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Construction
6 months
Strategic Workshops
Product Discovery
Platform Integrations
Development
Product UX/UI
React Native
TypeScript
Microsoft Teams
They are a well-known leader in the commercial construction industry providing general contracting, construction management, and design-build services for clients big and small. One of their most impressive differentiators is their aptitude for innovation with the application of virtual design and other emerging technologies in the construction space.
Crema has partnered with JE Dunn's technology groups since 2022. This engagement sat inside their estimating organization, the group responsible for pricing every General Conditions line item on every active project.
This work sets the baseline for every project's indirect costs: staffing, equipment, insurance, logistics. Get it wrong and the margin is gone before the first shovel hits the ground. For JE Dunn, this process ran entirely on a complex, multi-tab Excel spreadsheet. It worked when the portfolio was smaller and a handful of experienced estimators could carry the institutional knowledge required to use it, though it stopped working effectively as the business grew.
Because the spreadsheet had no guided workflow, new staff needed extensive one-on-one coaching before they could contribute independently. Formulas were routinely broken by estimators who didn't know what not to touch, corrupting data with no easy way to catch it. Teams across offices worked from copied files, with no single source of truth and no visibility into what others were doing. The support burden fell almost entirely on one person whose actual job was managing precon and estimating, not troubleshooting a tool.
Meanwhile, the portfolio was accelerating: 327 active GC projects in 2023, 291 in 2024, 453 in 2025. Growth was outpacing the tool's ability to absorb it. JE Dunn needed a replacement that could scale with the business, guide estimators through a consistent process, and centralize the data the spreadsheet had always kept fragmented.
Active GC projects managed in 2025
Project managers and estimators across JE Dunn's estimating org
Hours of support calls weekly addressing the GC process
The spreadsheet's accuracy was there, what it lacked was uniformity. Every estimator built the model a little differently, with no standard process to follow and no safety net for the formulas underneath. Closing that gap meant designing for standardization first, so every estimate followed the same logic regardless of who built it.
Replace the knowledge-dependent spreadsheet with a guided web application any estimator can use
Preserve JE Dunn's existing estimating logic while redesigning the experience around how estimators actually work
Integrate natively into Microsoft Teams and JE Dunn's existing systems
Focus MVP on what estimators need to produce an accurate estimate, leaving room for enhancements driven by real-world use
After 24 weeks of workshopping, user research, prototyping, designing, developing, and testing, the new and improved tool was ready to be rolled out to JE Dunn’s 871 project managers and estimators.
