ForConstructionPros.com

An Illinois contractor that has gone through a number of transformations since starting up in 1986 faced perhaps its biggest challenge last year when on its biggest job ever it was unable to use the refined coal tar material it was used to working with.

Eric Maul, president of Maul Asphalt & Sealcoating, Naperville, IL, says the 1 million-sq.-ft. job was a big step up for the contractor and presented a variety of challenges even before the issue of material came up.

"We bid work the way we think the work should be done. We don't cut corners," Maul says. "We tell the client what we think should be done to their parking lot and then we go from there. So we had been bidding big jobs but we weren't getting them.

"In this case we got this job partly because the client budgeted properly for it, so when we bid it we came in within their budgetary constraints. This job got us in...and this job is going to help us get bigger jobs."

In fact, it has already helped. Two weeks after completing AMC Cantera 30 Maul Asphalt was awarded a large hotel property, and the theater chain asked them to do another property 20 miles away.