AAspen Corporation walked away fromthe 2007 Golf Industry Show with theBuilder Excellence Award. The LegacyAward was presented to the Daniels,WV, firm at the Golf Course BuildersAssociation of America’s annual dinnerin Anaheim, California, for their renova-tion project on the Old White Course atThe Greenbrier in White SulphurSprings.

Most of the work on the C.B.Macdonald design had to be done inthe off-season in order to keep thecourse open for play during goodweather. Battling snow, freezing tem-peratures, and dark added tremendouschallenges to the project that was donein phases and stretched out over fouryears. “The weather was totally unpre-dictable, so we had to prepare for everypossibility that would come along, andof course it did,” related Aspen V.P.Ronnie Adkins.

Aspen is a certified golf coursebuilder and a charter member of theGolf Course Builders Association ofAmerica who for the past quarter centu-

ry have restored, renovated, irrigated,and built numerous courses throughoutthe United States. Many of these cours-es have hosted high profile televisedevents sponsored by the PGA andUSGA. Aspen president Donnie Adkinsbelieves part of the company’s successcan be traced to “their dedicated andhardworking employees.”

How do two brothers from Abraham,WV, starting with only $700 of workingcapital garnered from the sale of thefamily horses, end up running a multi-million dollar, award winning golfcourse construction and renovationbusiness? According to Donnie andRonnie Adkins of Aspen Corporationthere are several factors, “...work ethicand making quality our highest prioritybeing two of the most important. Andluck, never underestimate the impor-tance of luck, both good and bad, andbeing able to recognize opportunities.”

Twenty-five years ago when both quittheir jobs at Glade Springs, whereDonnie was the general manager andRonnie the director of grounds, to form

a real estate developing firm, interestrates skyrocketed. Bad timing or badluck? With no real estate developmenton the horizon, they were soon con-tracted to do a small renovation job atBlack Knight Country Club in Beckley.The architect overseeing the job, FredGarbin, was a past president of theAmerican Association of Golf CourseArchitects, and he was so impressedwith the time they invested, their atten-tion to detail, and the overall quality ofthe job that he recommended them forother jobs in the Pittsburgh area. Goodluck or good timing? And thus begantheir odyssey in the golf course businesswhich continues today the same way itbegan, by word of mouth. The golf divi-sion does little or no advertising, exceptfor an occasional ad in one of the trademagazines. “We do that more to sup-port the organizations like the WVGAor the GCSAA,” the brothers confided.

Aspen Corporation today has threesubsidiaries: the aforementioned AspenGolf, Aspen Irrigation, and AspenLandscape. Almost everyone in south-

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ern West Virginia recognizes those redtrucks and hardworking crews wearingred shirts with the familiar Aspen logoon them sprucing up lawns and gardensthroughout the area. The landscapingcrews venture as far as an hour’s drivefrom Beckley to perform their servicesand have even been seen in neighbor-ing states. The irrigation crews workwithin a 500 mile radius of home andconfine their services to housing andbusiness developments and golf courseswho want to install or upgrade their irri-gation capabilities. Having recentlyturned down jobs in Israel and inScotland for fear of overextending andnot being able to meet their own exact-ing standards, Donnie defines the terri-tory for the golf course division as “theplanet.”

Indeed it is. A look at the list of theirclients reads like a Who’s Who of golfcourses. There’s Riviera in Los Angeles (inpreparation for the ‘98 Senior U.S.Open), Oak Hill (in preparation for thePGA) in Rochester, New York, Shannopinin Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Firestone inAkron, Ohio, Nemacolin WoodlandsResort, Uniontown, Pennsylvania, TheGreenbrier, The Homestead, The CountryClub of Virginia, and our own GladeSprings, to name just a few.

Once you have reached the pinnacleof your profession, as Aspen Corporationdid in winning the Legacy Award in2007, what do the Adkins brothers feelthe next 25 years will bring? Ronnie seesthe recent trend of older, traditional stylecourses going back more to their originaldesigns and roots continuing. Goodexamples of this include much of thework Aspen has done at The Greenbrierand at The Homestead. These C.B.Macdonald and Donald Ross designsnow reflect their original selves morethan the courses they had evolved intoover the last century.

Donnie believes that to stay at theforefront of the industry they must notstray from their core values, but he alsorealizes that having cutting edge equip-

ment, especially laser technology, andskilled technicians to operate it will beessential. Today, one of their first jobs inthe Pittsburgh area that took six weekscould be done in six days thanks to theadvances in technology and equipment.Add that to his belief that good peopleare at the crux of their success and youcan understand how the company thatstarted with only five others plus thetwo of them, has grown to over 150employees.

Recently, he continues, “We haveworked equally hard to contain thegrowth of our company and thus main-tain the quality of our work.” In 2003Aspen did 70% more volume than theyear before. 2004 saw an increase of70% over what they did in 2003, and in2005 they experienced a 60% increaseover 2004. Such growth is what led toturning down those projects overseas.

Currently they have projects under-way on Lake Erie and in Virginia Beach.This spring they will begin work on thethird golf course at Glade Springs aspart of the Cooper Development.Woodhaven will be the sister course toStonehaven, which is also a design ofarchitect Tom Clark. Testament to theirlongevity is the fact that they are nowgoing back to update work at courseswhere they had earlier done renova-tions. Revisiting former clients a secondtime is even more rewarding to thesebrothers whose business modeldepends on a team concept that allowsthem to maximize both their labor forceand their machines.

Golfers fortunate enough to enjoysome of Aspen’s handiwork firsthandsimply hope they keep up the goodwork.

WVS Design 2007 ■ June/July ■ West Virginia South