A true Tulsa hometown company since 1988, Becco Contractors Inc. started small. General superintendent Chad Smith tells how his dad started Becco in the family garage with a backhoe, a dump truck, a trailer and five employees … and their first job was digging a dog’s grave for $88.
Becco grew by focusing on municipal, county and state needs, and now, some of its main clients include the Oklahoma Department of Transportation (ODOT), the City of Tulsa and the Oklahoma Turnpike Authority. The company is known for expertise and success in heavy highways, roads, bridge construction, grading, earthworks, concrete paving, asphalt paving, small and large drainage structures, retaining walls, water and sanitary lines and underground utilities.
With over 400 employees, Becco has specialty crews that perform almost all types of construction, and the team is capable of working numerous jobs concurrently. The company is known for a multitude of projects, and crews can self-perform a lot of the work, requiring fewer subcontractors. It’s helpful that they own their own trucks.
“We follow the bid process with everything we do,” says Becco’s Vicki West. “We buy and live and work local. We strive to find what we’re looking for in the Tulsa area, unless we just absolutely can’t. We’re civil contractors.”
Tulsa’s Gathering Place is one of the biggest privately-funded projects in the world at $465 million. Working alongside the city throughout the process, Becco contributed to the drainage structures, paving of roads and other contracting needs.
“In 2019, Becco won the American Public Works Association Oklahoma Chapter Silver Winner Award for ‘Project of the Year’ in the category of transportation between $25 and $75 million,” says West. “Becco also did work for the Hard Rock Casino in Catoosa. Now we’re building a bridge over the Arkansas River, just west of Tulsa.”
An equal opportunity employer, Becco also won the 2019 Prime Contractor of the Year for SBE Award Volume, given by the City of Tulsa. Valuing high quality construction with a focus on safety, the company keeps pace with Tulsa as the city progresses in infrastructure development. And Becco follows market changes closely. On top of it all, Becco has a recycling program to reprocess asphalt and concrete.
While Becco partners with entities like I Build America and the Associated General Contractors of America, Smith is especially pleased with the company’s ongoing partnership with Tulsa Tech; the school fills the company’s employee needs, and even customizes programs for people going straight to Becco. The end result upon graduation is a reliable employee, ready to go to work.
Known as the safest heavy highway contractor in Tulsa, the company has a family-oriented culture. With jobs primarily in northeastern Oklahoma, Becco has a high employee-retention rate which increases the company’s reliability. In 2017, Becco won an Association of Oklahoma General Contractors award for having over 400,000 hours with no accidents.
Photos by Mike Townson courtesy Becco Contractors
