What Steel Services does

Steel Services, Inc. is a fourth-generation, family-owned steel distribution and metal processing company headquartered in Richmond, Virginia, founded in 1946 by Thomas Jefferson Starke. The company operates three regional service centers — Richmond/Ashland (1979), Roanoke (1952), and Norfolk (1962) — plus a corporate headquarters established in 2000, serving customers across the Mid-Atlantic region including Virginia, West Virginia, North Carolina, and Tennessee. Its portfolio spans four core material categories — carbon steel, stainless steel, aluminum, and alloy steel — paired with value-added processing services: plasma cutting, oxy-fuel cutting, saw cutting, shearing, splitting, punching, and drilling. Processing is enabled by specialized capital equipment including the Peddinghaus Anglemaster-HD (the only machine of its capacity in the region), AKS Dura-Kut high-definition plasma, CSI Kodiak dual-process CNC cutting, Hydmech band saws, and Timesavers finishing machines, with capabilities spanning plates up to 30 feet wide and 200 feet long and thicknesses from thin gauge to 24 inches.

The business model is sales-led and quote-based: customers submit inquiries through phone, website forms, or direct service-center relationships, and orders are fulfilled regionally with delivery timelines ranging from one week to three-plus weeks. Revenue is generated from two streams — one-time transactional steel product distribution and professional-services processing add-ons — with no public pricing, subscription, or platform component. Customer concentration spans enterprise shipbuilders (Newport News Shipbuilding for nuclear submarines and aircraft carriers under SDI approval), industrial OEMs (Sumitomo Drive Technologies), and long-tenured fabricators and job shops (Everbrite, Colonial Welding, FEC Heliports). GTM relies on direct sales through the three service centers, inside sales via toll-free lines, a self-serve website quote-request form, and light content marketing through LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, and a monthly newsletter. The company holds no patents, has no external funding, operates as a privately held corporation under family ownership with no parent or subsidiaries, and runs a safety partnership with OnPoint Industrial Safety Services that reduced TRIR from 12.29 to 8.66 and LTIR from 7.17 to 3.71 between 2023 and 2024.

Name

Steel Services

Legal name

Steel Services, Inc.

Website

https://steelservicesinc.com

Company type

Private

Founded year

1946

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

51–100 employees

Short description

Steel Services is a fourth-generation, family-owned steel distributor and metal processor operating three Virginia service centers that supply carbon, stainless, aluminum, and alloy steel plus value-added processing to shipbuilders, OEMs, fabricators, and job shops across the Mid-Atlantic since 1946.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Steel Distribution and Metal Processing Services

NAICS

Metal Service Centers and Other Metal Merchant Wholesalers (423510), Steel Product Manufacturing from Purchased Steel (3312)

SIC

Wholesale-Metals Service Centers & Offices (5051), Sheet Metal Work (3444)

akta.pro primary industry

Steel Service Centers & Processing (Slitting, Cut-to-Length, Blanking, Leveling) (IMAKABAL)

akta.pro secondary industry

Specialty & Alloy Steel (Stainless, Tool Steel, Electrical Steel, High-Strength/HSLA) (IMAKABAJ)

Keywords

• Steel distribution services
• Metal processing services
• Industrial steel supply
• Custom metal fabrication
• Steel service center

Headquarters

HQ city

Richmond

HQ country

United States

HQ region

North America

Offices4 records

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Supply Chain, Operations, Personnel, Technology or R&D, Infrastructure, Marketing or Sales

Revenue model

1. Steel Products Distribution: Distribution of carbon steel, stainless steel, aluminum, and alloy steel products to customers across various industries. One-time transactional sales of steel materials.
2. Metal Processing Services: Value-added processing including plasma cutting, oxy-fuel cutting, saw cutting, shearing, splitting, punching, and drilling. Processing services added to steel products for custom solutions.

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels3 records

Marketing channels5 records

Core offering

Steel Services distributes carbon steel, stainless steel, aluminum, and alloy steel products, and provides value-added custom metal processing services including plasma cutting, oxy-fuel cutting, saw cutting, shearing, splitting, punching, and drilling. The company operates three service centers in Virginia plus a corporate headquarters, serving shipyards, OEMs, fabricators, and job shops across the Mid-Atlantic region.

Product overview

Steel Services is a steel distribution and metal processing company offering a unified portfolio of products and processing services. The core offering includes four steel product categories (Carbon Steel, Stainless Steel, Aluminum, and Alloy Steel) paired with value-added processing services including Plasma Cutting, Oxy-Fuel Cutting, Saw Cutting, Shearing, Splitting, Punching, and Drilling. Processing capabilities are enabled by specialized equipment including the Peddinghaus Anglemaster-HD for angle processing, AKS Dura-Kut for high-definition plasma cutting, CSI KODIAK for dual-process cutting, Hydmech band saws (M-20A-120 and H32-A), and Timesavers finishing machines. The company operates service centers in Richmond, Roanoke, and Norfolk, Virginia, serving customers across the Mid-Atlantic region including naval and commercial shipyards, job shops, fabricators, and OEMs.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• Carbon Steel Steel primarily composed of iron and carbon, with carbon content affecting strength, hardness, and ductility. Ideal for construction and tool-making applications and distributed to industrial customers across the Mid-Atlantic region.
• Stainless Steel Iron-based alloy with a minimum of 10.5% chromium content, providing high resistance to rust and corrosion. Durable and strong for construction, medical, and food processing industry applications.
• Aluminum Lightweight, silvery metal with excellent strength-to-weight ratio, corrosion resistance, and conductivity, used where weight reduction is essential without compromising durability.
• Alloy Steel Steel containing additional elements such as chromium, nickel, molybdenum, and vanadium that enhance mechanical properties including strength, hardness, toughness, and wear/corrosion resistance for construction, automotive, and aerospace applications.
• Plasma Cutting Ultra-precise plasma cutting using modern CNC equipment. CAD files can be imported directly into the system for automated part production, available to fabricators, OEMs, and shipyards across the Mid-Atlantic region.
• Oxy-Fuel Cutting State-of-the-art computer-controlled burning equipment producing close-tolerance shapes to specifications. Capable of producing rings, discs, and gear blanks from drawings for industrial customers.
• Saw Cutting Close-tolerance sawing of bars and beams using band saws capable of processing orders to specified tolerances, from one piece to thousands, for fabricators and manufacturers.
• Shearing Precision shearing of sheets, plates, flats, rounds, angles, and rebars, handling light gauge sheets to one-inch plate and from narrow strips to twelve-foot-wide plates.
• Splitting Flame-cutting of split tees and angles from wide flange and channel shapes. Any beam or channel four inches or deeper can be split; tees and angles can be straightened for an additional charge.
• Punching Hole punching using ironworkers to eliminate costly drilling operations. Holes from 1/4 to 1-1/2 inch diameter in material up to 1 inch thick can be punched in angles, clips, or beams.
• Drilling Accurately located holes up to 2 inch diameter and 6 inch deep in a single pass, providing heavy-duty base plates with large-diameter bolt holes at low cost for industrial customers.

Quantifiable outcome

• Safety Culture Improvement: TRIR reduced from 12.29 (2023) to 8.66 (2024); LTIR reduced from 7.17 (2023) to 3.71 (2024)
• +2 more outcomes

Named customers5 records

Segments4 records

Ideal customer profiles4 records

Technology focussed No

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Feature5 records

Partnerships

Four partnerships are on record, tiered minor and core.

• Association of Women in the Metals Industry (AWMI)minorOthers · 1 January 2025Steel Services joined AWMI to support professional development of women in the company, connect with industry leaders through networking events, and contribute to a more inclusive industry. AWMI provides professional development opportunities, networking events, and scholarships.
• OnPoint Industrial Safety Services (formerly Optimum Safety)coreStrategic or Co-development PartnerThree-year strategic partnership that acted as catalyst for significant safety improvements. Partnership established new safety leadership positions, adopted new safety tracking technology, and implemented safety milestone celebrations.
• Charity:WaterminorOthersStarke Foundation partnership with Charity:Water as official Water Project Sponsor. Donation funds multiple water points for entire communities in developing countries. Starke Foundation is the charitable arm of Steel Services.
• Metals Service Center Institute (MSCI)minorOthersIndustry membership organization for metals service centers. Steel Services participates in MSCI and received Safety Culture Improvement Award through this membership.

Scale indicators6 records

Recent moves6 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Broad incumbents

• Ryerson Holding Corporation: Ryerson is a large, publicly traded metals service center and processor offering carbon steel, stainless, aluminum, and value-added processing across North America. Directly comparable business model (distribution + processing) but operates at national scale versus Steel Services' regional Mid-Atlantic footprint.
• Worthington Steel: Worthington Steel is a major processor of flat-rolled steel with processing and distribution capabilities serving automotive, construction, and industrial markets. Comparable processing-heavy approach but operates at larger scale and with different product mix than Steel Services.
• EMJ (Earle M. Jorgensen Company): EMJ is a national metals service center distributing carbon, alloy, stainless, and aluminum products with processing capabilities across the U.S. Comparable distribution-plus-processing business model targeting industrial OEMs and fabricators, operating at broader geographic scale.
• Reliance Steel & Aluminum Co. Reliance is the largest metals service center operator in North America with a broad product portfolio and extensive processing capabilities. Highly comparable in offering set (carbon, stainless, aluminum, alloy plus processing) but competes from a position of national scale and capital strength.
• Kloeckner Metals: Kloeckner Metals is a major North American and European metal service center providing steel, aluminum, and stainless products with extensive processing services. Closely aligned business model and customer base to Steel Services, with significantly broader geographic and digital reach.

Direct peers

• Steel Technologies LLC: Steel Technologies is a flat-rolled steel processor and service center serving automotive, appliance, and industrial markets. Comparable in steel processing orientation and customer overlap (industrial OEMs, fabricators), though more focused on flat-rolled than Steel Services' heavy structural and plate work.
• Olympic Steel: Olympic Steel is a publicly traded U.S. metals service center offering carbon, stainless, aluminum, and value-added processing. Operates regional service centers similar to Steel Services, with comparable focus on industrial and OEM customers and similar processing capabilities.
• O'Neal Steel: O'Neal Steel is a large U.S. metals service center distributing carbon, stainless, aluminum, and alloy steels with full processing services (cutting, shearing, sawing, machining). Operates from multiple regional facilities serving fabricators, OEMs, and industrial customers, closely matching Steel Services' model and customer segments.
• Triple-S Steel Holdings: Triple-S Steel is a U.S. metals service center distributing carbon steel, structural steel, and processed products from multiple regional facilities. Closely matches Steel Services' business model of regional service centers with processing, serving industrial and construction customers.

Regional players

• Chatham Steel Corporation: Chatham Steel is a U.S. metals service center headquartered in Savannah, Georgia, distributing carbon, stainless, and aluminum products with processing services. Comparable service-center business model and customer base, serving the Southeast U.S. rather than overlapping directly with Steel Services' Mid-Atlantic territory.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat5 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights7 records

Customer concentration

• Facebookfacebook.com/steelservicesinc
• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/steelservicesinc
• Instagraminstagram.com/steelservicesinc

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles4 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Steel Services