HBA Inc. stands out for conservative business practices in an industry known for old-school ways.
The Anaheim-based construction company isn’t all that different in the projects it works on—it pledges to build “with passion, integrity and expertise,” according to its mission statement.
“We do the job right,” said Joseph Alessandrini, the company’s chief financial officer.
Employees at HBA, which has about 40 workers, say everyone—including executives—back up the company’s talk with their work.
“We have a positive, learning culture,” Chief Executive Gerry Pyle said. “And we work hard.”
Project leaders “do a lot of job walking,” Alessandrini said. Executives are at the office “all the time,” he said.
Operational meetings typically are held once a week and are largely informal.
Car Washes
Employees are rewarded for their efforts with perks ranging from car washes and a casual work environment to a structured bonus program and tuition reimbursement.
Hard work and a focus on quality have helped the company grow from about $1 million in annual revenue five years ago to nearly $12 million now.
It’s a rare example of growth in an industry that’s been hammered in the past few years with the slowdown in commercial development. HBA’s added about five positions in the past year.
The company ranked No. 3 in the small company category on the Business Journal’s second annual Best Places to Work list.
The list was compiled for the Business Journal by Harrisburg, Pa.-based Best Companies Group, an independent workplace researcher that managed the registration process, conducted the surveys, evaluated the data and selected companies for the list based on overall scores from surveys of management and employees.
The company doesn’t seek out attention. It eschews publicity and doesn’t even have a website.
“We’re under the radar,” Pyle said.
HBA is a full-service construction company. Its specialties are commercial and industrial concrete and masonry work. It typically works with larger commercial contractors for work just about anywhere in Southern California.
“We try to keep a mixture of (large and small) projects,” Pyle said. “No job is too small.”
It’s done work for Mercedes-Benz of Beverly Hills and Carnival Cruise Lines at the Port of Long Beach.
Recent projects have included work on a 14,000-square-foot memorial in Anaheim along La Palma Avenue. The memorial was created to honor workers who helped develop Cold War-era aerospace technologies in the area.
The company’s also gotten a bit of a reputation as the one you call to fix problems.
While others might get business by cutting costs and making low bids, HBA gets business because of its service, according to Alessandrini.
“We want to be the (company) they think of calling when a project gets in trouble,” he said.
A focus on getting the job done right and developing trust with customers “is what keeps the phone ringing,” Alessandrini said.
Officials aren’t afraid to stop and redo a project if its quality isn’t up to snuff.
CEO Background
Learning the ropes from prior companies has helped shape HBA’s culture, Pyle said.
“I’ve been in the business since 1986,” he said.
Pyle previously was an executive and part-owner of Anaheim’s I.C.E. Builders, which was bought in 2001 by Lexington, Ky.-based Gray Construction, a large national design-build company.
Pyle’s former mason at I.C.E. was Hank Blatnik, who had started his own self-named business a few years earlier.
The company’s HBA name stands for Hank Blatnik & Associates.
Pyle now is a co-owner.
HBA has a bit of a family feel. Pyle’s daughter, Kristi Pruter, is one of the company’s directors, as is Blatnick’s son, John, who oversees a unit of the company that does work in Texas.
“What I think stands out here is that (HBA) has a great sense of an ethical compass,” said Alessandrini, who previously worked at Santa Ana technology products distributor Ingram Micro Inc. “Sometimes that’s not always the case in construction. That’s why I came here.”
