Milwaukee FPC Live venue construction goes vertical

The FPC Live venue last week celebrated the start of vertical construction, as an elevator shaft and steel structures were visible in downtown Milwaukee.

The project is led by Madison-based concert promoter Frank Productions with a capacity of 4,500 and a budget approaching $70 million. Joel Plant, CEO of Frank Productions, said the rise in the budget was due to aggressive construction costs since breaking ground in May. But the bigger picture of the future building remains the same, he added.

“We’re approaching $70 million, it’s just a note that construction costs continue to be aggressive,” Plant said. “We’ve made some adjustments to the building internally, nothing terribly dramatic but we’re sorting out the finer details of seating placement and amenities inside the building. Nothing large scale has changed since we finished the construction drawings,” he added.

Currently, crews for Miron Construction and JCP Construction are working to enclose the building as much as possible before winter, Plant said.

Milwaukee Mayor Cavalier Johnson, Alderman Robert Bauman, Milwaukee Bucks President Peter Feigin and VISIT Milwaukee President and CEO Peggy Williams-Smith on Oct. 16 joined Plant to celebrate as crews finished the foundation and moved on to structural steel.

Plant said despite a “delayed groundbreaking,” the project is on a fast track to completion. The building is expected to be complete in fall 2025.

A firm delivery date will be ready in the next month or two, and the variability of construction will be significantly reduced when the superstructure is finally up, Plant said. Once a delivery date is secure, talent buyers will start going for the first tranche of artists and announce their picks in summer 2025, he added.

While the project doesn’t have specific workforce requirements, the company will monitor its use of underrepresented workers during and after construction, Plant said.

“Our general contractor, Miron, has conducted a joint venture partnership with JCP Construction and the purpose of that is to make sure firms based in Milwaukee with historically underrepresented construction laborers are included in significant pieces of this project,” he added, noting the company signed a labor agreement in 2022 before construction permits were secured.

When the venue is complete, there will be a projected 100 events in the first year, including concerts and private and community events combined, Plant said. The venue will start off with 65-70 concerts and around 100-125 events per year after the first three or four years, he added.

The 4,500-person venue is expected to create $10 million in economic impact in Milwaukee and the metropolitan region each year, Plant said, citing an analysis between FPC Live and VISIT Milwaukee.

Plant said the interior will have “amenities that don’t exist in the Milwaukee market today” for both concertgoers and touring artists. Those amenities include green room and dressing room resources, a loading dock and modern concessions, he added.

In July, construction took a two week pause due to the Republican National Convention. Around that time, the Milwaukee 2024 Host Committee worked with local businesses as the Secret Service established a secure perimeter around most of downtown.

In 2023, the project was approved for a second time by the city of Milwaukee after interest rates and costs sent the project back to the drawing board. In 2022, the project had its first final approval, but not without resistance from local venue owners during the regulatory process.