At construction sites around the region, it isn’t unusual that workers man cranes as large as buildings–large apartment complexes, hotels and mixed-use structures–ascend from the ground toward their eventual height.
Many times the cranes are provided by Rozell Industries Inc. in Queensbury, one of many services it provides in the field of construction.
Cousins Tiara Guidon and Jennifer Whalen are the third generation of the Rozell family to manage Rozell Industries. As vice president and treasurer, respectively, they join their fathers, Brian Rozell, president, and Michael Rozell, secretary, at the helm of the family-owned company.
It was founded by their grandfather, along with Brian, Michael, and Peter Rozell in 1981. (Peter retired two years ago; the patriarch is deceased.)
Rozell Industries is a general mechanical contracting company engaged in a variety of projects, mainly metal fabrication and concrete work, structural steel and pipefitting.
Another large part of their business is the rental of cranes. The company has a fleet of 11 cranes, ranging from a Shuttlelift 5540, that can lift up to 15 tons and operate inside a building, to the behemoth Tadano 400 G-6, with a capacity of 450 tons, probably the mightiest crane in the North Country.
“We really try to do it all,” Guidon said, and “We’ll go anywhere there is work.”
For example, when a Glens Falls customer had a project in West Virginia, Rozell employees were on the job there. Locally, they have set the chiller on the roof of the Glens Falls Hospital, installed the video board at Saratoga Racetrack, and put up a chairlift at the West Mountain Ski Resort.
The company’s workers also put in the concrete floor for a new building at the YMCA Camp Chingachgook on Lake George, built several automobile dealerships, and installed new rides at Alpine Freefalls amusement park. They are now engaged in a large structural steel and piping project in Crown Point.
The company’s 200 employees include managers, estimators, construction workers and crane operators.
“We do everything,” Guidon said, except electrical work.
The women now moving into management grew into their positions. Both have a sibling who chose a different career, so the succession was not inevitable. A fourth generation? Jennifer’s 12-year-old son, Zach, “comes in, works in the yard, helps the guys,” she said. Her own children, daughters ages 2 and 5, also enjoy “hanging out [at the business] like Jen and I did as kids.”
Guidon studied structural engineering at what is now SUNY Polytech but was then part of Hudson Valley Community College, working by day and taking courses at night. Whalen, more involved with the business-end of things than engineering, has an MBA degree. Another cousin, Guidon’s sister, is a graphic designer and helped design the company’s website, rozellind.com. Among other things, web surfers can watch cranes in action on the website.
Guidon has watched things evolve as the business was asked to do new things.
“We are big problem solvers,” she said.
They occupy five buildings in the Queensbury industrial park and will move this month into a new building in Latham, near Albany International Airport “to better serve our Albany customers.”
The new building will include manufacturing and fabrication space, office and storage space, and parking for part of their fleet.
You can reach Rozell Industries through their website or by telephone at 793-2634.