McDonald Architecture

"Can I have an office building to go please?" or "Special Value deal retail complex?" That is what we are hearing these days in the architectural world. Not so much burgers and fries but certainly give a building design and give it to me fast and efficient. Due to the economic environment we have had to do more with less and faster than ever before. The market has started to make its recovery and those that have tried to "get their money" have finally done so after putting their projects on hold for months or even years. The money is more difficult to get, the tenants are harder to sign up and that means they don't need new construction until all of the key ingredients are in place.

So what happens when they are in place? Run! When they ask, "Can you do this for me." Sure, Can I have two weeks for your concept rendering? "No, you can have a week". How quickly can we have the construction documents?.......3 weeks! What are you supposed to say...No thank you, take a number and wait in line? If we want to recover, we need to be responsive to the client in today's climate and right now they are trying to make a move and that means we move with them. We have seen some of the bigger firms baulk at this idea and they still tell their clients, This isn't the way we do things......WHAT? You have to reinvent yourself. If you don't you will be left behind. If you are going to stick around in this business, you have to have the ability to reinvent yourself, either consciously or unconsciously.

McDonald's game plan has pretty much stayed the constant, even through this economy. Now I don't like to even compare our architecture to McDonald's or any fast food for that matter but what I do appreciate is the ability to accomplish a task at a speed that the client is demanding. They are masters of the invention and right now that is what we need to accomplish as well. I would like to think we have a bit of a happy meal inside us as we create our designs and the client finds a surprise in every box. That surprise? Great value, great design, great communication and accomplish all of these things at Great-neck speeds!

Seriously, this is why we have been successful all these years. We understand and listen to our client's needs. As always, the quicker we accomplish the tasks at hand, the quicker the developer begins to make money. That is what we find at the bottom of the golden arch's rainbow. A pot of gold......or at least next week's payroll.

"If you work for money, you will never make it, if you love what you are doing and always put the customer first, success will be yours." Ray Kroc.

Take care my friends and remember to supersize me!

Rollercoaster

It is pretty amazing the way things have gone in the economy over the last two years. I am not that old so there may be many out there that will say this wasn't that bad....or it has been a REALLY bad one. All I can say is that this recession (or whatever name you choose to call it) has taken my family pretty hard. I don't just mean my family as in wife and kids, if you know anything about Ionic you know that my family members are all of our design team. We don't hire employees, we invite additional family members to our team. Their livelihood matters to us. We have let our home mortgage get way behind just to make sure payroll was met. We pass up on having fancy cars and consider that we are successful if all our design team has better vehicles than us.

So when we say this recession hit our family hard we understand all those small business out there who have suffered and who are still hurting. We continue to pray for you and the recovery just as it seems this crazy roller coaster has started to turn around for us. We are seeing the good fortune of all of our hard work and perseverance pay off. Just passing our 11th anniversary, we didn't think we would even have made it to the 10th. God is good.

We have always tried to do right by all of our clients, contractors, vendors and reps that work with us. things have been slow without doubt, but we see the roller coaster rising up the hill and getting us ready for a great ride. We are curious to see if it all comes about but also patient enough to wait and to be prepared to enjoy the journey instead of worrying about getting to the destination.

The roller coaster: a few years ago we dropped from 11 staff to 4. Now we are back up to 9 and hiring. A few years ago we had so many projects in the the cue we were planning on expanding our office size.....then the bottom out.......they were all gone. Today, we don't plan on expanding the office...just packing in tighter, but we have so much on the drawing boards (yes we still have drawing boards) : (2) medical office buildings, (3) retail complexes, (2) churches, some office buildings, several restaurants, apartment renovations, 200 multi-family/mixed use facility......and oh yeah.....a building with a roller coaster on the top of it. Go figure!

Enjoy the ride my friends......Have a great day!

W.O.W. M.O.B.

It all sounds like a secret agent headquarters but really it is a medical office building located on Will O Wisp Ave. The Ionic DeZign team took on the challenge to create a facility that in no uncertain terms was to be WOW! Wonderful....Oh My....and Wild....A creative venture that takes on an existing 20,000 square foot facility needing a face lift while a new Atrium Core provides the circulation and organization for three additional wings. A total development of over 106,000 square feet located near the Sentera Hospital in Virginia Beach. We look forward to moving forward with the Beach Health Pavilion.