Not Your Ordinary Garage Business
By LISA LOEWEN | Photos by BRADEN DIMICK
When you hear about a business operating out of a garage, you might imagine a small side business with maybe one or two employees.
What you don’t imagine is a thriving construction company with 15 employees and a full showroom of materials for building custom decks. Yet Kraz Construction & Landworks LLC has managed to turn an ordinary garage into something extraordinary.
The company’s owner, Mitchell Krasnican, was in search of something specific as he looked for the ideal location to serve as their base of operations. He had a long checklist of requirements. The first priority was to find a space large enough to store trucks and equipment, as well as to work on a variety of construction-related tasks.
The second priority was to create a showroom in which they could display examples of the company’s work and the materials they use. As a preferred builder with Trex, a company that provides composite decking materials, Kraz Construction is the only certified Trex installer in the region.
Krasnican wanted customers to be able to see and feel the decking products so they could make better-informed decisions.Krasnican said that the location also needed to have easy access to Interstate 70, close proximity to the majority of their customer base and an environment where employees felt safe.
After hearing about the industrial garage spaces that Clayton Devlin was building on Auburn Road, Krasnican found his ideal property — except it was missing a showroom.
Not one to settle for less than his dream, Krasnican approached the owner and asked it was possible to build a showroom in one of the garage bays.
“I don’t think Clayton ever envisioned this happening when he built the garages,” Krasnican said, “but he agreed to let us modify the space, and we turned one of the bays into a finished spaced with offices and a showroom.”
In addition to the showroom, Kraz Construction is leasing five industrial garage bays for storage and workspace.
LIKE FATHER, LIKE SON
Krasnican’s love for the construction business runs as deep as his love of law enforcement.
His father was a police officer who worked four days on, four days off. He owned a construction company called Silver Shield Construction and ran it on the days when he wasn’t on duty.
“It was always a dream of mine to follow in my father’s footsteps and be a police officer, as well as run my own construction company,” said Krasnican.
In 2011, he left his home in Washington state to play football at Washburn University. He joined the marines after two years of school.
While living in Topeka, Krasnican used his construction knowledge to take on small construction jobs and remodels in his spare time. Those small jobs soon turned into bigger jobs, and he found his schedule quickly filling up — just as he had dreamed.
This didn’t change the fact that Krasnican still dreamed of becoming a police officer. Unfortunately, the six-days-on, two-days-off schedule at the Topeka Police Department wasn’t enough to give him the time he needed to continue growing his construction business.
That changed when the TPD shifted to a four-day-on, four-day-off schedule, just like the schedule his father had enjoyed in Washington.
Krasnican immediately enrolled in the police academy and spent the next several years protecting his community while managing a booming construction business.
But “sometimes you can have too much of a good thing,” said Krasnican. “Business grew so fast on the construction side that it eventually became too much to handle as a side business. I was pretty much working 24/7, and something had to give.”
In 2020, Krasnican asked for a leave of absence from the police department. He wanted to take time to grow his construction business and get it to the point that it could operate without his constant presence.
When that request was denied, Michael made the heart-wrenching decision to resign from the police force and focus on the construction business.
For the next six months, Krasnican poured all his energy into Kraz Construction, streamlining operations and increasing efficiency. Then he rejoined the police force.
But once again, his law enforcement dream faded when he realized that the construction business still required more time than he was able to give. He made the decision to officially leave behind his career as a police officer.
“That was the hardest decision I have ever made,” Krasnican said. “I loved being a police officer and it was probably the thing I was most passionate about. But I was just stretched too thin and couldn’t sustain both.”
BUILDING THE BUSINESS
Even though Krasnican’s construction background was in framing, he spent the first few years making deck installation the primary focus of Kraz Construction. During the coronavirus pandemic, when building materials were in short supply, the cost of a wood deck almost equaled the cost of a composite deck.
It made sense to switch to the more durable product — hence the company’s shift to Trex composite materials.
During this time, Kraz Construction also built several garages, home additions and four-seasons rooms a year. He has since moved the company’s business model to buildings, primarily outbuildings and barndominiums.
“We are beginning to shift the business focus again,” Krasnican said, adding that their main focus in 2024 will probably be the construction of new homes.
Krasnican studied the housing market last year and discovered a glaring absence of larger family homes on several-acre properties. He took a gamble and built a five-bedroom, three-bathroom spec house on three acres located in the Washburn rural school district.
“At the time of the construction and when we put the house on the market, we were the only new construction on land in that school district,” Krasnican said.
Krasnican wanted to take advantage of the several-acre property in another way, by trying a new concept that was unusual for a spec house: the addition of a detached building.
“If you drive around Shawnee County and look at houses on three-acre lots, almost all of them have some type of nice outbuilding or detached garage. In my opinion, I believe if you build a house on land, it needs to have the outbuilding included.”
The house sold as soon as they put it on the market. This solidified Kraz Construction’s proof of concept and prompted them to build a similar build on Valencia Road.
PLANNING FOR THE FUTURE
Kraz Construction still works on decks, additions and detached buildings, but now plans to increase the number of spec houses they build.
“We built two spec houses in 2023, and the goal is to build six more in 2024,” Krasnican said.
Kraz Construction has now grown to a company with 15 employees — 11 full time and four part time. Krasnican is excited about the growth but understands the risks of growing too fast. Even though the company has several jobs booked well into the future, there is always the uncertainty that winter weather could prevent them from moving forward with those jobs at a regular pace.
“I need to make sure I can keep all my employees busy and paid so they can feed their own families. I just don’t want to risk anyone’s livelihood by trying to become too big, too fast,” Krasnican said.
Krasnican is also aware that growing his business can take up a lot of his personal time.
“The biggest limitation to our growth right now is me,” Krasnican said. “I have a lot of projects going on right now and don’t want to find myself stretched too thin.”
His other projects include opening two Dirty Dough Cookie franchises in November 2023, one in Lawrence and another in Topeka on Wanamaker Road.
Because it’s a side venture, Krasnican considered hiring a commercial contractor to complete the buildout on both locations. But the contractors’ bids gave him some sticker shock, so Krasnican decided to do the work himself.
“We were fortunate because we had the knowledge and resources to do the buildout on these locations. We probably saved $100,000 doing it ourselves,” Krasnican said.
They plan to open a third location in Manhattan in the next few months.
LEARNING FROM EXPERIENCE
Like most entrepreneurs, Krasnican says he has probably learned more from his failures than from his successes. Those moments when he had to step back, take stock and decide what to do next played a pivotal role in pushing him forward.
Krasnican credits his entrepreneurial spirit to the knowledge and structure he gained from past life experiences. From growing up with a father who worked in construction, to his career as a college athlete, his time in the military and his time working in law enforcement, Krasnican feels prepared for pretty much anything that life throws his way.
“You can’t put a price tag on the things that I have done in my life and the lessons I can take away from that,” Krasnican said.
