Employment Company Going Strong Despite Hard Economic Times

Employment company LaborWorks owner and CEO Scott Sabo says business is going strong. That’s good news during hard times — especially in the employment arena.

The company, which has its corporate office in Gig Harbor, Wash., was recently named to the Inc. 5000 list of the fastest-growing private companies in the country for the second consecutive year.

LaborWorks has expanded to 15 locations in Washington since opening its first branch in 1998. The corporate office opened the following year. The company matches workers with employers in a variety of fields, including general labor, construction, landscaping, warehousing and assembly.

Workers can choose either daily or weekly pay and are provided with both safety equipment and training.

“It’s never a dull moment,” Sabo said. “We do everything from moving scientists around the Microsoft campus to unloading fishing boats. We help supply the Puyallup Fair and clean the stadiums at Qwest and Safeco fields.”

The sports venues use LaborWorks because they can’t afford to keep people on a permanent payroll round-the-clock. But when they do need people, they need a lot of them.

“They have some staff that supervises all the unskilled labor, but they don’t need people all the time,” Sabo said.

“If you think about it, they need around 100 people to clean the stadium after a game. They make one phone call to us, and it’s taken care of.”

LarborWorks handles paperwork for employees for Labor and Industry insurance and state and federal taxes, and it doesn’t charge workers a fee. The company sent out 11,000 W2s tax forms last year.

Sabo has been in the labor industry since 1987.

“I come from a company called Labor World,” he said. “I was also the national operations director for Labor Ready.”

Sabo predicted that another venue to match laborers with employers on a temporary basis was needed in Washington. The company can find jobs for blue-collar workers that require a low skill level, but it can also hire truck drivers, certified forklift drivers and carpenters.

“It’s the whole ‘union hall’ concept,” he said. “We open at five in the morning. About 70 to 80 percent are the same people every day, and another 30 percent work on a limited basis. About 15 percent are women. The client could be one person that’s moving a big desk, or if a truck overturns on the highway and they need to get stuff off the road.

“We get a lot of people’s Honey-Do lists when the husband doesn’t want to do it.”

Workers also enjoy the flexibility the company offers, as workers can get paid at the end of the day.

“It’s a perfect part-time job for somebody,” Sabo said. “A lot of students will work a shift just to supplement their income, but they don’t want a full-time job that will interfere with their studies.”

Working for LarborWorks can help unskilled or inexperienced people break the “Catch-22” cycle where you get experience on a job, but you can’t get a job unless you have experience.

“We get them out there in front of the employer,” Sabo said. “It’s like an on-the-job interview. A lot of people end up being hired for permanent jobs this way.”

LaborWorks has remained busy in the face of a questionable economy.

“We’ve been pretty solid this year,” Sabo said. “When it’s a soft market, we’re usually steady because employers are nervous about their future and, rather than hiring people, they tend to use temporaries.”