The Old is New Again

Renewed Focus on Industrial Clients Means Expanded Marketshare

Expanding market share and increasing the diversity of your client base can be challenging, regardless of a company’s size or industry. But this challenge is especially true in the realm of construction services, where every client has its own unique corporate culture and project needs.

Fortunately, understanding and becoming a part of a client’s culture is a cornerstone of the way S. M. Wilson & Co. does business. This has helped the company’s recent efforts to expand its industrial client base, resulting in an exciting round of new projects and a strengthening foothold in the market.

From the company’s beginnings in 1921, right on up to the mid-1980s, S. M. Wilson had a strong commitment to industrial clients, a market that has helped the company foster its reputation for excellence. However, this market segment fell out of the limelight for S. M. Wilson, until Dave O’Brien, project executive for the company, joined in 1998. O’Brien had worked with St. Louis-based brewing icon Anheuser-Busch prior to joining S. M. Wilson. This opened the door for the company to have a new perspective on the industrial market.

Thanks to O’Brien’s leadership, S. M. Wilson embarked on a series of general construction projects with Anheuser-Busch in the St. Louis area. But when S. M. Wilson worked closely with the brewer to install a new bottle production line in the company’s main brewery in downtown St. Louis in 2004, the idea of creating a new business development team for industrial projects began to take on a life of its own.

Creating an Industrial Team

This decision led S. M. Wilson to create a separate business unit within the overall firm aimed at  focusing primarily on industrial clients. Today, led by O’Brien, the team consists of as many as four project managers, four project engineers, eight superintendents, and two estimators, in addition to a business development manager.

S. M. Wilson’s industrial team has had a number of successes, especially in the St. Louis area. In April 2006, it began a two-part project consisting of 168,000 square feet of renovation and selective demolition of the west and east wings of Building F at agricultural giant Monsanto, headquartered in Creve Coeur, Missouri. Starting in May 2006 and ending in October 2007, the team also provided construction management services for the new 98,000-square-foot Schneider Electric Technology Learning Center in O’Fallon, Missouri.

Drawing on its expertise in the beverage industry, in October 2007, the team began work on the Dr Pepper Snapple Group’s concentrate manufacturing and distribution facility in St. Louis, providing construction management services for a new 32,000-square-foot, high-bay racked storage warehouse. S. M. Wilson also recently began construction services for a new barge unloading and dome storage facility for Continental Cement Company in downtown St. Louis, slated to be completed in May 2009.

S. M. Wilson’s ability to forge strong relationships allowed Continental Cement Company to confidently select the firm for its storage and loading facility project. “When we selected our contractor, what it really came down to was a comfort level with the people we were dealing with,” said Tom Beck, project manager with Continental Cement. “[Early on,] we actually got to meet all of the key people that were going to be part of our project. That made the decision easier, because we felt they were good people who are honest and trustworthy and know what they’re talking about.”

Expanding its Regional Focus

Although S. M. Wilson is grateful for all the local success, the company sees a bigger picture. “We have had a lot of success in the St. Louis market, but what we realized is that there’s only so much industrial work that the St. Louis region is going to provide, even with all of the different market segments we already work in,” O’Brien said. “As a result, we decided to expand our focus strategically, not only by looking to translate our experiences to additional industrial clients, but by expanding our regional focus as well.”

In May 2008, the industrial team completed a $6.5 million design/build renovation and expansion at Standard Sales Company’s Olive Branch, Mississippi, distribution center, marking the team’s first regional project. Construction is also underway on a $4 million design/ build renovation and expansion for Burke & Brooks, LLC, at River City Distributing in Louisville, Kentucky.

For these and other projects, the members of the industrial team at S. M. Wilson believe it’s the team’s people and their unique ability to forge strong partnerships with customers that allows them to win clients and make a difference in any given project.

“The way I see it, anybody can build a building,” said Kirk Thuet, business development manager for S. M. Wilson’s industrial team. “It’s really a matter of how you’re going to develop a plan, how you’re going to work that plan, and how you’re going to put your customer’s needs first that make a difference on a project.”