Jay Cashman Inc.

The history of Jay Cashman Inc. (Cashman) dates back to the late 19^th century when Jay Cashman’s ancestors constructed the Provincetown Monument at the tip of Cape Cod. For decades, the family continued a tradition of high-quality construction services. Jay began his foray into heavy civil construction by revitalizing empty property in Boston into victory gardens. In the 1970s, he became involved in marine construction following a violent winter storm.

Cashman’s marine construction business has grown from there, adapting to changing markets in New England and beyond. Today, Cashman is a major provider of marine construction services, dredging and environmental remediation across North America, the Caribbean and parts of Central and South America.

Cashman employs hundreds of people for the execution of its projects, with a diverse field and office staff bringing extensive technical and location specific experience for both domestic and international work. Close to Jay’s core philosophy and built into the company’s every day behavior are the key concepts of safety, quality, efficiency and innovation for all aspects of the business.

Building together

Jay works with a strong management team, including Michael Empey, senior vice President of business development. Michael focuses on driving the business forward from behind the scenes and entering new markets. These efforts have brought Cashman’s diverse services to established and new clients, both domestically and internationally, making Cashman a provider of choice in the marine construction and dredging industry.

“It’s a combination of the services we provide, our size, resources and our experience that set us apart from our competition,” Michael explains. “We have the operational flexibility that allows us to make quick decisions to meet ever-changing client and market demands while staying true to our core beliefs and delivering a successful project on the metrics that are important to the client, the community and all stakeholders.”

The company is in the midst of gold mining operations in Alaska. Several thousand miles southeast, the company has completed a cruise ship expansion project in Saint Kitts in the Caribbean, and all in addition to 10-plus ongoing dredging and environmental remediation projects along the East Coast.

“We are optimistic of work opportunities in the Western Hemisphere,” Michael adds. “The Panama Canal expansion has been a boost to the dredging and marine construction market along the Eastern Seaboard of the U.S. Ports are expanding and increasing water depths to handle the larger post-panamax class of ships. There are projects in some stage of either design or execution in Miami, Jacksonville, Savannah, Charleston, Delaware, Newark and Boston, just to name a few, helping these local economies keep up in the race to transport goods in a more cost effective manner, feeding the growing global economy.”

According to Michael, the liquefied natural gas marketplace has grown significantly around the world requiring both import and export terminals for the more environmentally friendly energy source. The LNG transportation market is heavily dependent on maritime transportation, resulting in a need for new and upgraded marine facilities, deeper ports and terminals. Cashman sees the LNG market as both a growth opportunity for the company and the ability to participate in a market that will provide cleaner energy.

Continued growth

Michael explains that the marine industry appears to be in a pattern of grown at this time. “We have seen an abnormal spike along the East Coast with dredging work as result of Hurricane Sandy over the past 18 months,” he explains. “There are quite a few recovery projects from Sandy ongoing, as well as new work associated with coastal protection measures in anticipation of storms of this size in the future.”

Another boost to the operating capability for Cashman over the last eight months has been the launch of the company’s new clamshell dredge, the Dale Pyatt. “We applied our technical experience and expertise in dredging operations, along with state of the art components and environmentally responsible design to create a dredge that we fell gives us a mechanical dredging capacity not previously available in the U.S. market,” Michael elaborates. “Right now, the Pyatt is the largest operating clamshell dredge in North America. We have performed three projects successfully since the launch in September 2013 and looking forward to continued backlog and utilization of the dredge.”

Michael goes on to explain that over the last few months, the team has been fine tuning the dredges performance. “Through continual design and performance evaluation the vessel is operating the way we expected it to with continuous refinements that should result in additional performance,” he continues.

With its growing set of resources, Cashman continues to reach into new markets at home and abroad. Michael reports that the business has targets set on projects within the company’s core competency, but also looking into additional market sectors, including oil and gas, as well as environmental remediation and heavy civil opportunities that have the ability to employ existing resources, but outside of the conventional marketplace.

“New markets can present new risk, so it is important for us to make sure that the risk to reward balance is properly evaluated and can justify taking the leap into a new marketplace,” he details.

When the time comes to expand internally, Cashman will respond accordingly. The team practices measured growth, allowing the business to grow steadily while keeping safety, quality and efficiency in check and staying true to innovation. Whether up north in Alaska or between the isles of the Caribbean, the company strives to provide leading service and performance, regardless of size, scope or location. Above all else, Jay Cashman Inc. stays true to its mantra: Think Impossible.