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MBEXers, I think I found the item topping every tradesperson's holiday wish list this year.
HandsFree Labs, the brains behind the step-in Kizik sneaker, launched a new hands-free work boot built specifically for construction workers and tradespeople. They're called the Blue Ox, and they'll run $189 a pair ($199 for the steel-toed version). The idea is simple: pull them on and off hands-free, as many times a day as the job demands. But do they actually hold up and stay on? HandsFree Labs put them through 30,000 rounds on a compression machine, which is the equivalent of stepping in and out ten times a day for ten years. Still not convinced? They strapped the boots to a platform, had someone step in, and used a winch to lift him completely upside down to prove comfort and durability.
They also tested them while wakeboarding. As far as I know, that's not an OSHA requirement...yet 😅 I don't even work on a job site and I want a pair! (If you have a special in with Santa, please pass my request along 🥾🎅😄)
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Five Quick Things To Know & Do This Week:
1.) This Thursday - Join MBEX staff for an interactive hour over Zoom this Thursday (October 15) for our next Online Plan Room Demo. We'll cover the basics, such as setting up project search filters using keywords / phrases and CSI (division) codes, finding project documentation, adding oneself to a bidder list, and more. Bring your questions, and come ready to learn a new trick or two.
2.) Procurement Fair - The 22nd Annual Greater Minnesota Government Procurement Fair is taking place on Thursday, October 22 at Shooting Star Casino in Mahnomen, providing an opportunity for small businesses and contractors to learn about special programs designed to provide better access to the government marketplace, including a trade show, a variety of workshops, and chances to visit with 20+ State and Federal Government Agency representatives and others.
3.) Scholarship Opportunities - Help spread the word! Scholarship applications open December 1, 2026, for the Duluth Builders Exchange Legacy Fund and Duluth Builders Exchange Apprenticeship Scholarship, offering assistance to students and apprentices pursuing careers in the construction industry.
3.) Project to Watch - South St. Paul's planning commission recommended approvals for a $28-million, 78,000-square-foot public works facility with Kraus-Anderson (construction) and HCM Architects (design), and will include indoor fleet storage, maintenance shops, offices, a wash bay, and other operational spaces. Construction is targeted to begin Spring 2027 and is backed by $2.25-million in state funding.
5.) Video Break - POV: A local street is getting paved and the construction guy is actually 100% honest about the next few months 🤨 🛣️ 😂
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Inside Issue No. 41:
• MBEX YPN: Young professionals 40 years of age and under are invited to a casual evening with others in the early years of their construction careers on October 28
• Workplace Law: Eight workplace & labor law updates to know in October
• New Members: Meet the 11 companies who joined the Exchange last month
• Q4 Risks: Building weather resilience before the unexpected affects the jobsite
• Upcoming Events: Online Plan Room Demo (10/15 & 11/19); Construction Estimating Principles & Application online course (11/10); Reading Construction Documents (11/12 & 11/13); and Holiday Party North (12/10)
• Project Download: Updated project information for the week of October 7-13
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Millennials & Gen Zers: This One's For You!
Young Professionals Network on October 28 at Frattalone Construction
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A lot of industry event aren't designed with young processionals in mind. This one is.
The MBEX Young Professionals Network (YPN) on October 28 is for anyone 40 and under working somewhere in commercial construction, be it in the field, the office, in estimating, sales, project management, or still sorting out where exactly you land (looking at you, interns).
This is not a seminar or formal dinner with a speaker. It's a casual evening with people at a similar point in their careers, and that distinction matters more than it may sound.
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Date: Wednesday, October 28
Schedule: 3:00pm - 5:00pm
Location: Frattalone Construction
3205 Spruce St, Little Canada, 55117
Cost: $20 per person
Become a Sponsor: Support this event by becoming an Appetizer or Beverage Sponsor (select level when registering for the event)
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Showing up to a gathering like this in your 20s or 30s may not feel significant, but the connections that end up mattering most in this industry (the ones you actually call, the ones that turn into real work, the ones that make a hard week easier) almost always trace back to somewhere informal, like a happy hour, a laidback get-together, or a conversation that started because you were both standing near the same table. Think of October 28's MBEX YPN event like that.
There's also a peer element that's easy to overlook. Most professional development in construction runs vertically, learning from someone above you or passing it down to someone below. YPN runs horizontally. It's people in roughly the same stages of their career, talking honestly about what's working and what isn't.
And if you're a manager reading this, forward it to someone on your team who's earlier in their career. The connections made here will prove invaluable in the future, and there's no price that can be placed on that.
Come as you are October 28; see you there!
THANK YOU, YPN SPONSORS
We'd like to acknowledge those supporting our young construction professionals:
| | | Contact Melanie, Events & Membership Coordinator, with registration, sponsorship, or other event-related questions: (612) 381-2628 or melanie@mbex.org. | | |
Eight Essential Workplace Items to Review This Month
Latest Labor & Employment Law Updates
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Here at MBEX, we aim to help our members stay ahead of the changes shaping our industry, including updates to labor and employment rules issued by the current administration.
With rules changing quickly (and sometimes without much warning), staying compliant takes a bit of planning and a good heads-up on what actually matters.
Below is a quick rundown of key developments that are taking place, along with resources to learn more.
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NUMBER 1
Don't Miss Your Q4 Benefits Deadlines 🩺
Q4 is crunch time for employers and administrators when it comes to employee benefit plan compliance, and the deadlines can sneak up. Bookmark this Employer Guide to stay on top of the key retirement and health plan deadlines before the year closes out.
NUMBER 2
Union Approval Is at a 70-Year High; Here's What That Means For You 💪
A September survey found that 71% of Americans now approve of labor unions, the highest reading since the 1950s. Union membership has been trending the other way for decades, but approval numbers like that don't usually stay abstract. Here are six steps to consider for staying ahead of it in today's labor environment.
NUMBER 3
DEI Compliance Isn't Only a Federal Contractor Issue 🔍
Deloitte became the latest major federal contractor to settle with the Department of Justice over allegedly unlawful DEI practices (to the tune of $21.5-million). Whether you're a federal contractor or a private employer, the takeaways from this case are worth a review.
NUMBER 4
AI is Making Phishing Scams a Lot Harder to Spot 🥷
Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools have made it dramatically easier for scammers to craft convincing, personalized phishing attacks at a scale and speed that wasn't possible even a year ago. If it's been a while since you've reviewed your cybersecurity training and verification process, now might be a good time to change that. Here's what you need to know.
NUMBER 5
What a Recent Court Ruling Could Mean for Arbitration Agreements ⚖️
Another federal appeals court ruled that the Ending Forced Arbitration of Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment Act (EFAA) allows employees to bypass arbitration not only on harassment claims, but on all claims in a lawsuit. That's a meaningful expansion, and one employers across the country need to understand. Here's a breakdown and three steps to consider taking.
NUMBER 6
California Passed the First Law Restricting AI in Firing Decisions ⚠️
Effective July 2027, California's new "No Robo Bosses Act" prohibits employers from relying solely on automated systems when making disciplinary or termination decisions. A human reviewer has to be involved. It's California-specific for now, but laws like this have a way of spreading. Get the full details.
NUMBER 7
Courts are Pushing Back on Website Tracking Lawsuits 🕵️
September brought a wave of court rulings pushing back on claims that businesses illegally allowed third parties to track website visitors. Good news, but broken cookie banners are still a real and active liability. If your company has a consumer-facing website or app, here's what to know.
NUMBER 8
Working With Influencers? Make Sure Your Compliance is Airtight 🧐
If a court or agency decides your social media influencers should have been classified as employees, or that your employee brand ambassadors deserved compensation for promoting your brand, the costs of getting it wrong can add up in a hurry. Here are a few best practices to keep you on the right side of it.
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These recommendations are made by Fisher Phillips, a labor and employment law firm, for the month of October. We included those most relevant to our members and the commercial construction industry as a whole.
For Fisher Phillips' full comprehensive list of October's workplace and employment law recommendations, click below.
| | | The information provided here is intended for general informational purposes only. It should not be considered legal advice. MBEX strongly recommends consulting with qualified legal counsel before taking any actions based on its content. | | |
Meet MBEX's Newest Members
See Who Joined in September
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September brought 11 new companies into the MBEX fold, and we couldn't be more glad to have them.
Every new member joins for their own reasons: some are chasing new project leads and bidding opportunities, others are looking to expand their networks across the Upper Midwest, and some simply want to plug into the pulse of what's happening in Midwest commercial construction. Whatever reason brought them here, they've found the place where plans become partnerships.
Help us give a warm welcome to the newest members of the Exchange:
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Know Your Risks: Weather Resilience
Q4 Commercial Construction Risk Check-In [Part 4 of 6]
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If you've been in construction long enough, you've had a weather event disrupt a project. Maybe it was a late-season storm that set a schedule back two weeks. Maybe it was a flooding event that damaged materials on site. Maybe it was something far, far worse.
Weather isn't a new risk for contractors, but the frequency, severity, and geographic reach of extreme weather events is changing in ways that make the old assumptions about disruption worth revisiting.
What used to be a bad week can now be a business-threatening event, and the contractors who treat weather resilience as a core part of their risk management strategy are increasingly the ones who come out on the other side intact.
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😬 The Gap Between Experience and Preparation
Weather risk is one of the most universally experienced risks in the industry, and one of the most consistently underestimated.
According to Sentry's 2026 C-Suite Stress Index, 92% of construction executives have experienced weather-related disruptions in the past 5 years. That's nearly universal. Yet only 32% identified natural catastrophes among their most significant risks when looking ahead.
That gap, between what contractors have already lived through and how seriously they're treating that same risk going forward, is the same pattern we've seen with litigation and workforce challenges throughout this series. Experience alone doesn't translate into preparation, and in the case of weather, the stakes are getting higher.
Half of the executives surveyed said they believed a future extreme weather event could threaten their company's survival. That's not a fringe concern; that's the industry saying this risk deserves serious consideration.
🌩️ What Weather Risk Really Looks Like
Weather-related risk isn't limited to dramatic, headline-generating events. The more common and cumulative risks for Midwest contractors come from a pattern of disruption:
• A severe storm that delays a project by three weeks
• A stretch of extreme below-zero cold that halts concrete work at a critical phase
• A hailstorm that damages roofing materials staged on site
• A flooding event that comprises a foundation before it's been enclosed
Each of these events, and others, on their own might be manageable. The combination, across multiple projects in a single season, can put serious pressure on cash flow, contract deadlines, and client relationships simultaneously. And that's before accounting for the supply chain piece. A major weather event in a region that produces or ships construction materials can create shortages and price spikes that ripple across projects that were never directly in the storm's path.
Beyond property damage and schedule delays, severe weather creates direct safety risk for crews. Employees traveling between jobsites in deteriorating conditions, working in extreme heat or cold, or operating equipment on storm-damaged ground face elveated injury risk that connects directly back to the workforce safety concerns we covered in Part 2 of this series.
❓ Coverage Questions To Ask Now
The most actionable part of weather risk management is a conversation with your insurance advisor, specifically around whether current coverage actually reflects a company's weather-related exposure.
Here are a few questions to bring to that conversation before year-end:
• Does your property coverage reflect the replacement cost of materials, equipment, and structure's at today's price? Given inflation and tariff-driven cost increases, the answer to this question may have changed since your last renewal even if nothing on your end has changed.
• Does your builders' risk coverage adequately address weather-related losses on active projects? Not all builders' risk policies are created equal when it comes to what weather events are covered, at what limits, and under what conditions. Understand the details of your policy before an event occurs.
• Does your business interruption coverage account for weather-related scenarios? Project delays, supply disruptions, and forced work stoppages driven by extreme weather can all interrupt revenue in ways that standard property coverage doesn't address.
💡 Building Operational Resilience
Proper coverage is one piece of the puzzle. The other is operational: the plans, relationships, and practices that determine how quickly a company can absorb and recover from a weather event.
Emergency response plans and communication protocols that specifically account for weather scenarios should be in writing and reviewed regularly, not just in the moments when a storm is breathing down your team's neck. Knowing who is responsible for what, how crews are notified, how project owners are communicated with, and how materials and equipment on active sites are protected make meaningful differences in the long run.
A major weather event affecting a regional supplier can leave contractors scrambling for materials at the worst possible time. Building relationships with alternative suppliers (not as a backup plan that sits in a file somewhere, but as active, maintained relationships) reduces dependence on any single source and gives options when the primary one is unavailable.
Engage your insurance carrier throughout the process, not just as a policy vendor. Many insurers offer risk management resources, site assessment tools, and weather monitoring services that policyholders don't realize are available to them.
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The goal isn't to avoid every weather disruption; that's just not realistic. The goal is to make sure your business can take a hit and keep moving forward, with coverage, operations, and relationships that reflect the real risks you're facing.
As with rising costs covered in Part 1, workforce vulnerabilities in Part 2, and litigation exposure in Part 3, the theme is very consistent: the risks that hurt most are rarely the ones seen coming. They're the ones spotted on the horizon but not fully prepared for.
Next issue, we'll turn to cybersecurity and technology risk, a category growing faster than most contractors realize and carrying coverage implications that deserve a closer look before 2027.
| | | The information for this feature was sourced from For Construction Pros. Members are encouraged to do their own due diligence by speaking with legal counsel. | | | |
A valuable benefit of an MBEX membership is invitations to our social and educational events; by being an employee of a member company, you, too, can take advantage and attend all MBEX-sponsored events.
** indicates a newly added or updated event
October 15 - Online Plan Room Demo - Registration closes at 2:30pm on 10/14
From navigating the Deskpad, setting up project search filters, and adding your company to a project's bidders list, this free one-hour session is a great introduction to our Online Plan Room. Register
October 28 - MBEX Young Professionals Network
MBEX YPN is about making connections, building relationships, and growing one's network in a relaxed, welcoming setting. Come enjoy drinks, snacks, door prizes, and great conversation with fellow young construction professionals from across the industry also in the early stages of their careers. Register
** November 10 - Construction Estimating Principles & Application [Online Course]
This half-day estimating course tackles both the principles and the technology behind competitive bids, covering advanced estimating concepts like cost analysis, risk management, escalation, and flexibility, alongside a practical look at how digital tools like Bluebeam Revu can produce faster, more consistent estimates. Sign Up
** November 12 & 13 - Reading Construction Documents [Online Course]
This half-day estimating course tackles both the principles and the technology behind competitive bids, covering advanced estimating concepts like cost analysis, risk management, escalation, and flexibility, alongside a practical look at how digital tools like Bluebeam Revu can produce faster, more consistent estimates. Sign Up
November 19 - Online Plan Room Demo
From navigating the Deskpad, setting up project search filters, and adding your company to a project's bidders list, this free one-hour session is a great introduction to our Online Plan Room. Not yet open for registration
** December 10 - Holiday Party North
Swap your work boots for something a bit more merry and come enjoy a relaxed evening at Ridgeview Country Club in Duluth. Expect plenty of laughs, a great sit-down dinner, and maybe a few early holiday surprises. It's simply a fun night to celebrate the season and wrap up another year in construction together! Register
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• Total Projects Received at MBEX from 10/5/2026 - 10/9/2026: 83
• Total Project Leads Reported on at MBEX from 10/5/2026 - 10/9/2026: 7
• Total Active Projects Received / Reported on at MBEX as of 10/13/2026: 308
• Total 2026 Projects posted to the Online Plan Room as of 10/13/2026: 4,791
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Click the button above to view the most recent project data from 10/7/2026 - 10/13/2026.
For information about the Bulletin's content, technical issues, or to place an ad (such as a Minority
Notice, Job Posting, or Event Notice), contact Ashlee, Membership & Communications Director.
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Information within the MBEX Weekly Bulletin is obtained from sources deemed reliable. The Midwest Builders Exchange (MBEX) does not assume responsibility for its completeness or accuracy. You are urged to check your own sources in addition to the information contained in this publication. This issue contains plans and other bidding information received before and including the date noted above. The project data within this newsletter is intended for member companies' and their employees' use only.
2026 BOARD OFFICERS: President - Brian Kalla, St. Cloud Acoustics; Vice President - Sean Ochis, Northern Industrial Insulation; Treasurer - Allie Brady, Veit USA; Past President - Heidi Sedlacek, Associated General Contractors of Minnesota
2026 DIRECTORS: Kevin Bohrer, Donlar Construction; Ben Bowman, Adolfson & Peterson Construction; David Brandt, Schadegg Mechanical; Matt Lennartson, RJM Construction; Chris Niemand, Frattalone Companies; Jason Rentmeester, Kraus-Anderson Construction; Harry Rothstein, Weidner's Mechanical Contractors; Jim Rothstein, Erickson Electric; and Alanna Soukkala, Holden Insurance Agency.
MBEX STAFF: David Siegel - Executive Director; Julie Miller - Executive Assistant / Project Coordinator / Accounting; Ashlee Hartwig - Membership & Communications Director; Melanie Hendrickson - Events & Membership Coordinator; Jeff Boelter - Project Acquisition & Plan Room Support; Shauna Baska - Project Reporter & Bidders Lists; Ka Yang - Addenda & Apparent Lows; Peggy Esboldt, Madison Gentil & Michelle Siegel - Project Reporters; Don O'Connor - Independent Event Planning Contractor
You are receiving this email because you are employed by a current member company in good standing or have indicated you wanted to receive MBEX's Weekly Bulletin. Unsubscribe from the Weekly Bulletin
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