Bow2Stern: Full speed ahead

Take one step into the new Bow2Stern Services Inc. building on Capital Boulevard in Houma and it is obvious that this is not just another warehouse. It is a well-designed sales and service facility.

Immaculate floors glimmer with two-part epoxy, while elevated ceilings keep the climate cool and comfortable. Shelving is stacked and stocked with what seems like an endless supply of labeled parts and products, and the division of each service station is easily discernible. Everything is so well-organized that even a non-employee could walk in and immediately find what is needed.

“It took us 10 months to draw the blueprints,” Bow2Stern Co-Owner Buster Naquin said of the zero-discharge building that required only six months to actually build. “It took longer for us to lay everything out, figure everything out, but everything works. We put a lot of thought into it.”

Originally created in 2000 and incorporated in 2002, Bow2Stern is a marine and industrial multi-product service center. The business sells and services pumps, engine controls, tank vents, control valves, air compressors, firefighting nozzles and monitors, winches and more.

“The company was based on products that had a necessity for being repaired,” said Shane Thibodeaux, the founder and president of the company. “I just began slowly with one product at a time. And I started giving customers an avenue to get things repaired that they were having difficulty with. It evolved from there.”

As Thibodeaux gradually built his corporation, he remained a part of an engine starter company. In 2008, he and Naquin joined forces and started Engine Starting Products LLC (ESP) to harmoniously run alongside the Bow2Stern business.

Since teaming together, the two men, both graduates of the Universal Technical Institute in Houston with diesel mechanic backgrounds, have doubled their customer base, tripled their work force and almost quadrupled their workspace.

“From 2008 until now we have definitely taken the bull by the horns and we’ve grown the company tremendously,” Thibodeaux said. “When we became partners we had four employees plus ourselves. Now, I believe we are at 18. We also were in a 4,000 square foot building on Sunset Avenue, and we just recently finished completing the building of this facility, which is 14,200 square feet.”

The team also has a satellite location in Port Arthur, Texas.

Both Thibodeaux and Naquin, who are available to their clients 24 hours a day, seven days a week, attribute their success and growth to a customer-first policy, quality of work and products, and an emphasis on service.

“We understand what it takes to build this business,” said the president. “Business has been very good to us. Even throughout the oil spill we remained steady.

“We make sure (everything is) built as though we own the vessel that it is going on. That’s how we build it. It shows on every bit of our business.”

As the company continues to grow, customers, suppliers and manufacturers bring more products to the owners’ attentions, but only certain products make the cut.

“Everything we get involved in is tied into what we already do. We try not to step outside of our expertise,” Thibodeaux said.

Bow2Stern, together with ESP, is the authorized service center/distributor in the area for Gilkes, JABSCO, Patterson Deck Winches, Kobelt Controls and Austart Engine Starters, to name a few. They also carry a multitude of other product lines that tie in directly to what they do.

Thibodeaux credits the company facelift to a surge in the amount of reputable manufacturers who are interested in doing business with them.

“That’s what part of this new building has brought to the table,” Thibodeaux explained. “We were working in such small spaces at the old building and we were able to expand and we are able to have a showcase for these product lines. These people seem to be very interested in a company that thinks big like this. It’s helped us out a great deal.

“They don’t want you working on a dirt floor. They want to make sure that the facility that you have is something they want to hang their hat on. When they give you the authority to use their name and trademark, they want to make sure that it’s being showcased.”

With the best products on hand and a new, spacious sales and service facility, where every single item that passes through is reconditioned to factory standards and then adequately tested, Bow2Stern may have found a perfect place to drop anchor and enjoy what they have built thus far.

Slowing down, however, is not on the owners’ agenda.

“We would like to sit idle, but that’s not the case,” Thibodeaux remarked. “We own the property all the way to the next building and we’re already planning an expansion.”

A new multi-page brochure and elaborate website are also in the works for the company. Naquin said that since the business is still expanding and adding product lines, these marketing necessities are not the easiest to finalize.

“One of the problems with growing as fast as we’ve been growing is just trying to find the time to keep up, and it keeps growing as we are doing it,” he said.

Bow2Stern is not slowing down anytime soon and with another expansion on the horizon, the owners are in this for the long haul.

“Whatever we do, we build for longevity,” Thibodeaux said.

Bow2Stern owners, Buster Naquin (left) and Shane Thibodeaux have developed a way to test every item as if it were already on a vessel. “Everything we get involved with here, every product, we build some way to test it,” said Thibodeaux. ALYSON SHOWALTER