Joe Santelli named 2011 Pennsylvania Small Business Person of the Year

Photo by SantelliTemperedGlass.com

The Small Business Administration recently named Joe Santelli of Santelli Tempered Glass in Monessen its 2011 Pennsylvania Small Business Person of the Year. Santelli traveled to Washington D.C. in May to compete with other state winners for the national award.

Santelli Tempered Glass began in 2006, when Santelli, 55, quit his career of 29 years in safety glass sales and purchased a glass oven and a former steel mill on Monessen's riverfront, where he employed 23 people.Today, Santelli Tempered Glass produces safety glass using a custom-made automated system that exposes glass sheets to temperatures as high as 1,120 degrees Fahrenheit before moving them into the cooling system. The result is a stronger and safer product that shatters into harmless pebble-sized pieces, instead of jagged shards, according to a release.

Over the last four years, Santelli Tempered Glass refined its process, hired 28 more employees, increased sales by more than 800 percent, and opened two additional facilities in Florida and Indiana.