1869 founder elisha gray and enos m. barton headquarters clayton missouri u.s. number of locations more than 260 key people kathleen mazzarella chairman president and ceo products electrical communications and data networking revenue 6.1 billion usd number of employees 8 300 website www.graybar.com graybar is an american employee owned corporation based in clayton missouri . it conducts a wholesale distribution business for electrical communications and data networking products and is a provider of related supply chain management and logistics services . it is included on the fortune 500 list of the largest united states corporations . founded in 1869 in cleveland ohio by elisha gray and enos barton it was the origin of the western electric company . on december 11 1925 it was separately incorporated as graybar electric company inc. contents 1 history 1.1 early history 1.2 incorporation as western electric 1.3 formation of graybar 1.4 recent years 2 see also 3 notes 4 references 5 external links history edit early history edit during the post civil war reconstruction era an entrepreneur named enos barton who had served as a telegrapher during the war worked for western union in rochester new york . during this period barton met george shawk the foreman of the company s cleveland ohio shop . when that shop was closed down shawk bought some of the equipment and went into business for himself making various kinds of electrical and other apparatus including inventor s models . while on a trip to rochester he and barton who was then 26 agreed to go into partnership . to raise the 400 her son needed for his share of the business venture barton s widowed mother mortgaged her home . the new firm located at 93 st. clair street in cleveland grew . in may 1869 elisha gray an oberlin college professor and inventor of telegraphic equipment bought out shawk s interest . up until then gray had been one of the firm s top customers . he had invented a needle annunciator for hotels and elevators a telautograph a machine for the electrical transmission of writing and the telegraph answer back call box . gray and barton joined forces with an investment of 2 500 each with gray as the senior partner . the success of the new company attracted the attention of general anson stager general superintendent of the western union telegraph company . he offered to enter the business as an equal partner with gray and barton providing the company s headquarters was moved from cleveland to chicago illinois . in december 1869 the company moved to 162 s. water street chicago . the great great chicago fire in 1871 came within two blocks of its small plant . chicago illinois building which housed the shops and offices of gray & barton in the early 1870s the destruction caused by the fire resulted in greater growth for gray & barton as the company sold fire alarms and helped rebuild the western union infrastructure in the city . incorporation as western electric edit graybar electric internal call system preserved at edison and ford winter estates after several relocations all in chicago the business was incorporated as the western electric manufacturing company in 1872 to meet the capital requirements of the telegraph supply business . the new company so closely allied with the elder western that three of its five directors were western union executives . moreover stager was named president although it was barton as secretary treasurer who actually handled day to day affairs . although the young firm thrived in the telegraph industry it was not until the invention of the telephone by alexander graham bell in 1876 and the incandescent lamp by thomas alva edison in 1879 that western electric began to gain stature as a large company . part owner gray held the title of company electrician and spent his days working on his inventions becoming increasingly less involved in the operations of the shop and eventually he sold his interest in western electric in 1875 and retired to pursue independent research and to teach at oberlin college . in 1876 he filed a caveat with the u.s. patent office announcing his intention to soon patent an invention that would transmit vocal sounds telegraphically . gray dubbed his telephone the harmonic telegraph . only hours earlier however alexander graham bell applied for a patent for the same idea which became known as the telephone . as it turned out what bell actually patented would have never worked while gray s idea would have . 1 western union acquired both gray s and edison s telephone patents to challenge the american bell telephony company renamed at & t in 1899 which led to a patent infringement suit and bell ultimately being named the inventor of the telephone . therefore it was bell s patent and not gray s that launched the telecommunications industry . further information elisha gray and alexander bell telephone controversy as applications of electricity broadened western electric not only sold the electric bells and batteries telegraph keys fire alarm boxes and hotel annunciators it originally manufactured but also many items it purchased from other manufacturers . stager served as president of western electric until shortly before his death in 1885 and barton then served as president from 1886 to 1908 . western electric company was the first company to join in a japanese joint venture with foreign capital . it invested in nippon electric company in 1899 . western electric held 54 % of nec at the time . their representative in japan was walter tenney carleton . by the turn of the century western electric had become the main producer of telephone equipment in the united states . 2 it also manufactured arc lamps lighting equipment and power apparatus ranging from small fans to huge motors and generators . alongside manufacturing the distribution business continued to grow handling an extensive line of electrical supplies such as wire conduit wiring devices and pole line material . by the 1910s the company became the world s largest distributor 3 and the united states leading wholesaler of electrical supplies . these facts attracted investment by the american bell telephone company which also discovered that gray and barton could purchase supplies and sell them to the telephone companies more efficiently than the companies could acquire the supplies themselves . a chain of warehouses was established across the nation and the growth of the distributing business continued to increase through world war i and into the post war period . formation of graybar edit graybar president albert l. salt left presents 3 million check to western electric president edgar s. bloom as graybar employees down payment toward the purchase of their company in 1929 . scores of electrical supply manufacturers were using the company s distribution network and business relationships were formed . some of these relationships such as with general electric and the square d company are more than a century old and still exist today . in 1926 a separate entity was established for handling distribution of supplies and equipment . this new entity was named graybar in honor of the company s founders elisha gray and enos barton . this was the first time a major corporation had reverted to its original designation as the basis for its corporate name . the graybar electric company was capitalized at 9 million and consisted of 59 distributing houses in cities across the united states . graybar had become the largest merchandiser of electrical supplies in the world . in 1929 graybar employees purchased their company for its capitalized value which consisted of 3 million in cash and 6 million in cumulative preferred stock . graybar s corporate headquarters were located at the graybar building in new york city until 1982 . during the 1930s the company explored many different avenues of income including a line of appliances and sewing machines under the graybar brand . by 1941 the company s sales volume was more than 100 million the number of distribution houses had jumped to 86 and there was a corresponding increase in personnel . also that year the remaining outstanding shares of stock were purchased from western electric with a 1 million check signed by graybar president frank a. ketcham . when the country entered world war ii graybar s ingenuity and knowledge of logistics proved to be of immeasurable value in providing war needed goods . graybar became a vital link between america s manufacturers and america s defense needs . defense related business continued in the postwar era with graybar again aiding the military during the subsequent korean war and vietnam war . overall the company enjoyed strong growth in the years following world war ii its momentum not checked until the recession of the mid 1970s which led to graybar slashing its workforce by 20 % . as a result when economic conditions improved in the 1980s graybar was unable to gear up quickly enough to meet the rising demand for electrical products . the corporate headquarters moved from the graybar building in new york city to clayton missouri in 1982 . recent years edit the current graybar corporate headquarters at the graybar building clayton missouri . graybar modernized its infrastructure implementing one of the first computer to computer ordering systems but a weak real estate market and slowdown in construction began to take its toll on the bottom line . revenues which had approached 1.5 billion in 1980 improved to just 1.89 billion in 1990 then fell to 1.74 billion in 1991 prompting the closure of some regional offices and another reduction in the workforce . aside from a weak economy it was also becoming clear to management that graybar suffered from internal problems ; the company was losing market share on its traditional electrical business while unable to make desired progress on the newer communications data products . business improved as the economy recovered in the early 1990s . despite sales growing to 2.3 billion in 1994 management decided to realign the business starting in january 1995 forming two business groups one for electrical supplies and another devoted to the increasingly important comm data business . that same year graybar formed the solutions providers alliance teaming up with wholesale distributors kaman industrial technologies wwr scientific products and vallen corporation . to accommodate an aggressive new growth strategy graybar added 45 locations 2 400 employees and 350 salespeople from 1994 to 1999 . it also improved its network of warehouses spending 144 million to construct 16 major new facilities that dramatically cut down on delivery time . as a result of these investments the company was well positioned to take advantage of a strong economy in the final years of the 1990s . in 1999 annual revenues topped 4.2 billion while profits almost doubled during this period improving from 36 million in 1995 to 64 million in 1999 . the improvement in the comm data sector was of particular importance . in 1991 it accounted for just 17 percent of graybar sales but by 1999 totaled 38 percent . 4 graybar engaged in some external growth making several acquisitions in 1999 and 2000 the largest being splane electric supply co. a detroit michigan company with 30 million in annual sales 70 employees and six locations . 5 in 2000 graybar revenues improved to 5.2 billion while net income topped 66.2 million . 6 to support further expansion of its nationwide distribution centers instrumental to the company s growth graybar placed a 100 million bond offering in the summer of 2001 the largest financing effort in its history . 7 by this time nine of the 16 distribution centers started in 1997 were operational and the remaining seven were only months away from opening . once the system was in place graybar was able to achieve its long term aim of being able to ship to customers within 24