Building up: Spill Shield International stated slow, but now shows great promise.

• Author: Stomierowski, Peg
• Position: SPECIAL SECTION: TOP WOMEN-OWNED BUSINESSES

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Kris Harms, owner/operator of Spill Shield International, would seem to have the best of both worlds--a business she can feel good about and a trout stream through her yard.

It's hardly accidental. In leaving Anchorage a couple of years back, business in hand, she took a calculated risk. To hear her talk, it has paid off. She's working smarter now from her mortgage-free home on 7 1/2 acres in Willow, some 70 miles to the west. Back when she and husband Jerry were building the business in the city, they'd lived for a dozen years above a warehouse on Gambell Street.

"Now it's pretty much part-time for me, doing the same sales as when we were in Anchorage," she says.

THE ORIGINS

Back in 1992, Kris, with a background in business and auditing, was credit manager for an industrial supply firm and Jerry, a salesman, was working in food service. They'd gone to see a baseball game at Mulcahy Stadium when, in a serendipitous encounter, a stranger sitting next to them started telling them about a new way to clean up tarnished water supplies. Basically, he was looking for someone to sell a water-scrubbing system for him. He took them to his truck for a product look-see.

For Kris, who lists as her business credentials "a year of college and 40 years of practical experience," it was a case of love at first sight: "It was so unique."

Jerry agreed to go to work as an independent contractor for Bowhead Transportation, which had rights to the Spill Shield product line in Alaska, including the scrubber. This led to bigger things. Within six months, he and Kris purchased the Spill Shield distributorship from Bowhead. About a year later, they were introduced to a portable incinerator that seemed to hold similar promise for aiding waste-disposal efforts in environmentally friendly and cost-effective ways. They bought a handful of units and began selling them.

CHANGING HABITS

One reward of her career, Kris feels, has been helping people to change their bad habits.

"In the old days, they just dumped a lot of their waste on the tundra. It makes me feel good that I'm giving them an alternative that's good for the environment."

In 2006, as her husband was looking toward retirement, August's flood swept through Willow and the couple almost lost the 2,500-square-foot dream home they'd invested seven years in building. So they closed up shop and left the city.

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Now, they have a shop and garage and she serves their 200...