By John Puetz and Devin Pickett, Marsh McLennan Agency

In the concrete construction industry, margins are tight, timelines are unforgiving, and your workforce is everything. The crews, project managers, estimators and office staff who keep your business running aren’t just employees—they’re the foundation your company is built on. So, when it comes to the benefits you offer them, settling for average isn’t just a missed opportunity. It’s a competitive liability.

That’s why the Concrete Foundation Association has partnered with Marsh McLennan Agency to deliver something the industry has needed for a long time: a coordinated, carrier-aligned benefits program built specifically around the needs of CFA member companies.

The problem every contractor knows

Rising healthcare costs aren’t news to anyone running a business. 2026 is expected to be the highest increase in healthcare in approximately 15 years per Mercer benchmarking. That increase is anywhere from 6 to 9%. This is attributed to a number of things like higher healthcare prices, increased utilization, the rise in pharmacy drugs (drug spending up 9% for employers alone) and an aging workforce. What often goes unaddressed, however, is how those costs disproportionately affect small-to-midsize construction firms that don’t have the purchasing leverage of a large corporation. A 25-person concrete contractor doesn’t have the same seat at the table as a 5,000-employee national builder—and insurance carriers know that. Complex compliance rules like state-specific absence leave laws, ACA reporting mandates, COBRA failures, affordability miscalculations and benefit coverage mandates are more barriers to getting quality employee benefits, especially for employees across state lines. And that doesn’t even include the effects of having a limited human resources department in smaller companies such as overwork and lack of  communication.

The result? Member companies are frequently stuck with plans that are expensive, generic and underwhelming to employees who have come to expect more. High deductibles, limited networks and outdated plan designs aren’t just a budget problem. They’re a recruiting and retention problem. In a labor market where skilled tradespeople have real choices, your benefits package is part of your offer.

What the CFA-MMA partnership changes

The construction industry labor market is competitive, and to attract and retain quality talent, companies need to offer competitive compensation. This is where benefits come into play. Benefits are a total reward statement, ensuring that employees understand they’re getting not only quality compensation but also quality benefits that align with the needs of your current and future employees

Through the CFA’s partnership with Marsh McLennan Agency, member companies have access to a structured benefits solution that levels the playing field—bringing group-level leverage, carrier relationships and strategic expertise to companies of every size within the association.

The cornerstone of Phase 1 is a negotiated block discount with Aetna on medical coverage, available to member companies operating within specific qualifying states. This isn’t a marginal discount. It’s a meaningful, off-the-top reduction in premium cost that member companies can benefit from simply by being part of the CFA—before any further plan optimization even begins.

Consider what that looks like in practice. A 35-person member company in a qualifying state that previously had no leverage in carrier negotiations now walks into the market with the buying power of the entire CFA membership behind them. That kind of structural advantage translates directly into dollars saved—dollars that can be reinvested into the business, passed back to employees through richer plan designs or both.

“We had a great experience dealing with Marsh,” said Tim Ball, president, Origin Concrete, Inc. “The program they offered to run us through was well designed and very informative. They use all their muscle and knowledge acquired through their large business model and are able to apply it to our much smaller businesses. We were able to learn things about how to plan for the future.”

Not every CFA member operates in a Phase 1 state, and the program accounts for that. For companies outside the primary Aetna footprint, Marsh McLennan Agency has aligned secondary and tertiary carrier options specifically to ensure that geographic location doesn’t leave any member company behind.

These carrier relationships aren’t afterthoughts. They’re purpose-built alternatives designed to deliver the same core outcomes: significant cost relief, upgraded plan design and a benefits strategy that’s actually working for your company rather than against it. The goal is consistent—whether your operations are in the Midwest, the Southeast or along the coasts, the framework exists to bring meaningful improvement to your medical benefits picture.

Medical is the largest line item, but it’s rarely the only one that matters to employees. Dental, vision, life insurance, disability coverage and voluntary benefits like accident insurance or critical illness plans round out a total benefits package—and they’re also an area where CFA members stand to gain through this program.

Marsh McLennan Agency has aligned carriers across the ancillary and voluntary space to complement the medical strategy. This matters more than it might seem. When your benefits stack is coordinated—when the medical, dental, vision and voluntary carriers are aligned and the plan designs work together—the overall experience for employees improves dramatically. Claims are cleaner, administration is simpler and the value employees perceive goes up. That perception drives engagement, satisfaction and ultimately, retention.

A well-designed voluntary benefits lineup also gives employees options to customize coverage to their own situations without increasing employer cost. For a workforce that spans recent hires in their twenties and long-tenured foremen in their fifties, that flexibility is genuinely meaningful.

The next step

The process to get started is straightforward. CFA members are invited to set up a brief introductory conversation with John Puetz and Devin Pickett from the Marsh McLennan Agency team. That call is simply a chance to learn more about your company—your current benefits setup, your workforce profile, your goals and what’s been working or not working in your current program.

From there, the MMA team aligns the appropriate solutions and builds a presentation tailored to your company’s specific situation. There’s no one-size-fits-all approach here. The carriers are in place, the framework is built and the leverage exists—the work is matching the right strategy to the right company.

“We were able to use their services and have been very happy with the pricing and the service given,” said Ball. “We would highly recommend every CFA member to go through their assessment protocol. It will be very informative for you and my guess is you’ll be presented a better option than you currently have.”

In a landscape where benefits costs keep rising and generic solutions keep falling short, the CFA-MMA partnership offers something worth a conversation: a real path to better benefits, lower costs and a workforce that feels like the investment they are. Reach out to John Puetz (John.A.Puetz@MarshMMA.com) and Devin Pickett (Devin.Pickett@MarshMMA.com) at Marsh McLennan Agency to schedule your introductory call.