Though it makes up only 1.7 percent of the U.S. population, Minnesota is home to 5 percent of the nation’s top 200 nonresidential construction firms. Only California, Texas, Missouri, and New York have more. (Florida and Illinois also claim 10.) Those 10 companies range from Minnetonka-based Opus Corporation, the largest and most vertically integrated construction firm headquartered in the state (ranked number 32 nationally) to Knutson Construction Services in Golden Valley. (Knutson is number 197 nationally. See table.)
So why does Minnesota have such a strong foundation in nonresidential construction? That the state also has a cluster of 20 Fortune 500 companies has helped these large builders grow and expand into other markets. When these big companies expand geographically, they often take their trusted construction firms with them.
But that doesn’t fully answer why so many large construction firms began here. Nor can it predict how well these builders will do if recession causes new construction to slow down, as it has for residential builders. Still, the state’s largest builders, for the most part, believe that they’re sufficiently diversified in their specialties and geographical markets to weather a slowdown.
Why
Here?
Some observers will tell you that the region’s ethnic history has something to do with the relative concentration of large construction companies. “Young Scandinavian settlers that were highly skilled craftsman settled here during a period of growth along the Mississippi,” offers Tom Gunkel, president and CEO of Golden Valley–based M. A. Mortenson Company, the second-largest construction firm in the state.
Mortenson is only one Scandinavian name among several on the list of Minnesota’s top 10 builders. Kraus-Anderson Construction Company in Minneapolis is the oldest (founded in 1897), the fifth-largest, and the most prolific builder in terms of the number and volume of projects in the state. Scandinavian roots also are evident at St. Louis Park–headquartered Adolfson & Peterson Construction and Knutson Construction Services in Golden Valley.
Knutson is a good supporting example of Gunkel’s thesis. The company’s founder, Thor Knutson, arrived from Norway in 1902, starting out as a dollar-a-day carpenter building barns in western Minnesota. Nine years later, he founded his own company. Still, most top Minnesota firms were launched later, between 1939 and the mid-1950s, after the first waves of Scandinavian emigration.
That said, Scandinavians aren’t the only ethnic group represented in the top 10. German ancestry is also evident in names like Rauenhorst (the founding family of Opus) and Kraus. Another is Weis, founded in 1939 and currently headquartered in Richfield. The Irish also are represented through St. Paul–based McGough Companies and Ryan Companies US in Minneapolis.
