Earlier this year, Isaiah Clow bought the assets of Meridian Construction & Development Inc., a Spokane-based general contractor at which he'd been a longtime employee. 

In the process of buying the company, he changed its name to Cornerstone Construction & Development Inc.

Late last month, the Journal sat down with Clow to talk about his career, the acquisition, and the construction industry in general. 

How did you get started in construction? 

I think my first job was shoveling pea gravel into basements for a home builder at 18. Since then, literally, I've touched every part of residential and commercial construction.

I went to college, but then did a deployment to Iraq.

I opened a business back in 2006, and I did some residential work. I built cabins, homes, and really cut my teeth in that industry. It was great, because you get a lot more experience with the craft in residential construction, and that's really what I fell in love with.

From there, I went to work for a commercial contractor building gas stations for Costco. I got to travel the country doing that, which was real neat.

From there, I became a project manager at National Native American Construction, in Coeur d'Alene, and that's where I really cut my teeth on commercial project management and general contracting. I fell in love with it. The systems are so much more sophisticated than what I was used to. I loved it, and I thrived on it.

I got a call from a recruiter one day, and I think I left his voicemail on my phone for maybe a month. I thought, 'You know, maybe I'll call this guy back.' He had an opportunity, and I got to meet Mark (D'Agostino) with Meridian. I think that was in 2018. I got to study under Mark for several years and learned a tremendous amount about private construction development.

How did your purchase of Meridian Construction & Development come about? 

Mark and I had always been working toward this business transition, pretty much from day one. He was looking for a change of pace at some point. He just didn't know exactly when. And neither did I.

So why now? Was there any particular reason why you and Mark decided to take that big step at this time?

I think it was a combination of things. I think he certainly wanted a lot more time on the golf courses, both here at Manito and in Arizona and in California. And I wasn't getting any younger. So, it was really just a function of both of us being ready, with Mark being ready to move on to the next chapter and myself being ready for that next challenge.

It had been a conversation for many years, and we just actually started the conversation in earnest last fall. And, gosh, I would've never guessed it took that much time and effort to put a deal together.

It worked out and we were, knock on wood, able to keep every person on staff. We didn't have any turnover. We kept all of our clients, our bonding, and insurance. I mean, it was a great deal for us and the staff.

You changed the name from Meridian Construction & Development to Cornerstone Construction & Development. What was the thought process behind that? 

Yeah, that's a great question. The business acquisition was an asset sale, so it wasn't a stock sale. So, it was always gonna be a DBA situation. In the process of doing that, we came up with the Cornerstone name, and it was going to DBA Meridian.

But we started polling our team, and we wanted to create our own identity, something that was a little bit unique to us. We wanted something that really reflected the culture and the team that we have there right now. The name Cornerstone came to me when I was actually reading the Bible, and the disciples refer to Jesus as the cornerstone of the faith.

I loved that, the concept that something great could be built on character. We adopted that, and we have a very acute focus on culture at our workplace and by extension, to our clients. If we take care of our people, we know that our people are going to take care of our clients. We really felt like that name embodied how we wanted to be represented in the community.

What do you see as the biggest challenges within the construction industry right now?

Oh gosh. How much time do we have? 

Right now, the biggest thing that we're dealing with is market uncertainty, and it's probably the most uncertain market that we've seen in a long time. We see a fair amount of demand and a fair amount of interest in new projects, but we see a lot of them dying on the architect's table.

They don't pencil. They don't hit budget. The capitalization rate is too low. The risk is too high. The interest rate is too high.

And so, we're trying to convince folks that things aren't really going to get cheaper in two years or three years. Even if interest rates come down, the cost of that building isn't going to change.

We're finding that we're having to partner with architects a lot more to encourage businesses to just take that step and make things happen. That's been a real challenge, and we're not real successful at it yet, to be honest.

Do you have any advice for someone who is looking at going into the construction field?

(Laughs) You know, Baker, Garco, and Lydig are going to hate me for saying this, but I do think that if you were looking to get into construction, your best opportunity to actually gain experience as a carpenter or a plumber or HVAC tech is to go into the residential field first. Cut your teeth on that.

Gain some experience, and you'll be heads and tails above somebody that goes into an apprenticeship program or starts with a general contractor like us.

You know, if you can show up and demonstrate a little initiative, you're going to go places. People will salivate to have you on their payroll.

Construction is a great way to make a great income for yourself right out of the gate. Go get some experience at residential construction, then when you're ready to make that move into more of a managerial position in five to 10 years, go do that.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.