Member Spotlight

Tom Rogge & Travis Sondgeroth
Managing Members of K2 Construction, LLC

• What does a typical day at work look like for you?
• Tom: Jobsite visits, answering emails, making sure people have equipment
• Travis: Estimates, helping with HR & accounting, meetings with outside partners such as bonding, insurance and bankers

What do you like most about your job?

• Tom: Winning a bid and seeing the job progress as it should
• Travis: Performing well (safe, timely, profitable) on jobs and hearing good things about our work

What aspect of your job do you find the most challenging?

• Tom: Finding qualified help
• Travis: Helping to manage the projects from a personnel perspective.  This includes our own work force, clients, engineers and the public at large.

How did you get into the heavy highway construction industry?

• Tom: Went to UNL and started working for his uncle (Rogge Engineering) before starting K2 Construction with Travis in 2001
• Travis: Went to Penn State University for Civil Engineering and was branched engineer in the Army

​What is your favorite moment of your career so far? Favorite project?

• Tom: Favorite moment was restructuring of the company in 2008 that made Travis and I sole partners. Favorite project was the parking lot on the east side of Memorial Stadium.
• Travis: Favorite part of the job is giving longevity bonuses to our long-term employees. Favorite project was dismantling cell towers when Verizon & Alltel merged in 2009.

What are your hopes for our industry?

• Both: Hope that future generations begin to see the value of a career in the trades.

Who has been the most influential person in your career?

• Tom: My father because of his work ethic and my father-in-law because of his business knowledge.
• Travis:  My family because they provide the motivation and inspiration to continue to try and do better.

What did you want to be when growing up?

• Tom: Veterinarian
• Travis: Business Owner

What was the first job you ever had?

• Tom: Working on the farm
• Travis: A landscaping program for the kids of the families stationed at the Air Force Base in Turkey.

If you could go back and tell your 18-year-old self one thing, what would it be?

• Tom: Take more risks.
• Travis: Figure out what is important and spend more time on those things.  Don’t waste time on non-productive areas of your life.

What is one skill/ability you wish you had?

• Tom: Be a better golfer
• Travis: Singing

What is your favorite thing to do on a day off?

• Tom: Relax at the lake
• Travis: Golf

Do you have any hidden talents? If so, what are they?

• Tom: Locating underground pipe with witching sticks
• Travis: They must be so hidden no one has found them yet.

If you could meet anyone (past or present), who would you be?

• Tom: Warren Buffet
• Travis: Jesus

What is your biggest pet peeve?

• Tom: Greased equipment
• Travis: Hypocrisy

What is your greatest strength as business partners?

• We have a very balanced relationship and complement each other well. What one of us might not be so good at, the other is. When we met, we were buddies but also had a lot of respect for each other and knew it could work out well if we started our own company.

What do you admire about the other?

• Tom: I admire how much time Travis spent with his mother before she passed from cancer last winter.
• Travis: I admire his work ethics and how he is always willing to share his knowledge.

Who’s the better golfer?

• Tom: Travis.
• Travis: Me.

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