Joe Albanese grew up around construction. His father, a longtime executive at Macomber, worked on the original restoration of Faneuil Hall and Quincy Market, back during Kevin White’s administration as Boston mayor. Albanese, a 29-year industry veteran, worked stints at Macomber and Martini before founding Commodore in 2002. The firm is still young, in construction years, but it’s grown quickly, and Albanese has big ambitions – a surge in contract wins over the past two months is positioning Commodore as a post-crash force.

“I see us as being a market leader in New England, in the markets we choose to work in,” said Albanese, who retired from the Navy last year. “We’re not trying to be a half-billion-dollar firm. But we want to be a firm that is on all the good lists, that can compete with the behemoths, but can provide something that’s more personal, more focused, and put ourselves in the position where we can pick and choose the best clients, and continue to do repeat business with them.”

Joe Albanese
Title: Founder and CEO, Commodroe Builders; Newton
Age: 47
Experience: 29 Years

How’s business now, compared to six months ago?

The velocity of opportunities is significantly better now. As much as people might think it’s all about price, price is just the ticket to entry. You still have to add value to differentiate yourself. What’s most important is how we come out of this. I don’t want to come out of this like everybody else, because where’s the differentiation and competitive advantage to that?

So how do you differentiate yourselves?

First, it’s about the people. Second, it’s about the services. And most importantly, particularly in the corporate real estate market, it’s about deals, and how we can help people make deals.

We have really defined ourselves to be in the service business, where our product is construction, but it’s really a continuum of services we provide. We can waste our time and just be a throughput machine for pricing and provide that service to the market, but that to me is part of commoditization. We have to step back and be more thoughtful about how are we competing, what’s the ultimate goal of the deal, how can we really think and add some value to the broker, the landlord, the tenant, or to all of them? And in addition to all of that, how can we help the design team deliver on their dreams, too?

How would you describe the competitive landscape today?

It’s fierce. It’s upside-down. The risks have never been higher, and the rewards have never been lower. It’s counter-intuitive. And it’s been that way for the past 18 months. I’ve seen some really, really good deals out there, and a lot of tenants and real estate providers are really getting the benefit of that today. I see that window closing, for two reasons. One, we talked about the velocity increasing. As the service providers get more well-fed, as the weaker ones that have been pickling the market drop away, you’re going to get some more push-back on the people pricing at the sub-contractor and supplier level. I’m feeling that push-back already, and that’s going to drive their pricing up. The top line is starting to straighten itself out. We picked up a bunch of work in the past six or eight weeks, and I see the pipeline is still robust, and it’s really really good for the whole market. The bottom line hasn’t straightened itself out yet. I think all the indications are that it’s turning, and I think 2011 will be a different year than 2010.

On an industry level, what does the next year look like?

I’ve been in this market now going on 30 years, [and] what’s been remarkable to me is how you can take slices of time every four, five, six years, and all the players are different. They really are. Some of them evaporate, unfortunately. Some of the smaller ones or newer ones become the bigger ones and the real market leaders. I think there’s an incredible opportunity for firms now to jockey and fill in space that is up for grabs. Commodore has always had a long view. That long view has been threatened by these past 18 months, but we’ve continued to kick ourselves into thinking the long view. We’ve been focused on positioning the platform so that, when the market is straightened out, we can really power forward in all the markets that we’ve focused on.

It’s about footprint. And it’s about making sure that we can capitalize on the opportunities at that right time by having the right people in the right places. Since our inception, we’ve always had more capability than work. It’s why we were able to grow from zero to $80 million in six years. And it’s easy to pay for that when the market’s on a trajectory that’s high and right. When it’s going low and right, it becomes like a double tax. I’m looking forward to seeing, in 24 months, when hopefully the remnants of this market are behind us, I’m looking forward to seeing who’s who in the marketplace.

Joe Albanese’s Top Five Current Projects:

1.) Fish & Richardson Law Offices Construction of law firm’s new 124,000-square-foot LEED Silver offices at One Marina Park Drive, Boston.

2.) Bluefin Robotics 54,000-square-foot headquarters relocation at the Quincy Shipyard.

3.) Cambridge Innovation Center 60,000-square-foot expansion at One Broadway.

4.) TJX 38,000-square-foot tenant interior build-out in Framingham.

5.) MIT Eleven total projects. Assignments include renovations to classrooms, labs and corridors within the historic Main Group.