RK has also expanded operations into Arizona, Utah, New Mexico, Wyoming and Texas. Six months ago, RK transitioned into its new headquarters in Aurora, Colo., a 155,000-sq-ft facility that serves as the central hub for RK’s operations. Since the move, RK has added more than 1,200 jobs, significantly accelerating the company’s original commitment of creating 1,800 jobs over eight years.

RK employees are more than cogs in a wheel; they are part of a community—the RK family. Since 2019, the RK Hero Fund has given nearly $600,000 in grants to RK employees facing unexpected hardship, with 100% of the funds coming from employee payroll contributions. Employees also give back to the greater community. Since creating the RK Foundation in 2011, the firm has donated more than $3 million and supported 185 nonprofits.

ENR sat down with Rick Kinning, RK CEO and chairman, to talk about the specialty firm’s growth and what that means for its big family of employees. The following Q&A has been edited and condensed.

Kinning: Our first major project in Phoenix was for the first phase of TSMC [Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co.], and we’ve been in Arizona ever since. We recently picked up several new projects there, and we’re at 100 and some employees. In the next four months, we will have more than 300 employees in the Phoenix area. Our work there is for TSMC and data centers and a few other heavy commercial type projects. So we’re selective. We’re only working with people that we know, trust and want to enhance. We are fortunate to have the ultimate gift, and that is a plethora of phenomenal employees. I always say this: We’re in the people business, we just happen to build things. We’re at 2,800 people now. And by the end of the year, we will likely crest 3,000 or be close to it. We’re onboarding between 30 and 70 people a week and have been all year [across all our regional offices]. People power is the secret sauce.

NUPI pipe manufacturing at RK Steel’s Denver facility.
Photo by Unfound Door

Kinning: As an enterprise in 2026, we will grow by three times from our previous fiscal year. Why is that? It’s because we are set up with systems, procedures, facilities, equipment, manufacturing aptitude, fabrication aptitude and overall senior and experienced leadership. Of course we knock on wood and cross our fingers, but we’re having the best year we’ve ever had. We are not experiencing that sense in our soul that we’re out of control at all. And we are prepared for our 2027 growth, which is going to be significant as well. We’ve always been growth-based 100% of the time. That’s not for everybody, but the people that work here, they like it. It’s exciting.

I just love growing people. I think it’s really cool to watch young people have opportunity because this is a business of opportunity. With three times revenue growth in one year, there’s opportunity here for a lot of people.

But you must have financial discipline, and you must have a balance sheet to support the growth of the people and the capital expenditures that are required to maintain it. You must be financially ready for it. Right now, I don’t think it’s that hard for some [contractors] to book business, but how you execute on the business is where people sometimes that haven’t been there before will struggle.

Electrical skid production at the RK Mission Critical facility.
Photo by Andre Roman, RK Industries

Kinning: We’ve always considered ourselves a community builder, quote unquote, because we build everything you see. If you look at any major facility along the Front Range of Colorado, there’s a high probability we had a piece of it. As we have grown and are in all these other states, it may be harder to say that, but I will say this: We still make a supreme effort to have the family business feel. And I think that people truly appreciate that. In these times, some people get the feeling they’re being used like a tool in the box. You know, I just need a head count to go to this remote job wherever or whatever that may be ... but our people are coming on and feeling the way we give benefits, the way we work with them, the way we help them move, the way we give them per diem so they can have a life and a lifestyle that they can support a family. We’re family oriented. I don’t use the word community builder much anymore, but we certainly are their sense of community. And I truly, truly believe that.