Trevor Brescia and his sister Angie Pflueger of SVP Steel, LLC.

SVP Steel, LLC’s pool fencing at the Verde Dimora apartments in Mesa, Ariz.

A writer once said, “a sibling represents a person’s past, present and future.” For Angie Pflueger and her brother Trevor Brescia, nothing could be closer to the truth.

When Angie’s husband, Jason Pflueger, died suddenly in 2014 in an accident during a camping trip, the siblings strengthened their family ties and took over the reins of SVP Steel, LLC, the Phoenix-based company that Jason had run for more than a decade. Now, three years later, Angie and Trevor have gone from tragedy to triumph as their business and family bonds continue to flourish.

“The future is bright for us because we have a positive energy between us,” Angie says. “Trevor is an amazing person. He is always thinking of ways to improve the company and to keep moving forward in the industry. I truly couldn’t do it without him.”

Trevor, meanwhile, says he’s inspired by watching his sister step up to help run her late husband’s business.

“She’s driven … it’s pretty impressive,” Trevor says. “She was really able to stay focused and keep moving forward.”

Angie, Trevor and their team of employees handle a wide variety of steel projects for restaurants and apartments, from constructing beams and columns to building awnings, railings, gates and pool fences. Yet they admit their team will, in some ways, always be incomplete without Jason.

Everyone Loved Jason

“Everyone who dealt with Jason loved him,” Trevor says. “He was serious and he liked everything running smoothly; but he also had a sense of humor and he could be a goofball. He was just a good guy.”

Both siblings were faced with a steep learning curve in taking over Jason’s duties at SVP Steel, especially Angie, who had previously done mostly clerical work at the company.

“I had to learn a lot of things I didn’t know how to do. When I decided to keep the company going, I just went with my own gut. I guess I’m stubborn, but I just wasn’t going to let it fail,” she says.

She adds, “When my husband passed away, I was devastated. He was my best friend and we were married for 20 years and together for 21. Because he was my best friend, this drove me to keep going and to make the business succeed. I knew how hard Jason worked to be a success, and I wanted to keep true to his high standards by finding a way to continue that level of excellence.”

Brotherly Support

Angie got lots of support from her family and good advice on running a steel company from her friends Paul Stehl and Lori Saiz of Stehl Corp. But mostly, she leaned heavily on Trevor, who had worked with Jason for years.

“He was pretty much Jason’s right-hand man; he was like a brother to Jason. And now Trevor and I are running the company together,” Angie says. “Trevor had the background and could meet with all the superintendents, but because Jason did all the bids, Trevor had to learn that end of it, too.”

Together, the two siblings convinced clients and colleagues that SVP Steel would be as reliable, prompt and efficient as it had always been.

“It was impressive to see how much contractors trusted us to keep going,” Trevor says. “They had a lot of faith in us and the relationships we’d built.”

Helping matters is the continued booming economy of the metro Phoenix area. Angie contrasts today’s robust market with the roadblocks that businesses like SVP Steel had to overcome during the recession of the late 2000s.

“It was a scary time because the economy got so rotten, the housing market was terrible, and you were wondering if you’d get jobs. But we kept our head above water,” she says.

Progress and Prosperity

“Now, construction is skyrocketing around here,” she says. “It’s gotten really busy just in the last six months. We’d like to stay in the commercial end of things and move forward in structural steel and take on bigger projects.”

As Angie and Trevor look ahead to how SVP Steel will evolve in the years and decades to come, family is at the center of their thoughts. Angie says she’ll be thrilled if her 11-year-old son Sebastian one day decides to work in the family business. After all, SVP stands for his initials: Sebastian Von Pflueger.

“He’s young, but he has an interest in it,” Angie says. “As he gets older, I’d like him to learn how to weld, to get in the shop, work from the ground up, learn from the guys and experience [the business] from all angles and not to be just ‘the owner’s son.’ I want him to be hands-on and learn everything he can. And if he does become part of the family business, I want him to know his dad would be so proud of him.”

But Sebastian isn’t the only one who can carry on the family legacy at SVP Steel. Angie points out that Trevor and his wife are expecting their first child.

“We have big hopes that we can keep the business growing and keep it in the family,” she says. “When it’s family, you feel like you never have to worry about trust.”