Business View Magazine - Dec 2023

Today, the nationally-known BZI family of companies employs over 800 workers across its three primary divisions. Building Zone Industries, LLC is responsible for steel erection and has completed projects in all 48 lower U.S. states and Alaska; BZI Steel, LLC, with a 90,000-sq.- ft. facility in Cedar City, Utah, specializes in steel fabrication, using state-of-the art robotic and CNC cutting equipment. InnovaTech, LLC specializes in designing, engineering, and manufacturing innovative construction equipment and processes to enhance efficiency and safety on the job. “The biggest segment of what we do is steel erection,” explains James Barlow, who has been the company’s CEO since 2016. “We also have the fabrication division, so, in some cases, we will provide the steel package as well as the steel erection. And recently, we started a wall division with insulated metal panels. Our current market offering is what we call a ‘core and shell’ package, which is supplying the structural steel, putting it up, and doing the wall systems. That’s the ideal package that we offer.” A CULTURE OF INNOVATION BZI is well-regarded as one of the most innovative outfits in the industry. In fact, the firm’s slogan is: “It takes a flexible mindset to rethink steel.” “We’re a very innovative company,” says Barlow, “and rethinking steel is a commitment to always analyzing what we’re doing and determining if there’s an innovative solution that can make it even better. That’s really at the heart of the way we think and operate.” Barlow notes that this culture of innovation stems from the farm-life experience of its founders who have, by necessity, learned how to improvise and improve upon procedures and practices in order to make their work easier and their farms more productive. “Early on, we developed what we call the ‘Panel Table,’” he relates.“This was an innovative new process for doing a lot of work on the ground, convertingwhat would be aerial hours,or time spent in the air doing connections, and putting a lot of those man hours on the ground and then swinging assemblies into place.” That process, which saved time and labor, launched the company’s InnovaTech 83 BUSINESS VIEW MAGAZINE VOLUME 10, ISSUE 12 BUI LDING ZONE INDUSTRI ES