The Alaska Contractor - Summer 2008
The Alaska Contractor - Summer 2008
The Alaska Contractor - Summer 2008
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By Heidi Bohi<br />
AGC of <strong>Alaska</strong> Legacy Members<br />
Hector’s Welding offers fast, quality<br />
fabrication and design services<br />
When a livelihood has been a part of your day-to-day existence for almost your entire<br />
life, Ken <strong>The</strong>rriault of Hector’s Welding says it gets to the point where you’re never quite<br />
sure if you’ve learned something or if you just know it<br />
simply because the business has always been at your<br />
front door.<br />
He’s vice president and general manager of this North<br />
Pole-based welding company,<br />
now in its 51st year of operation,<br />
that his late father Hector<br />
and his mother Jeanette<br />
started in 1956 after moving<br />
to the Fairbanks area from<br />
Los Angeles, Calif., where his<br />
father had worked for North<br />
American Aviation during<br />
World War II.<br />
At first, Hector spent<br />
summers working for various<br />
general contractors in<br />
equipment maintenance and<br />
repair for the Richardson<br />
Highway and Eielson Air<br />
Force Base, while taking on<br />
moonlighting welding jobs<br />
during the winter months.<br />
When it became apparent<br />
to him there was enough<br />
business for him to be able<br />
to make it on his own, he<br />
opened a storefront in 1969,<br />
purchasing some land and<br />
a shop building. Since then,<br />
<strong>The</strong>rriault says, this second-generation family business<br />
has operated in five different shops in the North Pole<br />
area, continuing to expand and grow everything from<br />
inventory and equipment to personnel.<br />
Today, Hector’s Welding is known statewide for its<br />
fast, quality fabrication and design services, employing<br />
the best craftsmen in the industry to take on small and<br />
large retail and commercial projects ranging from repairing<br />
a bicycle or broken parts and equipment to custom<br />
built parts, new school installations, oil field development<br />
projects and developing clients’ custom designs. Although<br />
welding is the biggest part of the business, the company is<br />
also one of the largest suppliers of steel for wholesale and<br />
retail markets, offers heavy equipment rental and spe-<br />
Ken <strong>The</strong>rriault stands in front of one of the many custom built<br />
sluice boxes that the company fabricated for miners during a<br />
15-year period when gold mining in the Interior was booming.<br />
cializes in manufacturing and rebuilding mining equipment<br />
and parts such as sluice boxes, grizzlies, trommels,<br />
blade and truck liners, cutting edges and ripper shanks.<br />
Hector’s also custom builds aluminum and steel water,<br />
chemical and fuel tanks, or<br />
modifies existing tanks for<br />
homes, businesses, trucks,<br />
boats, planes and job sites.<br />
Many clients have been<br />
using Hector’s for 20 to 25<br />
years, <strong>The</strong>rriault says, because<br />
they appreciate what he says<br />
is the company’s prime area<br />
of specialization: knowing<br />
what the customer needs or<br />
what they should have. This<br />
is especially important in an<br />
industry where people don’t<br />
typically realize what welding<br />
involves, he says.<br />
“A lot of people don’t<br />
understand what it takes to<br />
mend two broken pieces,” he<br />
says. “<strong>The</strong>y think it’s bubble<br />
gum and that ain’t gonna<br />
make it – if something isn’t<br />
going to work we’ll tell<br />
them, or they’ll go someplace<br />
else.”<br />
Although most clients<br />
are in the Fairbanks area, several come from across<br />
the state. Clients include Cruz Construction (Palmer),<br />
<strong>Alaska</strong> Frontier Constructors (Anchorage), Colville, Inc.<br />
(Prudhoe Bay), Flowline <strong>Alaska</strong> (Fairbanks), and ATEC<br />
Industries in Elkridge, Md.<br />
<strong>The</strong> oldest of seven siblings – who have all worked<br />
in the business at one time or another – Ken <strong>The</strong>rriault<br />
oversees day-to-day operations that include five<br />
other employees. His mother and middle sister Donna<br />
share administrative and bookkeeping responsibilities,<br />
and his youngest brother Ron is a welder and machine<br />
operator. His sister Laura is president and lives in Valdez,<br />
and the remaining siblings are also co-owners so<br />
that everyone is involved in the family corporation. At