About Me

I have been in the construction field in one capacity or another for 20 years of my life. After joining the U.S. Marine Corps right out of high school and serving my country for a total of 8 years, both on active duty, and reserves I went into the glaziers union in the San Francisco Bay Area where I completed my apprenticeship and became a Journeyman, then lead man and ultimately a foreman working on commercial high rise buildings in San Francisco and surrounding cities in the bay area.

But I felt I was capable of more than just being a glazier installing architectural glazing systems and so I tried my hand in Sales as an outside sales representative for DM Figley Co. out of Menlo Park, CA. In this role I had my first exposure to other trades within the construction environment, most of them specialty trades through the products we sold. I was involved in highly specialized coatings for vehicular road surfaces on CA highways. When we were presented with new products it was my responsibility, with the assistance of the manufacturers rep to do presentations to engineering firms and architects to get the product specified as well as to Caltrans testing labs for new concrete repair mortars for highway repairs in the harsh environments of the Sierra Nevada Mountain Highways. These products included but were not limited to Sika, BASF Chemical and Dow Corning to name a few.

After a few years in sales I had the opportunity to get involved in Operations as a Project Manager for Bigge Crane and Rigging. This was one of the most exciting and challenging jobs I had held to this point and I reveled in the complexity and challenging environment of heavy lifting and complex rigging operations necessary for moving large, heavy objects from difficult locations through even more difficult points of egress.

These projects included everything from replacing the chains on a roller coaster in the Great America amusement park in Santa Clara to being the first company to close the Powell St trolley line in over 65 years for a crane pick. I planned and ran a project that set a 265 ton crane up on the steep hill that is Powell St, between California and Pine street, in order to remove a 12,000 lbs cooling tower from the roof of the InterContinental Hotel (see pictures). I have been responsible for permit closures of Hwy 101 for crane picks to CHP escorts of 70 ft long wind turbine blade transportation across multiple highways. This taught me the valuable lesson of inter-trade communication, logistics and how to think outside the box to find solutions to complex projects.

That position with Bigge was invaluable in teaching me how to approach complex problems requiring cooperation of multiple trades across multiple locations and over a prolonged time frame requiring extremely detailed and tight time constraints under very complex logistical constraints. I leveraged all of those skills I honed with Bigge Crane and DM Figley to pursue an opportunity that I was very passionate about in San Diego that allowed me to give back to sports at a pivotal point in a young athlete’s career, high school.

I founded a nonprofit in San Diego that would bring commercial construction companies, like minded individuals and professional sports teams together to provide high schools that were extremely under budget and whose kids were located in lower socioeconomic areas of the district with new, updated sports fields. The schools we helped all suffered from sports fields that were in dangerous conditions due to the lack of funds necessary to keep them in a safe enough condition to prevent needless injuries to the kids forced to play on them. The condition of these fields was causing life changing injuries to these kids in the form of torn Achilles, blown ACLs, broken bones and more. Some of these kids lost scholarships to colleges to play the sports they loved and a chance at a better life for them and their families as a result of these fields. I wanted to do something about this so I did by creating Second Chance Fields in 2013.

We partnered with the San Diego Padres with their Director of Field Operations sitting on our board of directors. We partnered with Caterpillar tractor company with a representative from their organization also sitting on our board, as well as Adrian Gonzalez, the Los Angeles Dodgers first baseman at the time, as a large and repeated donor, and involvement with the San Diego Foundation as well as many others. Together we were able to service six successful field renovations at five different schools over the course of 8 years before the aftermath of COVID finally closed our organization in 2021.

My family and I moved back up to the Bay Area in 2022 where I took on my current position at East Bay Glass as the General Manager first and ultimately becoming the VP of Operations where I currently serve today. In my role here at East Bay Glass I have single handedly transitioned what was a small residential glass company with an average job having a price tag of between $1200 and $2000 dollars to the largest non-union commercial glazing company in the bay area with an average project price tag of between $500,000 and $1,000,000 dollars with projects going up to as high as 10 million dollars. We also specialize in the complex and technically advanced projects that most union glass companies will not take on such as jumbo glass replacement at operationally active international airports requiring complex site safety and pick plans as well as FAA permits to set cranes up in active gates surrounded by airplanes loading passengers and terminals bustling with travelers, to road closures and AC Transit bus route diversions to set cranes up in downtown Oakland on Broadway.

Joshua (Josh) Pratchard is Vice President of Operations at East Bay Glass in Oakland, California. A U.S. Marine Corps veteran and journeyman glazier, he has worked in the glass and construction trades since 1995, advancing from union apprentice to foreman, project manager, nonprofit founder, and construction executive.

Leadership at East Bay Glass

Since joining East Bay Glass in 2022, Josh has been the driving force behind the company’s transition from a small local residential glass shop to a large-scale commercial glazing contractor. He implemented safety, operations and training procedures that have enabled East Bay Glass to take on complex projects, including work for the federal government aboard Bay Area military installations, at Oakland International Airport, and at Pixar Animation Studios, where the company worked under Hathaway Dinwiddie on the curtainwall redesign of the Steve Jobs Building parapet and roof tie-in. Josh is involved in every phase of the company’s major projects, from planning and estimating through execution. He oversees estimating and bidding for all major commercial projects, directs company operations, and manages the company’s finances. Leading a team of project managers and field leaders, he has helped grow annual project volume from roughly $1.5 million to more than $10 million. Under his leadership, East Bay Glass now takes on projects with glazing scopes of up to $10 million and has become the premier non-union glazing contractor in the Bay Area and a trusted partner to many of the region’s largest general contractors.

His clients include Pixar Animation Studios, Oakland International Airport, the Port of Oakland, North Italia in Walnut Creek, and The Cheesecake Factory in Daly City. On every project, he coordinates owners, general contractors, designers, and inspectors to keep the work on schedule and in compliance with brand, code, and inspection requirements.

U.S. Marine Corps

Josh enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps directly out of high school in 1999 and served as an aircrewman on CH-53E Super Stallion helicopters with HMH-361 at MCAS Miramar. He was meritoriously promoted to Lance Corporal early in his career. After advancing to Non-Commissioned Officer, he attended leadership training as a Corporal and served as a Primary Marksmanship Instructor (PMI) at Camp Pendleton, where he was responsible for ensuring that Marines in his squadron met their required marksmanship qualifications. While on active duty, Josh earned a place as a starting pitcher on the Marine Corps baseball team and, in the three months leading up to September 11, 2001, traveled the country representing the Marine Corps on the All-Marine national baseball team. After 9/11, he served on multiple deployments. He transitioned from active duty to the Reserve in 2003 and completed his service in the Marine Corps Reserve in 2007.

Career in the Trades

Following his military service, Josh entered the glazier apprenticeship with Glaziers Local 169 (District Council 16). He installed storefront and building-envelope systems on commercial projects throughout the Bay Area with Guaranteed Glass, Architectural Glass & Aluminum, and Walters & Wolf, and completed his journeyman apprenticeship ahead of schedule. He later served as a foreman at Valiant Glass, leading field crews.

Project Management

As a Project Manager at Bigge Crane & Rigging, Josh directed work on several of the Bay Area’s most complex projects, including the Transbay Terminal, the new Oakland span of the Bay Bridge, and the Doyle Drive expansion of Hwy 101 through the Presidio. This role was his introduction to managing large-scale projects. He led crews of up to 30 and oversaw millions of dollars in equipment, with responsibility for the financial, logistical, managerial and safety components of each project at the subcontractor level. He later built on that experience as Founder and Programs Director of Second Chance Fields, where he led multimillion-dollar field renovations at the public schools the organization served. In this capacity, Josh took on a construction management role, responsible for budgeting, managing subcontractors and volunteer workforces, and securing permits, while ensuring compliance with state, local and school district safety and building code requirements for the structures built. The projects were complex in both scale and schedule: most subcontractors donated their scope in kind, and all work had to be performed during school hours without disrupting classes, physical education courses, or other school sports in and around the work areas. Josh was responsible for keeping these subcontractors on schedule while they performed their work for free around their own for-profit commitments. It was a demanding assignment that drew on all of the experience he had developed in his earlier roles.

Founder of Second Chance Fields

In 2013, Josh founded Second Chance Fields in San Diego with nothing more than $230, a vision, and the determination to see it through. His first project was completed before Second Chance Fields was even incorporated as a California corporation, and his second was completed before the organization received its 501(c)(3) nonprofit designation. Countless people at local contractors and other nonprofit organizations told him it couldn’t be done, and that walking in the door unannounced, like a salesman making cold calls, would never work. Every rejection made Josh more determined to prove them wrong.

Nowhere was that more evident than when Josh met Luke Yoder, Director of Field Operations for the San Diego Padres. Josh began by walking into the Padres’ front office and asking to speak with the person in charge of community outreach. He was told to leave a card and was dismissed without the chance to explain his mission. As he walked back to his car, he passed a large roll-up door on the street that opened directly onto the ballpark. The grounds crew was working on the field, and the door was open for a delivery of infield dirt. Never lacking in confidence, Josh walked through the door, across the groundskeeping warehouse, and out onto the field, where he approached the person he guessed was in charge. He introduced himself and launched into his pitch before the man had a chance to say no. When Josh finished, the man introduced himself as Luke Yoder, the person in charge. He gave Josh his personal cell phone number, asked him to text the details of the project, and said he would be there to help.

Seeing an opportunity to work with the Padres’ director of field operations, Josh immediately contacted a local news station about the project and who would be there to help. A camera crew arrived that Saturday, and just like that, Second Chance Fields was born and beginning to make a name for itself. Over the next seven years, the projects grew steadily in size and complexity. Luke eventually joined the organization’s Board of Directors as Vice President, alongside other notable individuals and companies. The cost of registering for 501(c)(3) status was covered by a donation from an individual who would go on to play a pivotal role in the field renovation projects, making Second Chance Fields a registered nonprofit. The organization was recognized four years in a row as a top-rated nonprofit by GreatNonprofits, and Josh was personally recognized by San Diego City Councilwoman Lorie Zapf for his work in the community as Executive Director of Second Chance Fields.

Education and Credentials

• Bachelor of Arts in Philanthropic Leadership, Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy
• Associate degrees, San Diego Mesa College and Diablo Valley College
• California C-27 contractor’s license
• OSHA 10

Outside of Work

Josh lives in the East Bay with his wife of 14 years, Melissa, and two children, Elijah and Micah. He is a man of faith and a family man who is passionate about golf, the outdoors, and travel. He writes about these interests at joshpratchard.com.