As a young boy Robert W. Chew saw a need and seized the opportunity to tap into a market by selling boat ornaments to local ship stores. It was not what he was selling in Barrington’s neighborhoods that filled his wallet – it was how.
Chew used half hulls he built from his father’s boating company to hold and transport the ornaments from door to door and used his boyish charm to make the sale.
“I’ve always enjoyed seeing a market and going out and trying to provide a service to exploit that market – I find it very exciting,” said Chew, founder and president of SolarWrights Inc., a Bristol-based provider of renewable energy systems.
SolarWrights is the 2007 Business Excellence Award recipient for entrepreneurship.
The company is 36 employees strong and has seven offices throughout the Northeast. Driven by Chew’s passion, the company has grown rapidly – to the point that last year, Providence Business News rated it the fastest-growing private company in Rhode Island, with a 750-percent increase in revenue over two years, from $200,000 in 2003 to $1.7 million in 2005.
Sales in 2006 exceeded $2 million, and this year, Chew expects his company to finish at $5.6 million, growing to $9 million next year. “And that is a conservative,” Chew said.
For the entrepreneur who is passionate about his work, there is more to life than just the bottom line – there is a triple bottom line. Yes, No. 1 is to provide a return on investments to shareholders. And of course, he wants to provide an enjoyable work environment for employees. But he also wants to make a positive impact on society.
That impact is in the form of energy. With each installation of a solar or wind energy system, SolarWrights reduces the energy that homes or businesses need to get from the grid.
As Chew sees it, there are four things Americans have to do to reduce their dependence on fossil fuels: First, we need to be aware of how we use energy. Second, he says, we must learn to conserve energy. Third, we need to make our homes and vehicles use less energy. And lastly, we must use renewable energy wherever and whenever possible.
The renewable energy business, however, has seen its ups and downs, and so has Chew.
More than 30 years ago Chew formed R.W. Chew Company Inc., a contractor in solar heating and water services. In 1986, however, after then-President Ronald Reagan cut the 40 percent tax credit for solar systems without warning, the industry collapsed.
Chew’s company lost a fair amount of money, and most U.S. companies in his industry were sold off or closed down for good.
“Seeing something I’m so passionate about go away was difficult,” he said. “I think I was the only solar guy that survived. For a while there, there was no interest in saving energy.”
Chew closed the business a decade later in 1996 to work for a home builder, Acorn Homes, and was soon hired to work for Solar Works Inc., the company behind the Project SunRIse program which led the charge in Rhode Island’s Renewable Energy Fund. Chew is responsible for writing the Rhode Island Renewable Tax Credit legislation that has made renewable energy equipment tax-exempt.
His passion for solar and renewable energy never went away, but his passion and business sense really kicked into gear when he was writing the legislation and working for Solar Works.
“I missed running a business and I have a strong entrepreneurial drive and saw the opportunity coming down the road,” he said.
What Chew saw was the cost of energy significantly increasing, and that is what started the phone ringing at the Bristol corporate office of his new company, SolarWrights Inc., which he spun out of RemodelWrights Inc., a provider of green home building. He has grown the company ever since, expanding into Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont and New York.
“For a market to be what I call an attractive market to expand into, we need good relations with utility companies, good state incentives, and good licensing for solar contractors,” Chew said.
Rhode Island had incentives in place for the installation of solar and wind projects but that went away in January 2006.
“We are seeing Rhode Island as a fair market at best because the incentives went away and as a result we were forced into moving into other states with attractive incentives,” Chew said. “We had two choices: either go out of business or move into other states with incentive programs.”
Chew credits his entrepreneurial spirit to his two grandfathers and his father, who were also businessmen.
Now, the entrepreneur continues on as a serial entrepreneur and has spun off yet another business, WindWrights. The company provides residential wind turbine installations.
“Even though our name is SolarWrights, we are clearly an energy company,” he said.
Chew’s action as an entrepreneur has brought him great success, but he credits that success to the support from groups that share his vision and having employees who are proud of the company for which they work.
“It is not a one-person company,” he said.
SolarWrights Inc. is an alternative energy contractor focusing on the design and installation of photovoltaic, solar-thermal and wind-energy systems for commmercial and residential use. Based in Bristol, it also has offices in Connecticut, Massachusetts, New York and Vermont. To learn more, visit www.SolarWrights.com.
