Berts Electric University Information

With several generations of talent guiding the business and 180 electricians working on a broad range of residential and mixed-use towers, commercial and institutional projects, few - if any - jobs are beyond Bert's Electric Ltd.'s scope of abilities. While Bert's Electric is a complex organization, its founder and partners display an old-world friendliness, and they enjoy discussing the values that drive their success. Founder and president Bert Heinrichs, whose family emigrated from the Ukraine to Abbotsford in the 1940s and who operates Bert's Electric from the same five acres of land his father used to farm, says, "We get a deep satisfaction in bringing projects to a successful conclusion. Sure, it's important to be competitive and maintain a select client base, but what really keeps us going are the day-to-day challenges of providing design-build expertise, purchasing properly and maintaining a core group of dedicated employees, most of whom have grown with the company over the years and who are responsible for creating the opportunities for the next wave of apprentices and electricians. Partner Werner Friesen adds, "Our clients, like our employees, are our biggest asset, and we work hard to take care of both." At 38, partner Neal Rempel is Heinrichs' junior by 32 years, but he and his colleagues share the same mindset. "It's probably due to the majority of us having started out as apprentices," he says. "We've been raised under Bert's 'work hard and you'll be rewarded' value system and therefore act cohesively as a team." Partner Brian Albertson says, "This has a significant practical value given the demands of the industry, because we could be working on seven or eight budgets for 2008/09 and closing out five or six projects while another 15 to 20 projects are in full production." At a time when labour shortages plague the construction sector, Bert's Electric is operating at the peak of its game. Currently, Albertson, whose clients preside over highrise construction, is in the design stages of a LEED Standard-certified multi-tower complex in False Creek as well as the 43-storey multi-use Capital 6 residences in downtown Vancouver for the Wall Financial Group, which Bert's Electric has been involved with since the early 1990s.