."
Although the three companies compete for many jobs, each one has found some niches in the business, said Todd Langius, president of Koolfog.
"We started with tennis courts and patios back in 1989," Langius said. "But then we figured out how to do special effects with fog, which is very different from mist. Now we do mostly fog effects and special effects for movies, theme parks, parades, you name it."
Koolfog has worked on movies like "Jurassic Park," "Apollo 13," "Volcano" and "Escape from L.A.," as well as events like the 2000 Super Bowl Halftime Show, and theme parks like Universal Studios and Disneyland.
"While entertaining is people is obviously important, our primary focus has been guest comfort, particularly for areas that have long waits," said Scott Burklin, manager of park operations development for Universal Studios.
Langius, who has 18 employees, said Koolfog makes $1.5 million to $3 million a year selling systems that range in price from a $6,000 private patio to $350,000 for a movie like Jurassic Park.
Just a few doors down from Koolfog is Creative Mist Systems, which started about nine years ago, according to sales manager Eddie Knox.
"We do everything from restaurant cooling and poolside systems to high-end home patios and dust and odor control," Knox said.
"But we've really started to develop a good business supplying the automotive industry like body shops and tire stores."
Auto shops are expensive to cool with air conditioning because the garage doors are always open, so misting systems combined with powerful fans can make a big difference, he said.
As for the future of misting, Lemche said business can only grow.
"There are so many different applications for this, so I would say the industry is far from being mature," he said. "Every day we think of a new one."
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