26 | Lobell Construction T T Virginia Wright Track record brings in the big jobs Repeat clients are almost the norm, as was the case with their construction of the Catholic Church’s Chanel Centre in Hamilton East. 0800 PH DAMDOORS (0800 74 3263) sales@damdoors.co.nz | www.damdoors.co.nz | 118 Greenwood Street, Frankton, Hamilton Proudly Supporting Lobell Construction P 07 847 9428 E o ce@lje.nz www.lyndonjoneselectrical.co.nz Lyndon Jones Electrical are proud to be associated with Lobell Construction Ltd L o r d & C o Proudly Supporting Lobell Construction · Commercial & Industrial · Rural · Tennis Courts · Residential REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT Established in Hamilton in 1983 by Lue and Sharon Shaw as Lue Shaw Builders, the company was renamed Lobell Construction in 2008, and remains a family owned-and-operated business, with the same uncompromising dedication to high-quality craftsmanship as always. Lobell Construction continues to forge strong connections with clients and communities with its trademark personalised approach. Lue and Sharon’s son Louis is now the managing director, a title he shares with his sister Ellyse Meredith-Wilkie, with other family members also active in the business. Nine years ago Louis was a qualified carpenter with Lobell, having completed his apprenticeship in the family business, when an injury took him off the tools and into the office. “That led to Dad asking me if I wanted to do his job as he started to look towards retiring. I sat beside him in his office for the next five years while he gradually did less and less, until now he’s basically there any time we want his advice,” Louis explains. Louis still manages the company’s construction programming and scheduling, drawing on his time on the tools as he meticulously creates what is an essential part of any project’s success. “I’ve got a good understanding of how long it realistically takes to do something on-site,” says Louis. “That feeds into the estimating I do for labour in our pricing, and all the time frames for all the tasks on the job, giving us a framework for everything we have to do for construction and pre-construction,” he says. His carpentry labour estimate is normally within 2%, and Louis credits his accuracy of both pricing and programming to the years he spent driving around sites with his father, learning to ask the right questions to ensure nothing was missed that might cause a delay. Accurate targets, a realistic programme run through the Gantt Chart tracking software, which keeps a running timeline of what’s actually happening alongside what should be happening, and a team they know they can count on, all feed into Lobell’s reputation for delivering quality projects on time and on budget. Lobell Construction has 25 staff, including those in the office, some of whom have been with them for over 20 years, others over 30. There’s a depth of experience that gives Louis confidence that when the pressure is on they can deliver. “Ninety-five per cent of our contracts have penalties, and when you’ve got an entire school roll that needs to start on a particular Monday in January, you want to hit that deadline. In between us and the client and the bank is the project QS from companies like Kingston and Colliers, who check our progress claims in detail to make sure we stay accurate,” he says. The majority of Lobell Construction’s projects are commercial, with renovations as well as new builds. Over more recent years they have also moved into the industrial sector, with complex projects like the Sleepyhead Estate’s manufacturing hub in Ohinewai, which they were involved with from its inception. Much of the foam-manufacturing facility is already complete, its challenges successfully managed, including the massive 400-tonne steel superstructure for Building 2. “Structurally, it was an intense job. Building 2 has one of the biggest gantry cranes in New Zealand, 40 metres wide. The weight that’s lifting with these 40-metre rectangles of bed foam is huge,” explains Louis. Lobell Construction has done the hard yards over the years to achieve a track record strong enough to get them in the running for these huge, complex projects. The relatively small team and low overheads make their tenders competitive against the larger tier 1 companies. Working with multiple consultants is the norm, and Louis remains involved in on-site operations, mainly acting as primary liaison with their trusted subcontractors in the preconstruction phase, and meeting with clients and consultants for site meetings to ensure their ‘zero defects’ quality standards are met. Repeat clients are almost the norm, as was the case with their construction of the Catholic Church’s Chanel Centre in Hamilton East. It’s an administration block alongside St. Mary’s Chapel, which they seismically strengthened eight years ago. Turning the greenfield site into the elegantly designed and built single-storey centre with parapet walls and a warm roof system that combine to give it a taller appearance from the street had some unique challenges, says Louis.
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