🚧 Stop Comparing Construction to Car Manufacturing

Every so often, someone calls for the construction industry to “be more like automotive.” Or they dream out loud about “building like they build airplanes.” These statements are often meant to inspire modernization—but they betray a deep misunderstanding of what construction is, how it works, and what it already achieves.

Let’s look at the track records.

🚗 The Automotive Recall Crisis

If the automotive industry is a role model, then it’s one with serious quality control issues. In just the first half of 2025, Ford issued 81 separate recalls. These include issues like faulty door latches that can trap passengers inside; a risk especially dangerous for children. Citroën and DS told thousands of European drivers to stop using their vehicles immediately after a fatal accident involving a defective airbag. Other recalls span brands like Hyundai, Honda, Tesla, Rivian, and Mercedes, with problems ranging from software failures to brake loss and fire hazards.

These aren’t isolated incidents or rare corner cases. They’re recurring, large-scale failures in an industry that prides itself on industrialized, automated, and heavily standardized production. And these products are made in controlled factory environments with thousands of repeated units.

🏗️ Construction Isn’t Like That—And That’s a Good Thing

Now compare that to buildings. You rarely hear about a building being shut down due to a manufacturing defect. There’s no recall process, no mass notice to evacuate homes because a supplier’s component failed across an entire product line. That’s because buildings, despite being largely unique and built under varying conditions, perform astonishingly well.

Buildings can deliver hot water to the 8th floor within seconds. They withstand storms and earthquakes. They remain safe and functional for decades, often centuries. They do this not in a sterile factory, but on open construction sites, with changing teams, shifting schedules, intensely collaborating specialised trades, and constantly evolving client demands. Every project is, in essence, a prototype and yet most of them work exactly as intended.

⚙️ A Different Kind of Industry

The fundamental difference is that construction doesn’t mass-produce. It creates very complex, site-specific systems tailored to exact locations and needs. Unlike cars or planes, which are replicated by the millions, a building is typically a one-off. Prefabrication and modular construction may borrow ideas from manufacturing, but they still face the realities of context: climate, regulations, soil conditions, zoning laws, budget constraints, and more.

Yes, construction can and should adopt lessons from other industries—especially around logistics, digital tools, and coordination. But it should not try to become something it’s not. Comparing it to high-volume industrial production is not only misleading, it sets the wrong expectations and undervalues what construction already does incredibly well.

🏗️ Give Credit Where It’s Due

A building is close to magic. It takes raw materials and turns them into places where people live, work, heal, and learn. It stands tall, resists the elements, connects to services, and keeps people safe. And it does all this without recalls, without perfect factory conditions, and without millions of repetitions.

It’s time to stop treating construction like it’s behind. It’s simply different. And often, it’s better.