“We’re a design, build and project management company for corporate commercial interiors,” says Boyd. “We offer a full turnkey package from concept, of needing space, to butts in seats. We handle everything from the architecture . . . to facilitating the build out for tenant improvement in whatever vertical it is.”

The company’s work is mainly in the Lower Mainland of British Columbia but it does work with some national companies in other markets.

“In the first few years we went from six employees to 12 employees. Then I was able to go over to Italy and secure the Olympic contract for the 2010 Games here in Vancouver. So we were the first official furniture supplier.”

By leveraging relationships Boyd had built up over the years, the company started to do construction project management for a number of temporary facilities for the Olympics. That launched the brand in Vancouver.

When the recession hit in about 2008, Fusion was busy with the Olympic work.

“When the 2010 Games actually hit, we were entitled to have quite a significant allotment of Olympics tickets. So my partner and I bought a ton of tickets. What I did with those tickets, I started taking large what you call influencers out who could influence business into the Fusion world. So a lot of real estate developers and brokers. I would take 30-40 people out to a hockey game or take guys to the gold medal games and opening ceremonies,” says Boyd.

“After the 2010 Games, we just started seeing significant growth because Fusion was on the map. In 2011, 2012 we doubled the size of the business. I went from doing $10 million a year to $20 million a year and then we just had steady growth after that through just getting the right people on board.”

Boyd says he knew that to have enterprise value in his business he needed to bring in the right people. He found some key people who could run and grow the business.

In about 2017, the company brought in people to focus on the humanistic side of the business and that’s when it began to use three-year development plans for its people. It established its purpose which is to create an environment that supports the positive aspirations of everyone all the time.

With the development plans and having a clear vision, focusing on execution, Fusion was able to continue to grow. Revenue was up to $43 million before COVID hit. That changed everything.

“We had a pretty large portfolio in the office world. Obviously no one was going to the office during COVID. We had to scale back and unfortunately lay some people off. We kept the core group of people and we took advantage of the government grant to keep people on staff. I knew around the time when COVID hit that in the office market there was going to be a lack of office because a lot of construction was going on in the office market in Vancouver just before COVID,” he says.

“So I had purchased a company a couple of years before that event that was focused more on the industrial, technical side of construction project management. They were a facility planning group that focused on a different kind of channel. So when I bought it that helped us through the COVID period where we were doing more of these industrial warehouse specialty technical environments. We’re doing distribution centres and things of that nature.”

Boyd says that steered the company away from its core traditional business and got it entrenched in doing these unique environments. It allowed Fusion to expand into a few new channels.

Then after COVID it began to ramp up business again. The office market started coming back as well. Today, it has a fairly diverse portfolio of clients. Revenue this past year is going to be in excess of pre-COVID numbers. It is back up to 60 people after being down to 21 people during COVID.

Boyd says his next step in his life is either to do a possible acquisition or do a share sale to employees.

The Business Transitions Forum has given him an opportunity to meet advisors that can help him with the next phase of his life and his business life.

Upcoming Forum events this year include: April 9 in Halifax; May 4 in Calgary; May 14 in Toronto; September 24 in San Diego; October 16 in Winnipeg; and November in Vancouver.

(Mario Toneguzzi is a veteran of the media industry for more than 40 years and named in 2021 a Top Ten Business Journalist in the world and only Canadian)