About Us

Meet Our Leadership Team

ED BAHLER
Chairman of the Board and Owner

BRYAN STEFFEN
CEO and Owner

SAM KAUFMAN, PE
President & Owner

RYAN WILLMAN
Chief Financial Officer

KYLE SHATTO
VP of Pre-construction

SAM NESBITT
VP of Operations

DOUG BRUNTON
Human Resources Director

NATHAN MISCH
Director of Project Management

CORY APPLEGATE
Estimating Manager

JOE DART
Agricultural Business Development Manager

DAVIS WHITEN
Business Developer

MITCH EHRLICH
Business Developer

BRYAN CULP
Business Developer

OUR INTEGRATED Design-build approach

Project Feasibility
The first step of your project success is achieved in the Preconstruction Process. Our experience proves time and energy spent in Preconstruction saves 5%-10% in construction through collaborative design, well-coordinated construction, and reduced change orders. But more importantly, a successful preconstruction process effort ensures you are building the “Right Project,” not just building a project right.

Trust, confidentiality, and collaboration are vital in this phase. The “Right Project” is one that:

Fits the financial and schedule constraints with your vision and business objectives.

Balances production results, operating costs, biosecurity needs, and social pressures

Aligns with and supports your animal management philosophy and marketing needs

Takes advantage of past successes and challenges

Incorporates equipment preferences and automation expectations

Properly leverages site and manure management constraints

All these factors are vital in discerning the “Right Project” and then developing a conceptual design to clearly illustrate it. We are committed to invest in your project and ensure the “Right Project” is taken forward to construction.
DESIGN DEVELOPMENT
Here we take the conceptual design and Cap-X Budget from Project Feasibility and carefully detail it out based on:

Site engineering

Structural engineering

Equipment design

Modularity opportunities

Process details and controls

Biosecurity Protocols

Value engineering and constructability

Schedule and cost constraints

Through Design Development we prioritize investments together to ensure your production goals, management needs, and ROI are realized. The key objectives in this phase are to:

Clarify overall project objectives, scope and specifications

Clarify equipment scope, specifications and costs

Clarify subcontractors scope, specifications and cost

Drive out project inefficiency
Optimize project ROI

This step is vital to ensure the “Right Project” moves forward with clarity and confidence. This phase is a primary element to avoiding costly and unnecessary changes during construction. We are committed to invest our team heavily in this part of the process, and in turn, provide you with cost and performance predictability.
DESIGN & CONSTRUCTION INTEGRATION

Here we tighten up all scope and cost estimates for self-perform, subcontractor and supplier “buy – out”. Design, specifications and final buy-out is completed to ensure alignment with your production, management and ROI expectations. This final design effort and intensive buy-out is vital to ensure an efficient project and maximum savings back to you.

The “full project team” is formalized and integrated for a seamless transition to construction. The project scope, schedule, risk management, Buy – Out and final cost is completed. You, the customer, enjoys full transparency and project team accountability through this final design effort and into construction.
Construction Execution
Taking your vision for the project and our efforts designing around your operational requirements and business needs, our operations team mobilizes and commences with bringing the well-laid project plans to a built reality.

Safe delivery of timely and cost effective projects with predictable results are critical at this phase of the work. The “Right Project” is one that delivers on the following:

Safe execution

Cost & Schedule clarity

Quality assurance & controls

Elimination of known & controllable Risks

Timely & Integrated Problem Solving when challenges arise

Alignment between Farm & Project team to ensure “No Surprises”

Demonstrating these integrated objectives, with consistency, throughout the construction execution phase allows us to demonstrate our value and validates that “we do what we say we’re going to do” to build the “Right Project”

LET'S GET WORKING

SERVICES WE OFFER

INTEGRATED
DESIGN-BUILD

GENERAL CONTRACTING

DESIGN AND ENGINEERING

CONSTRUCTION
MANAGEMENT

REAL ESTATE
DEVELOPMENT
LEASE-BACK

LAND AQUISITION

LET'S GET WORKING

OUR CORE VALUES

Building Better Lives

We’re a family-owned, Midwestern company with deep roots in the agricultural industry. Like you, we place a heavy emphasis on hard work, integrity, transparency and open communication. We believe those are the qualities that Build Better Lives within our team, customers’ teams and the local communities we work in.

Ag Focused Engineering & Design

We strive to wisely hit the mark between ag and commercial standards to deliver quality and dependability without over-design. We believe partnering with architects and engineers to invest effort upfront prior to breaking ground strips out costs and reduces change orders while ensuring the project scope drives corporate objectives. Our disciplined engagement often delivers projects with no contractor driven change orders and less than 1% owner driven change orders.

Customer-Focused Solutions

Every producer experiences their own unique production challenges. We have a culture focused on creative problem solving with technical competence to resolve issues and help craft solutions that reduces risk and maximizes a producer’s bottom line.

Safety is a Commitment, Not an Obligation

Because safety is critical to Building Better Lives, we intentionally invest in safety training and processes. We are committed to an incident & injury free job site and safe work behaviors as a core value. It is the right thing to do for our people, those we manage, and also shields our customers from corporate risk and damaging PR incidents.

Continuous Improvement Always

As a contractor focused on driving results for producers, we devote time and energy to continually grow and improve. With humility and a personal desire to grow, we believe in challenging our internal status-quo to improve processes and our product to deliver stronger results.

Integrity At All Cost

A deep passion drives us, but integrity guides us. As our founder would commonly say, we want to “Do Right. On Time. With Excellence.” This deeply held value is the heart of our conviction to stand behind our commitments, treat all with fairness, give it our all, and serve our customers well.

At its core, Summit is an extension of the Bahler Group’s obsession with finding a better way.

For us, it’s more than a slogan; it’s a commitment to rethinking the status quo and delivering smarter, more efficient solutions for our clients.

The Bahler Group can trace its Midwestern, family-business legacy back to 1958, where it began as FBi Buildings, Inc., a proven leader in post-frame construction for the agricultural, commercial, and industrial market. Today, the Bahler Group is still family-owned and operated, and has expanded to be the parent company of seven businesses, all intentionally adding value to the sectors they serve.

1958

The founding company and a top 3 Post Frame Building company that builds over 350 structures a year and employs a team of over 220 team members including four engineers.

www.fbibuildings.com

2003

The leading Designer and Builder of churches and Ministry Space in the US. They employ nearly 50 team members including 12 Architects, 3 Interior Designers as well as a full team of Estimators and Project Managers.

www.aspengroup.com

2012

SUMMIT_Horizontal-Logo_Colored-Tagline-FINAL-1024x266

The leading Designer and Builder of Protein Production facilities in the US. Summit employs over 65 team members which include Project Developers, Engineers, Estimators, and Project Managers.

2016

A top 2 Designer and Builder of Swine Production Facilities in the US. Heartland employees over 35 team members including Project Developers, Engineers, Estimators and Project managers.

www.heartlandbuilders.net

2019

SSF is a leading developer of people and staffing resources to not only equip producers to affectively staff remote CAFO units, but also create energizing CAFO cultures. This ensure role clarity, minimize turnover and drive bottom line performance. SSF also equips barns to acquire and synthesize mission critical Data that equips Sr Mgmt and Slat Level Managers with instantaneous feedback ensuring a “Continuos Improvement” culture.

www.summitsmartfarms.com

2023

Today’s buildings are complex and require experienced construction partners. BG Buildings provides comprehensive solutions for your agricultural, industrial, or post-frame project. We offer services for every stage of the construction process, including 3D project visualization, pre-construction planning, design and engineering, material procurement, and timely logistics

www.bg-buildings.com

2023

At BESCO STRUCTURES, we’re not just building steel structures; we’re forging a new standard for efficiency and durability in modern steel structures. We take time to fully understand the demands of your operation, which is why we specialize in delivering high-quality, all-steel buildings that lead the way in both strength and streamlined construction.

www.buildwithbesco.com

SUMMIT LICENSING

1. Our Services: The information provided on the Website is general information only. We cannot guarantee the accuracy or completeness of any details regarding the services we offer, examples of our past work, or the history of our business as such details are provided via the Website. Nothing contained on the Website is or should be construed to be, an offer to provide services to you.

Summit has engineers on its staff who are licensed in the states listed below. Summit may be restricted from engaging in certain projects whether due to licensing restrictions or otherwise. We encourage you to reach out to us to discuss your project so that we may determine if Summit is able to assist with your project. Whether or not you decide to hire Summit or engage us for any services should be based on your direct conversations with our team, and not based on any information provided on the Website.

Each project for which Summit provides services is unique, and nothing contained on the Website should be construed as a recommendation specific to your project needs, nor as a representation of the potential outcome of your project. We disclaim all liability, direct or indirect, for any expectations (whether personal, business, or monetary) that any User may have to result from the use of the Website and any information located thereon. If you decide to hire Summit for our services, such a relationship will be governed by a separate agreement.

2. The Information We Collect: We may collect certain information from you described in the categories below (collectively referred to herein as “Information”):

2.1. Information by which you may be personally identified, such as your name, age, email address, personal website address, telephone number, address, and zip code (collectively “Personal Information”);

2.2. Information regarding how the Website is accessed and used by you, including but not limited to your internet protocol address, browser type, browser version, the pages of our Website that you visit, the time and date of your visit, the time spent on those pages, unique device identifiers, the content and advertisements you have accessed or seen, and other diagnostic data (“Usage Data”); and/or

2.3. Tracking technologies to track the activity on the Website, including but not limited to session cookies, preference cookies, security cookies, web beacons, tags, and scripts to collect and track information and to improve and analyze the Website, which may be collected directly through the Website or via third parties providing analytic services to us (“Tracking Data”).

3. Contractor License Numbers

AZ: ROC B-1 304904
CA: B-1066970
FL: RB29003737
GA: GCCO009157
IA: C126488
OR: 247996
SC: BD5 121301
UT: B100 9640078-5501 w/LRF
WA: SUMMIEL758JW