Page 24 - Peterson 85 Years and Going Strong

CORE VALUE: TEAMWORK
DeSilva and Peterson have been in business for a long time, so we know we’re going to get support because of that consistency. There’s equity in our business relationship.
– Dave Vandegriff, equipment manager, DeSilva-Gates
DESILVA-GATES: PETERSON’S LONGEST-STANDING CUSTOMER
May 3, 1937, was a big day for Peterson, although back then nobody knew it. That’s the day Oliver de Silva made his first purchase from Peterson Tractor & Equipment Co.—a transaction for $1,062.00. Oliver de Silva, Inc. (ODS) was just five years old at the time. Peterson was just getting started. In the ensuing years, that relationship has grown into a partnership. ODS—now DeSilva-Gates—has racked up some very impressive firsts over their eighty-nine-year history, and Peterson has been there through most of it. In short, DeSilva-Gates is Peterson’s longest-standing customer. The proof is on the books.
Today, DeSilva-Gates stands as one of the premier general engineering contractors in Northern California, with five affiliate companies all under the banner of the DeSilva Companies. DeSilva was the first local con- tractor to “go vertical” with the partnered acquisition of Dumbarton Quarry back in 1975—before vertical integration became popular. In 1987, they led a joint venture with CC Myers on the I-238 / I-580 inter-
change in Castro Valley, where the bid-with-bonus concept was born. And in 1998, DeSilva was the first contractor in California to go 3D, using Trimble’s robotic Total Station on their contract at the San Jose Air- port.
Accolades aside, the company has had its rough patches. In 1958, Ed DeSilva came on board to help his father salvage the nearly bankrupt company. “Oliver owed a half mil- lion on a job up north,” explains Rich Gates, president of DeSilva-Gates Construction. “Someone had con- vinced him to bid a job up in Alturas on I-395. He bid it in the snow and when the snow melted, it was solid rock.” Ed persuaded the employees to forego four months of pay with the promise of later recompense.
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