Nov. 22, 2021

This paid piece is sponsored by Concrete Materials.

Reaching a billion-dollar building year starts here.

In the final hours before Sioux Falls officially crossed that milestone, the workload at Concrete Materials looked like this:

Spend all day working on the Minnesota Avenue road project south of 57th Street.

Bring the final load of concrete to the Furniture Mart expansion.

Pour concrete at Hills Stainless Steel, a manufacturing project.

Work at a pump station in far east Sioux Falls.

Deliver concrete for a new CorTrust Bank in southeast Sioux Falls.

Bring concrete for a large new apartment complex near Dawley Farm Village on the east side.

Plus, back at the quarry and plant on the west side of the city, work continues to unearth and prepare the raw material needed to continue supporting the city’s building boom.

“It’s going to be directly connected – the more building permits, the more building activity, the more that directly relates to our activity,” said Clark Meyer, president of Concrete Materials.

As one of the core base ingredients in everything from buildings and footings to floors and roads, there are very few projects that don’t have aggregate-based construction materials in them.

Concrete Materials has felt the demand in a big way and responded.

Earlier this year, it used a portable plant at Foundation Park to support the needs of the Amazon fulfillment center – the city’s largest project of 2021.

“We’ve had to be innovative with our methods to meet demand, whether it’s temporary plants or bringing in contract-hired trucking firms to deliver material,” Meyer said. “Our reaction time has to be quick.”

It’s key that Concrete Materials is able to mine and produce concrete within easy access of much of the city, he said.

“Ready mix concrete is a perishable product, so the radius is pretty small, and the closer you are the better,” Meyer said. “There has to be a local source to service builders and to keep the materials as economically priced as possible.”

That is key to supporting the construction industry, said Craig Lloyd, who founded Lloyd Cos. nearly 50 years ago and has experienced the city’s building surge firsthand.

“We have a strong concrete industry in Sioux Falls,” he said. “If we didn’t have a local supplier group, we would be doing half of what we do in the city because we couldn’t produce. The proximity is a huge advantage.”

Concrete Materials will be supporting both Lloyd’s Steel District project and the downtown expansion of Cherapa Place next year.

“For years and years, we’ve had a great relationship,” Lloyd said. “They’ve always been a reliable supplier, and they’re very service-oriented.”

Being able to quickly bring in concrete from nearby is a big advantage because downtown is different from a large property such as Foundation Park. There isn’t room on most sites to include a temporary plant.

“We’ll be using a huge volume of concrete,” said Jeff Scherschligt, co-owner of Pendar Properties, developer of Cherapa Place.

“And that was a concern upfront. Can they handle that? Our contractor, Journey Group, wants to put up a floor every two weeks, and that takes a lot of volume when you’re doing a development at the scale that we’re doing.”

The 10-story building that’s included in the Cherapa expansion will be post-tension concrete.

“We didn’t have to worry about getting big steel girders, and it’s a more localized product,” Scherschligt said. “We’re worried about the supply chain getting backed up, and here they are locally as a huge, quality resource that can provide the kind of volume we need on a project of this size and scope.”

A 600-vehicle parking ramp also will be post-tension, and all three new buildings will need concrete for foundations and walls.

“They’ve provided the concrete on all our other projects, including the first Cherapa building, so they’re a local resource and good people who get the job done,” Scherschligt said.

Back at the quarry, Concrete Materials needs to be mindful of continuing to access the supply needed to support the area’s ongoing building activity.

“I used to say we had 10 years left there before we need to find another source, but when demand doubles suddenly, that becomes five years,” Meyer said. “It’s something we’re actively working on, especially because I expect next year to be similar to this. And once we learn the full implications of the infrastructure bill, we could be looking at significantly more of a boost in demand because we support so many infrastructure projects, from road to utility-related work, in addition to building activity.”

Concrete Materials prefers to keep its operation as close to job sites as possible, he added.

“So our No. 1 preference is to mine land adjacent to where we’re at now, and we’re exploring our options,” he said.

“We do have reserves north of Corson, but if we had to tap those, we’d be looking at bringing significantly more truck and rail traffic to Sioux Falls in addition to increasing construction costs. So we couldn’t be more honored to keep supporting these record building years, but we know it’s going to take additional effort on our part to make sure we can keep it up for the communities we serve.”

The demand also means Concrete Materials constantly is looking to grow its team. For more on opportunities, click here. 

Record-breaking construction projects stay on time thanks to on-site portable concrete plant