News
Client Story: Shooting Straight
Starting a business is no easy feat. But David Auza, owner of Auza Contracting, was born to tackle the challenge. Now he is celebrating 20 years as a premiere construction company in Arizona.
Read about how the company is succeeding with a straightforward approach.
Growing up in a farming community and working in his dad’s utility contracting business throughout his high school and college years, David Auza developed an aptitude for working around equipment. He used that experience to earn a degree in civil engineering before starting his own construction company 20 years ago.
“The idea of being self-employed and working for myself was a big key to starting my own company. As an owner, you have a little more freedom—but at the same time you have a whole lot more responsibility,” says David Auza. “Plus, being able to watch my dad run his own business encouraged me to want to do the same.
In 2000, David founded Auza Contracting. Based in Phoenix, Ariz., Auza Contracting bids jobs within a 100-mile radius. Seven work crews handle between 30 and 50 contracts per year. What started from ground zero with one job and three employees, is now $15 million in annual contracts.
“The business grew quickly,” says Auza, who serves as president and owner of the 63-employee firm. “It went faster than I ever expected because my business plan started out with three to six people for the first three years. But then we had an opportunity to work on the large Chandler Fashion Mall.”
Auza considers the mall his favorite project since it began as a simple street project for a few thousand dollars and then transformed into a million-dollar job for the entire mall. That necessitated hiring a lot more people and purchasing more equipment in a hurry.
Quality work led to Auza Contracting’s early success and over the first 10 years, they worked exclusively on dry utilities.
But today, they offer a wide range of services from dry utility to water projects and asphalt repair work to commercial and single house demolition. Many of the projects are overseen by Ryan Coppinger, Auza Contracting’s general superintendent.
The majority of the company’s work is currently for EPCOR Water, a utility water company, for which Auza Contracting does replacements for water service, fire hydrants, valves, meter boxes and their emergency work. Plus, they do plant work and sometimes get the opportunity to bid on EPCOR’s capital improvement work. Auza Contracting also performs a lot of time and materials work and completes 700-800 of those a year.
Additionally, the burgeoning business climate and growing population in Phoenix has created new opportunities for Auza.
“We still do some dry utility work for the data centers and solar plants and we use our Cat equipment on those jobs all the time,” Auza says.
To meet the various demands of their clients, Auza Contracting has expanded its services to include hydrovac work, sewer collection systems cleaning, sewer line videoing, manhole rehabilitation, demolition and shotcrete work, and some stormwater control jobs.
Large Equipment Fleet
To handle their various types of work, Auza Contracting operates a large and diverse fleet of equipment including Cat® mini, small and medium excavators, backhoe loaders, wheel loaders and skid steer loaders—with most machines logging 500 to 700 hours per year. The Cat machines are used for trenching, excavation, backfilling, material transport and other jobsite chores.
“At the end of the day, we chose Cat machines from Empire Southwest because of our ability to immediately establish our credit with Caterpillar,” says Auza. “There were no issues. It was so much easier with Cat Financial than it was the other guys."
“Once we started with Cat machines and Empire, we’ve never looked elsewhere—primarily for two reasons,” according to Chris Peterson, controller. “First, the ease of becoming established. Secondly, once we set ourselves up and paid our bills on time, we’ve never had an issue with adding another piece of equipment.”
“At the end of the day, we chose Cat machines from Empire Southwest because of our ability to immediately establish our credit with Caterpillar,” says Auza. “There were no issues. It was so much easier with Cat Financial than it was the other guys."
Building Momentum
With a longstanding reputation for integrity and getting the job right the first time, Auza Contracting has enjoyed well-earned success. The company continues to attract and retain highly skilled workers that further build its momentum and ensures quality and dependability for its growing list of clients.
Safety is also key for Auza Contracting. Auza Contracting has a safety consultant on staff to conduct random inspections and keep safety at the forefront of their business.
They hold weekly foreman and safety meetings as well as monthly safety meetings to award the best-performing individuals. They also recognize crew members in quarterly and annual rewards.
There have been some hurdles along the way according to Auza, such as learning the importance of adequate cash flow and dealing with customers’ perceptions and the way they run their businesses.
“In response to the marketplace, we changed our business model to identify a specialty niche with less competition,” Auza says.
Auza also admits he faces the constant challenges of finding and keeping skilled workers. If he could provide any advice to those just starting out, Auza says to plan ahead and be prepared. And make sure you have plenty of backing with cash resources to avoid any cash flow problems.
Overall, Auza Contracting stands out as a leader in the Phoenix contractor community.
“Creating partnerships is very important to Auza Contracting to sustain its team-like atmosphere,” Auza says. “I would like to leave a legacy of being known as a very honest, trustworthy and responsible company. Long-term relationships are very important to me as is just always being straight up with people.”
That partnership philosophy extends to his Empire salesman and the parts and service support he gets from his Cat dealer.
“We rely on our sales rep and I’ve known him for 40 years,” Auza says. “He’s really good at offering me all the resources, options and information that I need. For example, when we’re looking for/inspecting a new skid steer loader, we might want to be able to do milling with it and/or run a sweeper on it or whatever. Our sales rep makes sure that we are fully covered for all of the options.”
Additionally, it has been a privilege for Empire Southwest to partner with a firm with the stature of Auza Contracting.
“The service from Empire has been great, parts availability has been good. I can say that Empire overall has been good to work with,” Auza says.
Auza learned from an early age the importance of honesty and reliability in working with customers and associates to build a successful business. That philosophy has served him well.
The fact that they perform almost no rework underscores Auza’s operating philosophy. “We just like being straight up with our customers and honest about our rates,”
Auza says. “This is what it is and what we can do it for—and sometimes we identify concerns and we’ll adjust for them. Then, we’ll bid the job the way it should be done. I don’t like to sit there and ‘changeorder’ people. I prefer to say up front here’s what it is—then I bid it and build it.”
