DeMaria Building Co.

Brothers Joseph A. DeMaria, Sr. and Richard DeMaria learned their trade in construction working alongside their father, an Italian immigrant who was skilled in carpentry and concrete work. He built retail stores and apartment buildings in his spare time, and inspired his sons to pursue careers in construction management.

Joe and Rick incorporated the DeMaria Building Company on February 18, 1969, in Detroit, Michigan. They began with concrete work—sidewalks, basements—and soon moved into residential projects, including garages, additions, and modernizations—all in the metropolitan Detroit area. Always open to new opportunities, DeMaria took on its first job for the automotive sector in 1970 when it converted the coal-fired boilers to oil-fired at General Motors’ Chevy Spring and Bumper Plant in Livonia, Michigan.

DeMaria built its first gas station, for ARCO, in 1973. We soon had contracts from Shell, Sunoco, Mobile, and others as oil companies competed for traffic by putting a station on every corner in the Motor City. The gas station construction market dissolved in 1979 as a result of the oil crisis. By this time we had developed successful relationships with all three major Detroit automakers—General Motors, Ford, and Chrysler—and work from the Big Three became the company’s bread and butter for many years.

DeMaria also worked in the healthcare and education sectors during the 1970s, and these markets became increasingly significant portions of our business. For example, we bid on a project to build three cardiac intensive care units for the People’s Community Hospital Authority in 1978, hoping to get one, and were pleased and surprised to be awarded all three units, making the project one of DeMaria’s largest at that time. In 1975, we moved to a larger office in Detroit to accommodate the expanding business.