Crossland Keeps Truckin?

Giving away a brand new $20,000 Chevy truck might not seem like a smart budget move, but for Crossland Construction Co., it’s part of the cost of doing business. The Columbus, Kan., company started a drawing two years ago in which one employee can win a new truck if all 600 workers go 12 months with no “lost time accidents.”

Both years, Crossland Construction had to buy new wheels.

Chris Crossland, vice president of the firm’s Rogers division, said more than 2 million clean hours of work time have been logged since the drawing’s inception.

That has meant lower rates on workers compensation insurance which, he said, saves Crossland Construction 20 percent in labor costs. That kind of edge is helping the firm continue a staggering pace that saw it complete 3.2 million SF of buildings in Northwest Arkansas from 1996 to 2003.

“It’s something that we decided to take really serious,” Crossland said. “We wanted to convey to our guys that it’s really important to us.”

Crossland Construction’s attention to detail apparently won locals over from the start.

The Rogers division’s inaugural revenue goal in 1996 was $1 million, and it did $1.1 million. Last year, the division earned $66.5 million, a 58 percent increase over its $42 million in 2002 revenue. Already for 2004, the firm expects to have 1.1 million SF of new space under construction and at least another 10 percent surge in revenue.

The Rogers division accounted for about 40 percent of the company’s 2003 total revenue of $166.6 million.

“Before our revenue, we had two goals,” Crossland said. “To establish ourselves as a solid contractor with others in the area and to be involved in the community we did work in. Our relationships came first.”

Tight Knit

Founded in 1978 by Chris Crossland’s late father, Ivan Crossland Sr., and another brother, Mike Crossland, the company has three offices in Rogers, Tulsa and Columbus, Kan. In all, six Crossland brothers work for the company. Their four sisters have other occupations, but the family rents a Greyhound bus together every year to vacation from Christmas to New Year’s as a 50-member entourage in places such as San Antonio, Texas. They even do sweatshirts.

Ivan Crossland Sr. started out specializing in the construction of metal buildings in Kansas and Missouri. Ivan Crossland Jr. is now the firm’s CEO. He’s joined at work by brothers Bennie Crossland, president; Curt Crossland, Chris Crossland, and Mike Crossland, all executive vice president; and Patrick Crossland, vice president of field operations. The brothers serve on a board that meets about once a month, Chris Crossland said.

Chris Crossland started in the family business during high school and moved up to working on steel and concrete crews. He became a foreman and eventually a superintendent. He had built about 20 projects in Kansas before getting promoted to head up Crossland’s Northwest Arkansas office.

Crossland Construction includes a general contracting division that handles all hard-bid work, a construction management division, a design/build division that caters to clients who want a single point of contact, a corporate accounts division and a Crossland Heavy Constructors division. The newest segment, Crossland Construction Development, started in 2004 at the Rogers office.

Engineering News Record listed Crossland Construction Co. at No. 249 in 2003 on its list of the 400 largest U.S.-based general contracting companies.

Customer Service

Audy Lack, a partner at Miller Boskus Lack Architects P.A. of Springdale, said Crossland Construction has built its reputation by being legitimately concerned about upholding the project owner’s best interest.

“[Crossland Construction] has a big concern that any individual member of the team would have an independent agenda, whether it be a financial one or not, that would be contrary to the owner’s best interest,” Lack said. “They communicate to the owner what’s going on even beyond communicating well. They are not trying to pull anything over on the owner.”

The size of Crossland Construction’s work force, Lack said, has helped it in Northwest Arkansas. He has been involved in at least 10 projects with the firm.

“We can pour all the concrete, do the site work and hang the steel, ” Crossland said. “We can do so much of the project in-house.”

The Rogers division, which employs 270 people, has been hiring an average of four to five new workers per week. Chris Crossland said they recruit many young construction engineers right out of college.

“We’ve ended up with some really good people,” Crossland said. “We train those guys under our experienced guys. That’s how we grow our management field.”

Education, Crossland said, is the key to success. The company has started training its construction superintendents to be certified in site-water detention.

“It’s something we are trying to take seriously,” Crossland said. “It’s coming in the future and we are trying to be ahead of the curve.”

Bill McClard, senior vice president of Lindsey & Associates Realtors in Rogers, said he’s found Chris Crossland to be an honest man who stands by his word.

“I’ve sold properties that they have built and worked with them in getting them built and worked with them after the building is built,” McClard said. “And they have always been willing to come back and take care of what you call the punch list …

“Sometimes contractors are so busy with new business. It’s hard to get them to take care of old business.”

McClard said he has worked with Crossland on several projects including three 100,000-SF warehouses.

Development

The Rogers division is also concentrating some of its efforts in major metropolitan markets nationally with a new development arm.

“We generally don’t do business inside the areas that we have offices because we don’t want to compete with local developers,” Chris Crossland said.

The newest division, Crossland said, will focus on larger metropolitan areas with great industrial needs, such as Houston, Dallas, Kansas City, and St. Louis.

The firm will go into an area, deal with the logistics of developing the land and in turn build the project for a client. Crossland Construction will then be the owner of that property and lease the warehouse or distribution space back to the client.

Chris Crossland attributes the company’s success to the founding values of his father.

“He was a class act,” Crossland said. “He was a man of integrity. He built relationships off of doing what he said he was going to do.”

In fact, 60 percent of Crossland Construction customers are repeat customers.

The family patriarch started out working in the mining fields in Oklahoma before serving on the front lines in the Korean War, Chris Crossland said.

“He moved home and married his pen pal that he had in the war,” Crossland said. “He was stationed in California, and that’s where she was.”

Chris Crossland said his parents later moved to Kansas. Ivan Crossland Sr. worked at a chemical plant at night and built a ready-mixed concrete operation out of scrap metal during the day. From there, he started constructing metal buildings and eventually sold his shares in the ready-mix firm to get into construction.

Crossland said he and his brothers grew up in the construction field with their dad, but there were no easy breaks.

“We dug ditches, we poured concrete, we did whatever it was and we worked our way up through the company,” Chris Crossland said. “We had to earn our way through the ranks just like the other guys.”