Henry Gerstner-Stevens 1935 – 2024
After working in factories for years and struggling to make ends meet with a young family, it was time to find a new way forward.
I got a job on night shift so I could look for more income during the day. After several years of wheeling and dealing in plastic bags, poultry manure etc I built my first Site Office to hire to builders on construction sites, this was the start of MOBILE SHED CO.
I hired out my Site Office to a company working in Bacchus Marsh on 22nd April 1974 – my birthday – an easy date to remember and the freight was $5.00 each way, quite different to today’s transport costs.
Things went pretty good, but two jobs got too hard to handle, and when I lost my regular job after having a few days off to move to new premises, my Superannuation pay out allowed me to build more site offices, this time with a new design.
They went well and the business started to grow, Claire (wife) did the office work and I did all the deliveries and pick ups, building, repairs etc
We started to get work from VicRail, and one day I watched them moving some of their storage sheds from site to site, it took three men and a truck 2 days. I said to the Supervisor if I come up with a better system would you be interested in hiring from us. I could save them time and manpower- his response was “Show us”.
I then designed a SITE SAFE security storage shed , with a sliding door and security locking system, shelves, and hooks for hanging items, which could be delivered to site for immediate use.
After Patent, Design and Trade Marks were applied for, SITE SAFE was born, this was in 1986 and it was an instant success. We changed the name of our Company from Mobile Shed Co to SITE SAFE, linking our new name and products. We now supply the Construction Industry, Government departments, Armed Forces etc.
We then developed another seven different sizes with an all new patented locking system for the small units. Then the development of Flammable Liquid and Gas stores took place.
In the meantime we started hiring out 6m shipping containers for storage, and since these were not suitable to store 6m length materials, we extended some of our shipping containers to 6.25m and fitted them with pipe racks to complete our fleet.
SITE SAFE has been operating successfully for over 50 years and has recently moved to new premises in Derrimut off the Western ring road to accommodate our expansion program. With the addition of able and enthusiastic staff we look forward to a successful and bright future.
