RCDolner Construction was invited to build a new corporate office for Aegis Insurance of Jersey City, N.J., after performing a successful build-out for it years ago.

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Twenty years ago, when principals Stu Koshner, Roger Chartouni and Anthony Dolce founded RCDolner Construction , their goal was to “provide personal attention and quality services to the construction community,” Koshner says. “Most construction companies provide the same basic service, but what separates one from the next is personalizing.

“The budget, the schedule and the quality of the project have to relate specifically to what the client is looking for.”

Dolce adds, “In 1987, and even today, our goal was to provide personal attention to clients. We felt that the big corporations weren’t able to provide the service that clients really deserved.”

Shortly after the three went into business, they were asked to do prebuilt office fit-outs for two separate office buildings, each 500,000 square feet. “One landlord asked us to do a prebuilt office space and it went rather well; it leased quickly,” Koshner says.

“From that point, they asked us to build all the leased space in the building. We are fortunate to do a lot of repeat business and get recommendations from owners, architects and engineers.”

The number of repeat clients the company has is an astonishing 65 percent, Chartouni adds, “considering we’ve never had a public relations division or any marketing efforts to promote the firm. Our portfolio and our daily context have been our best marketer.”

Unique Installation
Approximately eight years ago, the company performed a build-out for Aegis Insurance in Jersey City, N.J., Senior Vice President Gerald Flamio remembers. “When it came time for them to expand and relocate their corporate office, they felt they had such a great success with [us] the first go-round, they invited us back to do their new corporate office in east Rutherford, N.J., in 2006,” he says.

RCDolner built a three-floor, 90,000-square-foot installation that included executive suites, conference facilities, a café and gymnasium. “What was neat was the president wanted to have some fun with the space,” Koshner says. The project included custom millwork with contemporary uses of wood, stone, glass, metal and specialty lighting.

“We interconnected three floors with a common stair that is open, well-lit and airy, all glass and stainless steel,” Flamio explains. “It opens into big areas that invite informal conferences – be it employee-to-employee or employee-to-customer. We did a lot of neat things to make it a nice and attractive workplace.”

The New York City-based company’s portfolio also extends into the residential, hospitality, healthcare, education, entertainment and institutional realms. It has performed work on the Soho Grand Hotel, the Tribeca Grand Hotel, the Hilton New York and the Roosevelt Hotel.

“We’ve been involved in a lot of landmark hotels, as well as major renovations and ground-up projects,” Chartouni notes. “So, our involvement begins with the construction phase. If the preconstruction phase is well-thought-out and well-developed, in most cases, the projects end up being very successful. The projects where you were called in a bit late, where preconstruction has been completed or never entertained, you’ll find that those projects become more challenging.”

Metropolitan Museum of Art
In 2000, the Metropolitan Museum of Art selected RCDolner to work on a cafeteria project, and soon became one of its most loyal repeat clients. “We do a lot of gallery work,” Koshner says. “We just finished opening the Greek and Roman galleries to great applause here in the New York area.” 

For the recent project, the company removed the roof from the southeast portion of the museum, then, it added two new floors and installed a skylight over the new Roman Court. It put in Roman columns imported from France and horizontal bands of limestone cornices, as well as a new, multi-colored granite and marble floor.