Business View Magazine | December 2020

43 BUSINESS VIEW MAGAZINE DECEMBER 2020 OWEN STEEL COMPANY opportunities. Most lead and supervisory positions are held by people who were promoted from within the company. Employee retention is important both in the steel fabrication industry and for Owen Steel, specifically. Finding qualified structural steel fitters and welders can be difficult. The company works with local community colleges to promote vocational education and skills training, but that pipeline has been disrupted by COVID-19 shutdowns. Unlike many other subjects, most vocational training can’t be done exclusively online. That has had some impact on Owen Steel, but the issue existed before the pandemic. “It’s a nationwide problem,” Pate reports. “Young people are not learning trades and learning to work with their hands, by and large. And for our industry, you know we’re implementing more automation, but there’s just a certain amount of that we can do because of the unique nature of our type of work.” Fortunately, Owen Steel employees tend to stick around long-term. New employees learn from veterans, allowing a reputation of quality work to persist for nearly a century. Founded in 1936 to serve local markets in Columbia, South Carolina, Owen Steel has grown into one of America’s premiere structural steel contractors. Today, it has two fabrication facilities, one at its South Carolina headquarters and another in Wilmington, Delaware, that collectively occupy 50 acres. They are both located near railroads and interstate highways, allowing products to be easily and quickly transported across the U.S. The firm primarily serves major cities in the eastern half of the country, specifically in the Interstate 95 corridor, but it has provided materials for projects as far west as Las Vegas, Nevada. Its customer base includes major construction management firms, such as Turner, Gilbane and Skanska, as well as the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. Owen Steel operates in a competitive industry but has found ways to set itself apart.