Colt Builders: A Brief History

Left to right: Jim Petersen, John Robertson, and Glen Yates

COLT BUILDERS: A BRIEF HISTORY

Like lots of company origin stories, Colt Builders began in a basement.

Glen Yates, CEO and president of Colt Builders, graduated with a degree in construction engineering in the early 1990s, at a time when Canada’s economy was entering a twoyear-long recession. Glen, a Canadian, decided to wait out the economic downturn in another hemisphere with warmer weather, so he headed to Australia for a year. When he returned to Canada, the job market was still dismal, and he ended up taking a lowwage job working as a construction estimator in—you guessed it!—a basement.

“I couldn’t even put gas in my car,” Glen recalls. “And I realized, ‘This isn’t going to work long term.’”

Glen was right—his long-term strategy would not keep him in a basement. At age 21, an opportunity came his way that set him on the path to eventually run his own business.

After gaining experience working in Hawaii, Georgia, Iowa, Texas, and Florida, Glen eventually settled in New England and started his first company. Shortly after its formation, the company was purchased by a larger organization. Through this acquisition, Glen was introduced to larger building opportunities in the rapidly expanding Northeast and Mid-Atlantic markets. There he became an industry leader as he directed the company expansion in commercial framing. Once again, like many times before, another opportunity came Glen’s way.

“I was approached by a Calgary company who was looking for framers to come to the United States,” says Glen. “I was young and not afraid of work, and so I decided to go. I framed senior living facilities all over the country, and I quickly advanced to doing that on my own in a few years.”

Starting Small Colt Builders was well established by the time Glen acquired controlling interest in 2011. The company was founded in 2004 by John Robertson—known as JR—a CPA by profession. In 1980, JR was founding partner of a Canadian accounting firm. In 1990, he left private practice and formed a real estate syndication firm, which expanded into real estate development, which led to construction projects and business opportunities across the United States.

Glen and Shane hand cutting a roof

The crew framing “in the day”

JR retired in 2001 when a private equity firm acquired the commercial framing company that he had controlling interest in. Retirement obviously did not last long. In 2004, he was approached by one of his long-standing business acquaintances and asked to start another framing company to service a particular developer of retirement communities. An agreement was reached, and Colt Builders was born.

It was a bit of a slow start, recalls JR. “When we founded the company, we didn’t have a lot of volume, maybe doing $8 million in revenue per year.” Compared to their current revenue of nearly a quarter billion a year in sales, their early days seem miniscule.

But the slow start was not meant to last. JR had a bigger vision. In 2008, Jim Petersen joined the company as an equal shareholder. His role was to expand into general contracting, primarily developing real estate for their private holdings. Colt survived the real estate downturn of 2008, and as the recession ended there was major growth potential. But as JR puts it, “I didn’t have 25 hours in the day or 8 days in the week.” He and Jim were determined to find a partner to lead and grow Colt Builders, and that’s when Glen arrived on the scene. In 2011, the general contracting was separated from Colt Builders and Jim became president of Gold Stream Companies, a developer of retirement communities in the Intermountain states.

Building a Business Glen purchased controlling interest in Colt Builders in 2011, despite his general disinterest in the corporate world. “I really wanted to make it on my own,” he explains. “I just had an entrepreneurial bug in me that I wanted to explore.”

The itch to build a business for himself came at a unique time—similar to his entry into the construction field as a fresh college graduate, he was attempting to gain new ground in his career during a massive recession. The 2008 financial crisis had crushed business across the United States, but now, in hindsight, Glen is grateful.

“It was an anxious time, but the recession allowed for this opportunity,” he says. “Without it, this opportunity wouldn’t have existed. For me, the timing was right, and with good experience and a good background, I was ready. I knew the industry. I knew the business. I wanted to take it to the moon.”

Setting his sights for the proverbial stars, Glen began to ramp up production and increase the number of builds, and he did so with a vision that was different from the industry’s status quo.

National Reach, Local Management “Framing has always been a regional business—maybe two states wide, at most,” explains Glen. But Colt wanted something different.

Glen and JR had experience building across the country in a variety of different markets, all with varied needs and best practices, which meant that if they wanted to become a truly national organization, they would need to replicate that experience within the business. But national companies without a community focus would also fail to provide the personalized experience needed to succeed in individual markets, which is why Colt was structured as a nationwide company with local presence in each market.

While Glen acknowledges that competition will always be local, Colt’s regional offices are tuned in to local needs, trends, and workforce requirements. This structure allows the company to thrive within a particular region while still having access to the resources of a national organization. Those national resources, headquartered in Salt Lake City, Utah, provide a great home base for supporting locations around the country (and lets Glen engage in some of his favorite outdoor activities like skiing and water sports), including places such as Austin, Texas; Phoenix, Arizona; Sacramento, California; Frederick, Maryland; Charlotte, North Carolina; Warwick, Rhode Island; and Kelowna, British Columbia.

Constructing Communities and Planning for the Future While Colt Builders is a commercial framing company for many diverse projects, JR, Jim, and Glen started their construction careers building retirement communities—a trend that Colt Builders has continued. This is a unique niche in the market, but the numbers alone prove how vital these kinds of builds will be in the coming years.

“I think that the retirement community development is maybe the strongest, in my opinion,” says JR. “In 2030, there will be 71 million people over the age of 65 living in the United States. Let’s say that 10 percent of that 71 million want the option of living in a retirement community—that’s 7 million people. But right now, there are only accommodations for 3 million people. So, if 10 percent want the accommodations, we have to build 27,000 buildings to accommodate the additional 4 million people.”

Those national resources, headquartered in Salt Lake City, Utah, provide a great home base for supporting locations around the country.

“The people I surround myself with have taken this company to places even I didn’t think it could get to.” —Glen Yates, Chief Executive Officer & President

Hornet saw demo with our Utah team

While it is true that multifamily homes are also high on Colt’s priority list, as JR says, “Somebody’s got to frame these retirement communities—why not Colt Builders?”

“We’re a People Business” Colt’s long-term plans for expansion and growth would not be possible without a talented and invested staff. JR and Glen both consider this to be the biggest asset of the company, and when asked about the best parts of their jobs, both of them have the same answer: the people.

“I love coming into the office in the morning and seeing everyone working,” says JR. “We are a people business because relationships matter—trust me. Our team is such a motivated team, and we have a great culture. It’s the most exciting part of my job.”

Glen agrees.

“I love seeing people succeed,” he says simply. “The people I surround myself with have taken this company to places even I didn’t think it could get to.”

And he’s right. Colt Builders currently has 500 employees and works with more than 1,000 subcontractors, generating $250 million in revenue every year. And they are not planning on stopping any time soon.

With a strong track record and a promising future, Glen is looking forward to expanding Colt Builders even more in the coming years. Given his success, he’s gained a lot of wisdom with regard to starting and growing a successful company. However, when asked what advice he’d give to other young entrepreneurs just starting out in the business, his advice is grounded and simple.

“Fear is a powerful force that prevents us from doing a lot of things,” he says. “But this is the truth: if you think you can, go do it.”