Brian Thomas has roots that run deep in the community of Yuma, which is being touted as Arizona's fastest-growing city and the nation's third-fastest-growing metropolitan area. With the exception of the years he spent in college, he has lived his entire 30-year life in Yuma, a city that has experienced nearly 50 percent population increases every five years from 1980 to 2000. Thomas has a 60-acre site with about 20 million tons of sand-and-gravel reserves, and after one growing season, it looks like the processes plant he built is going to take.

After graduating from college, Thomas went into a concrete pumping business (he still owns and operates two Schwing concrete pump trucks), then branched into cranes and riggings as well as excavating. More recently, he opened a ready-mixed concrete operation, all under the banner BLT Companies (representing his initials). After establishing his sand & gravel operation, Thomas decided that BLT needed to move more into the ready mixed concrete business. A Con-E-Co batch plant PLP Model 12 was commissioned in February 2002, with an hourly output rating of about 200 yd./hour, storage capacity for 160 tons of cement, 150 tons of fly ash, and 90 tons of raw aggregate materials.

The company, which up to now has supplied mainly residential projects to its ever-expanding marketplace, has 13 Peterbilt-mounted Kimble Mixer trucks stationed at the plant. But starting in April, much of the plant's output will be dedicated to a recent, $10 million Arizona Department of Transportation contract — the Interstate 80/Avenue 3E overpass renovation — for which BLT is scheduled to be the sole supplier. Consuming approximately 30,000 yd. of ready mixed and located less than one-half mile from BLT, the project is scheduled for completion in mid-2005.

by Steven Prokopy with material from Rick Markley, Rock Products/Primedia Business