South Australia’s Concrete Kings: The families and developers behind some of SA’s biggest infrastructure projects
Some enjoy the limelight while others prefer to keep a low profile, but this mix of families and go-getters are the driving force behind companies that are building our state. SEE THE LIST
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Some like to exert their influence while others avoid the limelight, but these giants of the construction industry are the driving force behind companies that are building our state.
THEO SAMARAS, KYREN GROUP
The apartment and commercial construction company is spearheaded by Theo Samaras - not to be confused with the more outspoken developer Theo Maras.
Samaras sarted a steel fabrication business before turning his attention to commercial development.
He has his fingerprints across Adelaide most prominently in the city’s East End with his company building Adelaide’s tallest building,The Adelaidean, on Frome St.
Other projects include Dwell student block also off Rundle St, the Credit Union SA building on King William, PWC tower on Franklin St and the adjoining Quest Hotel.
Kyren had plans approved in March 2020 for a $60m, 22-storey office block to the immediate east of the PWC building.
Samaras’ firm also owns the Auto Park brand which has five off-street parking stations in Adelaide’s CBD.
He’s been a relative quiet achiever in Adelaide who shuns publicity. But his company was thrust into the spotlight when it tried, unsuccessfully, to block a student tower being built next to the Adelaidean.
DAMON NAGEL, STARFISH
Starfish is one of Adelaide’s largest apartment and townhouse developers. Nagel founded tthe medium to high-density company with Ironfish property investment firm chief Joseph Chou in 2011 to fill “a gap in the local market for high quality, contemporary homes which would also deliver further value to investors”.
Nagel has had a hand in two of Adelaide’s biggest apartment towers - the Vue on King William St and the Bohem on Wright St.
The former sommelier, who worked in London and owns Brackenwood Winery at Kuitpo, is now focussed on the Hamilton Hill housing estate, Woodforde, the Dock One 750 apartment and townhouse revamp of Port Adelaide, the 100-room Marine and Harbours hotel, also at the Port, and a 107-room hotel on Wright St.
NICHO TENG, GREATON
He came to Adelaide to study as a 16-year-old - because he hated snow, ruling out Canada - and was told by his migration agent that Sudney and Melbourne were “too international”.
Now the Glenunga International High School alumni has his feet firmly planted in Adelaide although his Australian Chinese property investment firm Greaton is also doing big things in Sydney.
The 32-year-old is probably best known for paying $3.2m for 7000sqm property at Carrick Hill with the intention of demolishing the existing and build a new mansion.
He scrapped those plans and instead sold the house for $3.05m to Australian cricketer and SA local Travis Head.
Teng started his development career five years after graduating from Flinders University with an accounting degree. He was doing book-keeping for developers while studying giving him the required skills and knowledge.
He began building homes in suburban Adelaide and joined Greaton in 2015 as its managing director.
The company is behind the $300m West Franklin apartment project and is about to start construction on its landmark $200m hotel at the GPO site in the city.
EMMETT FAMILY, EMMETT CONSTRUCT
IF you and your children have sprung into action at Richmond trampoline park Bounce, then you’re doing so inside an Emmett build.
The company covers all corners of construction in SA - industrial, commercial, residential and retail with a portfolio worth in excess of $500m.
The Law School at Adelaide University, Elizabeth City Centre, Metro Shopping Centre, Hyde Park, Holden Manufacturing Plant, Woodville, Cheltenham and Morphettville Racecourse grandstands and warehouses for major national and international companies are just a few of the long list of achievements.
A truly family-owned company it was started by John. G. Emmett in 1908 and the family lineage contniues today under the control of his great grandsons Nick (managing director) and Tom (director).
MARSHALL FAMILY, MARSHALL & BROUGHAM
James (Jim) Marshall with business partner Stewart Brougham started the business in 1948 from the shed of Stewart’s father’s house in Barr Smith Ave, Glen Osmond.
However it’s the Marshall name and lineage that occupies the directorship of this SA company whose pedigree stretches across the gamut of construction from ecumenical to retail to sporting.
Jim’s grandsons Andrew and James are directors of the company and their father John remains chairman of the company, after 40 years.
Among it’s more publicly notable projects are Football Park, the former home of South Australian football.
The company also built schools and chapels for St Ignatius’ College, and more recently completed the Nuova Apartments on The Parade and The Bay Junction Shopping Centre, Glenelg.
Andrew Marshall was spokesman for a private group of benefactors who financed the Robert Hannaford sculpture of Queen Elizabeth II for Government House - only the third statue of its type in Australia and the first in SA.
He is also SA president of the Master Builders Association.
MOSSOP FAMILY, MOSSOP CONSTRUCTION + INTERIORS
A multi-disciplinary firm with a catalogue of projects spanning education, sport, office, prisons, shopping centres, health buildings residential and more.
The commercial construction company it is currently delivering the $16m visitor centre for the new Monarto Safari Park creating 130 jobs during construction.
Founded in 1979 the company is led by brothers Ray, John and Neil who - after completing apprenticeships in carpentry and joinery and working with a major builder - started Mossop initially as a building/interior specialist.
The building pedigree started with their father Bert Mossop who was a general builder after returning from World War II before shifting to caravan manufacturing and later a ceilings business
Mossop is a third generation company employing directly more than 120 staff and with an annual turnover exceeding $160m.
SARAH FAMILY, SARAH GROUP
The Sarahs have a long history in the state’s construction sector, dating back to 1939 when family patriarch Henry “Harry” Sarah relocated his young family from Melbourne to Adelaide.
After managing construction of the Bank of New South Wales building on the corner of North Terrace and King William Street, he went on to establish the Hansen Yuncken business in South Australia, and in 1961 went out on his own and established H.F. Sarah & Sons.
The family business flourished over the next three decades, and expanded into new areas including home building and commercial plumbing.
The company has continued to expand under the management of current directors and cousins James and Tim Sarah, who took over the reins from their fathers Don and Neil Sarah in the late 1990s.
The diversified company now employs more than 200 people across its commercial construction arm, its home building businesses and Hindmarsh Plumbing – the state’s biggest commercial plumbing company.
Sarah has been a major beneficiary of the State Government’s $1.3 billion education build, picking up major projects including the $100m secondary school being built in Whyalla and two new B-12 schools in Aldinga and Angle Vale. More than 1000 jobs are expected to be created over the life of the three projects.
JAMIE MCCLURG, COMMERCIAL & GENERAL
Few people have had as much of an impact on the look of the Adelaide city skyline as Jamie McClurg.
He’s ruffled a few feathers during his ascent to the top of his game, but there’s no denying the success he’s built up over the last two decades.
As executive chairman of Commercial & General, he is currently overseeing billions of dollars’ worth of development in the CBD and suburban Adelaide.
Completion of the Calvary hospital in the CBD in 2019 made Commercial & General the biggest single developer of CBD projects – measured by building space and value. Current projects include the $446m SAHMRI 2 building on North Terrace and the $1 billion WEST housing development at the former Football Park site.
McClurg is regularly listed as one of the most influential businesspeople in Adelaide, and he isn’t afraid to break ranks with his peers.
In 2019 he encouraged land owners to accept the State Government’s controversial land tax changes, while at the peak of COVID-19 last year he launched the “Suspend the Rent” campaign, urging landlords to offer financial support to tenants through the crisis.
In 2013 he fell out with former mentor Theo Maras, after nabbing a major tenant from one of Maras’s properties. Risky business in a town like Adelaide.
McClurg, a Pembroke old scholar, learnt his trade under Maras before heading interstate and returning to Adelaide in 2001 after setting up Commercial & General with Anthony Catinari.
If the North Adelaide resident can get something out of the ground at the controversial former Le Cornu site on O’Connell Street, it will become part of his rapidly-growing legacy.
KENNETT FAMILY, KENNETT BUILDERS
When John Kennett took the reins of his family’s construction business, he had no idea he was about to steer it through one of the worst recessions in its 100-year history.
It was the early 1990s when John and his cousin Geoff Simpson decided to separate the family’s business interests, and Mr Kennett took over sole ownership of building company Kennett.
As interest rates skyrocketed and construction work dried up, Mr Kennett was forced to take drastic action to save the business his grandfather and great uncle had established in a West Croydon paddock in 1914.
But after five years of pain, the economy turned, and Kennett has gone on to become one of the state’s biggest commercial construction companies.
In 2018, a fourth generation of Kennetts took the reins, with James and Scott Kennett taking over from father John as the company broke through $100m in annual revenue.
Like their father, James and Scott started their careers in very different industries before joining the family construction business in the early 2000s.
James had spent more than a decade working in retail, banking and finance, while Scott had worked as a station hand at Glendambo in the state’s north before pursuing a career in construction.
Under their leadership, aged care and education projects have remained key strengths of Kennett’s, while sporting infrastructure has also become a major growth area, with the company currently overseeing the $44m redevelopment of Memorial Drive.
CRAIG WEAVER & MICHAEL GRAMAZIO, SYNERGY CONSTRUCT
They may be one of the newer outfits in town but Synergy Construct has quickly made a big impression on Adelaide’s skyline.
Led by Craig Weaver and Michael Gramazio, the company has carved out a niche in high rise construction, with a string of office, hotel and student accommodation projects keeping them busy since the company was established in 2013.
Weaver and Gramazio held senior management roles at Baulderstone before going out on their own, promising to bring “Tier 1 Thinking” to their new venture.
The city’s booming student accommodation market has provide plenty of work for the duo, who are currently overseeing two high-rise projects no North Terrace, following completion of the Y Suites tower on Waymouth Street and the prominent UniLodge building on Gray Street.
The new Tom’s Court medi-hotel is also Synergy’s work and the company’s sky high ambitions are likely to see its cranes dot the CBD skyline for some years to come.
JIM WHITING, BADGE CONSTRUCTIONS
Badge remains one of the state’s biggest construction companies close to 40 years after it was established by current chairman Jim Whiting and a group of business partners.
Whiting took full control in the late 1980s, and under his leadership the company has expanded interstate, both organically and through acquisition.
More than half of the company’s revenue is now sourced interstate, but South Australia remains the company’s home and where it does most of its business.
Major projects currently under construction include the $23m expansion of Adelaide High School and Thomas Foods International’s new $300m processing facility in Murray Bridge.
Badge employs close to 300 people across the country, with offices in Adelaide, Brisbane, Sunshine Coast, Gold Coast, Perth and Melbourne.
Revenue soared last financial year, rising by 22 per cent to close to $360m, making Badge one of the state’s biggest privately-owned companies.
Whiting, a Sacred Heart College old scholar, was awarded with an Order of Australia Medal in 2019.
He is a past president of the Master Builders Association in South Australia and is an ambassador for the Hutt St Centre.