It would seem Albert Giacomazzi opened up shop at precisely the wrong time. When Giacomazzi launched his construction firm in 2006, he didn’t foresee the storm brewing on the horizon. Today — two years after the recession officially ended — the construction industry remains marred by tight financing, low demand, foreclosures and high vacancy rates, leading to legions of unemployed construction workers. But for the 56-year-old Giacomazzi and his public works-focused AMG & Associates Inc. business is good. What started out five years ago as a two man start-up has blossomed into a company with 16 employees and a portfolio of projects throughout California. Recently, AMG began bidding projects nationwide. Layoffs never came to AMG. The Santa Clarita firm has added on employees over the years and has seen revenue grow, Giacomazzi said. Public works has fared better than other construction segments such as residential or office, even though public money is tight. By expanding the business’s offerings, searching out overlooked public works projects and maintaining high work standards, AMG has been able to make a profit every year since its 2006 launch, Giacomazzi said. Despite a dip in revenue in 2010, the firm grew nine percent that year from 2008. This year the company expects to post $17.3 million in revenue, a 42 percent increase from last year. Question: How did this all start? Answer: Well, the reason I started (AMG) is my former partners were really focusing on development. They wanted to go into development. That is not want I wanted to do. I wanted to continue focusing on public works, so we just decided we would separate and I would start my own company. Q: And despite the struggling construction industry, how have you been able to grow? A: We are just not doing one type of project. We are a general contractor that does federal projects that does all different types of public works projects. We do work for private entities. We also work as a construction manager and we do pre-construction services, where subcontractors might just have one niche. We also have gotten into fire stations. We are very, very good at fire stations. Q: How has the public works sector been affected compared with other construction? A: The biggest impact has been the residential sector. When you have a collapse almost completely of one sector of our industry, those contractors need to go somewhere, so they have all migrated to public works because that is where all the money is. In 2006, I may have bid on a project and I may have had six bidders, now I bid a project where I have 26 bidders. Q: How has that increased competition affected your business? A: What we try to do is we try to steer away from those projects that get 26 bidders and find projects that may have reduced competition. We bid (one) project about a month ago for the city of Santa Monica that was to replace 350 bus stops throughout the whole city. And that only had 3 bidders. You have to be innovative. You have to be creative, and you just can’t be comfortable in this setting or you are just not going to survive. Title: President/Chief Executive Officer education: Bachelor’s Degree in Business Management, University of Phoenix; Master’s Degree in Business Administration; University of Phoenix Personal: Married with two daughters and three grandsons Q: How did you get into the construction industry? A: I graduated from high school and didn’t have any idea what I wanted to do. But I was dating this girl, and her dad was a superintendent and he offered me a job. I became an apprentice carpenter and worked through my apprentice program and started to get into supervision. So I was a superintendent, a project manager. As I started climbing into management … I knew I was going to (need more) education, so I got my bachelor’s degree in business management and a couple of years ago I got my MBA. Q: How has the industry changed since 1975? A: It has been dramatic. Sustainability is big in our industry (now). For example, all the reinforcing steel for rebar is all from recycled material. Even trash — how it is handled on a job site — is different. Then, you would just put it in a big dumpster and haul it to the dump site. Now we have to separate it. We have to separate wood, plastic, concrete and asphalt. And we have to keep track of it, so all of that gets handled differently at waste deposit sites. Q: Do you incorporate technology into your business? A: Every way that we can. My superintendents all have laptops. Some of them have iPads. If an issue develops on a project, they will take their iPad, take a picture, convert it into a PDF, add a note to it and ask me a question. ‘Hey what do you think of this? How do we solve this problem?’ and then they will e-mail it to me. I’ll take a look at it, analyze it, give them input and send it back to them. Q: You started out just before the industry crashed, as a new business then was it difficult? A: Nerve-racking. It can be unsettling, but you know we are weathering the storm. I don’t think we are going to see the end of this recession probably until the end of 2013. If we can just keep … building our business based on our core values, I think we will be blessed with continued growth. Q: Are you really weathering the storm? A: Even though we have had growth, our net income … is not what it’s been. Q: Why is that? A: Competition. Profit margins are much thinner. Our profit margin for 2010 was the smallest over the year than it had been for any previous year. And so 2010 is when we got hit the hardest. 2011 we actually popped back. So we are actually in pretty good shape for 2011. Q: You mentioned you swim at the local aquatic center. What’s it like swimming at a place you helped to build? A: Oh, awesome. Periodically, sitting around I’ll think ‘Wow! This is good. I helped create this.’
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