Josh certainly imagined it.
“You know, I had big dreams and big goals,” he said. “I didn’t expect anything less. I was reaching for the stars.”
Since that humble start in 1996, Josh has been joined by his older brother, Matt. Together they’ve built a company that includes more than 100 employees, seven different divisions and locations in Bemidji, Texas and Colorado.
An example of JC Custom Welding & Electric's national projects: 1,000-foot super tankers for the oil industry are loaded onto ships in Pasadena, Calif. Submitted photo.
Matt, 47, is chairman of the board and heads up the electrical divisions. Josh, 43, is president and chief financial officer. The company employs welders, electricians, shop fabricators, and millwrights, and does work both locally and on a national level.
It didn’t start out that way.
“I remember when I had no work in the early days,” Josh said. “I went through the Yellow Pages under Contractors. I called every single contractor, and you wouldn’t believe how many there are in the Yellow Pages until you actually call every single one. None of them had any work until I got to the very last one.
“That was Zetah Construction of Bemidji. Josh introduced himself to owner Howie Zetah and was able to get some of his first big welding jobs, including one project at Northwest Technical College.
Zetah was impressed with Josh’s determination.
“He just wanted to learn so much,” Zetah said, “and it was nice to see someone come in and ask questions and want to achieve what he did. You’ve got to start somewhere. He’s very intelligent. He’s very grounded, sticks to it and is focused. To this day he’s a good friend and we work with him often.”
Josh also made a good first impression on Paul Welle at First National Bank Bemidji. It was a $2,000 loan from Welle that helped with the Northwest Tech job.
“He was a pretty thoughtful, mature guy for that age,” recalls Welle, who has since retired from his family’s bank. “He’s really a sharp guy and he’s got an engineer type mind. Even at that age he seemed pretty mature in his thinking. That’s the really fun part of banking when you see a guy get started and go through the ups and downs of the economy, and the changing dynamics of the economic world.”
JC Custom Welding & Electric has completed numerous grass roots pump stations and tank farms over the past 15 years, including this project at Cushing, Okla. Submitted photo.
Josh appreciated the early support, and said he paid back the loan in full with profits from that first job.
“One thing we’ve maintained through all these years that I think has helped us stay afloat while others are crumbling is we’ve maintained to be a debt-free company,” Josh said “That helps us in the lean times.”
And there have been some lean times.
Early on, JC Custom Welding was able to find a niche in the logging industry, working with the former Potlatch oriented strand board (OSB) plants in Bemidji, Cook and Grand Rapids. When those plants started shutting down, JC Custom pivoted its focus to the oil and gas industry.
Portions of welded catwalks sit in front of the JC Custom Welding & Electric facility in Bemidji. (Annalise Braught / Bemidji Pioneer)
“Now we’re servicing three major pipeline companies across the United States,” Josh said. “We thought the worst was coming ... and now last year we had our best gross sales ever. We’re up to around 100 employees now and going stronger than ever.”
The company’s divisions are:
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Welding and fabrication
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Site welding and millwrighting
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Electrical
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Predictive maintenance
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Machine shop
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Pipeline fabricating and welding
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Advanced electrical systems testing
All of this started when Josh was a teenager.
“I loved working with metal,” he said. “So I would find chunks of metal, make knives or whatever I could out of it. When I got to Bemidji High School in the welding shop and machine shop, I really started enjoying it. I was a kid who at 13 years old asked for a bench grinder for Christmas. And then for Christmas my whole family pitched in and got me a $200 welder when I was 15 or 16.”
Meanwhile, his brother Matt was working in the electrical industry after earning a degree in robotic automated systems. After working for 3M and Potlatch, Matt joined his brother in 2000 and launched the electrical division.
“We’re both mentors to each other,” Matt said. “I couldn’t imagine any other way. I’ve always trusted him with everything. That’s why it works. We don’t overlap into each other’s stuff. They’re two separate things altogether. There is some common ground between us with our customers, but we do two totally different things.”
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Have you heard? From humble beginnings, JC Custom Welding & Electric has adapted and grown - Bemidji Pioneer
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