North River Boats expands with commercial, military contracts

GREEN — North River Boats, a pioneering manufacturer of recreation boats built to pursue salmon and steelhead on rock-lined waterways, is set to expand within the commercial and federal government markets.

While the market for recreation boats dwindles, business stemming from commercial and military contracts thrives, North River Boats owner Brian Brush said. And that could mean more jobs for the Douglas County labor market.

“It will definitely add jobs to the commercial side of our business,” Brush said, noting, however, that a slowdown in the sport-fishing industry could offset growth.

But if it stays steady, North River Boats could hire 35 to 40 more workers, Brush said. It currently employs over 300.

On Jan. 31, North River Boats closed its Tacoma, Wash., manufacturing facility. It is now moving that facility’s production side of commercial and government boats to the North River facility in Green.

North River purchased the Tacoma facility in 2001 from Aluminum Marine Construction (Almar Boats) with the intention of closing it.

“That was basically the plan when we bought the Tacoma facility and the production up there — it was always to move it down here,” Brush said.

The closure consolidates the two facilities’ management teams and tool sets and allows Brush to supervise all of North River Boats’ day-to-day operations.

Brush bought North River Boats, then North River Jet Boats, in 1997. The plant manufactured 41 boats that year.

After the 2001 purchase of the Tacoma facility, the commercial side of North River Boats increased its production of larger boats.

“At one point, it was just too large for us to move it,” Brush said.

The two facilities combined last year for a total production of 1,350 boats. Only 250 of those, however, were jet boats. That downturn had previously been noted when the company decided to drop the second-to-last word, ‘Jet,’ from its full name.

The Tacoma closure has been gradual. North River Boats began training its Green workers to build commercial boats while reducing the Tacoma work force.

The full closure put about 17 employees out of work, Brush said. But the company kept a salesman, a couple of draftsmen and a couple of managers from the northern plant.

Absorbing Tacoma’s work load could eventually lead North River Boats to provide training in aluminum welding again, said Gary Matthews, manager of North River’s fabrication department.

In 2004, Umpqua Community College and the state of Oregon provided North River Boats with grant money so it could provide training and growth to its pool of skilled workers.

“I’d certainly like to see something like that happen in the future,” Matthews said.

But first the boat-maker will have to expand its Green facility.

“We’re in the process of trying to purchase some adjoining property to this facility to build all of the larger boats here,” Brush said. “If we can’t purchase the property, we have enough space out back to build the facility and make it even bigger.”

The expansion will include a new 110,000-square-foot building, he said.

North River Boats currently builds aluminum boats at its Kester Road plant, a 70,000-square-foot facility off Diamond Lake Boulevard. But its production will also move to the Green facility.

Over the years, North River Boats has split into two divisions, Brush said. On one side is recreation, the other is commercial. The latter includes guide boats, lodge boats, commercial fishing boats, and government and military boats.

At first, business on the commercial side of North River Boats represented only 10 percent production. But that has since changed drastically. Today it represents about 45 percent of overall production.

The downturn on North River Boats’ recreation side, Brush said, has been caused by multiple factors, ranging from the economy and tightening credit spending to “serious fish issues,” which are affecting fishermen up and down the West Coast.

The Sacramento River in California, with its small returns of salmon lately, and lower harvest allowances for recreational fishermen on the Columbia River have put a dent in the recreation side of North River Boats’ manufacturing, Brush said.

“That’s why the Portland boat market is good for us,” he said.

Military contracts, however, could be very good to North River Boats and the local work force. Brush said the contracts require the drafting of blueprints and administrative personnel to build the boats and work with the military.

Recently, in addition to harbor patrol boats, North River Boats has built an unmanned minesweeper boat, or small submarine, for the Navy.

It also manufactures boats for the fish and wildlife departments of Oregon, Washington and California.

“There’s quite a lot of diversity in what we’re doing here,” Brush said.

But North River Boats is not giving up on the recreation side of its business. The company is trying to tap into the markets of Arizona and Utah, and particularly in the Great Lakes region, where fishermen use aluminum boats very similar in design to North River Boats.

“We’re trying to look outside the Northwest, with all of the fishery issues,” Brush said.



• You can reach reporter Adam Pearson at 957-4213 or by e-mail at apearson@newsreview.info.