Founders Mike Greenslade and Brent Parry are both natives of Oregon. They launched Bremik Construction in 2004 and still stay engaged in each of the company’s projects.

Framing is nearly complete on Lents Commons (formerly known as 9101 Foster), an affordable housing project for Prosper Portland that is expected to be finished in November 2017.

As more and more people have moved into Portland, its skyline has grown. One of the companies in the middle of that growth is Bremik Construction, a midsized firm with a reputation for quality work and practices.

Brent Parry and Mike Greenslade, both construction veterans, launched the company in 2004 with a plan to be a significant small company. The founders would have been happy with $5 million to $6 million in annual revenue.

But in 2006, the young company was awarded the White Stag Block project, a $22-million contract in downtown Portland. The refurbished facility is a merger of three historic buildings into one urban education and office center.  “We made this quantum leap, and that put us in a higher level in a short period of time,” says Greenslade, Vice President of Bremik.

Bremik has been expanding ever since, building new buildings and completing restorations in the growing Portland area. The company expects to bring in more than $100 million this year, and is working on a purposefully diversified portfolio that includes a new Hilton property in the Pearl District and high-end retail space in northwest Portland for Restoration Hardware.

Building on Core Values

The founders and the people who work for and with Bremik agree that the company’s core values—craftsmanship, innovation, being a builder businessman and consistency—are crucial to the company’s success. The values help to guide daily decisions in the office and in the field. “Craftsmanship means we will do it right or we won’t do it,” says Parry, President of Bremik. “Our subcontractors know the wall will be square because Bremik built it.” 

Bremik often self-performs much of its work to maintain quality and control of the construction schedule. 

Seeking New Solutions

Josh Ring, a Project Superintendent who’s been with Bremik since 2011, sees innovation in the daily decisions within the company. “We’re a younger company, not entrenched in the deep-rooted ways of some of the more seasoned companies,” Ring says. “Being so young and new, everyone came from another organization and adds a special flavor.” 

When all those folks get together and share their expertise and ideas, innovation is born. “Multiple ways of thinking can often generate a good idea,” Ring says. “You can look at old-school construction practices in a different light. Sometimes those ideas get discarded, but sometimes we hit a winner and it sticks.”

Builder Businessman

The company also offers an internship program that attracts young talent from area colleges. “We do a lot of coaching and training internally,” Ring says. “To stay innovative and fresh, we are constantly hiring and integrating young people and training them up so they can be aces.”  

Hiring those interns is part of the builder businessman idea. “We get project engineers out of the university system, and they are good at process and technology. They know how to learn,” says Greenslade. “But they don’t know how to build yet. That takes some experience and time.”

So Bremik’s leadership likes to hire interns for the summer, invite them back over the winter holiday, and then hire them full time upon graduation. The interns spend three to five years in the field, working with a superintendent, learning how to build. “As they grow and gain knowledge, we start to give them more responsibility,” Greenslade says. “We want them to get to where they could run a job or two. We really teach them how to build.”

Adding Value

That model is what helps separate Bremik from other companies, says Parry. “With builder businessmen, we’re breaking the mold,” he adds. “We’ve blended and blurred. We want everyone to understand the entire construction industry.”

When the Bremik staff meets with an owner early in the process, Parry says, there’s a builder businessman sitting next to him, someone who understands the process from beginning to end and is able to guide the decisions about the entire project. “We add value in the early stage because we understand how to build, what works, doesn’t work, what takes longer,” Parry says. 

Demanding Consistency

Of all the Bremik values, consistency may be the most difficult to achieve, but it’s also non-negotiable. “Whether you’re an athlete, carpenter or business owner, it’s really hard to be consistent,” Greenslade says. “We try to be consistent in our day-to-day work, even in how we approach projects and what we go after.” 

Strong relationships with owners and subcontractors rely on consistency, Parry adds. “Whether it’s a subcontractor or owner, they should always get the same approach with whomever they’re talking with or working with at Bremik,” Parry says. “We have a standard of quality for how we build.”

Smart Builders

It’s a model that works for clients, according to Tim O’Brien, owner of Urban Asset Advisors (UAA) in Portland. Bremik has built multiple projects for the company and currently has two UAA projects worth $40 million under construction. “Even though they’re a midsized firm, they have systems that are scalable, that are at or better than many of the larger construction firms,” O’Brien says. “Their systems are some of the best.”

O’Brien appreciates that Parry and Greenslade continue to stay involved in projects. “They’ve stayed engaged,” O’Brien says. “They always seem to know what’s going on. They always pick up the phone.”

He also appreciates the depth that Bremik brings to a project. “They aren’t just experts at construction,” O’Brien says. “They understand development. They help assess a project’s feasibility. They will frequently bring ideas and opportunities to the table.”

Building Relationships

O’Brien has experienced exactly what Parry and Greenslade hoped for when they launched Bremik. “We are builders, and we think like owners, like our clients,” Parry says. “We can add value by listening to what they want.”

“We are in a relationship business,” he continues. “Buildings are a byproduct of what we do.”

That means maintaining strong relationships with subcontractors, completing work that generates referrals, and treating employees well. “We continue to preach that philosophy,” Parry concludes. “Stop sending an email, pick up the phone, take someone out to lunch. People are real, and it’s people who build buildings.”