HOLMANS operated as a small, family-run company in Albuquerque, selling maps, surveying materials and scientific textbooks, when Tony Trujillo stumbled upon an HP-35 calculator at a conference in 1972.
Trujillo, then an assistant general manager for HOLMANS, knew the calculator — the first scientific pocket calculator to hit the market — could be a lucrative opportunity for the company's resale business.
"When I saw that product at that demonstration, I wanted to add that to our line right away," said Trujillo, who would ultimately come to own the company. "It would be ideal for our customer base."
HOLMANS — founded in Albuquerque in 1955 by Edward and Mary Holman — had a customer base of students and young researchers at labs and universities throughout New Mexico, like Sandia National Laboratories or New Mexico State University. HP Inc., the massive information technology company that manufactured the calculator, at that time didn't partner with a company like HOLMANS, Trujillo said.
Although hesitant initially, later that year HP gave Trujillo the chance to resell a small number of its calculators.
Holmans bought 10 HP-35s, plus one demo, with the intention of selling them within 30 days. Trujillo, who would go on to take over majority ownership of the company in 1989, sold those 10 calculators in 30 days — and then some 290 more.
This marked the inception of what would turn into a 50-year partnership with HP Inc. The partnership provided HOLMANS with stability and a clear path to grow as a "value-added reseller," said John Santoru, who came to the company in 1992 to work in its distribution facility.
He worked up the corporate ladder, and in 2011 along with Trujillo's son Anthony purchased what would ultimately become HOLMANS USA Corp. In April, Santoru took over as the president and CEO.
Santoru manages the 48 employees at HOLMANS' headquarters in Albuquerque along with those at offices in Los Alamos and Livermore, California. The company also runs a production facility in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. The expansions took HOLMANS from being a regional mapping company to a "national enterprise," Santoru said.
One reason for HOLMANS' growth has been its ability to rebuild devices to meet federal guidelines and repair or reconstruct components based on specific customers' needs. Another reason is the company's focus on employee development and growth — something Santoru has emphasized since taking over as CEO.
"It'll bring employee retention and an increase in employee performance," Santoru said about investing in HOLMANS' employees through surveys, training, employee recognition or installing new television monitors in the office to make sure employees are kept informed about company news. "Those are definitely the two things and those will lead to more clients and more customer satisfaction."
Currently, federal contracts like those with the Department of Energy make up a large majority of HOLMANS' sales. Santoru wants to diversify the company's customer base by landing contracts with state and local governments and educational institutions. But partnerships with major companies like Apple Inc., HP Inc. and Hewlett Packard Enterprises — which split from HP Inc. in 2015 — will continue to provide a foundation for HOLMANS' business, he said.
Especially when those large corporations acquire other companies, like when Hewlett Packard Enterprises acquired supercomputing company Cray Inc. in 2019 for $1.4 billion.
"The acquisition of Cray grew our business $10 million a year," Santoru said. Another acquisition — HP's purchase of Aruba Networks for $2.7 billion — increased Holmans' business by close to $3 million per year, Santoru said.
Yet HOLMANS wouldn't see such growth and expansion as it has today if Tony Trujillo didn't find that HP-35 calculator 50 years ago.
"At that time we didn't have that much in technology," he said about first landing the partnership with HP. "That was our turning point. That's how we are who we are today."
