Callison

Specialty: Retail, commercial, mixed-use, hospitality, health-care, mission critical
Management: John Jastrem, CEO and chairman; John Gish, chief design officer; Mark Ludtka, executive vice president, business development
Founded: 1975
Headquarters: Seattle
2010 revenues: $94.8 million
Projected 2011 revenues: $126.6 million
Employees: 900
Current projects: City Creek Center, Salt Lake City, opening March 2012; Amazon headquarters (Vulcan Real Estate), opened in April; Swedish Medical Center (South Lake Union, Ballard); MixC, Chengdu, China; TRSA, Jordan

Photo courtesy of Callison Callison designed the mixed-use development MixC in Hangzhou, China.

Mark Ludtka, executive vice president of business development for Callison, is generally optimistic about the economic recovery, especially in the Puget Sound region. The big question, he said, is the market’s overall uncertainty.

Though 2011 was an improvement financially on 2010, uncertainty has slowed the potential pace of growth. People are nervous about the state of the U.S. and European Union.

“There’s a lot of money sitting on the sidelines waiting. I think there’s trillions waiting to be put into exercise,” he said. “If you went out and asked many of the local developers what their number one word would be, it’s can somebody provide us with some certainty ... and if so, we’re going to jump on that train.”

2013 looking good

Depending on what happens with economic markets, Ludtka sees 2012 remaining similar to 2011. He said 2011 was a pretty good year globally but flat domestically. Callison is planning for domestic work to pick up a little in 2012, though it is unsure how much.

Pent-up demand won’t cause business to really grow until 2013. Ludtka thinks the domestic market will continue moving in a stronger direction than the global market.

Today, 60 percent of Callison’s work is overseas. Ludtka would like to see more of that shift back to the U.S., though the company’s international breadth has been strongly beneficial in recent years. China is Callison’s strongest market, followed by the U.S. Over the past year, Ludtka said the firm began to see Canadian developers looking for opportunities in the U.S., and work growing in Canada. He said Canadian developers are especially interested in the U.S. West Coast.

Northwest is strong

In the Puget Sound region, Callison is focused on retail, health-care and data centers, a particularly strong market right now. Ludtka said the apartment market is good if you’ve already got projects in progress but if not, you’ve missed your chance. He also sees potential office growth. “There may be some opportunities in the office market should the employment trend move upward,” he said.

Compared to the rest of the country, Ludtka thinks the Pacific Northwest is in a strong place and will continue to grow.

Callison had a series of layoffs during the recession, with the last round in January. It doesn’t expect any in the near future.

Retooling

The recession caused Callison to “retool” itself. Ludtka said clients have become smarter and more involved in projects, leading to better solutions but requiring more time and energy from the architect. Firms must be smarter, he said, providing clients with better facts and details to substantiate designs and solutions. “You’ve got to be very strategic about how you use your time to help meet the needs of your clients.”

Ludtka said Callison is most excited about the firm’s sustainability efforts, especially its energy modeling method. The firm’s modeling system provides teams with a 3-D image of how a building should be sited to increase efficiency, rather than just spitting out numbers. The system automatically makes a structure 10 to 30 percent more efficient, Ludtka said, and creates a fairly intuitive process. The system is drawing attention to the firm nationally, he said.