“Excel began out of a tough place in 2000. Although I was making the most money I had ever had made up to that point, the construction company I was working for did not value their employees and prioritized completing many projects over bringing quality to each project. I decided I wanted to build a company that valued their employees and built quality construction. By starting Excel, I took an 80% pay cut, and had to work hard to build a profitable company. However, it was worth the sacrifice to build our company as one that values our employees, as well as our customers.
My interest in construction developed in high school as I watched carpenter friends working with their hands to create something. I’ve always been mechanically inclined, and I enjoy seeing the fruit of my hard work and labor come together. Since I age 18, I’ve been in the trades. My second job was at Menards, from there I went right into the building trade.
Excel grew at a steady pace by word-of-mouth referrals. Initially, we were sub-contracting many our services. We worked on residential, industrial, and commercial projects. We built 300 decks for Home Depot in the Wisconsin and Northern Illinois region from 2002-2004. Lowes contracted us to build 3 multi-million dollar custom homes in 2006. We oversaw rebuilding for PPG Industries in Oak Creek following a tragic explosion. Another project we worked on was the expansion project for the Milwaukee Airport.
The sub-contracting projects were very profitable, but they didn’t allow for the creativity of custom work. In 2008 we focused on our own projects. We found our niche in constructing outdoor living spaces and it has been our focus nearly from the beginning. With the move away from subcontracting work we were able to begin devoting more of our time and effort to deck and other outdoor construction projects.
I see our focus on building decks and outdoor living spaces as a valuable service to Wisconsin residents. Wisconsin’s summers are perfect for outdoor enjoyment, yet few people have their home optimized for outdoor living. With our help, your time outside can be just as comfortable as indoors.
I’m a business entrepreneur, and I consider myself a visionary. I’m always looking to improve on the status quo, and build better projects. I look for more intuitive processes as well as ways to provide higher quality. My soft skills include thinking out of the box, creativity, and trouble-shooting. I see challenging projects as opportunities rather than obstacles. I highly value work well-done, so that means I’m often particular in how we build things. I strive to build things to last, and my ultimate goal is to see our customers experience complete satisfaction with our work.
While Excel Custom Decks receives a great deal of my attention, I’m a family-oriented, Bible-believing, and church-going individual. I enjoy outdoor activities including kayaking and riding motorcycles. I’m a current volunteer firefighter as well as a volunteer with Team Rubicon – an international disaster response organization. Excel Copter, is my side business. I create aerial imagery as a drone service that can be used for marketing, inspecting, mapping, events, search & rescue, and more.
As owner and CEO of Excel I am grateful to build excellence by design for you.”
