Business developmentforSt. Louis AEC firms.
BD-AEC embeds a business development department for St. Louis architecture, engineering, and construction firms. Senior leadership, market intelligence, creative capacity, and consistent execution give your principals a team behind their next stage of growth.
Outsourced growth infrastructure
A department behind your growth
Leadership, intelligence, creative capacity, and follow-through, working together as part of your firm.
01
Strategy
Choose the work worth pursuing. Market intelligence and Creative Mapping connect your strengths with the right buyers, partners, and opportunities.
02
Creativity
Give buyers a reason to remember you. Positioning, story, and proposals turn technical expertise into a clear case for choosing your firm.
03
Execution
Keep the work moving. Outreach, relationships, pursuit coordination, and regular reviews turn decisions into a repeatable business development practice. Kinetic Rebalance adjusts the effort as evidence changes, including doing less.
Strategy + Creativity + Execution = Growth
The strategy + creativity principle comes from our partners at BLDG Brands. BD-AEC adds execution.
Scott leads the relationship as CEO and Strategic Partner. The department brings the capacity around him. Your principals stay involved in technical decisions and key relationships; we establish the rhythm and carry the work forward together.
Explore the embedded departmentThe St. Louis market
Who buys design and construction here
St. Louis is a deep, headquarters-heavy AEC market with more capital in play than its size suggests, split across Missouri and Illinois. About 851 design and construction firms compete here, including 454 engineering firms, chasing a pipeline anchored by federal, healthcare, and public owners who buy on reputation.
St. Louis buys design and construction at a scale that punches above its metro size, and the signature driver is federal. The $1.7 billion Next NGA West campus, the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency's new 97-acre home in north St. Louis, opened in 2025 and anchors a fast-growing geospatial cluster around GeoFutures, the Cortex Innovation District, and T-REX. Boeing is mid-build on a $1.8 billion St. Louis expansion, including a 1.1 million square foot advanced combat aircraft facility for its F-15 and T-7 lines, and has moved its Defense, Space and Security headquarters back to the region. Healthcare is the other engine: BJC HealthCare and the Washington University Medical Campus are running a multi-year Campus Renewal led by the new Plaza West Tower at Barnes-Jewish, while SSM Health is building a replacement Cardinal Glennon Children's Hospital and finished a new Saint Louis University Hospital. Public owners keep the base full, from MoDOT and the roughly $3 billion Lambert consolidated terminal program to Metro Transit and the Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District.
It is also a deep AEC town, not an open one, and the biggest names are homegrown. National-scale primes headquarter here: Alberici, McCarthy Building Companies, and Clayco all run out of St. Louis, and HOK, one of the largest design firms in the world, was founded here and keeps its headquarters downtown. KAI Enterprises and other established design-build firms hold long relationships across the same owners. The federal, health-system, and public buyers that drive this market select on track record and trust, not the low number from a firm they do not know, and the same primes and program managers recur on pursuit after pursuit. Being new to St. Louis is not enough; you have to be known to the people who decide.
St. Louis federal, health-system, and public work calls for deliberate teaming and relationship development. BD-AEC serves this market selectively and does not claim a local storefront. BD-AEC brings strategy, creativity, and execution together in an embedded department, connecting market intelligence with relationships, positioning, and pursuit support. Your principals contribute the technical judgment; our team helps carry the work forward.
U.S. Census Bureau, County Business Patterns (NAICS 5413, 2022)
Federal & defense
The $1.7B Next NGA West campus for the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, Boeing Defense's $1.8B St. Louis expansion for its F-15 and T-7 lines, and the geospatial cluster around GeoFutures, Cortex, and T-REX.
Healthcare systems
BJC HealthCare and the Washington University Medical Campus Renewal, including the Plaza West Tower at Barnes-Jewish, plus SSM Health's new Cardinal Glennon Children's Hospital and Saint Louis University Hospital, Mercy, and BJC's own network.
Public infrastructure
MoDOT's St. Louis District, the roughly $3B Lambert International Airport consolidated terminal, Metro Transit and Bi-State Development's MetroLink program, and the Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District across a bi-state metro.
Corporate & HQ
A deep headquarters base including Centene, Emerson, Edward Jones, Enterprise Mobility, World Wide Technology, Anheuser-Busch, and Reinsurance Group of America driving campus and facilities work.
Institutional & homegrown primes
Washington University, Saint Louis University, and UMSL and its new School of Engineering, plus locally headquartered primes like Alberici, McCarthy, Clayco, and HOK that hold the relationships nationals chase.
RFPs and bids
Where St. Louis architecture and engineering work gets advertised
These are the agencies and institutions that put architecture and engineering work out to bid in St. Louis, and the portals where they post it. Bookmark them. Winning the work is a different job from finding it, and finding it is the part you can do yourself.
The Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District (MSD Project Clear)
The region's heaviest architecture and engineering spender; runs the Capital Improvement and Replacement Program (CIRP) and buys sewer and channel design, sewer and process design, geotechnical, surveying, large facilities, small pump station, natural channel and construction management services.
Board of Public Service of the City of St. Louis
Issues RFQs for design consultants on city public works, coordinating projects for the Street Department, Parks/Recreation/Forestry, Public Utilities (Water Division) and St. Louis Lambert International Airport; posts through its Bid Express plan room.
Missouri Department of Transportation, St. Louis District
Highway, bridge and related engineering services for the City of St. Louis and four surrounding counties, run from 1590 Woodlake Drive in Chesterfield; hires only from its Professional Services Prequalification List and on-call lists.
St. Louis County
Publishes county solicitations, including professional design and engineering services, exclusively through its Euna (Bonfire) eProcurement portal, which is the single vendor registration point.
Bi-State Development
Buys facility, station and infrastructure design across Metro Transit, the Gateway Arch riverfront, St. Louis Downtown Airport and the St. Louis Regional Freightway; states it advertises its major procurements solely on its own website via the iSupplier program.
St. Louis Lambert International Airport
City-owned airport buying terminal, airfield and civil design; runs its own DBE and ACDBE programs, an MWBE Utilization Form Package and an Interested Parties List through its Office of Business Opportunities.
East-West Gateway Council of Governments
The bi-state metropolitan planning organization; issues RFPs, RFQs and sealed-bid IFBs for corridor, freight and Great Streets planning and engineering studies, with its own DBE program.
Where solicitations are posted
How selection works here
Missouri codifies QBS in statute at RSMo 8.285 through 8.291: agencies must encourage architecture and engineering and land surveying firms to file statements of qualifications annually, evaluate on specialized experience, capacity to meet the schedule, past performance and proximity to and familiarity with the project location, then list three highly qualified firms and negotiate a contract with the best qualified first, dropping to the next only if talks fail. The two heaviest architecture and engineering buyers here gate you before you can compete at all: MSD requires prequalification in named categories with annual winter recertification and issues an RFQ on any project above $500,000 in fees before a committee from Engineering, Operations and HR shortlists three firms, while MoDOT's St. Louis District works from a Professional Services Prequalification List plus standing MoDOT OnCall and LPA On-Call lists and term agreements under EPG 134, following the federal Brooks Act. Diversity certification is unusually local: two of the five Missouri Unified Certification Program member agencies sit in this metro, Bi-State Development and the City of St. Louis/Lambert Airport, and Lambert is one of only two Missouri agencies that will process an ACDBE application at all.
The St. Louis bid watchlist
Finding the work is a job in itself. Once a quarter we send this page's market to your inbox: new federal awards in the St. Louis metro, buyer moves, and portal changes. No pitch, just the market.
Email scott@bd-aec.com with the subject "St. Louis bid watchlist" and we'll add you.
Federal market
Federal AEC spending in St. Louis
Federal agencies obligated $503M for architecture, engineering, and construction work in the St. Louis metro over the last twelve months. That is a large enough channel to build a practice around, and the firms below are already positioned in it.
Obligated, 12 months
$503M
Across the 15-county St. Louis, MO-IL area.
Largest buyer
Department of Defense
$473M of the total.
Firms winning it
- The Boeing Company · $317M
- FM Mccarthy, LLC · $36M
- Surdex Corporation · $14M
- Boeing Aerospace Operations, Inc · $13M
Federal prime contract awards, USASpending.gov, twelve months to August 2026. Federal work is one slice of this market and excludes state, municipal, institutional, and private owners.
By discipline
BD-AEC in St. Louis, by discipline
We embed a coordinated BD department for St. Louis AEC firms. We represent one firm per discipline, project type, and market. Open your discipline’s St. Louis page on the main site for the local picture.
Civil Engineering
St. Louis business development for civil engineering firms.
Structural Engineering
St. Louis business development for structural engineering firms.
Architecture
St. Louis business development for architecture firms.
Land Surveying & Geospatial
St. Louis business development for land surveying & geospatial firms.
Landscape Architecture
St. Louis business development for landscape architecture firms.
Construction Management
St. Louis business development for construction management firms.
Transportation & Traffic Engineering
St. Louis business development for transportation & traffic engineering firms.
Testing & Special Inspection
St. Louis business development for testing & special inspection firms.
Why us, here
An embedded BD department for St. Louis
St. Louis is one of the select major markets BD-AEC serves beyond its core, and it rewards a dedicated approach. This is a headquarters town where the same federal program managers, health-system facilities directors, and homegrown primes recur on job after job, and where selection runs on reputation rather than the low bid. An embedded BD department that works those relationships deliberately, and honestly represents your firm to the owners who decide, is the difference between a cold proposal and a warm introduction. We're direct about what this is: a market BD-AEC takes on selectively, with a coordinated BD team as the way in, not a local office pretending to know everyone in town.
By policy, BD-AEC represents one firm per discipline, project type, and market, an ethical line that protects every client's pipeline. For a St. Louis firm, that means an exclusive BD partner who will never walk your relationships across the street to a competitor chasing the same NGA, BJC, or Lambert work.
Questions
Straight answers
Does BD-AEC work the St. Louis market?
Yes, as one of the select major markets we serve beyond our core, not as a local office. We're honest about that. Scott doesn't claim to know every St. Louis owner by name or to run business development from a storefront in town. What we bring is an embedded BD department that works the federal, health-system, and public owners here deliberately, and represents your firm to the people who decide.
What kind of AEC firms do you represent in St. Louis?
Principal-led architecture, engineering, construction, and specialty firms, typically $500K to $20M in annual revenue, that need a more consistent growth function. We bring leadership, intelligence, creative capacity, and execution around the principals. By policy, we represent one firm per discipline, project type, and market, so we don't represent competing interests.
How is an embedded BD department different from hiring a BD director?
A strong internal hire can be the right choice when you have the budget, support, and work to sustain the role. BD-AEC brings a coordinated function: senior leadership, market intelligence, positioning, proposals and SOQs, relationships, and execution. If you're looking for fractional business development, this is a department model with capacity around the leader. We still need onboarding, access to your expertise, and your principals' participation in key decisions.
St. Louis is full of homegrown national primes like Alberici, McCarthy, and HOK. Can a smaller firm still compete?
Yes, but not by being a stranger. The federal, healthcare, and public owners here hire on track record and relationships, not the low number from a firm they do not know. We position your firm with the owners and program managers who decide, so you are the known quantity when the work comes up, and often the teaming partner those primes want, not the outsider underbidding for a seat.
How do we start?
Tell us about your firm and your market using the form below. Scott will respond within one business day, and he will tell you honestly whether your discipline and market are open before anyone spends time on a discovery call.
Your next move
Build your next chapter in St. Louis.
Tell us where you want your firm to go and what's getting in the way. We'll look at your market, your current capacity, and whether an embedded BD department is the right fit.
Scott Mann
CEO | Strategic Partner
Scott will respond within one business day. Your first conversation covers your goals, availability in your discipline and market, and a practical next step.
Let's talk about your firm
A few details help Scott prepare for a useful conversation.
This requests a conversation. Scott will follow up to arrange a time. How we use your information.