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P.O. Box 2267
Mt Pleasant , SC 29465
Steve Kendrick began Structures Building Company in January 2000 in Mount Pleasant, South Carolina after more than a decade of hands-on building and project management experience in Washington, D.C. While his early career centered around the construction of high-end office space, Steve's focus at Structures is on his true passion, building homes.
Structures Building Company has been growing steadily since its inception. Their homes have been featured in Home Magazine and recognized with numerous regional construction awards. But Steve's proudest achievements are the high marks that his clients give Structures for customer service. "While we all love building houses, we realize first and foremost that we are in the customer service business. Customer recommendations mean everything to us. It's great to see it all pay off."
New construction of custom homes. Structures also provides design services through its partner company, Structures Design Group, owned and managed by Phil Clarke, a long-time friend and coworker. Currently building in I'On and on Daniel Island.
Since 2000, Structures has expanded from building three houses within a year to completing 16, and the company expects to grow. "We'll always be careful not to exceed our threshold for doing great work," Steve says. His hiring philosophy is to recruit staff who share his passion for creative home building - even if their background is in other fields. He has recruited all of his employees through personal networking, rather than through newspaper classifieds. His team includes Phil Clarke, head of product design; Myron Hinton, project manager; Kristy Gorsuch, assistant project manager responsible for customer service; RP Newton, estimator; and Hawk McElveen, field supervisor with a focus on all closeout and warranty work. "I'm very lucky. We've got a great team of people who are committed to what we do."
From Massachusetts, Steve earned a B.S. in finance and entrepreneurial studies at Babson College near Boston, and studied architecture and urban planning in Washington, D.C. He and his wife, Anne, live in I'On with their children, Sophie and Will and are expecting their third child shortly. "While I didn't come from a construction family, I was always the kid off in a corner building something. I always knew I wanted to translate those interests into a career."
First, we love what we do, and that shows in how we work with our customers and in the houses we build. Second, we go out of our way to make our customers happy. I believe that if you do the right thing, and treat your customers the way you'd want to be treated, you'll be successful. Finally, we focus as much on our customers as we do our houses. Homebuilding is such a personal business. The approach we take with our customers reflects that.
Steve says his customers are those who are looking for more service and professionalism in their home building experience. "We go the extra mile with our customers and with their homes." For example, every Structures' customer has access to information about their home through Structures website - critical dates, e-mails, finish selections, project photos and more. "This is a great way to keep our customers involved in the project, whether they live locally or some other part of the country. These added services are what help make us different."
We meet regularly and communicate often. Every customer has different needs. We manage numerous projects, and have found it important to have frequent interaction with our customers, to make sure they are happy and well informed.
We use a fixed-price contract.
All of our work comes through referrals from real estate agents in the communities we build, and from clients. I've also invested in professional marketing materials, including a company brochure and website, which I feel convey our style well.
Technology is big for us. We pre-wire all of our homes to the highest local standards, giving our customers the ability to add features in the future that they couldn't even imagine today. We also incorporate technology into our management processes through our website, where our customers can review the construction progress on their home.
To keep our costs in check, most of our training is done in-house, with our subcontractors, supplier representatives and employees. We hold two meetings weekly, one in the office to review schedules and operations, the other in the field to review construction procedures.
We offer bonuses that are tied to project performance and to the GuildQuality customer satisfaction responses.
Lack of adequate insurance coverage is the greatest challenge that I see. It's a very volatile industry right now, and a little unsettling.
Treat people well and do the right thing. You sleep better that way.
It's an exciting time for us. We're young, and we expect to grow. We're very committed to finishing I'On, where we got our start. Recently we began work in another great community, Daniel Island. We'll gradually expand our presence over there and then look for new opportunities as I'On nears completion.