If you’ve driven by the Manatt office in Newton lately you’ve undoubtedly noticed that a big new building has sprung up over the winter.  This is the newest addition to Valley Environmental Services and just who or what is VES you might ask.

VES is a Burlington based company specializing in collection, of used motor oil, antifreeze and related items.  Sound’s easy doesn’t it.  That’s what I thought a year and a half ago when we decided to get into the business and become partners with Ken Reif of Valley Distribution.

 With the rising costs of burner fuels used in our asphalt production process it became evident that we needed to be proactive in controlling our costs to keep our competitive edge. Voila!  VES was formed.

Dean Broderson, a local Newton boy, was hired to manage our one employee, one truck company.  With three hundred and fifty thousand gallons of storage in Burlington we were off and running.  One and a half years later VES has expanded to five employees, three trucks and storage for one million gallons of oil.

The Newton Facility was our second expansion; the first being 140k’s worth of storage in North Liberty, which was constructed last fall.  The Burlington facility is similar in construction to the Newton Building with multiple tanks indoors storing 350k.  Newton has a storage capacity of 500k.  We are off to an exciting beginning but as VES grows so does the demand for fuel.  Manatt’s and subsidiary asphalt plants consume over 3 million gallons annually so we’ve got a ways to go.  We’d better give Dean and his troops another year or so to make that quota.  Remember, when you go to get your oil changed ask them if they use Valley Environmental.