Case Studies

The draw of western New York becomes more apparent as the greater Buffalo area undergoes a renaissance, creating a demand for high-quality, customized housing that’s being partially met by Natale Builders. Call them “forever homes,” says Director of Sales Peter Kress as he hustles between late-spring appointments from the Clarence office to the various sites […]

Architecture is more than aesthetics. It’s a service-oriented and relationship-driven profession that the Boston firm of Miller Dyer Spears takes to heart as it tackles projects for some of New England’s most prominent institutions. MDS specializes in institutions that, among other purposes, serve educational and health care needs, and must constantly be served in kind […]

When Dominic Piestrak began gathering builders for a high-end luxury community development in Clarence, New York, a small suburb outside Buffalo, his efforts raised a few eyebrows. It was the late ‘80s, “and everyone told me you’ll never sell them,” the real estate developer recalls. “At that time, Buffalo was a blue-collar town, centered around […]

There was a time when a company meeting entailed a lengthy round-table conversation, with coffee and donuts scattered about. While the goodies may remain, the advent of tablets, smart phones and interactive wall screens, has lessened the need for those sit-downs—or at least created the means for supplementing them. Yet, all the devices enabling this […]

Driving through New York City, President Steve Zervoudis sees Galaxy General Contracting Corporation’s work in each of the five boroughs. And while it’s always nice to remember a job well done, Zervoudis has the added benefit of remembering what many of these homes and mixed-use apartments buildings were like before Galaxy General Contracting came on […]

Relationships and reputation can go a long way in determining a contractor’s success. Founded in 2001 in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, CF Electric Inc. soon built up a reputation for commercial and industrial reliability with its diverse clientele including BNSF Railway, second only to Union Pacific in railroad network size with 32,500 miles of track […]

Employee stock ownership plans (ESOPs) have gained popularity in the last 20 years, in part because favorable tax regulations have made them an excellent way for retiring leaders to set up succession plans that reward their team, and because by passing profits and losses to ESOP trusts, which serve as shareholders, certain corporations can avoid […]

As companies grow larger, there is often a danger that employees will feel disconnected with upper management. “I think everyone needs something that motivates them to come to work and be part of an organization,” says Stan Sugden, president of Ruekert & Mielke Inc. (R/M), a 71-year-old civil engineering firm with offices throughout Wisconsin and […]

Increasingly popular, fitness trackers allow people to monitor, among other things, how many steps they take in a day. In many cases, simply by accounting for their steps, people are encouraged to walk more. What if we could bring that idea to, say, recycling? And get companies and institutions to track and increase their recycling? […]

When people think of a construction job they usually don’t imagine stacks of paper, but in reality that’s what it takes to get something built. On top of the hundreds of full-sized blueprints, a large commercial project—such as a hospital or department store—has at least 50 or more additional half-sets scattered around the site. All […]