“We’ve been in business for 24 years, and since the beginning, it really has been our service and support that sets us apart,” says Matthew Biles, Business Development Manager at Terrawise Solutions. “Everyone in this industry sells a good product, but you’re really only as strong and as good as the support and service behind those products. That’s literally our brand promise of building superior solutions together; that’s where it stems from. That’s what we’re about.”
Founded by John Rosier in 2002 under the name Construction Laser, the company established a strong reputation by offering the best Leica lasers combined with consistent customer service, followed, after 15 years of consistent development, by the construction of a state-of-the-art facility in McDonough, Georgia.
Today, Terrawise Solutions provides a wide range of cutting-edge construction technologies while maintaining the same dedication to excellent customer service that made it all possible.
Literally cutting-edge
One example of a cutting-edge product is the company’s TerraBlade, touted as the “world’s most robust and versatile 3D grading attachment,” a one-of-a-kind skid-steer grading blade that can be automated with 2D (laser) or 3D (GPS or Robotic Total Station) technology, with mounting capability on any skid-steer with an HP of 75-plus.
Operators can turn the eight-foot-wide cutting blade with two-foot hydraulic wings into a 12-foot-wide blade with several carry modes that offer real-time adjustment. “You can run it as a six-way dozer blade, box-blade, or catch and spill,” says Biles. “We stabilize the blade with a skid plate that eliminates the need for wheels out front, allowing the blade into tight spaces and corners.”
Heavy-duty and able to handle large amounts of material as well as fine grading applications, a TerraBlade on a skid-steer makes a fleet more versatile, enabling operators to both turn the skid-steer into a grading machine and cut down on equipment hauling.
Along with the TerraBlade, Terrawise offers a wide range of products and services, including machine control, vertical/building construction, LiDAR drones, machine LiDAR, survey, construction lasers, high-definition scanning, and sewer inspection cameras.
Meeting customers where they are
The company provides services that go far beyond the transaction, establishing a solid relationship and earning the confidence of clients with unparalleled capabilities in installation, training, consultation, and repair.
Dedicated to meeting clients’ demands, Terrawise stays in touch through productive communication, paying attention to needs, and ultimately guiding clients toward options that are sensible for their company thanks to a team of qualified survey and construction specialists.
The installation procedure devised and developed by the company is unique; making services simple and convenient is part of prioritizing clients, with install teams that, as a result, are entirely transportable. Terrawise can perform entire installations, uninstallations, reinstallations, and repairs on clients’ construction sites or at their offices thanks to its full-service trailers, minimizing difficult machine installations with trained installation specialists ready and able to deal with even the most arcane issues.
When a machine or piece of equipment isn’t operating correctly, Terrawise Solutions’ Leica Geosystems-certified technicians are ready to lend a hand at the fully factory-certified service center, while the company’s mobile salespeople and technicians will come to clients’ offices or job sites to retrieve or fix equipment.
Dealing with industry challenges is another part of the job; this year in particular, diesel prices and ongoing inflation have brought rising customer costs and a high level of uncertainty. But Terrawise has been unwavering about providing quality care across the board.
“We’ve been able to combat this by showing what ROI the technology can create,” Biles explains. “Showing customers they can speed up productivity and deliver more accurate results with superior service has allowed us to keep growing and pushing.”
Adequate training is also crucial. When a client is properly trained, trust is fostered throughout the process and confidence in the equipment is increased. For that reason, training is included in the package when Terrawise sells a solution, with coaching taking place in the client’s surroundings until they feel at ease and trust themselves to proceed.
Of course, further expertise is always supported. To keep customers fully informed about the newest and best solutions, Terrawise provides training sessions at its own location.
A great partner
Along with its array of products and services, the company embraces the strengthening of brand partnerships, exemplified in Terrawise’s new role as Leica Geosystems’ official machine control dealer for the state of Florida.
“Brand partnership is a key to our success, and we are lucky to have a great partner in Leica Geosystems,” stresses Biles. “We are now the official Leica Geosystems machine control dealer in Georgia, Florida, South Carolina, and Tennessee, and are proud to be the number one Leica Geosystems machine control dealer in the United States.”
Additionally, Terrawise looks forward to getting its team in place in Florida and introducing its customary level of machine control solutions and outstanding support, he adds. “Florida is a huge territory and huge opportunity, and we’re excited by this next chapter in our journey.”
In terms of expansion, Terrawise is experiencing impressive growth within the company and is pleased to have established a second location at the beginning of this year in Columbia, South Carolina.
“The opening of our second location shows our ongoing commitment to grow Terrawise as well as to serve our customers better,” Biles says. “We truly believe in our innovative solutions and in bringing them, with our level of support, to the market. We continue to expand our product portfolio along with our geographical reach.”
Certainly, pushing forward in the coming years remains a goal, and Terrawise aims to succeed at this with the help of a skilled, dedicated, and highly trained team. “We hope to keep growing internally and geographically, expanding our product portfolio and putting more and more Terrawise locations in the Southeast,” Biles affirms.
Speaking of Sodex Innovations
Indeed, while the company has long been known as a machine control dealer, in the past year it has also brought on machine LiDAR scanning solutions from Sodex Innovations.
Sodex Machine LiDAR scanning products unlock job productivity with a game-changing technology, providing the ultimate tool for the construction, aggregate, mining, and landfill industries.
These intelligent machine scanning solutions include the SDX-Compact, which makes it possible to equip any construction machine or a side-by-side with the latest surveying technology, providing real-time data and documentation, and the Sodex Innovations excavator system made for underground utility scanning. This LiDAR scanner is mounted underneath the boom of an excavator in an ideal location for transportation, enabling effortless pipeline construction monitoring by capturing terrain and trench data directly while working.
“While we’re definitely expanding geographically and opening up new locations, we’ve also been really focused on expanding the product portfolio across new product lines and being able to offer a lot of different solutions in the construction technology field,” says Biles. This ongoing commitment to staying on top of what’s new and innovative in the field has helped Terrawise Solutions continue building its name within the industry while staying strongly connected to its clients’ needs.
“We don’t just sell products and hand them off to somebody and say, ‘Here you go, thanks for your business,’” says Biles. “We truly believe we’re an extension of our partners’ or customers’ business. When we sell items, we’re there with training. When customers have questions, we answer our phones.”
Great products, great support
While technology is highly advantageous, it does come with its drawbacks (among them, that it won’t always work properly 100 percent of the time).
“For those construction companies that have technology they’re using on job sites, if something goes down or isn’t working correctly and they don’t have the support of a company that can get them back up and going, it will cost them thousands of dollars—sitting there, not working, and not progressing. What really sets us apart in these situations is the service and support that we bring to them, our expertise.”
Many Terrawise employees have been working at the company for numerous years and are all personally dedicated to using their skills and knowledge to help clients with any issue that arises. “We have really experienced guys out in the field who know what they’re doing,” Biles enthuses. “They’ve come from this industry, and we’re able to give all of our customers great support along with great products.”
That experience and dedication go hand-in-hand with Terrawise’s company culture, one that fully embraces its employees as “one big family.”
“We have around 30 employees spread throughout the Southeast, and we’re all hardworking individuals who like to get after it and make things happen,” says Biles. “But at the end of the day, we’re a big family, so our company culture is focused on the family, taking care of your family and all of us interacting, doing team-building activities that focus on us knowing each other really well.”
With that mindset coupled with years of experience and a wide array of industry-leading products, it’s easy to understand why Terrawise stands out and will continue to succeed for decades to come.
“It all stems from our brand promise, ‘Building Superior Solutions Together,’” Biles says. “We don’t just sell construction technology; we partner with companies to help them get the most out of their investments. We become an extension of their business. Our level of service and expertise is what separates us from similar companies.”
