Top 150 Executives Share Their Economic Outlook for 2016
Date Posted: March 28, 2016
Posted In: Ideas,
From St. Louis Business Journal: This week’s St. Louis Business Journal gives readers an inside look at the 2015 performance of the Top 150 Privately Held Companies in the region.
Ranked by revenue, the issue features mergers, new products and specific strategies these companies initiated last year. Because of the size of the section, there wasn’t much space to discuss the 2016 outlooks for each company.
Here are some of the executives’ outlooks for the St. Louis construction industry:
“We have a steady backlog of work with capacity for additional growth. We are projecting an increase of 3-4 percent in 2016, due to material cost increases such as concrete, structural steel and steel framing. In addition to a tightening of the labor market.” – Patrick Kozeny, president and CEO, Kozeny Wagner Construction
“Within the two regional markets that we operate, we expect growth in the local St. Louis region to be less than the national average and the growth in Denver to exceed the national average. Within our area of construction services, the overall trends for the mechanical industry are very positive in both the St. Louis and the Denver markets.” – Patrick Murphy, Jr., president and CEO, Murphy Co.
“We are excited about the economic outlook for PARIC in 2016. We are expecting another record year as growth in all of our core market segments remain strong. We are expecting to benefit from more growth from the senior living and multi-family markets in the next year.” – Casey Thurman, marketing manager, PARIC Corp.
“We have a strong, diverse backlog of projects and are very optimistic about future opportunities in 2016. To keep up with our recent growth, we have been hiring people across the board from within the field to project executives.” – Eric Gowin, owner, Contegra Construction
“2016 will be another record year for us. Backlog is strong going into 2017, and we continue to see a steady flow of leads and opportunities in our market segments.” – Mike Marchal, president, Holland Construction Services
“We continue to see signs of economic growth for the region with new developments and various opportunities in the private sector.” – Kieth Poettker, vice president, pre-construction, Poettker Construction Co.
“It appears the construction economy will continue to improve in 2016, which is bittersweet in that qualified personnel are becoming harder to find to fill increasing needs.” – Tom Huster, vice president, KCI Construction Co. Inc.
“For 2016, the St. Louis construction economy appears to be strong. At a recent construction collaboration meeting, all unions combined reported employment in the 95 percent range, which indicates a robust economy. However, we are still operating in the range of 60 to 70 percent of the peak of 2006. Tarlton is expecting a strong construction market going into 2017, based on backlog and proposed opportunities.” – Dirk Elsperman, executive vice president and COO, Tarlton Corp.