Baker Concrete Broadens Scope and Improves Processes for Success in Today's Tough Construction Market

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Written by John Egan for Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--To succeed in today's difficult construction market, Baker Concrete Construction (Monroe, Ohio) has had to change the way it does business, according to Bob Nussmeier, Baker's director of business development. "We broadened the range of projects--by type and geography--on which we bid to include jobs we might not have looked at before. We improved our operational efficiency, while keeping our focus on safety as job No. 1."

Nussmeier told Industrial Info, "We got creative in partnering with other firms--architect/engineering firms, as well as other construction companies--and we're working harder to position ourselves with decision-makers and decision-influencers, because relationships are important in this business. Being strategic about finding the right kind of projects and partners for Baker's improved success is an ongoing discussion with our leads and keys."

Nussmeier, an avid outdoorsman, put it this way: "You'll have more success if you put more lines in the water and try more types of bait than the competition does."

Nussmeier added that some things haven't changed at Baker: the company's focus on a safety culture and its ability to provide certainty in cost and scheduling. At a recently completed signature project at Miami International Airport, Baker employees worked 240,000 man-hours with an impressive safety record. "Safety is a huge factor in ALL construction," he said. "Companies can often gain an advantage over competitors if they have a good safety performance record. As a company that puts its employees' safety first, it is so important that every co-worker goes home to their families in good health."

A few years ago, looking to sharpen its competitive edge, Baker investigated Lean Construction principles to improve operational efficiency and reduce costs. Lean Construction is an adaptation of Lean Manufacturing principles, which were outlined in the book The Toyota Way. As David MacNeel, Baker's operations manager, explained in a recent issue of the company's employee newsletter, "As it turned out, efficiently building Toyota vehicles is not all that different from efficiently placing concrete. In both cases, a key to efficiency is found in increasing the reliability of hand-offs: from carpentry to rodbuster to place/finish crews." Baker has used Lean Construction principles in more than 20 projects since 2007, including the Great American Tower in Cincinnati and projects in Texas, Florida, Alabama and the Mid-Atlantic region.

Baker Concrete Construction specializes in all types of heavy, cast-in-place concrete construction, including industrial, renewable, power plants, heavy civil packages, nuclear, marine concrete applications, water treatment facilities and any heavy industrial emplacements that require high-quality or highly complex concrete formwork placements with cost and schedule certainty.

Last October, Engineering News Record ranked Baker No. 1 in specialty concrete contractors. Baker has been ranked among the top three firms in ENR's specialty contractor category each year for more than 20 years. Earlier this summer, Concrete Construction magazine ranked Baker the No. 1 concrete constructor in the nation.

Baker Concrete's expertise includes solutions for core infrastructure, preconstruction, project management and specialty construction, including repair and restoration, tilt-up and tunnelform construction, and more. Whether building a super-flat floor, a flawless reservoir tank, a hydrotreater or coker elevated pedestal, or an exposed architectural wall, Baker Concrete follows rigorous procedures to provide clients with superior workmanship.

The privately held company doesn't release financial data, but Nussmeier told Industrial Info that Baker places millions of cubic yards of ready-mix concrete each year in a wide variety of industrial, commercial, civil and institutional projects around the Americas.

"These days, there is less work and more bidders, so we are bidding on more projects to keep the pipeline full," he said. "We need to keep our pipeline even fuller today because our capture rate is down--ours and everyone else's."

Baker prefers participating in design-build teams versus trying to bid on work by itself, Nussmeier said. By partnering with an architect/engineering firm, or engineering, procurement & construction (EPC) firm, many times a design-build team can design, engineer and construct a project faster and at lower cost compared to the traditional process in which an architect/engineering firm designs a project and bids the construction work separately.

Currently, Baker is part of various design-build teams, including ones led by Parsons Corporation (Pasadena, California), Shaw Group Incorporated (NYSE:SHAW) (Baton Rouge, Louisiana), Burns and Roe (Oradell, New Jersey), and others. The Parsons-led team secured a contract to build part of a uranium enrichment facility in New Mexico. "Increasingly, we're teaming up with A&E firms, EPC companies, general contractors and other firms to win bids and serve the client's desire for cost and schedule certainity," Nussmeier said.

The Baker executive also detailed some of the types of projects that the company is bidding on today on which it might not have bid previously: "We're looking at hydroelectric power projects, nuclear, coal gasification, gas-to-liquids (GTL) projects, flood control in New Orleans, alternative energy, downstream oil & gas projects, chemical processing jobs and renewable power projects like wind and solar."

"These days, you have to be more proactive to a broader audience of decision-making construction professionals," Nussmeier continued. "The low-hanging fruit has already been picked."

Looking forward, he predicted that, "anything to do with natural gas will continue to be hot." That includes natural gas exploration, processing, liquefied natural gas (LNG), natural gas liquids (NGLs) and construction of natural gas-fired combined-cycle (NGCCs) generators. Increasingly, NGCCs are being chosen by utilities to supplement coal-fired generation that is being challenged, more and more, by environmental regulation.

"In 2009 and 2010, we bid on a lot of so-called 'shovel-ready' projects and projects that were funded by the federal stimulus program," Nussmeier told Industrial Info. "But those kinds of publicly funded projects are under a lot of pressure now from state and federal cutbacks. There is a lot of pent-up demand for projects to be built by the private sector. Large companies sitting on cash know this is a good time to build, as they can benefit from aggressive pricing from firms looking for work."

"To keep our prospect pipeline full, we're spending more time poring over data on economic trends and project spending--we're looking harder and digging deeper," he continued. "That's why we are glad to have IIR's PEC Reports® on industrial project activity. I've been in this business for 23 years, and I've never seen anything like the PEC Reports. Whether you're in construction, or engineering or equipment and material sales, the place to find out who's doing what project, where and when is IIR's daily project summaries."

Nussmeier noted that Baker has successfully won bids on multimillion-dollar projects with the help of IIR's PEC Reports. "Without the PEC Reports, it's hard to know where your next job is coming from," Nussmeier said. "Are we going to bid on an auto plant in South Carolina or an alternative fuels power project in Colorado? We use the PEC Reports to build relationships before a project is released. By the time a project is announced in industry trade magazines like ENR, it's too late. The decision is already made and the team has been selected. If it's not your job, all you can do is read it and weep."

Industrial Info Resources (IIR) is the leading provider of global market intelligence specializing in the industrial process, heavy manufacturing and energy markets. IIR's quality-assurance philosophy, the Living Forward Reporting Principle™, provides up-to-the-minute intelligence on what's happening now, while constantly keeping track of future opportunities.