The agency
A house on Hillside Avenue, and everything after it.
Tooher-Ferraris Insurance Group has been owned and run by one family for the better part of a century. The first office was a Stamford living room. The current one is The Kent Building on Danbury Road in Wilton, with a second at 845 Third Avenue in Manhattan.
1932
incorporated, in July
38
states licensed
36
career professionals
2,500+
clients served
How it got here
Every department in the agency started as somebody noticing something.
The dates below are the agency's own. They are worth reading because they explain why the specialisms are so narrow and so deep.
1932
Joseph J. Tooher Sr. and his wife, the former Mary Louise Brennan, form the Brennan-Tooher Insurance Agency out of their home on Hillside Avenue in Stamford. The agency is incorporated that July, writing home and auto for Stamford families.
Mid 1970s
Peter P. Ferraris Jr., a 6th-grade teacher at the Stark School who had been splitting summers between carpentry and the agency, takes the business over. The Tooher name stays. He opens a commercial department for small businesses nobody else was serving.
Early 1980s
Peter finds Community Association Underwriters, one of the first products written specifically for condominium associations. Tooher-Ferraris becomes one of two agencies in Connecticut able to offer it, and the association department is formed around it.
2000s
Eric Ferraris joins after three years at Priceline.com and brings the technology side with him. Carolyn Ferraris joins on reception and is now Quality Manager in the association department. The agency relocates to Wilton.
February 2016
Frank Pingelski is hired to head the Homeowner's Association Division as Vice President, managing the property managers, the boards and the specialty carriers.
2018
Thoughtful Insurance® trademarked in June. Risk Synergy®, the client service model, filed that September.
March 2021
The Benefits Division opens: group health, dental, vision, disability and voluntary benefits.
January 2026
Eric P. Ferraris, CIC, CRM, CLTC is named Chief Executive Officer and Principal. Peter P. Ferraris remains President.
Who you actually deal with
Which is why the same names keep appearing in the letters.
Peter P. Ferraris, CIC · President
The teacher who took the agency over in the mid 1970s, opened the commercial department, and found the association market that half the business now rests on.
Eric P. Ferraris, CIC, CRM, CLTC · CEO and Principal
Named CEO in January 2026. Came from three years at Priceline.com and has kept his father's habit of explaining the whole picture rather than the answer.
Chris W. Tallcouch, CIC · SVP, Commercial Lines
Joined to build commercial lines business development and now runs it. Known to clients for advocacy rather than for renewal letters.
Frank Pingelski, CLCS · Vice President
Heads the Homeowner's Association Division and holds the relationships with property managers, association boards and the specialty carriers behind them.
- Wilton
- Stamford
- Old Greenwich
- Fairfield County
- New York City
- Licensed in 38 states
So bring us the file and let us read it.
Association, house, business or benefits plan. The first conversation costs nothing and usually ends with two or three things you did not know were in your own policy.