“The company’s motto – where the contractor shops, and so should you – has remained a core value over the years. Today, about 70 percent of the overall business is contractor based, while do-it-yourselfers and home handy-people make up the remaining 30 percent.” ~ Brent Hartley, Western Building Center Distribution Center Manager
Kalispell, MT – To understand the history of Western Building Center, located here, you need to travel back more than 70 years to 1946. The United States was just emerging from World War II and on the verge of a massive building boom, and Les Kjos decided to open Western Woodwork, a cabinet and millwork shop. Eight years later, Ivan O’Neil joined the company and the partners expanded the business to include building materials.
As the years went on, the company continued to acquire and expand retail outlets as demand increased. That steady growth exploded in the late 1990s and early 2000s, and today the company boasts a dozen locations, as well as manufacturing facilities that produce floor trusses and wall panels.
Today, more than 70 years later, the company again finds itself in the middle of a period of explosive growth and primed to write the latest chapter in its long and storied history.
Western Building Center Distribution Center Manager Brent Hartley is a prime example of the company’s policy of growing from within.
“After college, I needed a job as quick as I could find one. I started there in 1996 and worked for a year at the retail location,” Hartley recalled. “Then I went to the distribution center and drove CDL trucks for about five years before transitioning into operations manager of our warehouse. My boss, Randy Kjos, retired in 2013 and I took over the purchasing of commodity items.”
He noted that the company’s motto – where the contractor shops, and so should you – has remained a core value over the years. Today, about 70 percent of the overall business is contractor based, while do-it-yourselfers and home handy-people make up the remaining 30 percent.
“Over the years we have diversified a little bit by producing wall panels and trusses,” Hartley noted. “We’ve also dabbled in cross-laminated timber. We’re willing to try some of those things in the business arena, and we’ve tried to get more market share over the years, but the core values have always remained the same.”
Cementing those values into the company’s culture has been an ongoing process, especially now that the company’s workforce hovers around 400 employees. Hartley said that number would be even higher if they could get all the people they wanted.
“No doubt it would be higher right now if we could find everybody we wanted to find,” he said. “As far as employees go, the labor side of it has been a challenge. We’ve tried out several options, including retention bonuses and raising pay. We’ve looked at a lot of things. Nothing’s been a perfect solution; it has been tough. Hopefully that will straighten out as we work our way through the rest of the year and into next spring.”
Hartley added that the pandemic created a number of difficulties on the supply side of the business as well, difficulties that the company has met head-on.
“It’s been a challenge for sure. As far as supply chains go, we are not immune, but I would say that being in business since 1946 and having a lot of good partners, good financials, and good credit has made a difference,” he said.
Hartley went on to say that in many cases, the people they work with are more than just suppliers and vendors; they are friends. These strong bonds mean that when times are tough, the company can rely on those long-standing relationships, just as Western Building Center’s customers and vendors can rely on them.
To that end, the company has maintained its stock of its top sellers: Douglas Fir and White Fir. Interestingly, Hartley said the western half of Montana tends to favor Douglas Fir, while the east generally prefers the White Fir, as well as Spruce-Pine-Fir. “Being right in the middle, we seem to sell a lot of both,” he observed.
In addition to lumber, where they purchase over 10 million plus board feet annually, the company does a booming business in floor trusses and wall panels, both of which are produced in specialty plants designed to optimize throughput.
“We’ve got two separate facilities for that; a wall panel plant that can build a pretty good variety when it comes to the panels,” he said. “It is up to date technologically, with automatic cutting saws and pucks that move where the computers tell them to go. Floor trusses are also coming out of that building on separate equipment. Our layup guys can shift from one type of truss to another in a manner of minutes, providing great efficiency. Those two buildings are managed by the same guy on the same property.”
All of these products are transported throughout the region thanks to the company’s fleet of delivery trucks and tractor trailers. In fact, all but about five percent of Western Building Center’s products are transported by the company’s own vehicles, with the remaining products handled by private transport companies.
Even though the company today bears slim resemblance to the cabinet and millwork shop that Les Kjos opened all those years ago, there is still a strong connection to the company’s humble beginnings. Hartley noted that many of the company’s original family owners remain part of the Western Building Center team.
“Randy is still one of the stockholders. Ivan, one of the original owners, remains on the board of directors, and his son-in-law Bill is still a stockholder who attends the managers’ meetings and works part time,” he said. “The original partners that started branched into six, offering partnerships to the store managers, and five of the original six are still involved.”
As far as what the future holds for Western Building Center, Hartley said he sees a continuation of the progress that has made the company an institution in Montana.
“We will continue to grow and expand. The thing that is in the back of all of our minds these days is where are we going next?” he said. “We really take pride in trying to offer the best customer service to our customers and creating a family environment for our employees. I think that’s what makes Western Building Center such great place to buy things and a great place to work.”
For more information, visit www.westernbuildingcenter.com.
