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As the headquarters for shipping supply firm Uline, the new facility being built in Pleasant Prairie, Wis., will be the seat of leadership for the company. Fittingly, the company bringing that plan into reality is known as a leader in the Wisconsin construction market. Since 1920, CG Schmidt has been building Wisconsin, and today it stands as one of the region’s leading construction management and general contracting firms.

The new Uline headquarters is one of the company’s most prominent projects currently under construction, CG Schmidt says. Originally based outside Chicago, Uline is relocating to the new 230,000-square-foot corporate headquarters and 1.1 million-square-foot distribution center.

“Most construction firms can execute corporate office and tenant build-out construction with a common process and good results,” the company says. “There are those special projects where budgeting leadership and superior craftsmanship are needed, but hard to find. This is where CG Schmidt adds more value and reduces more risk – by being a builder who can balance the building program with the available funding.”

CG Schmidt has extensive experience with corporate office projects, it says, but that is hardly the only area in which the firm excels. The company’s portfolio contains projects in senior living, education, retail, mixed-use, industrial and churches. On every project, the company says, its goal is to express its values and the values of its customers through buildings that enhance the community.

“CG Schmidt’s mission is to create exceptional facilities that improve the lives of others,” the company says.

That mission has led to a reputation built on the success of its projects and the satisfaction of its customers, the company adds. CG Schmidt has been recognized as one of the leading construction managers in the country by Engineering News-Record, and has been honored on numerous occasions by the American General Contractors and the American Sub­contractors Association. The company is ranked by revenue as the largest contractor in the Milwaukee area by The Business Journal of Milwaukee.

Careful Planning
The reason for the company’s success over the years has been its devotion to creating value for the client, the company says. To that end, the company has oriented all of its service around the concept of pre-construction services, following the old carpenter’s credo of “measure twice, cut once.” The principles behind that aphorism hold true for every phase of the construction process, according to the company.

“Because we care, CG Schmidt devotes a tremendous amount of attention and effort to getting [customers] the most value with the least amount of risk,” the company says. “To do this, CG Schmidt has structured our entire company around value-driven services commonly known as pre-construction.

“Over time and through extensive investment, CG Schmidt’s most unique credential has become this pre-construction expertise,” the company continues. “These services, under a negotiated contract, are absolutely essential to achieving the maximum performance from [a] facility. To do this, CG Schmidt combines the latest pre-construction software with a team of savvy estimators, project managers, field leaders and other industry experts.”

When the time comes to start work in the field, CG Schmidt says it can provide clients with peace of mind because they can be assured that the same company will be involved in every step.

“The majority of CG Schmidt’s clients make use of the skill and experience of our in-house tradespeople,” the company says, adding that it has taken on the majority of its recent projects itself. “In the last three years, about 80 percent of CG Schmidt projects included some form of self-performance, from general conditions work to demolition, concrete and carpentry.

“When we self-perform work, we initiate overall control of the schedule, maximize labor efficiencies, establish the standards for quality and safety, and ultimately provide [customers] with a better product,” the company adds. “In most cases, CG Schmidt performs this work based on competitively bid fixed labor rates and mark-ups.” CG Schmidt says it can deliver projects under any of a variety of methods. These include construction management, general contracting and design/build.

Past to Present
The history of CG Schmidt began in 1907, when Charles Schmidt came to the United States from Holland. After working maintenance in a Milwaukee brewery, Schmidt went into business for himself in 1920 with his own construction company. In 1929, his son Charles G. Schmidt inherited the company and began diversifying it into the company it is today.