toward the betterment of the industry,”
said Jonas Short, vice president of BLS. “We
want to provide a good place for people to
work, earn a living and provide for their
families. We also want to offer customers
quality service.
“As a family-run company, we take ev-ery
job personally. If you don’t do a good
job, people are going to talk. We don’t want
our names associated with bad projects. It’s
very important to have good people around
you to ensure you can deliver quality work-manship.
We are fortunate to have a strong
“It’s very important
to have good people
around you to ensure
you can deliver quality
workmanship. We are
fortunate to have a
strong management
team as well as many
long-term employees.
We are pleased that so
far, we have been able
to give out five-, 10- and
15-year service awards
with a few employees
nearing 20 years.”
– Jonas Short, BLS Asphalt
management team as well as many long-term
employees. We are pleased that so far,
we have been able to give out five-, 10- and
15-year service awards, with a few employ-ees
nearing 20 years.”
One of the architects of the family busi-ness
was Jim, Jonas’ father, who spent close
to 50 years in the construction industry be-fore
passing away in 2014. From the time
Jim was young, he would spend his sum-mers
hanging around his uncle’s construc-tion
sites in Saskatchewan.
Jim began his career in 1972 while working
for his uncles at South Bros. Construction
and South Construction. Following the pur-chase
of South Construction by ASL Paving,
he continued working for the company. In
1999, Jim and his wife, Irene, purchased
BLS (which was called Bruce’s Landscaping
Services at the time). In many ways, Jonas
says the deal had been a long time coming.
“My dad knew the previous owner per-sonally
and he always told dad, ‘You should
buy me out,’” said Jonas. “One day, dad final-ly
agreed to buy him out and they ended up
making a deal.”
After Jim and Irene purchased the com-pany,
Jim served as its president and Irene
managed the company’s finances. She has
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34 Think BIG | Quarter 1 2018 | saskheavy.ca