A Conversation Worth Having.

Stuart Berger Construction, a division of Cook & Krupa, focuses on three words in our business relationships: Value. Service. Experience. Those who have worked with us in the past, understand it doesn’t happen solely on the jobsite. In the early 1990s, we developed a plan to improve project outcomes by influencing the pre-bid planning phase with architects, engineers, and owners.

Paul Deffenbaugh, Editorial Director of Metal Architecture, posted an article that hit squarely on the conversation I’ve been having with architects and engineers for the past 30+ years. And it’s a conversation worth continuing. 

His article is titled Specifying Metal Building Systems: Best practices and common mistakes for architects doing metal building systems. To be effective, this conversation needs to have the participants he identified: architects, engineers, the metal building manufacturer, and the metal building dealer (contractor). In my experience, including the building owner, developer, or management firm also enhances the outcome.

Starting with the fact that the term “pre-engineered metal buildings” is somewhat outdated by today’s standards, the article hits on several key topics that I have repeatedly discussed with architects and engineers over the years. Those topics include knowing the system (specific to the manufacturer), opportunities and limitations of customization, engaging the resources available, and common errors that architects and engineers encounter when they enter the unfamiliar world of metal building systems.

In a similar way to what Deffenbaugh covered, we walk you through the advantages of through pre-bid planning in our publication called Pre-Bid Assistance: What Every Architect & Engineer Needs to Know. It explains our well-established process of engaging with architects and engineers during the pre-bid process when our insights (which supplement theirs) can have an enormous, positive impact on the ultimate success of the finished project.

When we engage in these conversations, we can provide value engineering insights that enhance the constructability of the project while maintaining the design vision. In the end, the structure is better suited for the purpose and, often, the cost can be reduced.

And that’s a conversation worth having.