The Beginning
XIT Paving and Construction began, as many start up companies, as a brainstorm of a couple of guys looking for independence and job security. Both Larry McSpadden and James McCollom (Cofounders) had been involved in construction related fields since the late 1960s and early 1970s.
James McCollom worked for several different road contractors and Larry McSpadden was general manager of a construction supply company. Larry and James met while watching their young daughters perform at pee wee football games and began to discuss business possibilities. Together they formed a business plan to call on property managers and general contractors to solicit pavement repairs, excavation and soil stabilization work.
James had an extensive background in cold in place recycling, cement and lime stabilization, and they began to purchase equipment related to the process. They held demonstrations for property managers, municipalities and school districts to educate people about this unique process as well as solicit work from the different entities.
As luck would have it, the great depression of 1985 for Texas Oil, Real Estate and Banks put a tight budget on most of the property managers, apartment complexes, city and county maintenance departments. XIT was compelled to subcontract excavation and soil stabilization from general contractors. Larry McSpadden, having been associated with all of the road contractors in his 13 year tenure with Lectric Safety Lites and by virtue of his rapport and reputation was able to land subcontracts with Uvalde Construction, APAC, Austin Paving, Ed Bell Construction and many others. Through the experience of working for general contractors, Larry and James began to solicit work as prime contractor. After successfully bidding several City of Dallas contracts and successfully completing the projects Larry and James broadened their horizons and began a concrete paving operation to go along with their successful operation as an earth work and soil stabilization contractor. With the idea of being a turnkey contractor their company size and volume of work increased. They grew from 12 employees in 1984 and $1,000,000.00 in sales to 50 employees in 1986 and $4,000,000.00 in sales.
By 1989, volume had increased to $5,500,000.00 and as such the headaches and growing pains of a construction company divided its owners and Larry bought James out of the business. From 1989 to present, volume increased to $12,000,000.00 per annum, 110 employees and expanded to successfully complete a wider variety of projects. They not only do their own dirt work, soil stabilization and paving, but have added underground utilities to their portfolio and also build all road projects from the ground up.