Experience Matters: Delivering for Schneiderman’s Furniture

By exceeding expectations and empowering clients' missions we forge long-lasting partnerships with our clients that span many years and multiple projects. In fact, more than 70% of our projects are with repeat clients, like Schneiderman's Furniture.

Schneiderman's chose our Client Direct Services group to design and construct its flagship, two-story 110,000-square-foot retail showroom in Lakeville, which was completed in 2017. Based on that experience, the upscale furniture retailer enlisted us to design and build two additional showrooms, a 130,000-square-foot store in Coon Rapids and a 47,000-square-foot store in Roseville, Minn. Retrofits of existing buildings, they were completed in just four months.

Here are some key points of success for these Schneiderman's projects:

• The flagship Lakeville showroom was meticulously designed to reflect the retailer's upscale brand. Upon entering the building, shoppers experience a grand staircase with glass railings and can shop for outdoor furniture on a second-story patio overlooking the city. The exterior features rich Minnesota Kasota limestone and extensive glass, creating an impressive building exterior while filling the indoor space with natural light.

• Schneiderman's required an aggressive timeline for the build-to-suit Lakeville project that included securing occupancy six weeks in advance of completion for staging furniture. We secured a temporary certificate of occupancy and met stringent deadlines to ensure this would happen.

• Having designed the flagship showroom in Lakeville, we deeply understood Schneiderman's brand and their vision, which we carried over to the Coon Rapids and Roseville showrooms.

• We established a guaranteed maximum price (GMP) very early in the process and expedited timelines by getting contracts signed while permit drawings were nearing completion, which contributed to meeting Schneiderman's aggressive timeline of four months.

• The Roseville project started just four weeks after the Coon Rapids project, so we applied design direction and decisions simultaneously between the two – institutional knowledge that was pivotal for saving time and money.

• The project management team delivered value-engineering options for the Coon Rapids store early, saving Schneiderman's nearly $1 million without significantly altering the desired design and brand elements.

• After discovering the building's original structural drawings were inaccurate for the Coon Rapids building, we redesigned and redistributed the exterior load for two of the glazed openings. While this pushed the exterior steel delivery back a month, we still completed the project on time and under budget – a testament to the value of our vertically-integrated in-house team model.

• We secured a signage variance for the Coon Rapids location, giving Schneiderman's permission to install a larger digital sign than allowed by ordinance and gaining greater visibility from the adjacent freeway and raising awareness of its presence.

• We adapted the project timelines for the Coon Rapids and Roseville stores to overcome delays caused by supply chain issues, a difficult labor market and COVID-19 safety protocols. Our flexibility ensured the projects were completed when promised.

According to Jason Schneiderman, president of Schneiderman's Furniture, “Opus meticulously executed our vision at the Lakeville store. It was a very collaborative process with their teams every step of the way, so we had no hesitation partnering with them again for these additional new showrooms."

Whether design-building from the ground up or reinventing existing buildings, our unparalleled design-build experience, coupled with our vertically-integrated team model, ensures we deliver for our clients on time and as promised.

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Client Direct Services (CDS) is Building for You. CDS is part of our flexible approach to meeting our client's needs. It pairs our award-winning construction project managers working directly with clients to deliver their organizational vision. Whether expanding for growth, optimizing efficiencies, or creating an inspiring workplace – every building starts with a purpose. Whatever your purpose, we build for you, delivering targeted solutions through our client-centric process, to take your experience to the next level. Learn more about CDS.

• More about Schneiderman’s Furniture – Coon Rapids Showroom
• More about Schneiderman’s Furniture – Roseville Showroom