Faith-driven

Faith-driven

Like many construction companies, Dallas 1 Construction & Development Inc. has struggled, but besides

diversifying, it has another coping strategy: Faith.

Bart Azzarelli Jr. grew up in the construction business, working for his father. He learned valuable lessons from his dad, who recently passed away, including being prepared for business cycles.

That's why his Thonotosassa company, Dallas 1 Construction & Development Inc., has branched into more public work, such as installing water mains and sidewalks and cleaning and re-lining sewer pump station equipment. It has even been installing information technology systems.

But Azzarelli, 60, his wife, Jan and Tim Pirc, the company's first employee, also added another ingredient when they started the firm in 1985: Faith. A visit to its Web site includes Bible verses on each screen and puts God in its corporate mission statement.

Along with diversifying, faith has been especially valuable as its core business - installing roads, parking lots and water and sewer lines for commercial and residential construction - has declined, forcing it to lay off 35 people in the past six months. Dallas 1 now employs 110.

Revenues for its past fiscal year, ended Sept. 30, fell to $28 million from $32 million in 2007. In fiscal 2008-2009, it hopes it can do $25 million.

"Maybe we can be blessed and do more, but we're not being ridiculous," Azzarelli says. "The market shows things going backward."

Dallas 1 showed increases in revenues for the past seven years, moving from $12 million to $32 million. Last year, it posted a loss because of the costs of a failed pipe repair service.

Although it benefits from its city contracts, those are periodically re-bid. And not all of its diversification has worked. Dallas 1 invested a lot of money into a "pipe within a pipe" rehabilitation service. But later it found it wouldn't work as well as it hoped. It stopped the service.

Azzarelli became an entrepreneur later in life. After working for his father from 1969 to 1984, Azzarelli worked for another contractor for two years as general manager for Tampa's Southern Water Contractors. In 1985, after Southern laid him off, he began Dallas 1, a name his father thought might be catchy.

Why didn't Azzarelli stay with his father's company? Different management priorities. Azzarelli's dad and his dad's four brothers owned Azzarelli Construction.

"It was way too much family," Azzarelli says. "I had different ideas on running a business."

Looking ahead, Azzarelli is hopeful that federal spending will stimulate new construction work. But he foresees problems for some of his competitors, who are bidding so low on projects that they may not be able to afford to stay in business.

"Some are out of business and don't know it yet," he says. "Jobs are going for ridiculous amounts of money. They are way too low."

While not everyone at Dallas 1 is devoutly religious, the company encourages all of its staff to be professional, meaning no swearing, anger or showing disrespect.

Azzarelli says his biggest lesson as CEO has been letting people know "you really love them and care about them."

"People are loved and cared for, by myself, the owners and managers," Azzarelli says. "It's the culture we have here."

Another lesson was delegating responsibility. Most CEOs want to micromanage the business, Azzarelli says. He learned at C12, a Christian CEOs organization, that to get the most out of your employees, and to retain the good ones, you need to let them use their talents.

"Once I let go, the company started growing," he says.

- Dave Szymanski