- Award category: Movers & Shakers
- Speciality: Full-service remodeling
- 23 years in business
- 1999 volume: $5.7 million
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Staff: 10 office, 18 field
Credit: Chuck Carver Photography
Pete Jacobson (front, center, with wife, Susan) founded his company 23 years ago as a carpenter driving a red van. By the ’80s, he was subcontracting carpentry for custom home construction and supplementing that with remodeling jobs to keep his crews busy. Then he grew disenchanted with home building and switched his focus exclusively to remodeling.
Jacobson takes pride in the size and quality of his field staff. “Carrying that many carpenters puts a lot of pressure on me to grow, and the only way to grow is to sell.”
Even taking into consideration the nationwide construction boom, the growth in the company’s revenues has been impressive. The accounting, budgeting, customer service, design, and production systems Jacobson put in place to manage his company have positioned Lake Country Builders to ride the wave of remodeling dollars rolling through the Twin Cities. Sales have quadrupled in the past eight years as Lake Country Builders focused on high-end work and the whole-house remodels that have won it numerous awards.