About Us
Mission Statement : Our mission is to provide the best insurance coverage at the lowest possible price and to promote ethics and integrity within our industry, educate our employees to better serve the needs of our clients, and aid the community financially through support of charitable, business and youth oriented associations.
Our mission is to provide the best insurance coverage at the lowest possible price and to promote ethics and integrity within our industry, educate our employees to better serve the needs of our clients, and aid the community financially through support of charitable, business and youth oriented associations.Sharp Insurance began in 1977 when Don Sharp purchased an existing agency in Visalia. We have grown to a staff of 20 in the Visalia office. Many of our agents and staff members hold professional designations. We specialize in contractors insurance, bonding and commercial insurances. We also provide the full range of personal policies you may need. Customer Service is our highest priority.
In the Bonding/Surety area, the agency has Power of Attorney and Delegated Underwriting Authority from several of the sureties we represent which translates into better and faster service for our bond clients.
Don Sharp Agency Spotlight
The remnants of the hard times of the Dust Bowl days still lingered in parts of the American Great Plains around 1944, when Don Sharp was about 5 years old and his family moved from Oklahoma to California. They hoped to find a brighter future and made the trip with two mattresses strapped to the top of their car.
In their new home in an area of California’s Central Valley about midway between Los Angeles and San Francisco, Sharp learned about hard work at an early age. He put in hours on the job in the auto garage where his father worked and on farms milking cows and picking grapes, cotton and peaches.
“If someone really wants an incentive to go to college, pick peaches on a very hot day when you perspire and have peach fuzz on your neck, and you put up with that for 10 hours or so,” says Sharp, owner of Sharp Insurance & Bonding in Visalia, Calif., not far from the spot where his family had settled when he was a child.
With a knack for public speaking and part-time college jobs such as radio disc jockey and film splicer, Sharp could have been headed for a career in the radio, television or movie industry. His college minor was speech art.
His main degree, however, was in business when he graduated from Fresno State University in 1963, and set out on a career course that led him to head his own insurance and bonding agency, now one of the largest bond brokers in California’s San Joaquin Valley.
The Leaderboard talked with Sharp about his business and his background:
Background: I was born in Oklahoma and we moved to California when I was very young, toward the tail end of the migration to California. We landed in the Central Valley where my father, who was an auto mechanic, went to work for a used car dealer. My Dad and Mom were totally opposite when it came to educational background. My Dad went through the seventh grade. My Mom had two college degrees. She went to work as a school teacher in the Dinuba, Calif., area.
Military service: I had joined the Naval Reserve to keep from getting drafted and ironically about 10 days after graduating from high school in 1956 my Reserve unit was activated because of the Suez Canal crisis. And so I was on active duty for a couple of years as a hospital corpsman at the Oakland, Calif., Naval Hospital.
Education: I came back (from the Navy) and went to Fresno State University, and graduated with a business degree in 1963. I made the Dean’s List every semester. I paid my way through college, working nights and weekends and afternoons. Anytime I didn’t have to go to school I was working.
Career path: I took a job with an insurance company, Industrial Indemnity, and qualified for what they called a “junior executive training program,” and the purpose of that program was to give a college graduate exposure to every aspect of an insurance company and eventually most likely have them wind up in the home office. Little did I know that I would ever put all that experience to good use as an insurance broker. I had seven transfers in about 15.5 years. I opened Industrial’s first branch in Anchorage, Alaska. Ironically, the very same week that I was asked to move back to San Francisco and work in the home office as a vice president of underwriting, a broker from Visalia called and said, “Do you remember that you and I talked years ago about the possibility of you buying me out when I got ready to retire?” I jumped at the chance. I had worked with the agency during my years with Industrial and knew the agency and the agents personally. I bought him out beginning Jan. 1, 1977, making a large down payment by cashing in stock in Industrial’s parent company that I had bought over the years and paying the remainder to the owner over 10 years from increased agency earnings.
Family: My wife’s name is Linda. She actually works in my agency. She’s my Chief Financial Officer. I have a daughter, Anna, 28, from a previous marriage. She lives in Seattle, Wash., and is a very accomplished knitter and crocheter. She actually has a Web site, www.victorygardenyarn.com, and sells handmade items over the Internet.
About my agency: We have 17 employees, including three full-time people in the bond department. We’re the largest bond broker in our immediate area. In the San Joaquin Valley, we’re probably the third largest. Our producers are Gary Alexander, Brad Comer, and me.
Notable agency achievements: I’m pretty proud to say that in 1997 we were named the Visalia Small Business of the Year by the Visalia Chamber of Commerce. The other one I’m very proud of: In 2003, we were named the winner of the Excellence in Business Award by the Fresno Bee newspaper in the finance and insurance category.
The reasons for my success and my agency's success are: Service is our middle name, frankly. I tell my staff, and I mean this sincerely, that the products that we sell you could literally buy anywhere else with any other insurance agency or bond broker, and I think what differentiates us from our competitors is the service we provide.
What I like about the bonding industry: It’s totally different than insurance. You can’t “buy a bond.” For contract bonding and contract surety, you have to qualify from a financial standpoint, an experience standpoint, a capability standpoint and a reputation standpoint. It’s almost identical to getting a loan from a bank. It’s a credit function as opposed to an insurance function.
When I'm not at work, I like to relax by: I like to play golf. I’m very active in sprint car racing. I sponsor some cars; I do some announcing; I do some publicity for a local track called the Tulare Thunderbowl. I enjoy spending time at a second home that we have on the California coast at Shell Beach.
How I give back to the community: I have served on the Visalia Planning Commission, 1983 to 1987; I was elected to the Visalia City Council in 1987 and served until 1991; I’m a past president of the Visalia Chamber of Commerce, Downtown Visalians, and the Building Industry Association of Kings and Tulare Counties.
What is the construction industry outlook in California and the other states you serve (Arizona, Texas and Nevada)?: The contractors that are active in infrastructure such as paving, grading, sewer lines, water lines, waste water treatment plant expansion, they’re busy. The good news is every job they do needs quality contract bonding. If you’re a residential contractor, you’re lucky to be in business.
The best advice I ever received was: My parents said, “Always live by the Golden Rule. You’ll never regret it.”
Source of Article: Merchants Bonding Company Magazine, August 2010.