Case Studies Industrial

In the summer of 2016, while many of her friends were enjoying week-long vacations on the beach, Cindee Burns spent her days walking the aisles of nearly a dozen Colony Hardware stores—and loving every second of it. Who needs sunscreen when you have a 60,000-square-foot roof over your head? Only, the massive home-improvement project she […]

Brain Corp’s original offices fell within the institutional cliché: plain walls and floors, rows of cubicles, basic and limited lunch and break areas. No design flourishes, no plants, no inspiring artwork—a place to come to work, and that’s it. In other words, “a very sterile, non-creative environment,” says Brain Corp Facilities Director Tim Fritcher. Now, […]

It’s the cornerstone of Shell Global’s Deep Water strategy, anticipated to be sucking 175,000 barrels of crude daily from beneath the Gulf of Mexico, by decade’s end. Built in South Korea and having arrived in Ingleside, Texas, last year for final construction, the four-column Appomattox platform will be 16 stories high and two football fields […]

Adam Cimaroli thinks about cement so his customers and partners don’t have to—where it needs to go, safely, effectively and at the lowest cost. “We want to have cement available when customers need it, where they need it, how much and what type they need,” says Cimaroli, senior manager of terminal projects for LafargeHolcim. It’s […]

Ever detail- and outcome-oriented, Paul Donhauser considers himself the Bill Belichick of corporate real estate management, although he may be more charismatic than the New England Patriots’ famously taciturn coach. He’s also much less secretive about his game plan. Donhauser might even like to see other companies, including competitors, borrowing from the winning strategy he […]

Usually, after a piece of property is sold the builder lets go of all responsibility concerning the project, unless of course that property was developed and built by a company such as Buzz Oates, which has a longer-term interest. Based in Sacramento, California, the vertically integrated development and asset management company specializes in building large […]

When Perry Rittiner defers credit to his employees, the founder of New Orleans-based Rittiner Equipment Co. isn’t merely being modest; he’s being practical about an industry that requires a lot of training just to get by. “You don’t find these people everywhere,” Rittiner says of the more than 100 men and women in his employ, who […]

Derrick C.W. Childs has his hands full—literally—on a late May day, handling an array of tools as well as a cellphone during a lively interview from a construction site in Cleveland. But that’s business as usual for this high-spirited man whose work ethic and Christian faith run deep. And, as if heaven-sent, business is booming […]

There’s life yet in The Foundry, a different kind of existence to be sure than when it was the foremost metal-casting facility in Kalamazoo, Michigan. But workplaces may have to change in order to be relevant and this one sure has, with the industrial work of another era giving way to 50,000-plus square feet of […]

Wichita, Kansas, is in the heart of Tornado Alley, the swath of south-central U.S. states especially prone to the most severe wind and hailstorms. According to the Tornado History Project, since 1950, Kansas has seen more than 4,000 tornados. Hundreds of those have passed through Wichita. Then, there’s hail. According to the National Oceanic and […]