Art Favre, the co-founder of Baton Rouge-based Performance Contractors, was a member, back in 1972, of the first class of students to graduate from LSU’s construction management program.
In retrospect, the program had quite a start. Also in Favre’s class were two other men who would also go on to be giants in their field: Pepper Rutland, who founded MMR, and Eddie Rispone, who started ISC Constructors.
Favre worked for some construction companies in Baton Rouge and Houston before starting Performance in 1979. Since then, Performance, which handles industrial construction, turnaround and maintenance for clients such as ExxonMobil, Procter & Gamble, Dow Chemical and SpaceX, has grown to be one of Louisiana’s largest companies, with nearly 12,000 employees and $1.9 billion in revenue last year.
Over same period, LSU’s construction management program has grown from a small cohort to one of the largest departments in the entire university system, with nearly 2,000 students.
While Favre was leading Performance, he was also involved in the construction management program, making sure the curriculum was developing the skills graduates needed when they got into the workforce.
“Over the years, we’ve been talking with the various administrations and system presidents that have come and gone about how to advance that program,” he said.
Favre has now made a big investment in that advancement. Last month, LSU announced plans for a stand-alone building for the construction management department. Favre spearheaded the fundraising effort and put up $15 million for the $107 million project, which is expected to break ground in 2026.
LSU President William Tate IV said the donations and stand-alone building will help the university accomplish its goal of making the Bert S. Turner Department of Construction Management a leader in the industry.
Favre said LSU ranks among the top construction management programs in the country. The hope is the additional resources will propel the university even higher.
“We would like to be able to tout our graduates are coming from the number one school in the country,” Favre said. “I think that’s a challenge that (Tate) would like to see us achieve.”
In this week’s Talking Business, Favre talks about how the donation came about and the outlook for industrial construction in Louisiana.
Interview has been edited for length and clarity.
How long was the process of starting this to actually making the donation?
Convincing the university system that we needed this advancement in the program was probably a 20-year endeavor. It’s only gotten more of a need in the last five to 10 years where it’s really taken off.
President Tate, to his credit, he recognized a couple of things. No. 1, that that program is integral to economic drivers in the state of Louisiana. Also, it fits very well within his pillars of importance for the university system.
A lot of his initiatives really can’t totally happen without involvement from engineering and construction management.
The other thing that it’s doing is we take up a lot of space in Patrick Taylor Hall now because we’re part of the College of Engineering. When we move into our new building, that opens up a big chunk of space, which the other disciplines in engineering are in dire need of space as well.
And it’s going to allow the university to be able to move the Department of Electrical Engineering into Patrick Taylor Hall. They’re now in an old dilapidated building that is in dire need of renovation or replacement and getting electrical engineering into Patrick Taylor Hall will basically get all of the main disciplines of engineering under one roof at the university.
So it’s kind of a domino effect. It gets us out of the way, gives us a new building and allows us a lot of room for expansion and development.
What are some of the new programs the university will be able to offer in the additional space?
A key piece of the development is additional research in construction practices, which we’re all very excited about.
We’re going to get about 60% to 70% of the building. The other 30% to 40% it’s going to be this advanced manufacturing, which is basically kind of a new curriculum program that LSU’s putting out there.
Most of our work is in the heavy industrial, the refineries, petrochemical, power, that sort of thing. This advanced manufacturing is more in all of the other manufacturing type facilities that we have in the state of Louisiana that aren’t necessarily oil and gas specifically related or chemical related.
The two combined are going to be a real asset for the state.
You talked about being from that first class, you and Pepper Rutland were in there. Eddie Rispone was in there. Y’all all ended up being big hitters in the construction industry. Any sort of feeling like “We’re kind of destined” for sorts of things, or were you just trying to get through in college?
I don’t think any of us necessarily had the vision of where we ended up in our minds when we were at LSU. I do think that we felt like we were very fortunate to get in on the front end of this construction management program.
At that point, they were bringing in a lot of adjunct professors and people from industry to teach some of the classes. And we felt like we got some really good firsthand knowledge of what the construction industry is really all about.
We joke about this all the time, but one of our professors in the beginning there was actually Roland Toups, of Turner Industries. And so Roland always jokes around about, well, “I taught these boys, everything they know.” Yeah, thank goodness you did. Otherwise we’d starve to death.
But anyway, it’s been an ongoing joke, but it really was, we had some great opportunities. And looking back on it, clearly we had some pretty dynamic individuals in that original class that were able to do some special things with their careers. But I think some of it had to do with the timing.
What’s the forecast for industrial construction in 2025? How do you see things shaping up in the near future?
We see our future as very strong. We’ve had two back-to-back double-digit record setting growth years. We think 2025 will be a little bit of a plateau.
In other words, we don’t think we’re going to go down in sales, but we don’t think we’re going to go up at the same rate of growth that we’ve had the last two years. So it is kind of a hold your own, but then we think 2026, 2027, 2028 looks very robust with probably some significant additional growth in volume.
And that’s based on a national level of operation, not just in Louisiana.
Any sorts of geographic areas or sectors you see as really strong in 2026, 2027, 2028?
Well, quite honestly, it is going to depend on next Tuesday (Election Day, Nov. 5). There’s a track if Democrats win and there’s a track if the Republicans win, and it won’t necessarily be the same track, but there will be a robust, we think a robust number of projects.
Certainly the Democrats have put a big halt on additional oil and gas expiration. And one of the big things in our industry here in Louisiana is liquified natural gas. And if they don’t let ’em start drilling more gas wells, then LNG is going to become a problem. And also there’s a moratorium on any new LNG facilities. So if they keep that moratorium, that’s going to majorly be a detriment to the economic development in south Louisiana. However, if they remove that, then it’ll be a very robust expansion. And those LNG facilities are very large. They’re $10 billion-$15 billion each, and there’s a number of them that are kind of waiting in the winds right now.
