A Visit with Olympic Fire Protection Corporation

On April 8, NFSA Field Operations staff toured Olympic Fire Protection in Owatonna, Minnesota, and spoke to the company’s new co-owner, Brody Jensen. We spent an hour touring the Olympic facility and discussing Brody’s invigorating plans for the future. Brody earned a degree as a Fire Protection Engineer from Oklahoma State, then worked in the industry for a number of years (including at Summit Fire Protection in Saint Paul) before moving to Owatonna to take over the reins at Olympic in June of 2018.

Olympic Fire Protection was started 41 years ago by Brody’s uncle, Steven Just. Steven and Olympic have been NFSA members for over 30 years. Steven is now retired from the business, which he sold to Brody and to a grandson, Blake Jenkins. The company employs roughly 30 people and operates nine field response trucks. They are fairly unique in the industry, as they do all their own fabrication work. Brody says that the Olympic folks are proud of the quality of their work and their technical ability to fabricate jobs quickly – often completing customs jobs in a single day.

In spite of his short tenure at the helm of Olympic, Brody reports that the company is already exceeding some of the performance goals he has set, and the Olympic employees are very busy. The company recently started a fire extinguisher service division with a mobile response unit in addition to their sprinkler fabrication, design, installation, and service work.

It was clear from our conversation that Brody has some exceptionally talented and dedicated veterans working in the company. It was also clear that Brody himself is a champion of firefighter education, fire prevention work, and the fire protection business. Olympic Fire Protection appears to be in some very talented and capable hands!