Built on Faith

Sometimes the builder of souls is not content to subtly whisper a life’s calling into one’s heart; sometimes providence goes further, deeper, seemingly writing the foreshadowing of destiny directly into our genetic code. How else to explain the photographs of John Bell Construction Founder and President Oscar Morejon as a child as young as four or five, cheerfully holding a hammer, a paintbrush, landscaping tools, following his father around the yard to lend a hand to paint a fence, build a deck, or assemble a piece of furniture? “For as long as I can remember, I’ve had this inclination toward working with my hands—toward building, creating,” Morejon tells AQUA Miami. “The seed was always there.” 

Of course, even a seed planted by fate needs metaphorical water to grow. And, so, when at age 15 Morejon asked his parents for a Ferrari to shuttle back and forth from baseball practice, his father instead gave him a pressure cleaner. “My dad told me if I pressure-cleaned enough houses and driveways, I could afford whatever kind of car I wanted,” Morejon chuckles as he recalls this decidedly anti-silver-spoon moment. Before long, he had a thriving handyman side hustle that not only put cash in his pocket but would prove to be the first step on a wildly successful entrepreneurial journey that continues to this day. “I have never known what a handout is—and I’m grateful not to know, honestly. Everything I’ve accomplished has been through hard work, perseverance, and the favor of the Lord.” 

Scaling Up 

Morejon grew up in West Miami, the last of four, born a full ten years after his closest sibling. His father was a jeweler, his mother, a teacher—immigrants who placed a high value on hard-work and gratitude. Both of his parents had come to the United States from Cuba as unaccompanied minors in the early 1960s as part of Operación Pedro Pan—the program between the U.S. State Department and Catholic Charities of Miami that secured a special visa waiver to more than 14,000 children between the ages of four and sixteen to flee Castro’s regime without their parents or other adult family members. Both had lived in foster homes, had to learn a new language, and, after meeting in Miami, built a life from scratch. One day by chance—if such a thing truly exists—his father passed a jewelry store seeking someone to clean the shop and made the most of the opportunity, becoming a master jeweler.  

“Sixty years later, he’s still sitting in that chair, making these custom, one-of-a-kind pieces by hand,” Morejon says. “What my dad does is truly remarkable. He has an incredible eye for detail and the steadiest hand you’ve ever seen. He could’ve been an amazing architect, engineer, doctor, anything. I respect him so much.” Still, Morejon’s father kept a little bit of separation between his son and the jewelry business. “I think he wanted to be sure I went to school and chose my own path freely rather than just slide into a family business, you know? But I still learned so much from him about being a forever student of your craft—about how you can’t cut corners striving for excellence.” 

Eventually, father and son alike will construct beautiful things. The difference, foundationally, a mere matter of scale. 

The Path 

After high school, Morejon enrolled at Miami Dade College to study engineering and architecture. He earned decent grades but was feeling something less than inspired. “I had to study for hours and hours to get Bs and Cs,” Morejon says. “I would have to read the same chapter in the textbook three or four times to get it.” Luckily, a mentor of his, Pedro Rebodero, pulled him aside for a timely heart-to-heart. “Before he died, he told me, bluntly, ‘I don’t know why you’re wasting your time with architecture and engineering. What you should do is study construction management.’” 

Morejon took the advice, switching his concentration to building construction technology—and quickly regained his enthusiasm for learning. His grades soon skyrocketed into easy A territory. “All of a sudden, I was really understanding and appreciating what I was studying,” he says. “I almost couldn’t believe this was an actual career. Instead of resistance and resignation, I just felt so much peace—I instinctively knew I had found the path to doing something I love for the rest of my life.” 

Morejon continued his education at Florida International University, pursuing a bachelor’s degree in construction management. (Somewhere Rebodero surely smiled.) At a FIU career fair, however, he hit an unexpected roadblock in attempting to secure the all-important college internship. After five or six unsuccessful interviews, struggling to project what he thought a given company wanted him to be, Morejon decided to approach his interview with Suffolk Construction from a place of radical honesty: “Look, we both know I have no experience,” he told the recruiter. “But I love this stuff, and I can promise you no one is going to outwork me, period.” He landed the internship and was pleasantly surprised to discover it was paid. “My dream work and a paycheck? It seemed almost too good to be true.” 

The company immediately tossed Morejon into the deep end, working on the complex, now beloved mixed-use Met 3, a project comprised of two high-rises—one 32 stories, the other 28—with a bottom-level Whole Foods in the heart of downtown Miami. “I had incredible bosses and mentors on those projects,” Morejon says of Suffolk’s now-Vice President of Operations Armando Diaz and then-general superintendent Jerry Snell. “They taught me everything I know about construction and leadership. I was like a sponge, soaking it all up.” 

The internship was extended. In fact, the company wanted to hire him outright as an assistant superintendent in the fall. The only problem? He wasn’t scheduled to graduate until the spring, and the company didn’t offer full-time positions to candidates without a bachelor’s degree. The situation seemed impossible—in fact, the school’s dean and Morejon’s academic advisor said as much—but Morejon was determined to prove that where there is a will, there are straight As. He loaded up on summer courses, taking six or seven classes even as he worked nearly 80 hours a week, pouring concrete in the morning and evening, attending classes during the day, burning the midnight oil writing papers and completing assignments in the dead of night. “I was told over and over again it couldn’t be done,” Morejon says. “I was like, ‘Do you really think I haven’t heard that before?!’” 

Morejon graduated in the fall and accepted the Suffolk position. In these post-recession years construction budgets were still tight and Morejon had an expansive purview and an wild amount of responsibility for a twenty-two-year-old recent grad—which he, of course, ate up eagerly, learning the ins and outs of technical skills such as waterproofing, how to read blueprints, and maintain schedules as well as interpersonal skills of getting out in front of conflicts, managing different personalities, and nurturing harmony on the site. Morejon built a reputation as an active rather than passive supervisor, always willing to grab a shovel or a broom; to pick up trash or help hang drywall. “If you want to be a good and effective leader who truly understands what is needed on a project and has the respect of your employees, you have to work alongside your people,” Morejon says. “There is no other way.” 

Morejon also met and married his future wife, Isabella, during this time. (Like his sister and cousin’s wedding rings, Morejon’s father handcrafted his and Isabella’s symbols of lifetime commitment…) 

Which is how it came to pass that in early 2016, as Suffolk debated where to move Morejon internally after the completion of Met-3, the newlywed turned to his beloved bride and said: “Babe, I know this is going to sound crazy…but I think we should start our own company.” 

Keep the Faith 

Admittedly, the plan had a few wrinkles. Morejon had no office or general contractor license, for starters. Also, Isabella was still in nursing school and not earning money. The couple had a grand total of a thousand bucks in the bank. (Their rent at the time was $1450.) A faithful servant, Morejon prayed on it: God, if this is the wrong choice, close every single door towards it, make your will obvious to us. Yet, rather than doors closing, he only felt greater certainty opening in his heart and mind. “If God has called us to do this,” Morejon told Isabella, “I think we need to be obedient and do it.” 

And then the bottom fell out. Or so it seemed. 

Morejon planned to resign on a Friday. That Wednesday he took the exam for his general contracting license…and failed. “I didn’t understand how this could be happening,” Morejon said. “But I still felt convicted. I felt as if God was saying, ‘So, how much do you truly want this? How much do you believe in this? What are you willing to sacrifice?’ I decided to keep the faith and resign anyway.” He would sell mangoes and pressure-clean houses and driveways while he studied to take the test again, he told himself. “Everybody thought I was nuts,” he says. “Some people still think I’m kind of crazy. But I felt favor from above.” 

Shades of Abraham and Issac on Mount Moriah, the following Tuesday, Morejon received a call from the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation. Turns out the wrong machine had been used to scan his exam. He had actually passed his general contracting exam with a score in the high nineties. “That was the exact moment I knew that we were going to be a successful company,” Morejon says. 

Rejuvenated and consecrated, Morejon went to work. He named his company John Bell—a combination of the “jon” from Morejon and the “bell” from Isabella—and went about building the client base in the same old-fashioned way he learned from his pressure cleaning days: knocking on doors, cold calling. Small jobs started to trickle in—a window reseal here, an air conditioning unit change-out there—and taught himself as he went. Soon he graduated to a bathroom renovation, then a kitchen, then an entire house. Isabella, then as now, was critical to the success. 

“My wife might not work day-to-day at John Bell, but she knows pretty much everything that’s happening on every job and has been beyond instrumental in our success,” Morejon says. “She’s an incredible wife and mother, and I would not be where I am today without here.” By July, Morejon hired his first employee—a good friend and one of the employees from the pressure cleaning and odd jobs business, in a lovely twist. 

To this day, John Bell Construction continues to grow organically, the mighty oak rising from the modest acorn. “I still strongly feel that when we land a job, it’s a job that God wants for us,” Morejon says. “When we don’t, it’s protection by God or part of a larger plan that it isn’t our place to know. It’s not always easy to set doubt aside and truly live by faith and not by sight, but working as hard as we can to do so is a massive part of my life and our company.” 

Set Apart 

John Bell is built around four core values: Excellence is what is expected. Teamwork is the key to success. Take pride in everything you do. Strive to be set apart. (Through the charitable John Bell Foundation, the company also seeks to fund “positive change through educational initiatives and community development programs.”) A few years ago, the company shifted from residential work to commercial, government, and healthcare projects. In the decade since founding the company, not only have the projects steadily rolled in, but so have the accolades—General Contractor of the Year from the American Institute of Architects; Best Place to Work from South Florida Business Journal. Morejon has also received the key to the city from both Coral Gables and his hometown of West Miami.  

But all that pales in comparison to an honor Morejon received recently after touring a job site with his father. He didn’t say much about it to his son in the moment—he is a man of few words, Morejon says. Later, Morejon asked his mother if his father had mentioned anything to her about the visit. “Oh, he has not stopped talking since he got back about how impressed he is with everything you’re doing, all that you’ve accomplished,” she told him. “He says he sees in you everything he wished for his own life.” 

“I had never heard anything like that from him—and it means more to me than anything else ever could,” Morejon says. “It reminded me that what we do with this company is bigger than year-end numbers or accolades. Don’t get me wrong, that’s all important and a blessing, too. But I want that to flow from us staying true to our core values, our faith, and from being a company that has a good reputation, a strong team—one that every single employee and their families can be proud of. The numbers and opportunities will come. I think that when you stop chasing the money and start chasing the dream, you have a lot more peace and a lot more success.”

For more information, visit johnbellconstruction.com.