We are a family business serving family businesses.

Clarence Ochs founded Bestway as a small retail lumber yard in Marcellus, New York. A few years later, the company relocated to Cortland, New York and began manufacturing pressure-treated lumber for sale to its retail customers.

In 1978, Clarence’s son Karl launched Bestway’s wholesale distribution business in Cortland, which thrives to this day, providing pressure-treated lumber and building materials to retail lumber yards and home centers across the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic states. In addition to the growing wholesale distribution business located in Cortland, the company has added sister locations conducting lumber treating and drying operations in North Carolina (1997), Gouverneur, New York (1998), and Pennsylvania (2001). 

In 2022 and 2023, Bestway expanded the distribution business beyond the reach of its Cortland facility by beginning to offer Bestway pressure-treated lumber products out of Cresco, Pennsylvania and Stony Point, North Carolina. This expansion has enabled the company to reach well beyond its previous footprint, now serving customers up and down the eastern seaboard from four strategically placed locations. All Bestway facilities continue to offer treating and drying services when convenient for customers.

While there have been many changes since 1962, Bestway remains a family-first business dedicated to selling the best products, tailored and delivered in accordance with the customer’s needs.