Michels Corporation

Michels Corporation

Industry	Utility, engineering, design and construction contractor
Founded	1959, Brownsville, Wisconsin (as Michels Pipeline Construction)
Headquarters	Brownsville, Wisconsin United States
Key people	Pat Michels, President Tim Michels, Vice-President Kevin Michels, Vice President
Number of employees	5,000
Website	www.michels.us

Michels Corporation is an international utility, engineering, design and construction contractor based in Brownsville, Wisconsin. With more than 5,000 employees in its 18 divisions, Michels is the largest construction company in Wisconsin. It currently maintains nearly three dozen permanent office and yard locations from coast to coast, as well as Alberta, Canada.

Michels is involved in various areas of utility construction, including pipeline construction, horizontal directional drilling, deep foundations, communications and pipe rehabilitation, as well as sewer, water and tunnel construction. The company is also involved in cable placements, pipe restoration, concrete paving, vertical drilling, road construction, and electrical power infrastructure construction services, as well as in trenching and construction of natural oil and gas projects.

Michels Corporation was founded as Michels Pipeline Construction, Inc., but changed its name in 2001 to better reflect its utility construction services. As of 2015, Michels Corporation is ranked No. 33 on the Engineering News-Record Top 400 Contractors list. In 2013, 2014 and 2015, Michels Directional Crossings won Project of the Year honors from Trenchless Technology magazine in the new installation category for its notable horizontal directional drill projects.

Dale Michels founded the company in 1959 as a gas pipeline construction company and provided services to Wisconsin utilities. In 1963, Michels began providing outside plant construction and installation of buried telephone cable systems. The company expanded again in 1970, forming a Sewer, Water and Tunnel Division.

In 1976, Michels began producing crushed aggregates to supply materials for various road and building construction projects throughout eastern Wisconsin. The next year, 1977, Michels began constructing rural water distribution systems throughout the Northern Plains. As part of this development, the company constructed water mains, laterals and residential water service.