Up and Comer of the Year

Pragmatic finds a green niche in the industry

Pragmatic Construction LLC Milwaukee The leaders of Pragmatic Construction are (from left to right) Steve Servais, principal; Juli Kaufmann, principal; Nikolai Usack, principal; and Charlie Ketchum, employee of the month at the time of the photo.

Bread is baked in a sun oven.

Yarn is spun from the fleece of three alpacas kept in the yard.

Manure from the geese, ducks and other creatures roaming the 15-acre Racine property fertilizes the soil.

The small community of Racine Dominican sisters living at the Eco-Justice Center knows a thing or two about living in harmony with the world. So, when it was time for the community to expand its 1912 Dutch colonial home to accommodate six people rather than three, the sisters’ approach to sustainable living made the project a natural fit for Pragmatic Construction LLC, said Sister Janet Weyker, director of the Eco-Justice Center.

The sisters had three directives for Pragmatic: help them finish the most eco-friendly building addition and renovation possible, respect the historic nature of the property and help secure local contractors and subcontractors for the work.

Two thousand square feet later, the new is indistinguishable from the old, Weyker said, and the building is an example of the many green-building materials and techniques available today.

Milwaukee-based Pragmatic, founded in 2006 by Juli Kaufmann, Steve Servais and Nikolai Usack, advances green-building concepts with a practical eye on cost-saving benefits.

Much of the company’s work focuses on the belief that many methods of traditional construction are unnecessarily expensive, wasteful and impractical.

That approach led to the business re-ceiving numerous awards, including the 2006 Wisconsin Governor’s Business Plan Contest, which recognizes innovative business models.

That, along with the fledgling company’s ability to quickly establish a new niche in the Wisconsin market, prompted The Daily Reporter and Wisconsin Builder to name Pragmatic the Up and Comer of the Year.

The three founders of Pragmatic have a history in the construction industry, and they play active roles in the building community. Kaufmann serves on the Wisconsin Green Building Alliance board of directors and uses her marketing experience to promote green building statewide, said Connie Lindholm, WGBA’s executive director.

The company, she said, is poised to take off.

“They are innovators, willing to take risks, highly intelligent,” she said. “They want to make a difference, and they see this as a way to make a difference. Pragmatic is really determined to change the way people think about green building.”

Toward that effort, Kaufmann donated a variety of resources pertaining to environmentally friendly materials to the library at the Urban Ecology Center in Milwaukee, said Lyn Falk, president of Solterra Studio in Thiensville and developer of the library.

“[Pragmatic’s owners] are very education oriented,” she said. “They want to help their clients understand the options.”

The unique outlook espoused by Pragmatic matched the Eco-Justice Center’s mission well. The sisters did their research before embarking on the project, and they had many ideas about what features they wanted in their building. Pragmatic helped them with the how and where of making the ideas materialize, Weyker said.

The company’s short history wasn’t too worrisome, Weyker said.

“I think we were their first big project outside their own homes,” she said. “They spoke so knowledgeably, and that gave us confidence.”

By Jennifer Pfaff