As I sifted through our Top 50 surveys this year, it quickly became clear to me that this group of heavy hitters had posted another year of solid growth. Despite all sorts of political infighting within our government, financial crisis outside the United States, and never-ending conflict and fear of war across the globe, the U.S. construction market somehow managed to stay on track and maintain its slow and steady rise to recovery.
Electrical and datacom revenue earned by this year’s Top 50 contractors reached its highest level in the past seven years — $15.7 billion. This total is 12.4% greater than the prior year and nearly 31.5% higher than the total revenue figure posted in 2010. Renewed growth in the private sector and continued demand in the health care and data center markets helped drive this impressive total.
As you might imagine, a high percentage of the Top 50 contractors characterized the business climate last year as “fair” to “strong,” and nearly 90% of the companies met or exceeded their sales goals. What’s even more encouraging to me is that 29% of the companies adjusted their bids in 2013 for greater profits, and 43% anticipate doing the same in 2014. In addition, a large percentage of Top 50 participants predict the economy will continue to improve through at least the end of next year.
But despite all of the good news we yielded from these proprietary surveys, there always seems to be areas of concern to keep us in check. On July 21st, Reston-Va. based Truland Systems abruptly closed its doors and left approximately 1,000 workers without a job. The shutdown affected dozens of active projects across the Washington, D.C., region. According to local news reports, the company had fallen behind on debts and was dealing with cash flow problems. Because our Top 50 listing is based on revenue performance in the prior year (2013), we made the decision to leave The Truland Group on our list. It’s unfortunate that a company that posted $448 million in revenue in 2013 would be forced to take such drastic measures, but we should all take this to heart — even a Top 10 Electrical Contractor isn’t immune to a total collapse.
One other area of interest I think we should all be paying close attention to right now is the labor market. As work picks up in many regions and backlogs rise, the labor pool shrinks, and contractors have difficulty finding skilled labor to complete the new projects. When asked if they were having difficulty with worker shortages, more than half of the Top 50 participants said “yes.” Positions in high demand include project managers, foremen, superintendents, estimators, and supervisors. As more and more seasoned workers retire from the industry, this problem is only going to get worse. Some companies saw this coming and put programs in place to combat it. Those that didn’t may soon find themselves slipping down the chart or disappearing from our annual listing next year.
Related
2014 Top 50 Electrical Contractors
2013 Top 50 Electrical Contractors
For more details and analysis of EC&M ’s Top 50 Electrical Contractors, turn to page 18 to gain a better understanding of the inner workings and future plans of these industry-leading construction companies. There’s much to be learned from these big players, if you spend the time studying how they operate their businesses and plan for the future.
