Specialty contractors, whether steel or electrical or masonry, struggled through another year of steep revenue declines in the Southwest. The top 80 firms saw the value of work performed in Arizona, Nevada and New Mexico drop 28% to $2.5 billion in 2010, compared with $3.4 billion in the previous year. And that was just the firms that were willing to report revenue—many chose not to, leading to the lowest participation for this survey in more than a decade.
Arizona subcontractor revenue tumbled 28% to $1.4 billion in 2010, but it was Nevada that took the biggest blow, dropping below $1 billion in revenue for the first time since 2002.