Page 20 - BusinessWest August 4, 2025

Business Banking | Cash Management | Commercial Lending
Hydro >>Continued from page 18
grew over the years to become a major name in general contracting,
site work, and heavy civil engineering.
John Sr. and Laurie have told their story many times. As the
Power Power
1990s dawned, the couple ran a successful property-management
operation, with 14 employees and some 900 units in seven apart-
ment complexes. But, due to the recession that struck the nation’s
economy at the turn of the decade, the owners the couple worked
Y You our r
for started bleeding properties at a startling rate; they lost 73% of
their business within six months.
With prospects bleak — Laurie went to work at a local police
department and a Boys & Girls Club to help make ends meet — the
pair looked for another opportunity to strike out on their own, and
Business Business
they found one in seal-coating asphalt driveways and parking lots.
As John Jr. and Josh grew up to become partners in the company
— they will become the majority owners at the start of 2026 — the
enterprise has grown to about 45 employees and six crews. It has
also expanded its footprint, opening a 4,000-square-foot office on
with a full-service team with a full-service team
Falcon Road in Westfield, and will soon add a 7,500-square-foot
shop on that property.
Meanwhile, a second business called ROAR (Raymaakers Onsite
focused on focused on your success. your success.
Aggregate Recycling) — more on that later — now takes up the com-
pany’s entire former headquarters on East Mountain Road in West-
field, and added a second site in Wilbraham.
In short, business is strong for this growing construction com-
pany that has built a reputation in some very specific niches, and
shows no signs of slowing down.
Humble Beginnings
In 1996, John Sr. and Laurie started J.L. Raymaakers, which
first specializing in paving and site work, crack filling at places like
the Holyoke Mall, snowplowing, and more. The ‘& Sons’ part of the
firm’s title came later, as sons John Jr. and Josh, who had been help-
ing out from an early age, officially joined the company.
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“It’s been a long road since me and Johnny were
probably 10 and 12 years old and we worked
here, and we always wanted to keep going, keep
growing.”
“We’ve come a long way,” Josh said. “It’s been a long road since
me and Johnny were probably 10 and 12 years old and we worked
here, and we always wanted to keep going, keep growing.”
The firm, as noted, now specializes in excavation, site work, and
construction projects of all kinds, including airport runways and
taxiways, pump stations, and the foundation technique known as
sheet shoring. Engineering and site work ranges from storm basin
cleaning and repair to storm drain installation and repair; from
water and sewer line installation to concrete work and retaining
walls — a step up, certainly, from seal-coating driveways.
“There’s a lot of MassDOT work now,” Josh said. “We have a big
job, a bridge project, in Alford, and we have big road reconstruction
project in West Brookfield. We just finished a big road reconstruc-
tion that also included two bridges in New Braintree last year. And
next year, we’ll be doing a total rehab on the Mansfield Airport.
That’s going to be a whole new runway, taxiway, sub taxiways, the
whole airport — a $10 million job. We’re also in Pittsfield doing the
taxiway at their airport.”
Closer to home, the company won the contract for underground
natural gas infrastructure for the city of Westfield, and a crew is
now dedicated to that niche. J.L. Raymaakers & Sons handles some
private commercial projects as well, but its focus remains municipal
and state jobs, many of them large-scale.
With so much of that type of work dependent on state and fed-
eral funding — and the latter coming into question across a number
of industries in recent months — the brothers have been pleased so
far that public work has not slowed down in the first half-year of the
www.monsonsavings.bank
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Hydro
Continued on page 48 >>
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AUGUST 4, 2025
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