Feature Tenant

Cleghorn Builders, Renovators, Excavators

Moving day is approaching for Matt Cleghorn, and as you'd expect, he's quite excited. The owner of Cleghorn Builders, Renovators, Excavators is moving the eight-year old business to the Spruce Lake Industrial Park this spring from its current Coeur Court location.

"It's a new building that, when completed in June, will give us 4,500 square feet of space," says Cleghorn, who took over the residential & commercial construction services company from his father four years ago.

"We're a loyal Saint John west-side company. With retail expansion continuing on Fairville Boulevard and other west-side areas, land is becoming more expensive for the industrial businesses we serve, and they will likely relocate to Spruce Lake industrial park. Plus, there is little-to-no competition for us in Spruce Lake, so the decision to relocate was a natural one."

Cleghorn credits Saint John Industrial Parks Ltd. staff, and Brian Irving in particular, for facilitating the decision and the move. "They really understood the challenges we faced in trying to grow our business in this paranoid economic market. They wholeheartedly did everything imaginable to help make this possible."

The company differentiates itself from competitors by taking jobs where it is the sole general contractor. In that spirit, Cleghorn says they make every effort to keep each project completely in-house, sub-contracting little, if any, work.

"This is a full-service excavation company. We have our own equipment, and we do all aspects of site preparation work - water and sewer, road building, and general landscaping. When we construct new residential and commercial buildings, we do all of the foundations & concrete work, framing, roofing, siding, electrical, plumbing, drywall, crack filling, painting, flooring, and finish carpentry. We are also very busy in the renovation market, offering all of the above services."

As Cleghorn sees it, control over every aspect of the process is the main catalyst for the company's growth and stellar reputation in the community. "It's given us a major advantage over other companies for quality control. The benefit to our customers is that they only have to deal with one company and one person to facilitate their projects. Plus, we can manage costs and deliver more competitive pricing on certain items because we almost never have to contract any work at cost plus profit."

Once settled into the new facility, Cleghorn's plan is to grow the services the company offers residential and commercial customers. He is confident the park will be a major contributor to the company's continued success, particularly through new business opportunities.