From Flyover to Front-Runner: Little Rock’s Evo Rises to the Top of Prefab Construction

Pre-fabricated DIRTT offices at Nabholz Construction of Conway (Photo provided by Evo)

Evo Business Environments, founded in Little Rock in 2013, has established itself as one of North America’s leading providers of DIRTT (Doing It Right This Time), a prefabricated construction system that’s transforming the process of commercial interior construction.

DIRTT, based in Calgary, Canada, uses advanced software to plan office spaces and prefabricate walls, windows, casework, floors and other interior components in a factory. The components are then shipped to the site for assembly, leading to a quicker and more sustainable alternative to traditional office construction.

Evo became a DIRTT partner in 2015 after two years of working to convince the company to agree to the partnership.

“From the very beginning, our goal was to be a partner,” Zac Cerrato, principal and head of sales and marketing at Evo, said in an interview with Arkansas Business. He’s the son of the company’s president, Chris Cerrato, and brother of Casey Cerrato, also a principal and head of operations.

Since 2015, Evo has risen to become one of the top DIRTT providers nationally.

“One month, we sold more than anybody in North America,” Chris Cerrato said. “We’re typically considered flyover country, so it just it raises our visibility with the manufacturer, which means more resources, which means they want to help us. They see that we’re doing things well, and they want to help us even do it better. And then, when we go to conferences, some of these big dealers have heard our name and go, ‘I heard you guys are doing great things in Arkansas.'”

Thomas Wright, regional territory manager at DIRTT, told Arkansas Business that despite people typically looking to larger metropolitan areas for inspiration, Evo has developed a portfolio “as robust as any other in our industry.”

And the DIRTT product line has expanded Evo’s business opportunities beyond its original furniture focus.

“Our first core business is furniture, office furniture, and that’s always going to be a big part of our business,” Chris Cerrato said. “But something that’s cool about having the prefab side is it’s just a way bigger piece of the pie. It gets us involved in projects that we may not have even gotten involved in on the furniture side.”

So customers who come to the company for DIRTT because it’s “cool,” then use Evo for the furniture of the office as well.

“You’ve already built the relationships and the trust by that point, so it’s kind of a no brainer,” he said.

All three Cerratos said DIRTT helps the company have more credibility in the construction industry, more opportunities for architectural products and more efficiency in installation processes.

It also helps when Evo is designing a space, because the designers can see everything and place furniture they already know the dimensions of.

Evo has done DIRTT installation projects throughout Arkansas, as well as in other regions. Offices at Nabholz Construction in Conway, Lighthouse Financial of Rogers, Rock Dental of Little Rock and the Memphis airport are all DIRTT projects, as well as both of Evo’s own offices.

The company has also done installations for schools, health care offices, hospitals, hotels, retail locations and even a liquor store.

DIRTT Process

At the core of DIRTT’s system is its proprietary software called ICE that creates a connection between design and manufacturing.

“The software is a video game-like experience,” Chris Cerrato said. “Once they draw something, they can fly through it. So we can do that virtually, or have clients come in here and see it, literally just fly in the front door and go walking through it.”

The technology also allows for a virtual reality (VR) walkthrough of designed spaces. When a design is finalized, the software translates it directly to specific manufacturing instructions.

“That’s why their lead times are so good,” Chris Cerrato said. “They have product coming out of factory two weeks after we send the order in, which is crazy. There’s no humans typing stuff in and measuring things and cutting it all. It’s all electronic.”

It’s also easy to adjust and extremely customizable, Evo DIRTT designers Robert Fuller and Libby Kremer said.

“It’s super efficient,” Fuller said. “As a designer, I don’t have to mark up a drawing and send it to somebody.” Instead, he can change wall heights, paint colors, furniture pieces, finishes, wall types and pretty much anything else DIRTT designs inside the software immediately.

And Kremer said it’s important as a designer to be able to “start and finish” everything in one place.

Another advantage is if a piece is damaged, it has a specific DIRTT code, so Evo can send in for a replacement, and the factory will make an exact replica, which is cheaper, faster and more efficient than traditional construction, Fuller said.

“DIRTT’s approach immediately reflects accurate 3D models with exact material costs and can dramatically reduce construction schedules and risk of errors,” Wright said. “This type of custom prefab or modular construction also enables users to reconfigure their spaces over time as needed, leading to more sustainable behaviors and fewer dumpsters.”

Sustainability

Another advantage of DIRTT? It’s good for the environment.

“Traditional construction methods are typically slow, wasteful, inefficient and may be quite disruptive to update for changing demands,” Wright said.

DIRTT aims to streamline that process which creates “significantly” less waste. Its production facilities are also powered by 100% renewable energy through the purchase of renewable energy credits.

The World Economic Forum estimates about 40% of all solid waste in the United States derives from construction and demolition. DIRTT can eliminate physical mockups and reduce construction change-orders through its software.

Spaces are also “precision-manufactured” off-site, and delivered to jobsites partially assembled for installation with basically no further offcuts, dust or waste. What “little packaging DIRTT uses,” can be returned for reuse or recycled, Wright said.

“Sustainability is another one that’s huge if you give a flip about the world,” Chris Cerrato said. “If you think about, as an owner of a brand new building, there’s a giant dumpster out there, everything that’s in that dumpster is stuff you pay for, and it came to site full size. It got cut down to the pieces you need. And then all that scrap — you paid for somebody to take that, put it in that dumpster, paid for that dumpster to be there. You paid the landfill fee for the huge ton of waste. It’s crazy.”

Cerrato said DIRTT’s waste can be as low as 1% of materials.