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1860-1900
Getz Bros. & Co.- America's largest non-commodity international marketing and services company-traces its beginnings to 1860 and a place called Lower Lake, California, a frontier area one hundred miles north of San Francisco. Joseph Getz, a Prussian immigrant, opened a general store there that served farmers in the area, selling dry goods and groceries.
By the early 1880s Getz Bros. was exporting food products to customers in Shanghai and Hong Kong, which later led to the opening of the first Getz overseas office, in Shanghai. The company did well shipping foodstuffs to China, its reach soon extending beyond Shanghai into northeast China, a populous region with an appetite for the cheese, oils, and meat products Getz exported.
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1900-1990
With World War I came the opportunity for the firm to greatly increase its penetration in China, as British and other European traders exited the market. Getz Bros. opened a second branch office in Hong Kong to serve south China with an expanded selection of American-produced hardware, house wares, and packaged goods, in addition to its established line of food products.
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Having been operated in Hong Kong and China market for nearly a century under two foreign companies, (Getz Bros. Inc. and Muller and Phipp) the Hong Kong operation was incorporated locally in 1978, by merging its Consumer trading unit with its Industrial products and service operation. In late 70s, the Industrial Division of the company started its interior contracting business with partition and ceiling systems, (representing Armstrong, Celotex, Tajima, KCC, Donn, USG, Intalite, etc. the company's insistence in good quality and reasonable price had secured immediate recognition. Getz was selected as one of the few Partition and Ceiling contractors for Government offices. At the same time, Getz expanded its service to cover flooring contracts. In mid 80's, the company was a well known contractor in this field. Major ceiling/ partition/ flooring Projects including Jardines House (formally Connaught Centre) around 80,000 m2, Ocean Centre around 70,000 m2, Harbor City around 50,000 m2, Lippo Centre (Formally Bond Centre) around 60,000 m2, New Hong Kong Bank Building (all lift shift walls), Bank of China around 80,000 m2, Wu Chung Building (around 40,000 m2) and Immigration Towers 50,000 m2.
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Since mid 80's Getz introduced to the local market with Open Plan office furniture system, (Representing Haworth, Click System, designing and producing own brand "Grey lines" Workplace etc.) As leading contractor for Office furniture system, Getz completed many office renovations for Airline offices, (e.g. CPA), Bank Offices (e.g. Bank of America), Educational Institutions (e.g. City University of Hong Kong), Container Terminal offices (e.g. HIDC). The Office Furniture Systems for Housing Authority Head quarter.
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A major change came in 1981, when Getz's parent company, Trans Union Corp., became a member of The Marmon Group Inc., an international association of more than 100 autonomous manufacturing and service companies with total sales of over $6 billion. By refocusing on the firm's traditional strengths and setting new goals, the new owners were able to position Getz Bros. to take advantage of its incomparable knowledge of the Far East and become the leader in Pacific Rim trade.
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International manufacturers benefit from Getz Bros. expertise in a number of ways. Working with Getz enables them to move into markets they would not feel confident entering by themselves. Getz Bros. has an infrastructure-warehouses, trucks, and equipment-that enables it to effectively market and distribute products in overseas locations. With its solid logistics infrastructure, Getz Bros. can evenly distribute fixed expenses, bringing down the cost of distribution channel for each manufacturer.
Every day, millions of people in more than 23 countries use many of the products, which Getz Bros. sells.
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