Colorado Iron and Metal: no sign of slowing

2023 Mercury 100 fastest-growing private companies

FORT COLLINS – Colorado Iron and Metal has been growing its recycling business, and president Dan Garvin sees no sign of that slowing.

“The Northern Colorado community has grown, and our business has grown with it,” he said. “Coming out of COVID and the supply-chain issues made a bottleneck for materials. Commodity prices rose for everything, and that also contributed to our growth.”

Colorado Iron and Metal saw revenue grow nearly 104% over the past two years, placing it among this year’s Mercury 100 fastest growing companies in Northern Colorado. The company, located at 903 Buckingham St. in Fort Collins and 2929 N. Garfield Ave. in Loveland, saw revenue rise by nearly $7 million between 2020 and 2022, when it stood at $5,948 million.

Predominantly a commercial business, the company currently has 22 employees.

Colorado Iron and Metal was born in 1995 when Kent Garvin bought a company called Nelson Metals and changed the name. In its early years, the three-person operation sold new steel fabrication, recycled metal and shredded paper.

Kent Garvin sold the company in 2014 to his two nephews; Dan Garvin became president and Marty Garvin became vice president.

Today, the company operates all along the Front Range and has built its scrap-metal recycling facility to one of the largest in northern Colorado.

According to its website, “We recycle all types of metal, from small bags of aluminum cans to large amounts of bulk scrap metal. All you have to do is walk in, drop off your junk metal or cans and get paid for it.”

For larger jobs, the company has what it claims to be the largest variety and size of roll-off containers in Northern Colorado, and onsite pickup for commercial and industrial customers also is available.

The company has metal-processing equipment to shear, shred, chop, strip or bale scrap metal as well as load, unload or haul any metal, large or small.

With frequent appearances in the Mercury 100 list of growing companies, Colorado Iron and Metal also received a 2018 Small Business of the Year Award from the Fort Collins Area Chamber of Commerce.

Dan Garvin has received his own share of kudos, including a 2021 Young Executive of the Year award from the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries.

Having had the pleasure of working with Dan over the years, I can say that he embodies everything the Young Executive of the Year Award represents,” said ISRI president Robin Wiener. “From his start on the board of ISRI’s Rocky Mountain Chapter to his current work on the ISRI board of directors, Dan has consistently demonstrated his leadership skills while working to raise the visibility of the essential role of the industry as well as ISRI. The present and the future of the industry are in great hands because of the work of Dan and our young executives.”

He has served on ISRI’s government relations committee, as co-chair of the ISRI council of chapter presidents and membership committee, and vice-chair of its communications committee.

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