Renowned BrandSource member, Don Hillebrand of Don’s Appliances in Pittsburgh was inducted into the AVB Hall of Fame during a main stage presentation at BrandSource’s Convention 2023 in Nashville for his lifetime of achievement within the group and the industry.
Don Hillebrand’s remarkable retail odyssey began in the early 1960s when he walked into a Maytag store with a help wanted sign in the window just looking for work. A few short years later Don made the fateful decision to strike out his own and started Don’s Appliances in 1971.
Working tirelessly from early morning until late in the evening, Don was the driving force that turned the fledgling one-man business into a regional powerhouse. Today the company has 12 locations and employs over 175 people selling appliances and plumbing products to customers from Pittsburgh to West Virginia.
“The reason we have had so much success here is that I’ve always focused on the customer first and we’ve never lost sight of putting the customer’s needs above all else,” he said in a pre-taped video played at the induction ceremony. “I only took to business so far; it was my boys who took it over the top.”
Don’s son Tim contends it was the hard work of his father to which the business owes its tremendous growth and success. “Without his sacrifice none of this would be possible,” Tim said. “In the early days he was in the store or doing service calls all day long. He only came home briefly for dinner, and he then went back to the store to do deliveries. He is without doubt the hardest-working person I have ever known.”
