Since its start in 1981, Humphries and Company has been noted for its premium interior general contractor services throughout the Metro Atlanta Area, for its reputation for high-quality consistency, and for building relationships with its customers and subcontractors.
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Humphries boasts an extensive portfolio of interior construction projects including office space, call centers, switch and data centers, clubs, medical offices, law firms, securities firms, and base building repositioning. Due to the team’s high quality of work, Humphries and Company sees a great deal of repeat business. Rather than resting on their laurels, however, the company is always actively seeking more projects and clients.
“We’re in the service business; we service clients and people and we invest in our people,” Scott Moore, Managing Partner for Humphries, says. “We have very strong professional people who have been with us for a long time. The average tenure of our employees is 17 years; our people are the best in town.”
Working for the company himself since 1985, Mr. Moore has successfully completed over 800 projects in more than 125 buildings in the greater Atlanta area during his tenure. Some of the projects he successfully spearheaded include serving as project manager for the Arthur Blank Family Foundation Project, which was the first LEED Gold certified project in the State of Georgia. Moore also became Humphries and Company’s first LEED Accredited Professional, and he continues to lead sustainable initiatives for the company.
Humphries assists its clients in managing the construction process. From the preparation of cost estimates to scheduling, value engineering, constructability analysis, lead time identification, subcontractor prequalification, selection and bidding – not to mention construction coordination and quality assurance – the company is there for and with its clients from start to finish.
Founder Jimmy Humphries started the company in 1981 and built its sterling reputation over the years. In 2008, Moore along with three business partners purchased the company from Humphries and began operating. “We are working to continue the legacy and improve it,” Moore shares.
The story of Humphries and Company is one that reflects the growth of the entire Metro Atlanta Area over the past three decades. From a population of around 2.4 million in the early 1980s when the company was founded to approximately 5.6 million people today, Humphries and Company has been a part of major construction projects and commercial expansion in the area. The market was deeply affected by the Great Recession but is now bouncing back and Humphries is right there with it.
“These are good times in our industry after four to five lean years,” explains Moore. “Atlanta has a lot of construction going on right now with two stadiums [the new football stadium for the Atlanta Falcons downtown and a baseball stadium for the Braves in suburban Cobb County], expanding companies, plus companies moving into area… the local construction industry is about as good as I’ve seen it. There is a lot of work out there and we’re just trying to do our fair share of it, take care of our existing clients and turn out a quality project for a good price.”
Humphries also embraces a culture of environmental awareness and sustainable building practices. The company has committed itself to being a good steward of the environment by employing company-wide sustainable practices out in the field and within its corporate operations. Humphries has worked on reducing emissions from its projects, road vehicles, and its mobile and stationary equipment. The team has also worked on generating zero waste through reducing upfront demand, reusing materials and recycling. Company team members also have the expertise to identify opportunities to enhance the sustainability of a project and work to find the optimum balance between budget and sustainability building goals. Humphries and Company has completed many LEED Platinum, Gold and Silver projects over the years.
The company is also dedicated to safety and quality and trains its workforce to the highest standards. Humphries engages in company-wide safety training with its employees and extensive project management and superintendent safety training is implemented within the company. Additionally, there are weekly jobsite safety training meetings and certifications offered in OSHA and First Aid.
Due to its reputation as a best in class contractor, the company is held to very high standards, which propels the team to be the best they can be. “Atlanta can be a small town in the construction industry,” says Moore. “So we constantly do everything we can to make our clients happy and make every project successful because we are not doing projects in other cities or traveling or having one-off opportunities. We work with a lot of repeat clients, so we always maintain our passion for quality and responsiveness to our clients. We often go to meet them as soon as one project is over for them to work on another. We focus on bringing our A-game because of our reputation. We are used to it, we welcome it. It’s ingrained in our DNA; that’s how we operate.”
Most of Humphries’ projects are short in duration, with largely an 8 to 12 week turnaround. Moore credits the company’s project managers and superintendents for maintaining this schedule. “We have been very busy in terms of construction projects. Along with that come challenges and manpower issues, so managing workloads and spreading around the projects that we’re running along with our subcontractors is important. Workload management is constantly changing and evolving, so we make sure we don’t overload a subcontractor and get ourselves in trouble. We stay on top of it because of the quick turnaround.”
Humphries has worked on a number of notable projects over the years throughout the Metro Atlanta area and has been honored in the industry for its efforts. While the company largely built its reputation working with area law firms, Humphries has constructed significant projects in other sectors including corporate office, data centers, retail and hospitality, medical, higher education, high-end residential, and faith-based projects.
The company had a notable year in 2014, completing several projects and propelling the firm to a number one ranking for interior construction in Atlanta in the Atlanta Business Chronicle. Just this year, Humphries worked with the Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) at their offices at Perimeter Center in the suburb of Sandy Springs, Georgia. The scope of work was a complete renovation including the demolition of existing materials and systems back to the original shell. Humphries installed all new infrastructure, including a new chiller plant, data center, transformers, and a secondary electrical feed. Each floor includes all new security and data infrastructure, while state of the art conference rooms were built featuring room schedulers, iPad functionality, projection screens, and motorized window shades. The main lobby of ICE includes new marble wall panels and flooring, lighting, and several security measures including turnstiles, scanners, and badge systems.
Humphries was also instrumental in the redevelopment of Ponce City Market, a mixed-use development project located in the heart of Atlanta. The 2.1 million square foot building is one of the largest by volume in the Southeastern United States. Formerly a Sears Distribution Center from the 1920s until 1987, the building sat abandoned for years until extensive renovations were made in the past few years. Humphries remodeled multiple spaces in the building, developing offices for companies such as athenahealth, Cardlytics, MailChimp, HowStuffWorks, and Jamestown Properties – the real estate investment and development company that spearheaded the development of Ponce City Market. Humphries’ work on their offices was profiled as one of “Atlanta’s Coolest Office Spaces” in the Atlanta Business Chronicle.
Other projects include repeat business with companies based in Atlanta including CNN, SunTrust, and Georgia State University. Another notable project was the construction of the Legoland Discovery Center in Phipps Plaza, a shopping mall in Atlanta. Humphries and Company constructed the 34,000 square foot indoor amusement park and worked with the architect, engineers, ride vendors, Lego theme coordinator, cinema vendor, café designer and the attraction operator for space planning, constructability, schedules and budgets. The attraction includes a roller coaster ride, iconic Atlanta landmarks rendered in Lego bricks, a carousel, a 4D Theater, play equipment, a retail store, a café, public restrooms, and staff offices and restrooms. The project was delivered one month earlier than originally projected and within budget.
Moore credits the subcontractors and vendors who work with Humphries for bringing projects to successful completion. “We subcontract 80 to 85 percent of our work,” he explains. “We rely on them and they’re a good stable of people who are loyal to us. We’ve been told we’re the best in managing their people; we don’t cry wolf or have them work unnecessary weekends. We are dedicated to doing a good job of managing people and money, which benefits our clients by building good relationships with our subcontractors and suppliers.”
Of course, Humphries has a number of projects presently in the pipeline, including an expansion of Cooper Carry, a local architecture firm, and work on Lincoln Financial’s offices. “We like the activity level in Atlanta and we like our position in the market,” concludes Moore. “We are thankful for our clients and their work. We have a talented and diverse staff and are proud of the diversity of our projects.”
