Thomas W. Hill

Hill founded Summit Materials in 2009 and, over the course of his 12 years leading the company, grew it from a small private enterprise to one of the largest public producers in the U.S.

His career in aggregates began well before Summit, though.

In 1980, while pursuing his MBA, Hill took a job with CRH and spent 12 years working in Ogden, Utah, with Amcor – the first company acquired by CRH. Later, Hill took over as head of the materials division at Oldcastle, CRH’s North American arm. From 1992 to 2006, Hill helped to increase sales at Oldcastle from $100 million to $7 billion.

Hill then spent two years (2006-2008) as CEO of Oldcastle before embarking on what he called the most stressful thing he’s ever done: starting Summit.

Mergers and acquisitions were a focal point of Hill’s time at Summit. Beginning with just seven employees – including former Oldcastle co-workers of Hill’s – he helped to grow Summit’s annual net revenues to $2 billion.

Hill stepped away from Summit in 2020 and currently serves in an advisory role for Foley Concrete Products, a pipe and precast business based in Georgia. Hill says it is a matter of when – not if – he gets involved in aggregates again.

“I grew up in suburban New York, and I don’t think I would have believed it if someone would have told me I’d spend 40 years crushing rock,” Hill says. “All I can say is thank God it happened. It’s been an absolutely fantastic experience.”

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