building a good reputation

1000 667 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Brett Harley

22 Marigold Drive, Fairy Hill
Visit Richmond Valley Northern Rivers-01
building a good reputation

When the only pub in town burns to the ground, it’s a big responsibility being the one chosen to rebuild it. The success of Uki’s new Mt Warning Hotel, which opened in 2015, is not only the toast of the town, but has helped Brett Harley see his work in a new light.

“It’s an iconic building that will be around for a long time,” Brett says. “It was an incredible opportunity for us to be recognised for what we could achieve in both construction and overall development.”

Brett has run his building business out of Kyogle since 2002, focused mainly on constructing new houses across the Northern Rivers region. Initially he did this with a business partner, and after his partner’s retirement in 2014, Brett renamed the business Brett Harley Building.

The Mt Warning Hotel job came about the same way that all of Brett’s jobs come along.

“I don’t do any advertising at all,” he says. “That job came through local recognition of my work – all of my business is word of mouth,”

The strength of word of mouth is something all new Northern Rivers businesses should be aware of, Brett says. “Remember it’s still a relatively small area, so be true to yourself, as both good and bad word spreads fast.”

The good word has spread far and wide across the region for Brett Harley Building, with home building and renovations from Coopers Shoot to Eureka, along with a concentration of projects closer to home in Kyogle and Casino.

The business is at full capacity with six carpenters, four apprentices and up to 50 subcontractors on the team. And Brett doesn’t plan on growing any larger.

“I can’t physically do any more work without a total restructure of the business, and if we did that the business would lose its strength. People like being able to speak to me directly about their projects – it’s small enough to know everything that’s going on.”

Since taking over the business on his own, Brett spends more time working from the desk.

“Building has always been my passion, and these days I’m enjoying the more creative aspects. For about 90 per cent of my projects I do the design right from conception,” he says, while he leads his team through to final construction.

“I enjoy that creative aspect, that you can look back on a building with that sense of achievement.”

brett_harley_building_003
brett_harley_building_004

Share this story

Read more stories

A fighting spirit … and great networks

 768 1024 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Five Sixty Farms
Stranded on the roof of his house with his wife and their eight children, Pepe Fassos watched helplessly as his beloved greenhouses smashed and floated away in a tsunami of floodwater.

cape byron distellery 002

spirit of the rainforest

 960 540 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Cape Byron Distillery
Let’s forget the beaches for a moment, as the true lifeblood of the Northern Rivers landscape is surely its rainforests, some of the most botanically…

A hive of success and support

 940 627 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Wild Honey Creative
Wild Honey Creative is living proof that special skills and services we might once have associated with our cities – such as graphic and digital design, innovation in marketing and brand storytelling – are thriving in regional areas.

gateway finefoods kyogle

local, seasonal, transformative gem hits town

 960 639 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Gateway Fine Foods and Catering
Debbie McQueen has three words of advice for anyone starting a business in Kyogle: flexibility, perseverance and patience. They’re three traits Debbie…

simply clean lismore 001

simply better for you

 1600 533 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Simply Clean
It’s probably no surprise that it was a cleaning company that was the most well organised of all the businesses Huw and Becky Jones found for sale…

Keeping it real in the Tweed

 1706 2560 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Tweed Real Food
Tweed Real Food is a business launched in 2018 from a desire to be resilient. Little did founder Julia Foyster know how prescient her plan would turn out to be.

Hovering across the wave of success

 1139 749 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Fliteboard
It was meant to be an extended break for David Trewern and his family. A chance to rest and reset in Byron Bay after decades of building and selling fast-growing digital marketing agencies. But as he looked out over Belongil beach in 2014, an idea struck him.

northern_lights _ballina_northern_rivers_001

let there be light

 2000 1333 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Northern Light
“I eat a pot of honey every day and I’ve been stung more than 70,000 times,” says Jeffrey Gibbs, founder of Northern Light, an organic beeswax…

edmonds conveyancing ballina 001

home is where the heart is

 1920 847 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Edmonds Conveyancing
The legal aspects of buying and selling a property are not normally associated with having a laugh and even singing, but the Edmonds Conveyancing…

A planet of business diversity

 2016 1512 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Tropical Fruit World
It’s been almost 50 years since Robert and Valorie Brinsmead bought the 200-acre farm in Murwillumbah.

stone and wood 001

not just a business, a community partner

 960 761 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Stone & Wood
“That’s like asking parents to name which of their children they prefer,” says Jamie Cook, Stone & Wood co-founder. He has been asked which of the…

nicholson fine foods yamba

eclectic food innovator shines

 1030 1030 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Nicholson Fine Foods
The small coastal town of Yamba is home to the one of the world’s best eating prawns, the Eastern King Prawn. It’s also home to the highest…

Northern Co-operative Meat Company

collaboration and cooperative capital

 1600 1066 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Northern Cooperative Meat Company
It comes as little surprise that one of the largest employers on the Northern Rivers is a co-operative, and with Casino being the beef capital of…

ahead of time on equality and agility

 1000 667 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Hurford Hardwood
When Olive Hurford told the bank manager she’d be looking after the accounts of her husband’s new building company, the story goes…

lights, camera, action in ballina shire

 2560 1750 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Byron Studios
Northern Rivers has long been a hub for film makers and a popular backdrop for film and television productions. But there has been one thing missing to tie it all together…

planting natural beauty

 2048 2560 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Biologi
There was a little bit of the “weird spirit of Byron Bay” in the 2017 creation of the natural skincare range, Biologi, says co-owner Lucy Macdougald of her chance meeting with Ross Macdougald, who is now both her business partner and husband…

oatten and hoffman kyogle 002

revving up the community engine

 1000 667 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Oaten and Hoffman
In 2015 Tim Hoffman was riding the high on business success, and had no clue about the blow that was awaiting him….

A walk on the wild side

 1245 933 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Vision Walks Eco Tours
Wendy Bithell has built her multi-award-winning eco-tourism business, Vision Walks – Eco Tours, by combining her two areas of expertise: ecology and technology. Her Byron hinterland adventures are as diverse as nature walks with night vision goggles, Indigenous bush tucker tours, and three-day women’s indulgence escapes.

Mount Warning Tours Tweed

a natural business adventure

 1920 1080 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Mount Warning Tours
Despite only existing for four years, Mount Warning Tours’ short life has been eventful: from purchasing the ex-Murray River ferry Spirit of Wollumbin…

Flexing the entrepreneurial muscle

 2560 1707 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Summit Sport & Fitness
Like many Northern Rivers businesses, Summit Sport & Fitness has undergone immense change in 2022 – except, rather than being buffeted by floods or pandemic, these changes are positive, and mark a new chapter for owner Matthew George.

Start Typing

X