AB Civil Consulting, LLC (AB Civil) is a Construction Technology Consulting firm offering services in the areas of Civil 3D Machine Control Model Building, Construction Technology Consulting, Earthwork Take-Offs, and Drone Data Processing. In the construction industry, we are recognized for our superior customer service. At AB Civil we are passionate about the service we provide to our clients. It’s not just a product to us. Client relationship is EVERYTHING. We strive to optimize our clients’ use of technology, allowing them to fully benefit from the equipment they have invested in. Through a collaborative effort with subconsultants and data prep specialists, we provide a consistent and bespoke product to our clients. AB Civil places emphasis on our clients' specific operations and company structure. We set out to develop a true partnership with our clients, understanding their needs to develop systems that correctly utilize their technology. We do not merely provide a product, as other modeling firms often do. We provide a service, supporting and advising our clients from the delivery of our products to the completion of their projects. Our team of experts have years of construction experience, learning the business in roles such as foreman/superintendent, project managers and estimators before mastering the 3D machine control modeling process. The AB Civil team can provide insight to your project because we have the experience.
External link for AB Civil Consulting
Clarksville, TN 37043, US
We are hiring!
AB Civil has been growing like crazy. We've experienced about a 50% jump in work over the last 10 weeks. We are considering hiring a full time experienced model builder if anyone is interested. TBC only for our models, so if you are an Agtek or Civil 3D model builder that wouldn't work. We're open to training on TBC though. We'd like a minimum of 2 years experience for this position.
A glimpse at the progress within the company!
Yeah I'm a charts and graphs type.... Here's a cool one about AB Civil. This includes lost and dropped clients but not part time fill in clients who just need a little help. We're at 111 active clients I believe. Cool to see the progression. This is a cumulative stacked bar graph from when we started until now. It also shows the lead source and how that changed over the years. It's kind of crazy how far we've come in such a short amount of time. We have amazing clients and employees, we wouldn't be anywhere without them.
Check out what's going on!
Business Update: So we’ve been busier than usual at AB Civil but good news all around. We hired on another new-to-the-industry team member last week. Same as the rest of our team we have high hopes for him having a bright future at AB Civil. January was slow, February was average but March has been BUSY! The last two months work has us trending 40% higher in new contracts from last year. That is EXCLUDING the largest job we’ve ever landed which was a highway job from a couple months ago. This week we’ve blown our single week invoicing record out of the water…by Wednesday! We’ve added a number of new clients and we’re beyond excited about that. We’ve teamed up with one independent model builder who has modeled over a dozen jobs for us. He was slow, we have the work so it was a win/win for both of us. Only bad news: Our app has been put on hold for a little bit until we catch up with models which has been happening quickly. We have all of the information we need, it’s just a matter of re-recording and finishing touches. Very anxious to get it done but sometimes other priorities come up! That’s all for now!
It's not often that I get to visit an active site that we've modeled. I've been to less than 10 active sites out of every project we've worked on. But last week I had an awesome opportunity to visit a couple sites and meet a few of our clients in person. Fessler & Bowman and Simpson Land Development allowed me onto a couple great sites and I'm eternally grateful. Thank you Will Goodnow for the tour of Bryton Woodfield! There's no better feeling than getting to walk a site that we had a part in building. It's also crazy how different a site looks from a computer screen to real life. Simpson's Bryton Woodfield apartment complex project is way smaller in person than it looked building the model. Meaning, it is wild to consider how much site they packed into one footprint. That 20 acre site should easily be 40 acres based on the complexity. But they don't have that luxury out there, they have to fit this tight site into a small footprint, delivering a product that returns the owner a great profit (and makes the traffic in the area even worse 😂 ). Fessler and Bowman's Stowe project looks way larger in person than it did as we modeled it. One of the basins was constructed by a previous contractor and it is absolutely MASSIVE! And they're digging for the second one now. In the coming months I hope to secure some local clients that give me the opportunity to get back out in the field and witness this amazing technology changing the way we build everything!
Revisions kill this industry. They negatively affect construction, quality, schedule, and production. No one likes them, yet, it seems like they’ve been happening more and more frequently. There is nothing worse than receiving an email with a revision. When it comes to model revisions, they’re normally needed yesterday, and there’s almost never anything I or the contractor can do about that. They receive the revision when they're already deep into the project, now they have to stop and pivot just to keep going. I must say, our team has been amazing with revisions recently. We're getting Bluebeam overlays to clients in less than 24 hours. That means we can verify what changed, assess the situation, and come up with a plan. But that doesn’t mean it isn’t frustrating; it’s very stressful. However, I will say this: we have no right to complain about revisions. It does put us in a bad spot by pulling our focus and momentum from other jobs, and it messes up our schedule, which can start to affect our other clients. But let's have some perspective. The contractor has it WAY worse. They face costs they will never truly recoup, they have to move areas, and change operations. Then, they have to move equipment in and out, and move crews and materials. All this costs time, money, and resources. What about the direct implications of these changes? Most contractors are working multiple sites at once. Now they have to halt their schedules as well and put all their attention onto one job. Sometimes, it's nearly a stop-work situation. That leaves their other projects in a vulnerable place where things can get missed or forgotten about. The last thing our client needs is for us to voice our frustration to them. I might complain with them, but I always try my hardest to end the conversation on a positive note: 'Don’t worry about it, send the files, we’re on it.' That’s what they need from us. We're paid to service them; when they need something, we're all over it. No complaining, whining, or excuses, just support. That's our job, to support them. We don’t just give them a finished product; we support them every step of the way. Whatever we can do within our abilities to support them, we do. With powerful programs and even more powerful technicians behind them, there's a lot we can offer. From Bluebeam overlays to quantity verifications, we offer whatever we can to help.
Word-of mouth is a powerful tool!
In a lot of ways, I’ve forgotten about how important word-of-mouth is in business. We recently relocated to a new, larger office space, and I got very lucky by finding it this way. It reminded me how important it is to get engaged within your local community, not just being connected through phone calls and email. We outgrew our first office space pretty quickly, which was just a single 300 square foot room. We started that lease in 2022 when business was somewhat consistent and much smaller. That all changed in 2023 when we doubled overnight. The only way for us to keep up was to hire additional employees. We added 4 employees in 2023, 3 of which were local to Clarksville. As you could imagine, that singular room quickly felt small, so it was time to find something that could accommodate our growing team. I spent a lot of time scouring local office lease listings, but most everything on our side of town is retail with very little office space options. I knew the market well and spent a few months looking at listings all throughout Clarksville but came up pretty empty. The most affordable space we found was about $1500 per month plus utilities, for 1200 square feet. It was a very good deal compared to everything else I saw. It wasn’t in the greatest location, but seeing as we don’t currently have any local clients, that wasn’t a major concern. We were getting pretty close to pulling the trigger on that space, and it also just so happened to be across the street from my barber. I was getting my haircut one day and telling him about it, and that it was by far the best deal I could find within 20 minutes of our home. I told him the rent and he said, “Wow that’s very expensive.” I replied with, “Trust me, I’ve been looking for a while now, and that’s by far the best deal I could find.” He then shared that they lease their 1200 SF space for $1200/mo. Needless to say, I grabbed the landlord’s card and called him. He had two spaces available, one was 850 SF and the other was 1200 SF for the same $1200 per month that the barbershop pays, but with all utilities included. The businessman who owns the property is in his 80s, has been in Clarksville for his entire life, and doesn’t price anything to the market, only based on the way he wants to price it. No online advertising, just word of mouth. Doing out the math, we saved $600 per month compared to the other location we had looked at...for the same-sized office space! Signed that lease as soon as we could. But I couldn’t help but think, had I never had that conversation with my barber, another local businessman, I never would have found our landlord and would have paid way more for the same sized space. It was a good reminder of how important it is to be active in your local community, no matter if you’re an outsider (like we are) or not. That’s how not only businesses can grow, but incredible professional relationships can form.
Overall, separating models and surveys in construction projects promotes accuracy, flexibility, verification, risk management, and effective communication, ultimately contributing to the successful execution of the project. #trimble #topcon #machinecontrol #constructionequipment #constructiontechnology #dirtwork #earthmoving #excavators #surveying
Let's try one that's more difficult! #trimble #topcon #machinecontrol #constructionequipment #constructiontechnology #dirtwork #earthmoving