Around the first anniversary of Joe Sullivan being named chief executive officer of MontanaSky Networks, the information technology business is getting a facelift.

The Kalispell company’s new logo soon will show up on everything — employee shirts, the service fleet, billboards, signs and business cards — replacing a random mix of logos from years past.  

“We need to clean everything up and make it all look high-tech,” Sullivan said. “Right now you can see all the different eras MontanaSky has been in.”

The rollout caps off a year of working toward perfecting MontanaSky’s customer service, which is at the heart of its identity.

“If we didn’t streamline and make the customer service experience everything it needs to be, then we’re just a fancy logo that doesn’t mean anything,” Sullivan said.

The design was created by artist Mac Morgan of Bigfork. Sullivan said the company’s appreciation for the customers who patronize MontanaSky as a local business gives it incentive for staying local itself, even for things such as the new logo design.

MontanaSky has been a hometown-oriented business since Fred Weber started the company years ago in Eureka. Sullivan, who is now 29, started working for Weber in Eureka at age 16 after he solved a stubborn streaming audio issue in one weekend.

He had been living in Libby, where he was home-schooled and spent much of his time in his parents’ computer shop, which is where he gained his technology skills.

At that point, the Internet was mostly run through dial-up, so after Sullivan was hired by the grateful head of MontanaSky, he spent most of his time on the phone helping people get connected and trouble-shooting email problems.

 In 2002, MontanaSky moved from Eureka to Kalispell. Kalispell information technology company DigiSys had a year earlier been sold to CenturyTel, and Sullivan said MontanaSky received a deluge of requests to fill the void for local service.

Sullivan estimates MontanaSky had 380 to 400 customers at its Eureka site, a number that jumped to somewhere between 600 and 700 when it moved to Kalispell.

“We’re now at almost 7,000 customers,” he said. “To have that kind of growth is pretty exciting.”

But growth is not a goal in itself, Sullivan said.

“We don’t want to be the biggest, we want to be the best,” he said. “Our customer service should be exceptionally high. If we get too big for that, then we want to stop growing.”

Still the majority owner among MontanaSky’s six owners, Weber has largely retired from day-to-day operations, though he still maintains a presence in the business, Sullivan said.

One of the most important lessons Sullivan said he has learned from working with Weber is to stay out of debt.

“We grew slowly with the cash we had coming in,” Sullian said. “One of Fred’s sayings is ‘Do we need it, or would it be nice?”

Even in the ever-changing tech world, new equipment is often more a luxury rather than a necessity, Sullivan said

 “We have often bought used equipment rather than brand new,” Sullivan said. “In the tech industry, by tomorrow, something will be worth half of what it was when you bought it.”

What MontanaSky doesn’t skimp on, though, is making sure its customers are treated well, Sullivan said.

“We always ask ourselves that question — will it improve our customer experience or get us where we need to go?”

With this year’s focus on internal processes, Sullivan said MontanaSky took a long, hard look at its customer-service procedures. One example, he said, was how the company has changed its approach to customers signing up for DSL service.

“Before, we would hand them a modem, tell them in seven to 10 business days it should start working and that we would call them and talk them through the installation,” he said.

After deciding that was a frustrating process for many customers, MontanaSky now sends a truck to every single installation to eliminate back-and-forth phone calls.

“It costs us more, but the customer experience is so much better,” he said.

Sullivan keeps on top of what customers want by getting out in the field as often as possible. Many customers have no idea that the person installing their Internet is the CEO of the company, he said. This gives Sullivan real insight into what the customers most want from the people who show up at their door in a MontanaSky truck.

 “I like to keep my hands in stuff and keep a good pulse on customer experience,” he said. “It helps me to make adjustments if I see things firsthand.”

 MontanaSky has 26 employees in its Kalispell location with five working in Libby. It purchased Libby’s cable company last December. MontanaSky already is a provider for Dish Network and Direct TV satellite services.

New projects in recent years have involved construction of fiber lines from Kalispell to Libby; installation of fiber lines from Missoula to the Mission Valley in partnership with Ronan Telephone; and adding high-capacity lines for Bigfork schools, giving the Bigfork school system a more robust Internet connection than is generally available in rural areas.

MontanaSky also has added a wireless Internet service, Wi-Max, available to some Internet customers in Kalispell and LIbby to bypass the phone lines.

Customized solutions are a big part of what the company does, Sullivan said, with technology audits for new and existing customers helping MontanaSky assess service gaps and customize solutions.

“We don’t try to shove customers into our box,” he said.

Sullivan will usually put in seven days a week at work, he said, and it’s a light day when he works six hours on a Saturday or Sunday. He said the other owners put in the same kind of hours. Sullivan doesn’t mind the heavy load, especially when he is out of the office on a problem-solving mission.

“That’s what I love most about the industry,” he said. “If something isn’t working, there’s always a reason, and I love finding out why. I love the chase; that’s what’s fun for me.”

Business reporter Heidi Gaiser may be reached at 758-4439 or by email at hgaiser@dailyinterlake.com.