EagleSpan lands $3.2M airport deal

LOVELAND – Business at EagleSpan Steel Structures Inc. is taking flight.

The maker of pre-fabricated steel buildings has secured a $3.2 million contract to construct a new aviation complex at Washington, D.C.’s Dulles International Airport.

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Dulles Jet Center, a private fixed-base operator at the airport, has enlisted EagleSpan to build a 210,000-square-foot facility, which would be placed on a 20-acre parcel at the airport. Dulles Jet Center recently won a contract to be the newest fixed-base operator at Dulles International, one of the nation’s busiest airports.

Dulles International, located 26 miles west of downtown Washington, D.C., is undergoing a $3.4 billion expansion project. The project is nearly doubling the size of the airport and prompted the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority to add a fixed base operator. Fixed-base operators provide fuel, hangar and maintenance services for private jets.

The deal with Dulles Jet Center is part of an expanding niche for EagleSpan, which is headquartered in Loveland and operates a factory in Fort Collins.

Aviation-related buildings represent about 50 percent of EagleSpan’s sales, up from just 15 percent a year ago, said EagleSpan president Jerry Curtis. The aviation connection is bound to grow even more this year. EagleSpan is finalizing a contract for nearly $2 million to build factory buildings for an airplane-manufacturing company in Florida, Curtis said.

The Dulles Jet Center is the single-largest contract ever for EagleSpan. The company’s most visible projects in Northern Colorado include the exhibition arenas at the new Larimer County Fairgrounds and the RVBoatel at Johnson’s Corner.

As planned, the Dulles Jet Center would consist of two 85,000-square-foot hangars, two multistory office buildings and two maintenance wings. The six buildings will be hooked together to appear as one large facility.

The pre-built components will be shipped across country beginning in May, and final delivery will occur in late July, Curtis said.

“There will be 80 semi loads of buildings,” Curtis said. “It’s a monster project.”

Despite the size of the project, Curtis said he doesn’t anticipate needing more employees to execute the Dulles contract. The company is about to finish a $2 million project that will be delivered to Jacksonville, Fla., this winter. Employees on that project will roll over to the Dulles project. EagleSpan has about 60 employees.

The Dulles Jet Center contract comes close on the heels of EagleSpan’s announcement in December that it’s changing owners. Superior Oil and Gas Co. of Yukon, Okla., (OTCBB: SIOR) has agreed to buy EagleSpan for $3 million; the deal is scheduled to close next month.

As part of the deal, Superior Oil plans to invest an additional $3 million in EagleSpan.

“The Dulles Jet Center is just the beginning of a full line of EagleSpan magnificent complexes to be built,´ said Dan Lloyd, CEO of Superior Oil.

The new capital, coupled with the expanding list of customers, has prompted Curtis to think of expansion in the near future.

“We are contemplating additional plants,” he said. “It won’t be in 2005. More like 2006 or 2007.”

Curtis said EagleSpan would look to build a second facility in a geographic territory closer to a cluster of customers. He didn’t disclose where that location could be.

Incidentally, EagleSpan won’t be the first Northern Colorado construction company to leave an imprint on Dulles International. Greeley-based Hensel-Phelps Construction Co. built the airport’s Midfield Concourse for regional airlines in the mid 1980s.