Fire Safety flames-4

About Fire Safety

Scott Chapman, FSSC CEO & Benny Young, Fire Suppression Specialist
Father and son, Richard and Scott Chapman
Fire Safety Sales Company (FSSC) was founded in Santa Fe in 1974 by the Los Alamos Assistant Fire Chief Richard B. Chapman and Fire Captain Chester Woodson. Richard’s son Scott trained with his father in the business and was inspired to become a Santa Fe Firefighter and Senior Paramedic in 1978. Scott returned full-time to FSSC, to head the company in 1990. Richard and Scott, as firefighters, applied their first-hand knowledge of the unique character of fire dangers in northern New Mexico, and that experience-based knowledge has informed the fire safety systems and protection services provided by the company for nearly half a century. Today, Fire Safety Sales team members are certified to install, inspect and repair fire protection systems from the industry’s leading certified manufacturers; and sell and service parts and equipment for businesses, non-profits, government offices, and firefighting organizations across New Mexico.
Fire Safety Sales Company (FSSC) was founded in Santa Fe in 1974 by the Los Alamos Assistant Fire Chief Richard B. Chapman and Fire Captain Chester Woodson. Richard’s son Scott trained with his father in the business and was inspired to become a Santa Fe Firefighter and Senior Paramedic in 1978. Scott returned full-time to FSSC, to head the company in 1990. Richard and Scott, as firefighters, applied their first-hand knowledge of the unique character of fire dangers in northern New Mexico, and that experience-based knowledge has informed the fire safety systems and protection services provided by the company for nearly half a century. Today, Fire Safety Sales team members are certified to install, inspect and repair fire protection systems from the industry’s leading certified manufacturers; and sell and service parts and equipment for businesses, non-profits, government offices, and firefighting organizations across New Mexico.
Professional Firefighters know that rigorous training is at the core of fire protection and suppression – and Richard and Scott maintained that commitment to team training over the decades.

Richard B. Chapman, FSSC co-founder (1927–2022) Before establishing Fire Safety Sales Company in 1974, Richard Chapman had already spent a lifetime in service to his community. He was Assistant Fire Chief in Los Alamos, New Mexico; started an office supply company in Santa Fe; was Assistant Fire Chief and a fire safety inspector in Amarillo, Texas; and had guided hunters and fishermen, worked construction, and waited tables as a young man.

But Richard Chapman’s devotion to service began in the days after Pearl Harbor, when he enlisted in the United States Marine Corps. More than a year after he enlisted, Marine officials realized he was only 15, so he continued to serve his country at sea in the Merchant Marines for the remainder of the war.

Richard served in his first fire department in Los Alamos, shortly after WWII. As the decades passed, he observed how time and resource scarcity limited fire departments in their capacity to deliver public safety training and keep commercial fire protection equipment reliable. So, shortly before being named Los Alamos Deputy Chief in 1974, Richard and another department captain, Chester Woodsen, founded FSSC to help provide those services.

Richard retired from the Los Alamos fire department in 1995 and joined the Department of Hospitals and Institutions to raise the level of specialized fire protection needed in medical facilities across northern New Mexico. He continued to serve as an advisor to Fire Safety Sales Company until his retirement.

Over the years, our team has worked in virtually every building, facility and setting in our region – and we know what makes your facility unique and the best equipment to keep you safe and code compliant.

In the past three years alone, our team has collectively and individually completed 45 national certifications and our training is ongoing, with equipment, technology and Code upgrades.

Today, seven members of our northern New Mexico community make up the FSSC team:

Scott Chapman, FSSC CEO Lisc. #051289; #MS 12–14 Journey Man 14

Certified In:

Ansul, PyroChem, Buckeye, Range Guard
Fire Sprinklers
Kitchen Systems
Backflow Repair
Emergency Lighting
Fire Extinguishers

Benny Young

Certified In:

Ansul, PyroChem, Buckeye, Range Guard
Fire Sprinklers
Kitchen Systems
Backflow Inspection & Repair
Emergency Lighting
Fire Extinguishers

Derrick Hatt

Certified In:

Ansul, PyroChem, Buckeye, Range Guard
Fire Sprinklers
Kitchen Systems
Backflow Repair
Emergency Lighting
Fire Extinguishers

Lenny Barela

Certified In:

Ansul
Fire Sprinklers
Kitchen Systems
Emergency Lighting
Fire Extinguishers

Alex Marquez

Certified In:

Ansul
Kitchen Systems
Backflow Inspection & Repair
Emergency Lighting
Fire Extinguishers

Tony J. Cappellucci

Certified In:

Ansul
Kitchen Systems
Emergency Lighting
Fire Extinguishers

Sidney Summers

Certified In:

Fire Sprinklers
NICET Level 1
Fire Extinguishers