Headquarters: Minnetonka

Inception: 1953

Family name: Rauenhorst

What the company does: Commercial real estate development, design, and construction

Type of ownership: Private corporation

Principal owners: Family trust

Number of employees: 206

Family members in the business: 2

Family members on the board: 2

Commercial real estate development is not a genteel field. It’s about big risk, payoff, and, not infrequently, the ego required to play in that sandbox. But when people talk about the Opus Group, those aren’t the words that lead. Instead, you hear terms like “values,” “humility,” “charity,” and “community minded.” Of course, Opus Group has placed big bets, but founder Gerry Rauenhorst’s values loom large over the firm, 71 years after its founding as Trojan Construction. (His wife, Henrietta Rauenhorst, is also credited as shaping the company’s values and culture, though she never carried a business card.)

“We’ve played a role in whatever was the hot niche,” says president and CEO Tim Murnane, the second non-Rauenhorst to run the company.

Opus designed and developed the University of St. Thomas Minneapolis campus, Ameriprise and Capella towers, the Grant Park and Carlyle condo complexes, Woodbury and Arbor Lakes lifestyle centers, and Best Buy’s Richfield campus, among other local landmarks. Prior to the Great Recession, it was a top 10 national developer working in industrial, office, retail, and residential, with 33 regional offices and $2 billion in revenue.

Gerry Rauenhorst, or “Mr. Rauenhorst,” as many remember him, was a pioneer of the “design-build” model, offering development, design, and construction under one roof, stripping away the historic agita between architects and contractors—“to promote collective accountability and responsibility from concept to completion,” in the company’s words.

Opus also pioneered another approach. “This business has its share of shady characters,” says Murnane. “It’s about egos and bottom line. But Gerry hated flash or flaunting. He was about faith, family, work.” He turned control of the company over to son Mark Rauenhorst in 2000, while sons Joe and Neil Rauenhorst ran regional operating companies.

“The family is committed to this industry through Opus,” says Gerry Rauenhorst’s grandson Matt Rauenhorst, CEO of subsidiary Opus Development, “but it doesn’t need to be a family member leading it to drive growth and success.”

Murnane, 65, has spent most of his career at Opus. He was senior vice-president/general manager when he left in 2009, following Opus’ partial collapse in the Great Recession. But he returned a year later to helm it.

“Tim’s an exceptional person. He’s made of all of the same ingredients as Gerry and Mark,” explains Bob Strachota, owner of Shenehon Co., which offers business and property valuations and has worked with Opus for decades. “After Tim left, Opus realized he was like family and shared their values.”

The GFC (for “great financial crisis”), as it’s known in the industry, almost broke Opus. “We used our balance sheet for finance, so we were very exposed,” recalls Murnane. “The capital markets locked up. There was a gap between debt and values. A lot of buildings went back to lenders.”

“[Gerry Rauenhorst] was about faith, family, work.”

—Tim Murnane, CEO, The Opus Group

There were a lot of casualties of that era, but Opus was not one.

“They solved their problems in a different way,” says Strachota. “The lender became involved, of course. It liked the company and its values. Opus reinvented itself, and the lender took the assets and got out of the business to make room for Opus to grow again.”

The company shrunk by nearly half. “When we relaunched,” says Murnane, “we said we’ll get back in development but not be as aggressive.”

Today Opus is roughly a $500 million company comprising a holding company with three specialty divisions—design, construction, and development. It operates eight offices, primarily in the Midwest and Mountain West, managing business in 30 states. It currently is most active in residential and industrial development. Demand for warehouse space is strong, as companies have soured of just-in-time sourcing after Covid’s supply chain disasters. And despite the commercial real estate recession, it says construction volume is up 55% since 2019.

Opus has institutionalized Gerry Rauenhorst’s munificence. It contributes 10% of pretax earnings to charitable programs in the communities where it operates. (The Opus Foundation gave away $4.5 million last year.) “Gerry came from nothing,” notes Murnane, but at his death in 2014, he had endowed five separate foundations.

“For Gerry it was about faith and doing the right thing—the circle of life,” says Strachota. “[Opus is] continually giving it away.”

The Rauenhorst family’s role remains influential and ongoing. Matt Rauenhorst could become CEO of the larger enterprise, while cousin Joe Mahoney is senior director of real estate development. Mark Rauenhorst recently retired from Opus’ board, but sister Amy Goldman and Gerry’s granddaughter Anne Deanovic remain.

“The family voice on the board is who we are,” Matt Rauenhorst notes. “It’s our culture, our values.”

That so many know the Opus name but relatively few know its story is perhaps by design. “This is an incredibly successful company and family,” says Strachota, “that operates mostly under the radar.”

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