HAY RIVER - When Terry Webster came North almost 20 years ago, it was in the hope of getting a job in air conditioning and refrigeration.

Hay River plumber Terry Webster enjoys the challenge of his trade. - Paul Bickford/NNSL photo

However, things didn't work out that way.

Now, he is the owner/operator of Webster's Plumbing and Heating in Hay River.

Webster first moved to Inuvik in 1990 from Newfoundland, where he had studied air conditioning and refrigeration at a community college.

A relative told him she knew of an employer who needed workers with his trade.

"It was supposed to be all arranged, but that got all messed up," Webster said.

So he found himself in Inuvik with no job.

Webster first worked for Canadian North and then as a freight manager for GeoPetro Resources.

One of GeoPetro's customers was Rocky's Plumbing and Heating in Inuvik.

Webster said one day he jokingly asked Rocky's owner, Mario Lemieux, if he was looking for workers and Lemieux also jokingly answered yes.

Webster said, a couple of weeks later, he went to Rocky's Plumbing and Heating looking for that work.

"I said, 'I'm here to take you up on your offer,'" he recalled. "That's how it all started. I had no experience whatsoever."

That was in 1997 and Webster apprenticed at Rocky's for four years.

Looking back now, he said, despite the fact things didn't go as planned when he first moved to Inuvik, they still worked out really well.

"It was a blessing in disguise," he said, adding he met his wife, Kelly, in Inuvik and they started a family there.

In 2001, they moved to Hay River, where he worked for B&T Plumbing until November of last year.

That's when he started his own business, Webster's Plumbing and Heating.

Webster said he wanted to become his own boss and have more control of his time, mostly because his two daughters - aged eight and 11 - are involved in sports.

"I only take on enough work that I can do," he said.

His business's paperwork is handled by a bookkeeper.

"I do strictly the work and they handle all the paperwork, which is good," he said.

The plumbing work is mostly at residences, along with some industrial sites, and takes him to a number of communities besides Hay River, including Fort Smith, Enterprise, Fort Providence, Kakisa, Fort Simpson and Fort Resolution.

Webster, 36, said he enjoys the work since there are different challenges every day.

"You're always doing something different," he said, adding he enjoys it much more than working in an office. "You don't know what you're going to get into, and I like fixing things."

Webster said the trades offer a lot of opportunity to young people in the North.

"There are not enough tradespeople up North," he said, adding that goes for electricians, carpenters, plumbers and other occupations.

Webster said he sometimes has trouble keeping up with the demand for his services.

"Just when you think you're catching up, it gets busy again," he said. "It can get crazy."