How Groundwork Construction Co. of South Florida Was Born in South Florida
The call came in on a Tuesday in 2003, and Frank Kessler still remembers the woman’s voice, thin and tired, from a house near Lake Worth. She’d hired a roofer who’d hired a framer who’d hired a drywaller, and now her living room ceiling was raining plaster onto her grandmother’s piano. Five different company names on five different business cards, and every one of them was pointing at somebody else. Frank’s crew from Keystone had been out to fix a door frame, and she asked him, almost embarrassed, if he knew anyone who’d just take responsibility for the whole mess.
He stood in her driveway that afternoon, looking at the patchwork of trucks and materials from half a dozen suppliers, and felt something turn over in his chest. This was the job he’d been watching his whole career - the big project that needed a dozen trades but had a dozen different contractors fighting over who owed what. Frank called his brother that night and said, “We’re doing it wrong. The keystone gets the glory, but the homeowner’s living in the groundwork - and nobody’s owning it.”
Groundwork Construction started the next month in South Florida. One fixed bid. One accountable contractor. One crew boss who answers his cell. Frank made a promise to that woman in Lake Worth, and he made it to every homeowner since: the price we quote is the price you pay, and our name is on the whole job from the first permit to the final walkthrough.
Our Founder’s Personal Connection to the Construction Trade
Frank didn’t stumble into construction. He was born into it, though he tried to leave twice. His father ran a small masonry crew in Broward County, and Frank’s first memory of the trade is the smell of wet concrete at six years old - that sharp, mineral scent that clings to your clothes and doesn’t wash out. He’d stand at the edge of a footing pour, holding his father’s coffee, watching the mud flow into forms that his old man had checked with a spirit level held so close to his face it looked like he was kissing the thing.
By sixteen, Frank was swinging a hammer for real. By twenty, he was running his own crew for Keystone, learning every trade he could talk his way into - electrical from a guy named Ruiz in Delray Beach, plumbing from a master in Boca Raton who made him snake drains for six months before he’d teach him to sweat pipe. The work got under his skin. Not the finished kitchen or the new roofline, though those mattered. What got him was the moment before anyone else saw anything - the footing poured full-depth, the flashing lapped the correct way, the impact window anchored into structure and not just stucco. The stuff that kept the house standing when the hurricane came.
He left once for college, lasted two semesters studying business before he missed the physical honesty of the work too much. Left again in his late twenties for a girl in North Carolina, took a job selling lumber, and spent eight months staring out a window at construction sites he wasn’t on. She asked him one morning why he was so quiet, and he realized he was listening to a nail gun three blocks away, trying to identify the framing pattern by the rhythm of the shots.
Frank came back to South Florida. Came back to the heat and the afternoon thunderstorms and the particular challenge of building in a place where the ground is wet and the wind code is written in blood from Andrew and Wilma. He’s been at this more than ten years now, and what gets him out of bed isn’t the next project - it’s the homeowner who finally stops worrying because they know who’s accountable. If he weren’t doing this, he’d probably be teaching it somewhere, running a small program for kids who think they want out of the trades until they feel what it’s like to build something that lasts.
Meet Our Team - The Person Behind Every Job
Frank Kessler, Owner & Founder
Frank runs every job personally. State-licensed general contractor, trained across every trade his crews perform, from foundation to finish carpentry. He’s certified in wind mitigation inspection and has pulled permits in every municipality from West Palm Beach to Belle Glade. No corporate franchise background, no MBA shortcuts - he learned this work in the field, from journeymen who’d slap your hand if you tried to fake a measurement.
What makes Frank different is simple: he still carries a tape measure in his truck, and he still uses it. He’ll check a sub’s work himself, and he’ll tell a homeowner when something doesn’t need to be done, even when it costs him the upsell. His hobby is fishing the canals near Canal Point, where he goes to think through problems he can’t solve on-site. His commitment to you is direct - when you hire Groundwork, you get Frank’s cell number, and you get his word that if anything we built isn’t right, one phone call brings a Groundwork crew back to make it right.
Our Promise to South Florida Homeowners
We run our company on a code we call S.O.L.I.D., and we don’t put it on the website to sound good. We put it on every contract.
Square bids - The number doesn’t move after the handshake. We learned this the hard way in 2006, when a supplier in Wellington jacked lumber prices mid-job and Frank ate the difference rather than pass it to the homeowner. Now we lock our material costs in writing, and if our estimate is wrong, that’s our problem, not yours.
One accountable crew - Every trade under our license, one boss on your job. No subcontractor roulette, no finger-pointing when the electrician and the drywaller disagree. We’ve seen too many Palm Beach Gardens projects stall because two different companies couldn’t coordinate a schedule.
Licensed & inspected - We pull the permits. We meet the code. We pass inspections the first time, because we’ve been doing this long enough to know what the inspector in Boynton Beach cares about versus what matters in Boca Raton.
In writing - The scope, the schedule, and our 730-day Built-Right Project Guarantee, all on paper. Not a handshake, not a verbal promise that evaporates when the crew moves on.
Done right - From the footing up. If it’s not right, we come back and make it right. No claim forms, no runaround.
Our Credentials
State-licensed general contractor - Licensed to perform all trades under one roof, from structural work to finish carpentry. This matters because a homeowner who hires five different contractors hires five different insurance policies, five different schedules, and nobody with legal responsibility for the whole project.
Insured & bonded - Full general liability and workers’ compensation coverage on every employee. This matters because if someone gets hurt on your property or something goes wrong with the work, you’re not left holding the bag or fighting with an uninsured subcontractor’s lawyer.
Years of local experience - Deep knowledge of South Florida building conditions: limestone substrate, high water tables, hurricane wind codes, and the specific inspection requirements of municipalities from North Palm Beach to Clewiston. This matters because a contractor who doesn’t know local code costs you time, money, and failed inspections.
Strong local reputation - Built project by project, neighbor by neighbor, across South Florida communities. This matters because in construction, your reputation is your bond - and we’ve been here long enough that our next customer often lives three doors down from our last one.
Rooted in South Florida
Our crews live where they build. We hire South Florida journeymen who know wind code by heart, who’ve framed houses in Wellington that took Category 3 winds and held, who’ve poured footings in Belle Glade soil that fights you every inch. We buy materials from local yards, train apprentices on real jobs in Lake Worth and Delray Beach, and leave every jobsite broom-clean, because the house next door belongs to somebody’s neighbor too. Frank’s fished the canals near Bryant, pulled permits in Palm Beach Gardens, and sat in traffic on I-95 like everyone else. We’re not a brand that landed here. We’re a company that grew here.
Written by Frank Kessler, Owner at Groundwork Construction Co. of South Florida, serving South Florida since 2003.