The First Thirty Years: The Recession Years

From a one-person office in 1995 to a thriving team of 200+ in 2025, every client, project, and employee-owner has played a pivotal role in shaping Alliant’s success.

To celebrate this journey, we’re taking a closer look at some of our milestone projects that brought us here. Join us for our blog series, “The First Thirty Years: Clients, Projects, Employee-Owners,” where we will highlight our biggest accomplishments and the people behind them.

The Recession Years

A conversation with John Dillingham (Founder and CEO), Clark Wicklund (Vice President) and Mitzi Dillingham (Former Director of Human Resources).

The Opportunity

Between 2000 and 2007, Alliant was riding a wave of momentum. The housing market was thriving, our teams were designing major design-build projects, and business was booming. It was a time of growth and opportunity. Then came 2008.

The global recession, sparked by the collapse of the subprime mortgage market, sent shockwaves through every industry, and Alliant was no exception. Practically overnight, the landscape changed, projects stalled, and budgets tightened. The future felt uncertain. But this chapter in our history isn’t just about hardship. It’s about how we responded. How we stood by our clients, supported our employees, and stayed true to our values. Looking back over the past 30 years, this period stands out, not just for the challenges we faced, but for the integrity, grit, relentless hard work, and unity that defined our response.

The Story

John: In this series, we’ve talked about the Mississippi Jewel, TH 212 Design Build, and Spring Creek — very project-heavy stories. But this one’s different, it’s more of a speed bump. The recession that began in 2008, and how it impacted people, our industry, and Alliant. For us, it didn’t just affect land development and survey like you might expect from a subprime mortgage crisis. It was big enough to become a global recession. It changed how governments were funded and how much tax was collected — it affected everything. Small businesses like ours are the backbone of the U.S. economy and when we suffer, so do state and federal revenues.

Clark: The housing market alone accounts for about 25% of the nation’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP). So, when mortgages were poorly underwritten and defaults started piling up, the entire system began to unravel. It was devastating.

John: That’s what made this recession so frightening. We built Alliant to be 50% public and 50% private clients, to weather economic downturns. But even that formula didn’t work. We had to find new ways to survive. Everything we did during that time had lasting impact, and it’s why we’re where we are today. But at the time, we didn’t have the revenue coming in, meaning we had to cut expenses. And in a consulting firm like ours, that usually means cutting people and we did not want to lose anyone.

Mitzi: We used a program through the Minnesota Unemployment Office that allowed us to temporarily reduce hours for full-time employees. I think we cut hours by an average of 40%, and employees could supplement their income through shared unemployment. It minimized the impact on our unemployment rate and allowed people to stay employed without losing 40% of their paycheck. It was a truly wonderful program.

John: We started with 45 employees and ended with 39 when we began climbing out of the recession. Losing only six people was remarkable, especially compared to others in our industry who were laying people off every other Friday.

Clark: Keeping that many people was significant. It brought us closer together. Morale was tough… but there was still hope.

Mitzi: And because of that program, there was less worry. People knew they could supplement their income and stay afloat.

John: Everyone’s job changed. Mitzi went from recruiting, because we were in growth mode from ’05 to ’07, to supporting employees and helping them understand their options. Clark’s role shifted and he began traveling farther to find work. I went to Azerbaijan in 2008 because we didn’t have much work here. But people saw we were doing everything we could to keep things going.

Clark: That mattered to employees — seeing us put the work in.

Mitzi: It meant a lot. From an HR perspective, it was wonderful seeing leadership dig in and do whatever it took to keep the company going! I think that’s why we didn’t see much attrition. People believed in the leadership and there was a sense of optimism.

John: For me, failure wasn’t an option. I’ve always been an optimist and so has Clark. We just buckled up and got to work. And it paid off. I remember getting a call on August 1, 2008, from an architectural client about a golf course development in Azerbaijan — the first in the country, Dreamland Golf Course. He said, “We need to be there 8 am Tuesday morning.” I didn’t even know where Azerbaijan was. But we needed the work. So, I said yes. I flew out Sunday night, had a brutal flight, and landed for the interview. We won the project, and I ended up going there four more times. That work kept four or five people busy for over a year, which was great!

Clark: You were in Azerbaijan, and I was in Dickinson, North Dakota. Back in 2004, while presenting for the Spring Creek project, a development group saw our presentation and asked us to take on Palmer Point, a major subdivision on Lake Minnetonka. But when that wrapped up and the market slowed, the same group invited us to Dickinson. That turned into an 850-acre mixed-use project we worked on: housing, commercial, retail, industrial, it involved stormwater management and coordination with a new I-94 interchange. I was out there from 2010 to 2013, living in a hotel every other week.

John: And it wasn’t just me and Clark doing whatever we could. In late 2009, Fluor and Ames won the I-15 Core Design Build project in Utah and asked for Bob Green and his MOT team. Within a week, Bob, Brett Burfeind, and five others were in Utah. Brett later went to Denver for project work there. That work helped us bridge the gap when there wasn’t much happening in Minnesota.

Mitzi: Employees saw the effort, and as more work started to come in, you could start to feel the morale lifting. It was actually amazing to witness.

Clark: And even though the work was far away — Azerbaijan, Dickinson, Utah — it was all done out of our Minneapolis office. People with families who couldn’t travel were still able to contribute. And I think they appreciated that.

John: That’s the good that came out of it, we came out stronger. We grew from 39 employees to over 200. Looking back, all the worry and tough decisions were worth it. We did what we had to do to keep the company healthy and people employed. And from 2011 to 2020, we had one of the best economic runs in U.S. history, and we were ready for it because we kept our team intact.

Mitzi: This story matters. It shows where we’ve been and where we’re going. We were a small company, but we were creative, supportive, and impactful, even during a major downturn. It’s part of our legacy.

John: And we’re still that company. We’d do it all again to take care of our employee-owners. It’s important to share stories like this — so our clients, partners, and employee-owners understand that our journey hasn’t just been about the wins. It’s also about the challenges we’ve faced and how we’ve responded. That’s what defines us. Integrity, and being future-focused — that’s how we’ve built Alliant, and it’s how we’ll keep building better communities for years to come.

We’ve come a long way, and the stories keep getting better. Up next: Opening the Jacksonville Office—how we made that strategic leap.