60 seconds with Bill Bastian Sr., Bastian Solutions

Bill Bastian Sr., Bastian Solutions
Title: Founder and vice president
Location: Carmel, Indiana
Experience: 60 years in the materials handling industry
Primary Focus: Field sales, new product design, company management and mentoring new hires

Modern: You’re celebrating 60 years in the materials handling industry, which is quite a milestone. Tell us how you came into the industry.
Bastian: In 1955, I was 24 years old, I’d recently gotten out of the service and I joined the E.C. Stark Company, which was my father-in-law’s business. Materials handling wasn’t his primary business, but he did distribute Colson casters. I’d always wanted to have my own business, and in 1962, I was able to purchase the business from him. I renamed it the Bastian Stark Company.

Modern: What was the industry like back then?
Bastian: It was mostly fork trucks, pallets and push trucks, but things were changing. Being out in the field, I came in contact with some of the large companies in and around Indianapolis, and I could see the way they were thinking about automation. Even before I bought the company, I realized we had to add other materials handling products and services. In about 1959, I had an opportunity to quote a fairly large conveyor job for a Chrysler plant. We didn’t have a line of conveyors, or an engineer, but I found someone who would quote the job for me. While I’m not an engineer, I was good at math and had experience building houses. I understood the application, and as luck would have it, I got the job. About that time, Hytrol was getting started and we became one of their early distributors. We were fortunate to get started just as a revolution was taking place in the conveyor industry, and we really trained ourselves to become conveyor experts.

Modern: You began as a distributor, yet, over the years, you have become a systems integrator and manufacturer. How did that evolution take place? 
Bastian: As the business moved along, customers would ask us to do things that weren’t in the catalog. So, we began to design special handling equipment, and worked with fabricators in the area to build them. Eventually, we were selling quite a bit of these types of orders and realized we were getting pretty good at it, so we began manufacturing ourselves. Systems integration grew out of the conveyor business, which was a system. My son, Bill, joined the company in the 1980s. He’s a terrific engineer and was really excited by the automation revolution. A lot of things were coming together that were making automation possible, like the computer industry and the servo motor, and Bill really moved us in that direction. Even after 60 years, I see new things coming every day that blow my mind.

Modern: What are customers looking for today that’s different? 
Bastian: Customers have the same problems as they always have. What’s different is that the industry has come up with things that have delivered real improvements. Automation is moving things faster, taking up less space and doing it with less labor. You have exciting new automated storage technologies, and robotics is just amazing. In the coming years, I think automation and robotics is going to continue to advance to get a product through all those phases from manufacturing to its final destination.