Dive Brief:
- Vancouver, British Columbia-based Mercer Mass Timber has launched a construction services division, the company announced on March 4.
- The timber building materials manufacturer, which is a subsidiary of wood pulp producer Mercer International, will offer both onsite installation and consultancy services for clients who want guidance and strategic support, per the release.
- Brian Merwin, senior vice president at Mercer Mass Timber, told Construction Dive that the firm doesn’t see itself competing with other installers. Rather, Merwin said that the new division would work with clients who are building with mass timber for the first or the second time.
Dive Insight:
Merwin said that the new division would provide a “turnkey” solution for its clients and that it represented a new offering for customers. It also doesn’t represent a strategy shift for the company toward construction and installation.
“Our core business is still supplying mass timber materials for installation,” Merwin said.
Services that the new division can provide include engineering, structure modeling, project and labor management, scheduling and quality control, according to the release.
The approach, according to the release, would be vertically integrated. Because Mercer would run the process from top to bottom, it would lead to reduced waste, streamlined schedules and lower risk, the release said.
Mercer’s decision to establish this new division matches up to the burgeoning popularity of mass timber as a building material, particularly as the demand for green buildings grows.
High-profile clients that have tried mass timber include Amazon, which employed the material on its $2.5 billion second headquarters in Arlington, Virginia. Other notable projects include the $150 million Limberlost Place in Toronto and the $32 million new headquarters of Cincinnati Public Radio in Cincinnati, which broke ground in August.
