‘Whatever your vision, we’ll nail it for you’

Rich Palzewic

Staff

December 2, 2024

ROSENDALE – With its growth in the last several years, Rich Zimpel, residential salesman/project manager with Pinno Buildings, said it was time to move into another growing market in Northeast Wisconsin.

Pinno – a contractor based in Rosendale in Fond du Lac County offering a variety of construction services – recently announced it is expanding into Green Bay, Door County and the Fox Cities.

“(They are) markets we’ve always kind of been in, but we never had the right people in the right places,” Zimpel said. “Our sales structure is based on territory. Because (those areas) have been growing over the past however many years, we finally decided it was the right time to have somebody solely dedicated to those areas.”

Because he has a history with Pinno’s newly expanded territories, Zimpel said Jeremy Pomasl was brought aboard to lead the charge.

“Jeremy has been working in those areas for a long time,” he said. “He knows a lot about building because, for the last few years, he was a project manager doing residential houses in those areas. With his other background, he is a really good fit and knows the market well.”

Moving into the Northeastern Wisconsin markets, Zimpel said, also correlates with the growth Pinno has experienced.

“We now have more than 100 employees,” he said. “When I started in 2018, we had 60-65 employees.”

With the expanding markets, Zimpel said Pinno now covers a “good portion of the state.”

“We cover everything pretty much east of I-94 as it runs from like Madison to La Crosse or Eau Claire,” he said. “We also do work in northern Illinois. Time will tell whether we grow more or less in the future.”

Building dreams, one nail at a time

Zimpel said Pinno began operations in 1978 and has seen growth ever since – serving clients in the agricultural, residential, equine and commercial markets.

“Today, Pinno offers a complete ‘turn-key’ service package starting with design/engineering and ending with high-quality post-framed buildings,” he said. “Our ability to offer unique flexible designs and distinctive solutions for our customers differentiates Pinno from the competition.”

Zimpel said Pinno offers both all-inclusive and material-only packages, as well as professionally engineered and erected structures to its customers. 

“Customers can come to us, and we’re basically holding their hands from start to finish,” he said. “We also work with people who have a lot of their own contacts they like to use, and we’re able and flexible enough where we can work with them at any stage of the project. I’m not sure a lot of other construction companies want to do that – many won’t touch a project unless they can do it all.”

Because the construction industry is “very competitive,” Zimpel said companies have to have that flexibility.

“There are a lot of (construction companies) out there, but there’s also not,” he said. “The labor force behind that is dwindling, so what we’ve seen is there are a lot of smaller companies that have come to work for Pinno.”

Though that flexibility sets Pinno apart, Zimpel said the company is much more than that.

“The quality of our buildings is second to none,” he said. “The entire team takes an intimate approach to every job. We’re not just there to put up a building. We want to know how you’re going to use it now, and then, as you grow or your family situation changes, what does that look like in five or 10 years down the road?”

Zimpel said with Pinno, it’s not just about selling a building.

“We want it to work for you because, at the end of the day, if it doesn’t work for you, it’s kind of on us,” he said. “How you build your business – and how we build our businesses – is from referrals and from the reviews we get at the end of the project. I can’t tell you how many times I get a call from somebody saying I got your name from so-and-so. It might have been somebody we built for 10-12 years ago.”

Zimpel said his areas of expertise include residential work, barndominiums, traditional style homes and remodels.

“A barndominium is a house that looks like a barn,” Zimpel said. “A lot of people will say that it’s a building method, while others say it’s a pole shed house. My personal approach to that is, what is it going to be when it’s done? If we’re building a house, then let’s build a house. We’re going to make it look like you want, but from a design standpoint, we have to look at it as a house. Barndominiums are becoming a larger percentage of our business.”

With a dwindling labor force to choose from, Zimpel said over the years, Pinno has changed its tactics for attracting and retaining construction talent.

When the company lost talent during the economic downturn in 2008, Zimpel said Pinno pivoted its approach slightly.

“Our approach has been more of a… we’ll call it an apprenticeship without calling it an apprenticeship,” he said. “A lot of companies (with a) similar size to ours are looking at bringing kids in straight out of high school and working hand in hand on the job sites with our veteran group of guys. They’re learning from some of the top guys out there who have 30-40 years of experience. We’ve been able to establish a pretty strong workforce taking that approach.”

Zimpel said Pinno has had to take that approach “because it seems as though fewer and fewer people” are going into the trades.

Rain, rain go away

After early-season rain transitioned to drought-like conditions this summer, Zimpel said Mother Nature threw another monkey wrench into the construction world, with wet conditions again prevailing this fall in Northeast Wisconsin.

“Obviously, there’s nothing you can do about that,” he said. “We’ve been doubling and tripling crews on some sites to try and beat the weather, but there’s a limit to that. You can’t simply throw the entire fleet at it because you have to be somewhat productive, too. There’s a fine line – you have to pick your spots.”

Zimpel said Pinno increases its crews on some sites to make sure as many buildings/projects as possible are enclosed before the cold and snow hits.

“It can be a day-to-day approach at times,” he said. “Also, you deal with vacations for (the holidays). A lot of time is spent in the office discussing all these things. At least things tend to slow down on the customer side of things this time of year because people aren’t really focused on building – their focus is on the holidays and family.”

For more on Pinno Buildings, visit pinnobuildings.com.