When he founded WestAir in 1970, Andy Castiglione likely wasn’t thinking about this moment, 50 years into the future, where one of his employees would be writing a blog post outlining the success of his brand. But, here we are! Sitting in the National City SuperStore, thinking about how much the business and the industry have changed over the last 50 years.
If you’re not familiar with the WestAir story, here’s a very brief version of it. Castiglione had been working at an industrial supply company when he recognized both the need and the opportunity for better customer service within the industry. With this idea in mind, he set out with his wife, Sue, to found ‘San Diego Welders Supply’, a business to be built on the values of customer service with high quality products. These values quickly proved to be the right foundation upon which to create a business, and WestAir (its new name as of 2001) began to flourish.
