Sound Environmental Strategies

Specialty: Brownfield redevelopment, environmental engineering, due diligence, remediation
Management: Berthin Hyde, president/CEO; John Funderburk, managing principal, Seattle; Tim Murphy, managing principal, Denver
Founded: 2001
Headquarters: Seattle
2007 revenues: $5.9 million
Projected 2008 revenues: $7.5 million
Current projects: Remediation for the Ballard Blocks development; demolition and abatement oversight, soil and groundwater investigation and remediation for a property on Madison Avenue on Capitol Hill; due diligence and subsurface investigation at a Ballard dry-cleaner site; investigation, monitoring and oversight at more than 25 retail service stations

Image courtesy of Sound Environmental Strategies
For the under-construction Ballard Blocks office-retail project, Sound Environmental Strategies performed environmental site assessment, delineation of contamination and contaminated soil removal. SES will be providing an asbestos and lead-based paint survey, abatement coordination, demolition and contaminated soil removal for the project’s second phase across the street.

Sound Environmental Strategies, a Seattle-based environmental consultant, has seen rapid growth in the last three years. The growth is exciting and good, but Bert Hyde, the company’s president, said it also changes what the company is concerned about.

SES has almost tripled its employee base and revenues each of the past three years. It went from having 15 employees in 2006 and doing $3.4 million in revenues to this year’s 56-person team with 2008’s projected revenues growing to $7.5 million.

“I’m concerned because we’re bigger,” Hyde said. “You begin to worry when you get more people and you want as broad a client base as possible.”

To broaden its client base, SES is looking to do more municipal, port and public work. It would like to work with the Port of Seattle, which has more than $10 million slated for projects in the next couple years. In preparation, SES is getting to know the port and the way it works.

“We’re just making plans to do what it takes to do work for the Port of Seattle in the environmental arena,” Hyde said.

More public work

Though the port projects are still about a year away, Hyde said the company is already branching into public projects with the state Department of Transportation, Seattle Department of Parks and Recreation and the Port of Grays Harbor.

“We’re starting to see some success in our efforts to move into that area,” he said.

The firm’s bread and butter has always been local, large real estate companies such as those affiliated with John Goodman including Triad Development and Pinnacle Realty Management. That work represents about half of the firm’s project load today, while 30 percent is work on former gas stations and bulk storage terminals and 20 percent is miscellaneous.

Strong future

Hyde is happy the firm’s headquarters is in Seattle, and thinks the market will be very strong here for many years, despite the slowing economy. But he said SES is also paying a little more attention this time around.

In past slow-downs, Hyde said SES had been “economy-proof to a certain extent” because its large developer clients “get more active when everybody else is inactive.”

Having a larger company widens the economic concern. “That’s the roller coaster we’ve been on when you have that type of rapid growth.”

Hyde attributes his company’s growth and success to its experience with regulators and its ability to turn projects quickly. But the largest growth factor is the work environment, which he said is comfortable and a bit “wacky.”

“I’ve worked for three pretty large national firms and I learned how not to treat technical people. We make it fun.”

Hyde said another strong factor of SES is its local roots. “A lot of it has to do with being a native Seattle person,” he said. “It’s amazing how important that is ... because it’s becoming less and less people. But I think that has something to do with our success.”






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