An history full of passion
1974 - 1979
Promising début...
Founded in 1974 by Mr. Paul Lacasse, HONCO, at this early stage, specializes mainly in the design and the manufacturing of its self-supporting steel building. In cooperation with the CRIQ (Centre de Recherche Industrielle du Québec) and Laval University, HONCO develops a self supporting construction technology from a structural steel panels that presents an industrial design ahead of its time.
In 1975, HONCO obtains patents of the self supporting structural steel panel technology within Canada, the United-States and some european communities.
Its steel panel manufacturing plant, still located along the Highway 20, had at that time a production surface of 745 m² (8000 pi²) and the company relied on around 8 employees in the office (drafters, technicians, engineers and administration staff).
1980 - 1990
Always expanding...
Well positioned on the Eastern Quebec and New-Brunswick markets, Honco opens a branch office in Anjou in 1980 which quickly proves to have in-depth knowledge of the regional steel building markets, as numerous local employees are integrated : sales representative, estimator, drafter, project manager.
During that time, Honco's main office located in Saint-Nicolas hires new employees to meet the increasing amount of work: consulting-sales, estimation, engineering-drafting and installation team. In fact, with the addition of a distributor network within the province of Quebec, Honco pre-engineered steel buildings sales increases considerably.
The increasing amount of requests coming from export markets encouraged Honco to participate to tenders. That is how we obtained contracts for construction projects in Africa (Egypt, Gabon, Cameroun), in Europe (Turkey), and in Central America (the carrabeans).
Moreover at the beginning of 1980, many modifications are done to adapt the production machinery to metric system and to add new production equipments.
In 1979 and 1980, two successive expansions of Saint-Nicolas manufacturing plant are done to get a total of the production surface to 2 790 m² (30 000 pi²).
1991 - 2000
Experience = customers' satisfaction
After expanding twice Saint-Nicolas main office premises, a totally new building of 745 m² (8 000 pi²) has been built adjacent to the manufacturing plant. More functional and modern, the new offices can better meet the constant growing activities of Honco.
The 90's have been marked by its development and expertise in northern regions of Quebec where good planning, coordination and project managements are the key to success. Parallel to the activities done in northern regions, Honco is also well known on foreign markets with its supply of building structures for several important projects in Asia, in the Middle-East, in Eastern Europe and in the Caribbean.
Standing by the growth objectives and customers' satisfaction policy, Honco's quality control program has been certified ISO 9001 in 1998.
2000 and years to come
Honco : a far-sighted company
Keeping in mind to do our best to meet customer requirements and to expand its market, Honco has implemented a Builders Network in Canada, in the United-States and at an international level, on the basis of having independent companies with construction experience and regional know-how.