When Allen & Sons Construction takes on a project they literally set the standard for concrete construction. Family owned since CEO, Mike Allen Sr. started his own con-struction firm back in 1982. Allen & Sons Construction specializes in building big ware-house/condo and office centers.

Located in French Camp, CA, the company is busy putting up the first two of what will eventual be seven office/warehouse structures in Lathrop. “This project is very typical of what we do,” said Mike Sr. Allen & Sons first installs the slab on site. Forms are then built for the walls and the concrete is poured. Once ready, the walls are lifted by crane and held in place as workers secure them first with a massive brace system. After securing the braces they weld the walls together.

On this particular project the of-fice/warehouse structures are 30,000 sq. ft. each. The wall panels range from 24ft.-30ft. tall. Each building takes approximately 855 cubic yards of concrete. From start to finish Allen & Sons is able to have the complete structure up in an unbelievable 30 days.

In addition the company is also handling all curb and gutter work at the site as well. “While these buildings represent what we do on a regular basis, they are actually much smaller than many of the structures we build,” explained company President Mike Allen Jr.

“We certainly kept ourselves busy on those two projects,” Mike Sr. joked. Each building was 140,000 sq. ft., with an additional 40,000 sq. ft. garden center building. Approximately 8,000 cubic yards of concrete was used on each of the projects. 100,000 sq. ft. of paving was installed at each site, as well as 7,000 lineal ft. of curb and gutter work. To be able to get the projects completed on time and on budget crews of up to 40 workers at times worked on site.

The Central Valley’s I-5 corridor like much of the state is booming with new construction. Many companies have located not only their stores in the area, but also massive warehouse distribution centers for outlets in coastal regions. Allen & Sons has constructed both types of structures. Their list of clients reads like a Who’s Who of retail chain operations. Among them include Kohl’s, Long’s Drugs and Costco. “With a company like Costco, you know what the deal is going in,” Mike Sr. said. “The company has a 120 day, rain or shine, start to finish deadline. We have done a lot of work for Costco and strive hard to make certain that we meet whatever requirements they have.” Many of the retail distribution center warehouses Allen & Sons build can be as large as 800,000 sq. ft. Being centrally located the company has built stores and warehouses in Tracy, Modesto, South San Francisco and Santa Cruz.

Retail warehouses and stores aren’t the only thing Allen & Sons builds. The company is currently working on three five-story office/condo buildings in downtown Sacramento. Each structure measures some 65,000 sq. ft. The company is also busy building a 400,000 sq. ft. warehouse for the military at the Tracy Defense Depot.

This is the second warehouse Allen & Sons has built at the site. The first warehouse was 500,000 sq. ft. “It is sort of like going home,” Mike Sr. mused. Being a military warehouse, the project is a high spec job that will include such standards as an 8” thick floor. The entire job will take a year to complete.

Allen & Sons also handles many jobs for Caltrans building concrete barriers and other assorted projects. Another family owned company, SlipStone, Inc. frequently works in conjunction with their concrete counterpart on many projects. SlipStone is a patented process that creates decorative concrete work for walls. The system is adaptable to a wide number of machines such as Power Curber, Miller and Gomaco. The SlipStone process is currently being used in the U.S., Canada and France. Up until a few years ago the traditional manner of constructing decorative walls was a major cost factor. Mike met the challenge by doing extensive research. The company developed a system that was able to impress any type of design onto the side of a slip formed wall.

The SlipStone process for creating textured barrier walls has met the standards and been approved by the Federal Department of Transportation. In addition to freeway work the SlipStone process has been employed upon many of the man-made lake walls for lake front communities.

Taking a proactive stance to deal with a challenge is typical of Mike Allen. In order to ensure the company continues to have a steady group of skilled workers, Allen & sons has set up a program with a local Adult Education School to ensure that their non-English speaking employees are able to learn English. “We feel being able to read, write and speak English is a very important aspect of helping employees grow,” said Mike Sr.

When an employee completes the ESL program and is awarded their certificate Allen & Sons gives that employee a $400 bonus. “Our company policy is, Learn not to burn,” ex-plained Mike Jr. By encouraging employees to increase their knowledge the company sets up an atmosphere where employee loyalty will flourish. Allen & Sons has some 120 employees. A quarter of these have been with the company for close to twenty years or more.

Like the company’s proactive ESL program, Allen & Sons has taken a similar stand dealing with work related injuries. They hired a Safety Officer whose job it is to ensure that company employees adhere to all industry safety standards. The Safety Officer will write up those workers who fail to obey safety regulations. Likewise when the Safety Officer sees workers who have performed their work and followed safety standards he presents them with gift certificates to Outback Restaurants. 

In addition to Mike Jr. the other family members working for the company include son, Jared who is National Sales Rep for SlipStone and also doubles up duties over-seeing site operations for Allen & Sons Construction as well. Another key person is Rick McElhinnie, company vice-president. Rick oversees all structural concrete projects. 

A third generation of Allens can be seen working at the company’s offices. Mike Jr.’s fifteen year old son, Aaron works in the shop during his summer vacations. Mike Jr.’s daughter, Lexis helps out in the office while on break from school as well.

“I really enjoy seeing an employee being able to progress with the company and achieve the American Dream.” Mike Sr. stated candidly at the close of the interview. With the proactive stance Allen & Sons has taken they have certainly put the family company at the forefront of progressive construction firms. Cc