OFRS, Inc. was founded as a “yellow iron” environmental construction and remediation contracting company. The company was formally launched as Oil Field Restoration Services, Inc. in January 2014 by Charles “Chip” Anzalone, a geologist and environmental consultant by training. The company legally changed its name to OFRS, Inc. in late 2015 in order to drop the “oil field” reference from the name due to poor upstream oil market conditions and the negative brand image that name projected.
OFRS’s roots lie within the environmental consulting industry. The company was spun out of an established, well-known environmental consulting firm in California, previously known as The Source Group, Inc. (or “SGI,” for short), where Mr. Anzalone had worked as an environmental consultant for over ten years.
This is perhaps OFRS’s biggest competitive advantage as compared to other small environmental construction firms: Mr. Anzalone has over 15 total years of environmental consulting experience and OFRS has since added other executives and senior managers with similar experience to further round out the company’s regulatory and construction knowledgebase. This makes the company uniquely qualified to understand all aspects of a demolition and remediation project, from the upfront environmental analysis and regulatory requirements and constraints all the way through project execution, waste handling and coordination, and regulatory project closure.
OFRS is certified as a small, disadvantaged business by multiple cities and agencies, including the California-unified certification process that includes LA County Metropolitan Transit Authority (Metro) and Caltrans. We are also a certified HUBZone (historically underutilized business zone) small business concern by the U.S. Small Business Administration.
Historical Company Roots
While working as a senior project manager within the environmental industry, Mr. Anzalone noticed a huge vacuum within the consulting companies. There were few companies that offered truly turnkey services for complex, technical environmental projects that required a mix of consulting, construction, and remediation expertise. During his early tenure at SGI, the company was like many other environmental consulting firms, always subcontracting the “yellow iron” portion of the work, and in so doing, leaving huge revenue opportunities to others.
While at SGI, Mr. Anzalone became more interested in the construction aspects of remediation than the consulting components. SGI allowed him to develop the company’s in-house remedial construction program in 2009 as “SGI–OFRS.” From 2009 through 2013, this division steadily grew. During this time, SGI-OFRS focused solely on environmental clean-up efforts for oilfield clients such as Warren E&P, Breitburn Energy, CRC, as well as the Ports of Los Angles (POLA) and Long Beach (POLB).
In January 2014, SGI-OFRS began separating from SGI and was incorporated as a stand-alone company called Oil Field Restoration Services, Inc, but in its early days due to the previous ownership structure, the company largely operated as a subsidiary to SGI. In October 2014, Mr. Anzalone negotiated the complete separation of the company from SGI, believing this legal separation would be key for the company to embark upon a stable growth path and foster working relationships outside of the oil and gas markets. More importantly, with OFRS no longer tethered to SGI, a single environmental consulting firm, the new stand-alone company would be able to work with other environmental consulting firms as they would no longer be in competition with SGI. This substantially broadened OFRS’s target market.
Concurrently with the company’s separation from SGI, as 2015 approached, it became clear that a major slump in the upstream oil market was imminent. Mr. Anzalone knew it would be imperative for OFRS to expand its reach into different markets, including federal, municipal, and large-scale private development. As a small business that relied heavily on the shrinkage of the oil market and closure of oil-related facilities, Mr. Anzalone knew this would be a challenge, but it was a challenge that was surmountable and indeed OFRS has thrived during its subsequent successful years of operation.
Current Market Positioning & Sample Client List
OFRS has established itself as a strong player in California. The company is on a stable growth curve with a substantial backlog of work under contract and a full pipeline of work opportunities.
Since separating from SGI, OFRS has been able to grow its client base into a diverse list of companies and agencies in variety of markets. A sample list includes: