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PETROLEUM DIRECTORY: Fairbanks general contractor gains foothold in oil, gas construction industry
After five years of marketing to the oil and gas industry, Great Northwest Inc. enjoys a high level of acceptance as a leader in heavy civil ‘earthwork’ construction Amy Marie Armstrong Special to PNA
Great Northwest Inc. of Fairbanks has been marketing their construction services to the oil and gas industry for only five years. But with its convenient base and its easy access to air, rail and road transportation, the company is quickly becoming a leader in the earth moving, cleanup and reclamation business.
“Working with the oil and gas industry is fairly new for us,” said Howard ‘Buzz’ Otis, president of Great Northwest. “But we are being received quite well and we are enjoying building long-term relationships with new people.”
As Otis builds the company’s portfolio, Great Northwest looks back to its roots for guidance.
“We started in 1976 as a landscape contractor,” Otis said, noting that landscape work naturally leads to being environmentally conscious and making work sites attractive. “The environmental standards have always been a part of our past and our approach to construction has been to have clean, well-maintained work sites with people on those sites who are conscious of doing a good job. We recognize that any level of pollution is not acceptable and we are trying to be exemplary in the way we go about our business.”
That doesn’t mean readers will see many headlines about Great Northwest winning environmental awards for their work, Otis said.
“We go out and do good work for our clients,” Otis said. “We try to be successful for the client and let them take the credit rather than ourselves being out on the front page.” Protecting workers also a priority Aside from taking extreme measures to protect the environment during a job, Great Northwest has an excellent employee safety record, Otis said.
“We are a union company and put a lot of time and energy into making sure our employees are properly trained and have the safety equipment they need to do the job,” Otis said. “We have an excellent working relationship with labor.”
That good working relationship extends to customers.
“We make sure our clients are satisfied,” Otis said. “We solve problems as they arise. We don’t let them fester. Sometimes we have to give a lot, but at the end of the day, we move forward while maintaining our standards.” Community ties Otis’ high standards go beyond business. He is active in his local community as well.
“I try to lead by example,” he said, crediting his ability to participate in public affairs to having good managers, employees, and partners at Great Northwest. “It allows me to get deeply involved in public service. That is important to me because my goal is to make the community and this state a better place for all of us.”
Otis was a member of the North Star Borough Assembly from 1982 to 1988. He is on the executive committee of the Alaska Support Industry Alliance, the executive committee of the Fairbanks Economic Development Corp., he is co-chairman of the procurement committee for the annual fund-raiser of the Catholic Schools of Fairbanks and he is chair of the Fairbanks Chamber of Commerce. He and his wife, Renee Webb-Otis, have been married for 20 years and have three children.
“We have really focused on community throughout our history,” Otis said. “Of course, my involvement in the community benefits Great Northwest. But it is not self-serving. Just by being here, Great Northwest helps drive the economy and benefits other businesses.”
Otis said it is easy for business owners to get wrapped up in the day-to-day affairs of running a business. He is thankful he has the ability to step beyond his role as president of Great Northwest and reach out to the community.
“In some ways, because many other business owners don’t have the ability to stay involved as much as they would like to, it is even more important that I do so that I can help represent all of us,” Otis said.
Busy season ahead for rock crusher Otis anticipates the company’s rock crusher will stay busy during the summer construction season.
“Our machine is state-of-the art, reliable and safe,” Otis said. “This is a big benefit to our clients because we can give them a lower unit cost.”
Great Northwest manufactures a variety of rock and aggregate products, including graded aggregates, gravel, peat, rip-rap and topsoil. In the past few years, the company has done extensive road upgrades and culvert replacement and resurfacing roads on the Dalton Highway. Otis expects Great Northwest to be involved in as many as 10 such projects this summer.
The company also specializes in environmental cleanup work on the North Slope. The company’s 300-acre location at an industrial park in Fairbanks also contains a foreign trade zone.
“This allows duty on any materials supplied from a foreign source to be delayed until those materials leave the zone,” Otis said. It gives customers a financial cushion while manufacturing or storing materials until a project is ready for those materials.
Through an arrangement with the Alaska Railroad, Great Northwest can stage and unload cars from a 6,000-foot railroad spur on the company’s southern property boundary. A gravel pad that enhances the siding facilitates staging materials. Van Horn Road serves as the property’s northern boundary with easy access for highway transportation. The rest of the property is being developed as gravel mining and processing areas with several million cubic yards of gravel available for a variety of projects, Otis said.
The company’s shop and maintenance facility is connected to the 2,500-square-foot main office via a CAT-5 network system. Both facilities were built in 1998. The making of Cuddy Park Despite its relative newness to the oil and gas industry, Great Northwest played an important role in an industry wide project last summer.
The company helped prepare the site for the new 14-acre Cuddy Park, a service project that 600-plus attendees at the annual British Petroleum Classic — held in Anchorage last year — helped to finish.
“We were one of many construction firms involved,” Otis said. “We moved several thousand yards of fill material and helped do the foundation work for the structures, including the theater. They (BP workers) went out there with the rakes and shovels and hard hats and got to work putting the finishing touches on the grades we established.”
The park honors D.H. Cuddy, president of the First National Bank of Alaska, formerly known as First National Bank of Anchorage, one of Alaska’s oldest businesses. Cuddy has run the bank for more than 50 years, financing numerous oil-related projects.
“We were quite proud to play a major role in the partnership that put that project together,” Otis said. “It exemplifies what our company is about.”
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