Brusco-Rich, Inc. (BRI) was established in 1967. Initially, BRI was a representative organization selling commercial Heating, Ventilating and Air Conditioning (HVAC) equipment. In 1969 the local factory direct salesman for Ingersoll Rand Corporation (I-R), Ken Schader, was asked by I-R if he would like to become an independent distributor for the I-R pump group. This prompted a meeting with the ownership at BRI (Warren Rich) and a partnership was formed.
BRI operated with two separate sales organizations, one to support the HVAC business and one to support the pump business. Over the next several years the pump group at BRI grew in product coverage and physical size. BRI began to develop in house repair and field service capabilities in the early 1970’s. Sizeable investment was required to continue to develop pump repair and service capabilities and inventory pumps, parts and accessories.
Following the recession in the early 1980’s, Warren Rich sold his interest in BRI to Ken Schader, making Mr. Schader the sole owner of the company. Brusco-Rich, Inc. started to formally adopt the name BRI, Inc. and BRI continued to grow as a broadly capable distributor and service provider.
In August 1986, BRI became the industrial distributor for Goulds Pumps which replaced I-R as BRI’s primary pump line. Many other excellent pump and mechanical seal lines were added over the next few years.
In 1988, Ken Schader sold BRI to George Giessing, Stephen Gambaro and Gary Erler. BRI was located at 213 Chesterfield Industrial Blvd., Chesterfield, Missouri and the company was continuing to grow. By 1990, BRI had opened up branch sales offices in Calvert City, KY and Decatur, IL to support our customers with closer, local service.
On July 30, 1993, during one of the most prolific floods in St. Louis history, a levee broke in Chesterfield Valley, flooding a significant area, including BRI. With 10 feet of water in the building, BRI suffered significant loss, and was forced to temporarily relocate until a new permanent location could be found. Resourceful and resilient, BRI opened on the next working day and conducted business as usual with much assistance from our manufacturers.
For the next 18 months BRI operated in a temporary location in downtown St. Louis. A new 28,000 square foot building located in Ballwin, MO in St. Louis County was purchased in 1994. This building was renovated to include a state of the art repair facility and the company relocated in February, 1995. The new permanent address became 240C Sovereign Ct., Ballwin, MO 63011.
Since moving into our new facility, BRI has kept growing thanks to a dedicated employee staff, excellent products and a continued focus on service. New products such as vacuum pumps, positive displacement blowers, fluid filtration and separation products, motors and controls and tank agitators have been added.
A new repair facility was built in Decatur, IL in 2000. Repair and service capabilities helped keep our customers running during the tough economic times cause by the most recent business recession in 2001 and 2002. In addition to repair and rebuild services, BRI added staff to perform predictive maintenance services like vibration analysis and thermography in 2004.
BRI, Inc will continue to focus on hiring the best people who can offer our customers the best products and the most comprehensive bundle of services. This will allow our loyal customers to continue to reduce their costs, increase their equipment reliability and become even more competitive and profitable.
