The company, which specializes in glass for commercial and public properties of every size, provides interior aluminum framing and heavy glass walls, field-glazed window walls and curtain walls, and unitized glazed walls for commercial and public buildings.

1CG focuses on the highest quality service which begins with estimation and project management, moves on to in-house fabrication, and finally to weather and water testing and installation.

“It went from two men and a truck in 2005, to 65 employees and a $50 million a year business in 2024, with a lot of hard work and perseverance in the years between,” is how Paul Dustin, 1CG’s Vice President of Business Development describes the company founded by “two men in a truck!”

In the first year of business, the guys brought on two more, both of whom are still with the company today. They operated their own fabrication shop since day one, a department 1CG is proud to showcase to its customers. It’s uncommon for large commercial glaziers to do their own fabrication when they do 50 million-plus in annual revenue, and 1CG says it is committed to continuing to keep this in-house, as it gives the company a competitive edge.

“They cut their teeth by working alongside a general contractor who was helping with Wachovia’s expansion—but that wasn’t all they did, because they did incorporate other projects of the same size and were already into schools when I joined in 2009,” says Dustin.

“When work was so abundant in the early 2000s, some companies had turned up their noses at schools, but after the economic downturn in 2008, when private work went away, (and Wachovia, the nation’s fourth largest bank, was acquired by Wells Fargo), we were growing, having done work on schools for a couple of years.”

That attitude of not ‘turning up their noses’ at small projects has stood 1CG in good stead. Even though much of the company’s work in recent years involves showcase projects at universities, hotels, and mid-rise commercial buildings, the team has recently taken on a project retrofitting the windows at a former Navy hospital which is being converted to a much-needed multi-family residence.

1CG started with 5000 square feet of office/fabrication/warehouse space in Monroe; now it has a 25,000 square foot indoor space in two side-by-side buildings on a 4.5-acre lot which Dustin describes as “busting at the seams.” The good news is that the company has just been approved for a construction loan to expand its operations facility.

In 2020, Paul Dustin, with his wife Michelle, company Accounting/HR Manager, opened the first satellite office in Charleston while a second satellite in Atlanta opened in 2021, which covers not only the Atlanta area but also the Nashville, Tennessee, and Birmingham, Alabama regions.

Appointed Vice President of Business Development this past November, Dustin and his family will be returning to company headquarters when their children finish the school year, leaving the staff of five they’ve hired in the past three years to run the office in Charleston.

“We have found that satellite offices have been a game changer for us. We had managed the Charleston and Atlanta areas from our main office for years, but having local management does amazing things for developing relationships and for being able to visit job sites, and that’s what we’ll continue doing,” says Dustin.

He points to several factors, starting with “our captain. His philosophy, perseverance, and drive helped the company achieve steady growth and an excellent reputation.”

He describes the company as “a quality contractor from start to finish, and management-heavy. From the beginning, Mike emphasized the importance of putting energy into each department, from sales to estimating and project management, all the way to our execution and our financial management.”

Dustin notes that each department has its own Vice President, with three of the five, like him, having entered the company at low-level positions early on and worked their way up. Now they collaborate at an executive level and build processes based on feedback from each level of their own departments, streamline communications, and ensure that if mistakes do happen, lessons are learned and mistakes are not repeated.

“We try to put quality into every aspect of the contract because we don’t want to sell something only to have the customer say, ‘these guys don’t know what they’re doing and are doing a terrible job at estimating or installing,’ so we focus on every aspect.”

In the interests of complete transparency, 1CG’s website offers a field labor management chart, showing how each project is carefully planned at a meeting attended by all levels of management, from Regional Construction Managers and General Superintendents to safety and quality control, to financial departments. It illustrates how the software in which the company has invested, such as ProContractor and the ExakTime tracking system, can monitor costs and hours and how information flows in a circular way, from the project manager to the superintendent to the field labor division and then back from the field labor division to the superintendent and the project manager.

1CG’s in-house, state-of-the-art fabrication facility, where fabricators cut and assemble metal frames, has played a crucial role in the company’s success from the beginning. It continues to do so with the recent acquisition of its third, fully automated Rhino 1350 CNC machine, which allows for precision cuts to the framing systems.

In-house fabrication benefits clients, since it allows 1CG to have full control over the quality of the craftsmanship, and also allows the company to accelerate production schedules should a building project move ahead more quickly than anticipated. Then, as the work is completed, the materials to be installed are loaded onto 1CG’s fleet of trailers, ready for on-time delivery, which means the general contractor doesn’t have to find space to store the glass on site until they’re ready to have it installed.

“We do a lot of blast and hurricane impact work,” Dustin says, “and all of our shop drawings are engineered and very specific on how the systems need to be built and installed, what anchors should be used, what spacing—all of that pertinent information has to be communicated to the installation subcontractors to make sure it’s done accurately.” This is the responsibility of Adam Tsiukes, who manages the installation, safety, quality control, and testing, and ensures manpower is available to execute the job.

It’s not easy to find the outstanding glazers 1CG requires, who are both good at what they do and ready to work hundreds of feet in the air, Dustin says, “but once you find them, you do whatever it takes to keep them around. We have several subcontractors that we use repeatedly, and we do everything we can to keep them working for us.”

Another factor that has contributed to the success of 1CG and certainly shouldn’t be overlooked is its family-oriented culture and a policy of promoting from within. Employees who see a future for themselves within the company take pride in their work and happily volunteer for projects such as supplying boxes of toys and food at Christmas to a “community where the kids don’t otherwise get much,” as well as being title sponsor for Teal Diva, an organization that offers emotional support to cancer patients and their families.

As Vice President of Business Development, Dustin says, “Part of my job is understanding the market and the growth in different types of construction, seeing what developers are doing and where they’re spending their money. We have our eyes on a few towns where we might open satellite offices, but that can change, depending on growth,” he shares.

“There’s no office yet in Tennessee, although it’s on our radar. We have hired a project manager who lives in Nashville and works out of our Atlanta office as we try to break into the Nashville market. It’s a saturated market with a lot of construction, and it’s competitive, but as we complete jobs and show the kind of service we can provide, our reputation for quality service gets out and will help us reach our goal,” he says.

“We want to become a $100 million a year company. We don’t know if that will take five years or 20, but we’re working toward that, and satellite offices will be central to achieving it.”

The post Adding Light and Beauty to Buildings for 20 Years<p class="company">1st Choice Glass</p> appeared first on Construction In Focus.

Co-Owner and Chief Financial Officer Mike Altieri joined the project in its first year after his graduation from college, when the business found initial success through positive word-of-mouth from its custom residential playground projects. The company is now nearing its third decade of specializing in playground construction in Northern California.

Playgrounds Unlimited has made its name from countless successful projects across the West Coast. Some of these include playgrounds for the Oakland Zoo and for Heather Farms Park in Walnut Creek, as well as Imagine Playground at Dublin Sports Grounds in Dublin, California, which now features an all-inclusive playground. The company also recently completed seven parks for the city of San Jose.

In the company’s early days, the commercial playground construction market was coveted. In that market, a contractor builds for well-known playground manufacturers like Burke Playgrounds, Little Tikes Commercial, Miracle Playsystems, or Playworld Systems. Sales representatives for these brands need contractors to build the playgrounds once manufacturers secure a deal to do so. Playgrounds Unlimited’s clear understanding of client needs, unique installation techniques, and skilled employees enabled the company to make inroads with such manufacturers for projects, which quickly became the bread-and-butter of its operations.

The company has expanded its services to constructing playgrounds for schools, parks, churches, municipalities, and others. It has moved further into additional ventures like playground removal and site preparation, prefabricated buildings and sun shelters, water play systems, earthwork and drainage, and more. The company’s considerable résumé of services has allowed it to become a turnkey, end-to-end contractor. “If you show us a play area or an empty field,” Altieri says, “we can build it for you, start to finish.”

Driven by playground manufacturers and park administrators, safety standards, guidelines, and training have changed over the years, and Altieri notes the entire industry has evolved significantly since the company began three decades ago. Playgrounds in past decades were more of a free-for-all, comparatively speaking, with minimal barriers and more opportunity for kids to fall from a play structure. It was in the 2000s when structures began to shift toward a greater emphasis on user safety. Today, playgrounds are tied to safety in both design and construction.

Playgrounds underwent a “modular phase” not long after safety standards were heightened, and structures became simpler as a result, with more basic slides and play elements, a change that was great for installers but not as well-received by educators and the families and children using them. As such, challenging and complex playgrounds are coming back into fashion, with creative elements such as net play, upper body activities, and interactive elements that can be added without sacrificing safety.

Within playground construction, organizations like the American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM) and the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) create and maintain strict safety standards to prevent serious injuries. These guidelines then become the new benchmarks for the company to measure its structures against, giving it the chance to flex its ability to innovate and market new approaches and a challenge to find new and better ways to build. One such approach by Playgrounds Unlimited is the development of its own brand of Poured Rubber Safety Surfacing, “SAFEPOUR”.

SAFEPOUR is a safe, durable, and low-maintenance poured-in-place rubber surfacing system designed to meet and exceed industry safety and performance standards. Rubber safety surfacing, such as SAFEPOUR, is poured beneath a playground or a water park area to provide fall protection and increase accessibility. Altieri says while any business can offer a great product, if installation is done incorrectly, it creates nothing but problems. “We utilize systematic installation techniques to ensure SAFEPOUR is installed for maximum effectiveness. We don’t just want to sell our clients on a brand or name; we want to know the product works and it works correctly.”

This approach is crucial as the playground industry continues to innovate in developing and constructing ever-taller playgrounds and more complex play elements, such as suspension bridges, ropes, climbing walls, and natural climbing components and obstacles. Companies like Playgrounds Unlimited must develop innovative building techniques that are safe for builders and create structures that are safe for participants. As such, design and development have roared back into play, as creative designs that previously were only seen in amusement parks are coming alive on playgrounds across the industry. Now, even school and community areas are seeing sophisticated playgrounds with greater play value for their users.

In addition to safety, technical design, and complex play, other emerging themes on today’s playgrounds include accessibility as manufacturers look to make “all-inclusive” environments that allow for users of every ability level to access and enjoy playground activities safely. Social media is also an evolving aspect of the playground industry as it provides a new, digital format of spreading news and reviews by word-of-mouth and an immediate way for families to discover and share new playground areas with each other.

Playgrounds Unlimited sets high expectations for itself and feels the responsibility to keep up with these evolving trends and continue to develop as a builder. In that vein, speed is not always the company’s priority. Keeping business operations well-paced allows for greater focus on project construction and installation and how it can affect clients. Management is also quick to cite the employees as a key reason for the company’s success. Every team, both in the office and in the field, works well with one another and creates a positive work environment.

The company’s employees take great pride in their work and what they do. They are experienced problem-solvers, understand the product, and want to engage with clients and leave them feeling good about both the completed project and the relationship; they want to deliver the best product possible. As a result, Playgrounds Unlimited has kept many of its clients on repeat through this philosophy as well as through the efforts of those valuable people working behind the scenes.

Altieri says the best projects are often those done for school districts or private schools because the students watch the playground installation with anticipation and are eager to have a new play structure to explore. “That’s really who our client is: the children who use it,” he says. Their smiling faces are never far from his mind as Playgrounds Unlimited sets out on another project to “Build Play, the Right Way!” and to continue to build its SAFEPOUR brand—“Rubber Surfacing Done, the Safe Way!”

He says that it has not seemed like 28 years of business but, in that time, Playgrounds Unlimited has gone from building routine playgrounds to constructing elaborate structures that are stimulating and challenging for both builders and participants. This growing innovation drives the company to stay its course while learning new construction techniques to increase safety and efficiency and provide clients with the highest quality projects and service. The company intends to stay right where it is as an industry leader in playground construction and surfacing installation.

The post Creating Safe and Challenging Ways to Play<p class="company">Playgrounds Unlimited</p> appeared first on Construction In Focus.

Best Choice is also considered one of North America’s Top 100 Roofing Contractors. That’s in the opinion of Roofing Contractor, the official publication of the International Roofing Expo (IRE), North America’s biggest roofing and exteriors event.

In addition, in 2022, roofing materials manufacturer Owens Corning honored the company as the largest Platinum Preferred Roofing Contractor, a recognition not previously used by Owens Corning. “It was the first time Owens Corning acknowledged a contractor as the largest Owens Corning Platinum Preferred contractor in the country,” says BCR founder, Wayne Holloway.

Forward facing customer service, high moral standards and a commitment to its people as well as innovative growth strategies keep paying off for the company and its clients. From its founding in 2009 up to 2016, Best Choice completed over 19,000 roofing projects. Today, make that over 80,000 jobs. The company operates in around 30 states and has established over 70 company-owned and franchised locations across the United States.

“We have grown substantially,” says Holloway. “In 2019, our reported revenue was in the $50 million range; in this past year, we proudly did just over a quarter of a billion dollars in revenue (franchising, affiliates, and corporately-owned stores).”

“Business in a box”
In mid-2022, Best Choice began awarding territories for eager, would-be franchise owners, which has proven extremely successful. Even though the company has experienced profound growth and expansion over the years, Holloway recognized that there was a greater need for Best Choice’s services across the U.S., not only for consumers but for entrepreneurs looking for an established brand and business model to serve the community they live in.

The company had two options. The first was to continue with greenfield expansion via partnerships and corporate initiatives. The challenge of that approach was that Best Choice wouldn’t grow quickly enough to establish the national footprint desired by Holloway. The second option was to pursue the franchising route. With Best Choice’s proven track record, documented processes, industry knowledge, and seasoned staff, offering Best Choice via a franchising model just made sense. Many of Best Choice’s competitors in the franchising space were franchisors who got into the roofing business; Best Choice is different in that it is a roofing company that entered the franchising space. This crucial differentiator will certainly help franchisees excel, faster.

“We entered the franchising space because we documented all our processes for years and had all of our key performance indicators (KPIs) in place for everything from sales to production,” says Holloway. “We have this business model and industry figured out very well. And we’ve buttoned this thing up well enough for it to be essentially a business in a box for the right person, and sure enough, it is.”

Franchise buzz
Best Choice Roofing uses a franchise sales organization to gain additional exposure. Now, nearly two years into the new business venture, the company has existing franchisees eager to share information on the opportunity, their successes, and their performance. “Now that we have successful franchisees who can validate the effectiveness of the system and the impact Best Choice has had on their family, we are seeing a massive boom on the franchising side,” says Holloway.

From the company’s perspective, ideal candidates are financially capable, ethical, can be good stewards of the brand, are teachable, coachable, moldable, and more of an ‘implementer’ than ‘visionary’. “We’re looking for the motivated individual who is willing to implement an already proven successful model. We’re a roofing organization, but we’re also a sales organization that just so happens to install roofs,” says Holloway. “And to lead a sales organization, you’ve got to find the right personality, or you’ve got to find a person who understands they have to find that right personality.”

To ensure consistency, new franchisees undertake an extensive and intensive weeklong training package, which includes continuous education, product training, and business training, as well as general and acceptable business practices. “Our goal is to not only create a steward of the brand, but also a dynamic and effective leader and businessperson.”

Long before launching franchise opportunities, the company spent years working on the model, methodically improving and refining it along the way. “I knew that to get to franchising, I needed people to prove that the business model itself was successful,” says Holloway. “I had to prove that Best Choice’s success wasn’t because of just me; I had to prove the model. So the company offered some partnership opportunities in other parts of the country to loyal and dedicated employees, and those partners were able to prove the business model itself worked. And once they could prove that, I was able to go to the franchising world.”

Coast to coast
Today, the Best Choice Roofing brand has grown to around 1,700 people in the field representing the brand. Expanding organically and through its franchise model, the company has an East Coast office in Wilmington, North Carolina which was set up in 2022, and a West Coast franchise location (Los Angeles), which began operating in 2023. With offices on each coast, and offices in between, Best Choice is proud to recognize itself as a roofing contractor from coast to coast.

The Best Choice story is one of determination, vision, and refusal to compromise on values. Much of the company’s reputation comes from being there when people need it most, helping repair damage to roofs from wind, hail, and other weather events. Best Choice’s goal is to help the customer repair their roof to pre-storm condition. To do so, BCR’s experts will assess the property damage, evaluating the necessity for repair versus replacement, and will then provide a quote for the work (except in Florida) and will even work with the property owner’s insurance carrier to point out damage the roof sustained and discuss repairability. Best Choice will then quickly and properly install a new roof for the client.

While weather-damaged roofs remain a significant part of the company’s business, Best Choice also launched a retail program in early 2023 to promote its services. The retail program was launched with the goal of generating leads for franchisees and corporately owned stores, leading to a successful sale at the customer’s house. This program was in development for years, leveraging some of the industry’s top tier talent. Every detail has been methodically thought through in order to provide the employee, the franchisee, and most importantly, the customer, the best experience they can find, all while installing the best products in the industry.

“Our retail program was established with the intent to show up to the property with the ability to offer not just a great product and a great installation, but an overall superior experience,” says Holloway.

The company is already seeing its retail program take off, helping customers who don’t wish to go through insurance for their roofing needs. “Our focus remains helping customers with weather-damaged roofs, but with the personnel and processes already in place, we decided to extend our services to customers who don’t wish to go through their insurance company for replacement. Because of the attention given to the development of this new division, we’re already seeing profound success, providing even more opportunity for our staff and for our crews, all while providing the best experience for the customer,” Holloway shares.

Customer first
In building its reputation through the years, Holloway and his team have remained, in the words of the company, “resolute in our mission to create a meaningful and positive influence on our valued customers, dedicated employees, and cherished partners.”

Streamlining its processes over time means America’s premier residential roofer first accesses and inspects the roof for weather damage and provides a wellness check for customers, free of charge. Beyond the initial inspection, Best Choice is focused on driving value to its customers by acting as a technical advisor to their insurance company, offering competitive financing with a simple soft pull credit check, quickly performing installations with certified installers, and ensuring all code requirements are met or exceeded, with the ability to provide Owens Corning Platinum lifetime warranties for as long as customers own their homes, backed by Owens Corning.

Certain values are evident in their practice: responsiveness, eagerness, professional customer engagement, effective communication, the goal of providing a superior experience, and constantly developing and incorporating the newest and best technology, including a proprietary Best Choice Roofing app.

“I tell customers that when they’re looking to replace a roof on their largest investment, they need to choose a company that’s not only proven to be ethical and honest, but one that can prove they are as good as the warranty they offer,” says Holloway. “By the sheer size of our company, our location count, and the fact we’ve been in business for a decade and a half, I doubt there’s anyone more qualified than we are. Regardless of price or who comes to your door first, there are a lot of factors to take into consideration, and I feel like we check all of the boxes you want checked as a property owner.”

The post Where Top Service and a Smart Business Model Go Hand in Hand<p class="company">Best Choice Roofing </p> appeared first on Construction In Focus.

Since that feature ran, a decision was made to take Taylor Flooring and a firm called Wacky’s Flooring & Lighting and “merge them into one brand. The goal is to amalgamate the services we have under one brand and one name,” explains Sales Manager, Patrick Wood.

Taylor Flooring and Wacky’s Flooring & Lighting are both owned by the same parent company, Creative Flooring Solutions. If all goes to plan, a new retail outlet called the Taylor Design Centre will open early in 2024 at a Wacky’s location in Dartmouth. Blending Taylor and Wacky’s will create a “one-stop shop,” that will make things “a little bit more seamless for our clients,” Wood says.

Despite this huge move, some things at Taylor Flooring remain the same. In addition to its Dartmouth headquarters, the company has branches in Bridgewater, Sydney, and Halifax, Nova Scotia, although details about the post-merger operations of these branches are still being established. The company specializes in flooring finishes and counts carpets, hardwood, laminate, tiles, water-resistant flooring, and luxury vinyl as its main products. Thanks to the merger, however, some major changes are pending on the vendor front.

“Our offerings don’t really change,” states Wood. “With the merging of the brands, however, we’ll be able to merge a lot of our suppliers. Up until this point, there were some suppliers that were exclusive to the Wacky’s brand and some that were exclusive to Taylor; we felt as long as we were separate brands this made a lot of sense and helped with our competitiveness. Now we can take the best of the brands and merge those as well.”

Laminate and luxury vinyl are Taylor’s top-selling products, with water-resistant laminate proving particularly popular. RevWood is one of the leading water-resistant laminate brands the company stocks. Waterproof or water-resistant does not mean “flooring that can withstand a flood,” but refers to laminate that can handle spills, messes, and small puddles without being ruined.

“When we talk about water-resistant and waterproof, really what we’re talking about is everyday life. You might have some toddlers running around. They’re spilling stuff and you’re not able to get that cleaned up right away,” Wood explains.

Private residential, retail, office, hospital, and multi-unit apartments are the main markets served by the company. “The multi-residential [sector] has been and continues to be our biggest growth area. The amount of growth our builders are seeing—t doesn’t seem to want to slow down.”

Smaller commercial projects involving, for example, an office building having its foyer updated or a new carpet laid, represent another significant growth area.

In business since February 1993, Taylor Flooring marked its 30^th anniversary last year. Wood says a legacy of excellent customer service has been key to the company’s longevity. “When Robert Taylor started the company, he was big on making sure that every customer was served to the best of our ability,” he says.

Founder Robert Taylor sold the business in 2012, and it is now run by Creative Flooring Solutions, which also owns several other companies—or divisions as Wood prefers to call them. Besides Wacky’s, these divisions include Creative Sports Solutions (CSS) which handles flooring, seating, bleachers, and other features at athletic facilities; Specfloor Atlantic, which specializes in marine flooring on boats; and Ralph Connor Co. Ltd (RCCL), flooring contractors.

The new Taylor Design Centre will offer a wide array of products and services. Design Centre customers will be able to select fabrics, window coverings, lighting, and cabinets, as well as flooring finishes. “All the things when you’re designing a new home, we can take care of all in one place,” says Wood.

In addition to selling these wares, Taylor installs them too. The company offers a full installation service for tile and self-performs most carpet installations. Other types of flooring, plus cabinets, lighting, tubs, staircases, and custom showers can also be installed upon customer request, either by Taylor staff or select sub-contractors. While installation is a rapidly growing part of the business, such services are meant to augment, not displace, the company’s core offerings. The same goes for non-flooring-related products.

“We do flooring really well, and we will always be a flooring company; that’s where our base is. But if we can continue to grow our cabinet division and build the same reputation there as we do in flooring, [such products] are going to be the areas that will keep our company strong in the long term,” says Wood.

Taylor Flooring has roughly 25 employees at present, and anyone looking for work here needs to be willing to learn on the job. “For the most part, almost everybody is trainable. It would be nice to have flooring specialists, but they are far and few between,” shares Dartmouth Store Manager, Bryce Zinck, of applicants.

A collegial personality is another important character trait in employees. “We look for people that are able to hold a conversation and have that eagerness to talk to [customers]. There’s nothing worse than walking into a store and have somebody sitting there staring at their phone, not wanting to get up and help people,” says Wood. Self-motivated people are welcome as well, given the company culture. “We try to keep an open door policy. If you have a suggestion or an idea of how we might do things better, bring it to us. We want to keep evolving as customers are evolving,” he says.

Previously, coping with COVID-related supply chain delays, price increases, and labour shortages were some of Taylor Flooring’s biggest challenges. In recent months, these disruptions have “settled down a bit. Shipping has been nice and consistent over the last several months,” says Wood. “Pricing has started to equalize a little bit, which allows us to offer better pricing for the client.”

As for its labour force, the company has been trying hard to “meet our employees where they need to be. [We’re being] a little bit more flexible, making sure our schedules aren’t quite as tight so that when we do have some hiccups with COVID or colds, we can mitigate those things much easier,” he continues.

In true silver linings fashion, the COVID pandemic “made us more mindful. Making sure customers are comfortable is very important. We still see people coming in with masks, so we always like to ask, ‘Would you like me to put one on?’” he says. “COVID has also helped us with efficiencies, made us more aware of how we do things.”

When it comes to suppliers, while not getting complacent, the company prefers to stick with vendors with whom it has built relationships. “I think with the suppliers that we have we’re always looking for what’s new—trying to keep it a little more on the cutting edge. If there are new products that are coming out, we want to make sure they fit with our clients,” says Wood.

The company regularly attends trade shows and advertises via billboards and radio. “Because a lot of our customers are 40 and above, radio is still very current for them. We try to meet them where they are. I think there are opportunities for us to expand into TikTok and some of those other platforms with the younger generation,” he says.

For all that, reputation and word-of-mouth referrals remain central to any promotional efforts, says Zinck. These two factors are particularly important given that the company has a big presence in small communities where word travels fast. “We have the reputation of being the best… and that’s how the business grows, because of reputation,” he says.

Taylor Flooring enhances that reputation while cultivating community ties with its ongoing sponsorship of local hockey teams, toy drives, and other philanthropic ventures.

Going forward, “I think the goal is what it’s always been: we want to stay number one within our industry. We want to continue to grow, to take market share, keep offering and finding new ways of expanding our services to what our clients need,” says Wood.

“We really see the merger as an excellent opportunity to be able to continue to serve our clients and be able to grow within our industry here. We really hope the merger is seen as the [consolidation] of what’s been going on behind the scenes for the last several years. It’s going to help solidify all the services we have under one place and one brand.”

The post Enhancing Products, Services, and Customer Care<p class="company">Taylor Flooring</p> appeared first on Construction In Focus.

Dedication to full-forest utilization, efficient manufacturing, and responsible forest management has propelled the company into strongly competing along the forest products supply chain as a sustainable producer of quality hardwood lumber, industrial products, and wood biomass.

Established in 1993, family-run Thompson Appalachian Hardwoods started as a small green sawmill and has since expanded to a full-service forest products company with a fully functional sawmill, dry kilns, concentration yard, planer mill, and extensive timber procurement program.

The family roots run deep. Founded by Nordeck and Mary Claire Thompson in Huntland, Tennessee, following in the footsteps of his father, W.N. “Bill” Thompson Sr., Nordeck has kept the business in the family, employing three of his six children, including daughter and CFO Claire Getty.

Growing through challenges
“My granddad helped my dad capitalize the business as they got started, and since then it’s been a slow and steady methodical grind every day to do the best we could for that day, but also looking forward to see what could happen next,” Getty says. That approach means not regarding issues that arise as problems, but rather taking them as opportunities and striving to meet them.

“We’ve done that over the last 30 years,” she says. “The basis of it is being in a place with high-quality raw material—privately owned timberland—putting it out and expanding and growing through challenges to the next thing.”

For Thompson, seizing opportunities has also included starting its own trucking company, Thompson Transport, to move its products to and from its mills and avoid the problems that come with relying on third party providers.

“Looking back, my dad knew he needed to do something that would get him further down the supply chain so he wasn’t so reliant on others to get his products,” Getty explains. The company has also invested in a dry kiln facility and a logging company with two crews, more instances of how overcoming obstacles and challenges can catapult a company forward.

A sustainable industry
One ongoing challenge as a forest products company is dealing with the misconception of the sustainability of the industry, Getty adds.

“We get asked every day if we’re running out of trees, if we’re cutting down too many trees,” she says. “But we’re committed to educating people on the importance of the working forest and how it’s imperative for us to have sustainable building products coming from wood by maintaining the economic value of standing forest.”

When you’re a landowner, she adds, you have to think about why you own this land, what its value is, and what you can do with it. “Also, what can my future generations do with this land?” Getty says. “We want lands to stay forests; we do not want lands to have permanent land use conversion. People don’t realize that when you take a 200-acre tract and subdivide it into mini farms, you’ve completely taken out that rotational, working forest.”

Going a step further, when you clear land for stores and parking lots, those places will never grow trees again and never positively impact the environment.

“If we don’t maintain the economic value of timberland, people will choose other things to do with it and it will cease to be timberland,” Getty says. “We’re able to provide a 40-to-50-year economic cycle for families to keep forestland intact, to keep them in their family’s portfolio, and to have a monetization and reward for doing a good thing, which is growing the Earth’s forests and maintaining natural carbon sequestration systems. That’s our main point.”

The next step is intentionally being the best stewards and practitioners of harvesting the woods that they can be. To that end, all of Thompson Appalachian Hardwood’s loggers and procurement agents utilize best management practices, flag property lines, know where the streams are, and sustainably manage and harvest to maintain the area’s optimum ecology.

And while people don’t like clear-cuts, Getty says, they can be very good for the forest, as opposed to simply cutting all the good trees and leaving the bad ones. “At that point, it can be best just to go in and clear everything and let everything grow back, because the best trees are what come back afterward,” she says, adding that young trees actually sequester more carbon and are more productive from a climate perspective than aged forests that have reached peak maturity and are showing signs of mortality.

The result, she says, is that, “as a company and as a forest industry, we’re able to go into those forests when the trees have reached peak maturity and peak value for the landowner.”

Trees at the very southern tip of the Appalachian Mountains, where the company is located, begin to deteriorate from the inside when they start dying. When they fall, they emit all the carbon they’ve sequestered. Thompson Appalachian Hardwoods harvests the trees and creates a solid product that will store that carbon indefinitely.

“Those products are natural carbon storage solutions in a time where we’re all looking for ways to reduce our footprints and store carbon,” Getty says. “We’re all about optimizing the yield and making the most we can of these trees. We don’t want waste, and the waste we do have we can use as biofuel.” Other biofuel byproducts that come from cutting logs into lumber include bark, sawdust, and wood chips, all of which will be burned to generate energy.

In another sustainable initiative, the company recently installed a 600 hp biomass boiler, paid for in part by the USDA Rural Energy for America program and the U.S. Forest Service Wood Innovation Grant program. The boiler assists with turning waste products into steam to run all the company’s dry kilns, eliminating the need to have propane trucked in weekly.

“We produce a product that will burn and create energy,” Getty says. “That’s one of the steps we’ve taken to be a zero waste facility, and we actually burn our byproducts to create energy.”

Boosting safety, managing risk
The company also takes safety seriously, ensuring all employees are trained properly in all areas of the job, and is dedicated to creating a positive company culture.

“We also do a lot of internal training now, which is another area that we’ve invested in,” Getty shares. “We’re tired of everybody talking about how awful it is to hire people and how ‘nobody wants to work and everybody’s lazy’ and so on; it’s not true. Everybody who says that needs to reflect on what kind of jobs and businesses they’re running and whether they’re actually a good place to work.”

For Thompson Appalachian Hardwoods, this has included investing in a full-time Human Resources Manager to help recruit and retain top people, maintain a culture of safety, and create pathways for advancement, all efforts that have helped create a more stable workforce.

Getty is also proud of the company’s improved risk management program. 15 years ago when involved in logging and sawmilling—considered the top most dangerous job by OSHA—the company was expensing its significant insurance premiums, whether for property, casualty, or general liability. “Yes, people had to wear hard hats, but we weren’t going over and beyond in our safety culture,” she says. “We were just doing what we needed to do.”

The company learned that making risk management a primary focus of the business would result in reduced claims and reduced premiums, and it would actually become a revenue stream and investment opportunity with eligibility for alternative insurance opportunities, Getty says. “We started investing on the front end—in risk management, safety committees, safety training, regular internal safety audits, and pre- and post-accident screenings,” she says.

Steady improvement resulted in acceptance into a captive insurance program, so now instead of writing monthly checks, it’s simply a part of doing daily business.

“Now we’re investing not only on the ground in the different ways that we handle risk in our plants but also in how the premium dollars are spent: it’s going into a pool. If we don’t use it, we get the money back,” Getty says. “We got a 30 percent reduction in our premiums this year and got the money back because our claims have gone down. We’re seeing a reduction in claims and therefore a reduction in our annual insurance costs.”

Educating others about the industry is a huge part of the company’s ongoing mandate as well, Getty says.

“We’re thrilled to be able to do that, and one of the things we’re called to do here is help others understand what this looks like and why it’s important to us,” she says. “I’m unabashedly proud of what we do. When others say, ‘you cut down trees,’ yes we do, and this is why and this is how. This is what happens to the forest after we cut down trees, and this is the impact of our business in a rural economy. There wouldn’t be high-paying jobs, jobs with potential advancement in rural Tennessee, if we weren’t here.”

Keeping the business in the family has certainly helped with those successes.

“I came back to work because I saw something that my dad and my granddad had been growing,” says Getty. “And there’s such beauty in that. Our family has been in this industry for a very long time and it’s been respected in the industry.”

While Getty’s educational background and work experience prior to joining the company was in a different field, her dad wasn’t afraid to take a chance on her. “He learned how to do it, taught me how to do it, and put me in contact with people who could also help me learn what I needed to know. And after a while, he let me do it. I think that’s a big part of succession planning—the control piece, and not relinquishing enough control at the right time.”

Looking forward
The company is currently installing a second sawmill which will double its capacity and production, and there are plans to continue to modernize facilities to improve efficiency.

“We want to create an environment of transparency in our supply chain. We want people to see and understand what’s happening, to tell the story of where our products are coming from, where our wood is coming from,” Getty says. “People are very concerned about the sustainability of the product, but they don’t understand what we’re doing is already sustainable, and we’re doing it in a good way.”

The company will never stop trying to do even better in its practices, though, while continuing to educate others about the forestry industry as a whole.

“It’s about letting people see and be proud of what our country’s forests are producing for the world, and how our forests are a climate solution in a variety of ways,” says Getty. “We need to protect them, but we also need to be careful about what we’re trying to protect them from.”

The post Good Things Come in Trees – Practicing Sustainable Forestry<p class="company">Thompson Appalachian Hardwoods</p> appeared first on Construction In Focus.

Jeff Pettiecord founded the company in 1981 armed with little more than a dump truck, tractor, backhoe, and a vision to succeed against the odds. This vision remains core to the company today. “Jeff’s work ethic has really carried us,” says Chief Operating Officer Nick Wylie. “He’s in his sixties now and he still works every day out in the field and is very active.”

As co-owner of the company, Wylie also splits his time between the field and the administrative side of the business, overseeing operations. As a result, leadership maintains a keen understanding of what’s going on at all levels of the company. “We’re basically founded just on hard work and that persists with everybody in our office and our administrative staff spending time in the field, working to make sure everything goes well,” he says.

The company’s core values break down into four specific guidelines. Number one is “be your best,” a foundational belief that governs all the rest. The second is to make the customer experience as smooth as possible. “We are the customer’s easy button,” Wylie says. “We’re usually the first ones into a site to work, and we make ourselves the low-maintenance, easy to work with subcontractors. That’s what we specialize in.”

The company’s third core value is to “be flexible,” while number four is to “be there for others.” When combined, these four values form a solid foundation that has governed the business for over 40 years and facilitated lasting success.

In addition, the team is committed to green solutions. The company’s environmental remediation division has successfully completed a wide range of projects to restore contaminated sites to a healthy environmental state, from fuel storage tank removal and contaminated soil removal to demolition or a combination of multiple solutions.

The company’s environmental division is “very focused on recycling and finding solutions for waste,” says Wylie. “We’re taking in waste from the ag industries around Iowa, because agriculture is a very big industry in this state.” The team makes compost from that waste, creating an in-demand product. “We sell a lot of compost,” he shares.

This commitment to reuse is seen across multiple divisions. After clearing a new development, the team creates mulch from the felled trees. “We literally can sell it back to the landscape people who are putting the finishing touches on a landscape of a new building or new development or new highway that we cleared the trees from. So we bring the recycling side of it full-circle.”

The company’s high-quality mulch can also be used for child safety. “We also take those trees that we’re clearing from these developments and process them a certain way to make them into certified playground mulch that we can sell to cities and school districts for their playgrounds. We put a lot of time and effort into making sure that material is just right. And IPEMA certifies it so that all the school districts and parks departments know they’re getting a quality product.”

IPEMA, short for International Play Equipment Manufacturers Association, is the voice of the public playground industry, assuring that any product with their certification meets rigorous standards. “IPEMA is very involved with the certification process for the mulch to make sure they’re getting a good product,” Wylie says. “And they do a lot of advocacy for us, letting cities and school districts know that this is a quality material that kids won’t get hurt on. We’ve all been places where it looks like they just grind up pallets and throw them in playgrounds. I’ve got two sons, ten and six, and I don’t want them falling off and landing on a bunch of junk material that somebody just ground up and put in a park. IPEMA is very involved in educating people on what product is needed so kids can play safely.”

When it comes to current challenges, J. Pettiecord was fortunate enough to avoid most of the difficulties the global pandemic brought. “COVID really didn’t affect us all that much because we were a necessary service and we never really shut down,” Wylie explains. Instead, the company’s major concern has been the workforce shortage that predated the pandemic. “One of the biggest challenges we face is an aging workforce and that not as many younger people want to go into contracting businesses like this. So finding younger help is really a top priority that we have.”

The workforce shortage highlights the importance of promoting the trades. “I’ve been a big fan of kids going to trade school,” Wylie says. “I’m in my early forties and when I was in high school, [the attitude] was you’re going to college, period.” He wants today’s youth to recognize that there are viable options other than a college degree to find a well-paid, satisfying career. He is actively working “to show them a different path, that the trades can be very fulfilling and, if you want to, you can spend your days doing more than shuffling paper across a desk.”

To promote the trades to the younger generation, Wylie takes an active part in career fairs and speaks at high schools about career opportunities. “I’m very passionate about it,” he says. And not just when it comes to his own sector. “The world needs plumbers, the world needs electricians, the world needs heavy equipment operators, the world needs truck drivers. So I try to stress how important it is to have more people in the trades and that there’s a really good living to be made being in the trades.” In addition, he points out that young people who choose the trades can graduate from trade school without taking on the student loans that are burdening many college graduates today.

“We are very passionate about getting younger people into the trades and we love having the younger generations come in and work with us,” Wylie summarizes. “We want to show that it’s a great place to work and a place where you can grow a career.”

Looking ahead, the team is eager to keep on the tried and true path they have set out on.

“We’d like to continue providing great service to our customers and continue to grow,” Wylie says. “We’re doing work all over Iowa and have started to do more and more in Nebraska. So we’d like to expand the geographic location of where we’re working and provide our customers with great service.”

With four decades of success behind them, this team’s plans for ongoing expansion are sure to play out as planned.

The post A Premier Specialty Contractor<p class="company">J. Pettiecord</p> appeared first on Construction In Focus.

Founded in 2014, this elite and trusted provider of highly specialized turnaround services is based in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. With a national database of more than 10,000 skilled and qualified craft laborers, SWAT works in 17 states. The company also has master service agreements with over 50 U.S. facilities, including some of the major oil refiners and petrochemical suppliers in the world.

On being worthy of SWAT
Along with its dedication to exceptional service, one of the most vital aspects of SWAT’s culture is its personnel. In addition to the supervisors, technicians, and project managers who oversee and manage projects, SWAT employs 7,000 experienced artisans hired only through referrals.

“We pay our people pretty much the most in the industry, which helps to get the best people,” says Chris Husser, Director of Business Development. The company then does everything in its power to keep those people safe.

“Safety is our number one concern,” Husser says. “It’s paramount in our business.”

When asked how the company manages to implement and maintain its exemplary record, he has a simple answer. “To be honest with you, it comes from the people that we have, and it comes from the top down,” starting with founder Johnny Holifield. “It’s been ingrained in our minds—that’s how we do business. It’s just a way of life for us.”

This includes looking out for each other as well. Referring to fellow employees as brothers and sisters comes naturally when spending so much time with your work family, he adds, and such an approach is understandable when you realize what’s at stake.

“We’re in the turnaround business. We work 24 hours a day, seven days a week. We work around the clock; we don’t have time off. We’re proud of our safety record, and we’re proud of the way we do our thing,” he says.

Under the guidance of Safety Director Clint Case, SWAT adheres strictly to the motto of just working hard and getting things done with no complaining.

“We do not complain about anything, because if you do that’ll be your last day to work,” says Husser. “Do not come to management with a problem that is very easily solvable. We all have company credit cards, we all have gas cards, we all have company vehicles; we all have everything [we need]. They give us every tool in the business to do what we have to do. And if we come with some little complaint and a problem, it’ll be your last day. That’s just the way it is.”

Good people get you places
This upfront management style is yielding impressive results. In its 10 years of existence, SWAT has gone from doing $3 million in the first year to $720 million in revenue this past year. The largest turnaround company in the entire country, SWAT had 550 people working in the field during its slowest two weeks over Christmas and, starting in January, that rose to about 3,000.

Those 3,000 will work steadily until the hottest summer months when numbers decrease slightly, and will ramp right back up in August with 3,000 again, all the way to Christmas.

“We are rocking and rolling,” says Husser. “We also have the largest equipment fleet in the country, and we own all of the equipment—our turnaround trailers, extractors, and aerials. We’re the bar. And I don’t mean that in a conceited way. Everybody wants to work at SWAT.”

Employment is exclusive, however; SWAT is the only direct-hire company in the country that does not accept submitted résumés.

“You can’t come to our HR office like every other turnaround company in the world,” Husser says. “People usually go to an office and ask if there are any jobs going, and ‘can you put me to work?’ They give their NCCR certification and their weld stamp and they’re approved—they can start out at Dow Chemical. You can’t do that with SWAT,” he says. “The only way to become an employee of ours is if a SWAT employee brings you in.”

That you have to be referred by an existing SWAT employee to even get a foot in the door reflects the company’s staunch cultural standards relating to accountability. “It’s about safety, productivity, communication, and accountability,” Husser says. “That holds people accountable.”

If an employee refers a potential worker and that worker doesn’t pull their weight for some reason, the SWAT employee is held responsible.

Ultimate accountability
Certainly, accountability and reliability are imperative when it comes to turnaround services. A specialty welding company, SWAT services and performs maintenance on plants that turn crude oil into gasoline and jet fuel during routine shutdowns every six to eight months.

“If they don’t shut down, they’ll explode,” Husser says. Of course, during a shutdown, the client company isn’t making money, so maintenance must be fast and efficient, which is where SWAT’s expertise comes in.

“We come in with anywhere from 100 to 600 people working two shifts around the clock,” says Husser. “We’re replacing pipe, pulling exchangers, cleaning them, fixing leaks, changing the catalysts in these big reactors that turn crude oil into gas. It’s a bad process; it’s some brutal stuff, the chemicals, but that is what we do.”

But SWAT is also in the people business, he adds. Every project manager has two superintendents, who each have four general foremen, who themselves each have about 40 craft-level people who work for them.

“Essentially, it’s a pyramid: project manager, superintendent, general foreman, then what we call the hands—the welders, fitters, boilermakers, machinists, all of those craft-level people out there turning the wrenches and doing the work,” says Husser. “And they’re all working anywhere from 14 to 60 days straight.”

It’s a dangerous job, but it pays well, he adds. While SWAT bills some big companies almost $2 million a day, it’s also paying 500 employees weekly, starting on day one of the turnaround, anywhere from $40 to $90 an hour, with a $120-a-day per diem on top for each person—all of which can lead to cash flow challenges.

“You can imagine doing a 30-day turnaround with 500 people, and you have to fully finance it for the customer before you get your first check,” Husser says. “Cash flow in our industry is a huge obstacle. We have to pay our people who are then going to work.”

Biting the bullet
Another recent challenge was the COVID pandemic, which resulted in every plant shutting down every turnaround.

“Can you imagine how hard that was to get through? When the plants weren’t doing turnarounds, we had no work,” he says. “It was literally, ‘go home. Don’t use any fuel. Don’t charge anything to your credit card,’ and we’re going to hang on for dear life.”

Unfortunately, the plants themselves didn’t shut down, continuing to push work without performing turnarounds, which led to blow-ups, fires, and even workers being killed.

“You can’t keep running the units because they’re just going to blow up. You have to replace things,” Husser emphasizes. “It burns up that pipe so hard. Imagine a piece of pipe that’s one-inch-thick when we install it and when they start the unit backup. Eight months later, that one-inch pipe is about a quarter-inch thick.”

Other ongoing challenges include an influx of new turnaround companies, he adds, because there are more refineries popping up every day.

“And they want to steal your people,” he says. “They’ll offer more money, and maybe give them a brand-new truck, and you can’t fault them. But we have such loyal people. We’ve established ourselves now.”

Instituting an intense work ethic, exemplary service, and diehard loyalty has gone a long way to keeping SWAT on top over the years, and they’re all qualities that everyone involved with the company identifies with and is proud of.

“The second you pull onto the property of SWAT, it’s about the people, period,” says Husser. “I can ask my owner Johnny Holifield to give me one word of why we’re successful, and that’s what he would tell you: people.”

The man who set the pace
Johnny Holifield himself still plays a large role in the success of SWAT, which is now majority-owned by a private equity firm. Two years ago, he tried to retire, counting on the company selling to the next private equity firm.

“Fast forward two years. That didn’t happen. The company just didn’t sell because we were steadily growing and growing and growing,” Husser says. “So now, he’s been back for several months running the operation.”

How he runs his business is how he runs his business and he’s been very successful, Husser adds, but at the end of the day, Holifield puts things out there that need to be done, and employees had better do them or they’ll be looking for a job. This means SWAT employees strive to continually stay safe, work hard, and put work first, all of which have contributed to Holifield’s vision and uncompromising expectations.

“In the turnaround world, that’s essentially what we do all day, every day,” Husser says. “That’s what we do.”

With its uncompromising motto of, “When it matters most, bring in the best,” SWAT’s reputation speaks for itself no matter the job or the conditions.

“If there’s one word that sets us apart from any other company in the world, it’s people,” he adds. “Until you’re in the people business, you don’t understand that to the fullest. Our people are our backbone in the field.”

The post At SWAT, People Are the Backbone of the Business<p class="company">Specialty Welding and Turnarounds (SWAT)</p> appeared first on Construction In Focus.

Established in 1986 by Dan Matarozzi and Dan Pelsinger, this now entirely employee-owned company also supports the intricate procedures involved in obtaining approvals and ratings for building sustainably, while offering the vast knowledge base it has amassed over the years regarding sustainable systems, methods, and products.

Rather than demolishing, the company methodically removes or “deconstructs” buildings to recycle and repurpose project works, working with a network that deals with building material reuse. Now with 38 years in business as a general contractor out of San Francisco, California, the company spent its first two decades performing historic renovations throughout San Francisco proper.

“It came down to leaving the front street façade of the building and making the interiors very modern,” says Matt Dimitroff, Senior Superintendent. “We found a niche with modern architects in the city in the late ’80s and early ’90s, and that was our focus for roughly those first 20 years.”

With a massive portfolio of references and completed projects under its belt, the company’s work has generally been acquired by word-of-mouth rather than traditional advertising, with a focus on building and carrying a substantial team of skilled craftspeople and managers.

A push to modernize
After 10 years in the city, gaining substantial experience with structural upgrades of buildings over 100 years old, work consisted of replicating ancient casework while adding an incredible modern twist, Dimitroff says. “Our focus for the last 20 years has been a substantial push toward modern architecture and that’s now primarily 100 percent of our business.”

The company now has work in place for a medley of national architects that build primary, secondary, and tertiary homes across the U.S., with a focus on California and Wyoming and Dimitroff leading the Jackson program. Now on its eleventh project, seven of those have been ground-up, 10,000-square-foot modern structures for both California- and Jackson-based architects.

“We’re diversifying and playing the field and doing a lot more smaller work,” Dimitroff adds. “We carry two to three large $20 million projects a year concurrently, and then infill with smaller remodel work as those needs arise.”

Employee ownership
The company is particularly proud of its Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP).

“It’s a huge selling point for us,” says Dimitroff. “I’ve got laborers who are invested in every project they touch, journeyman carpenters, and project managers—everybody is giving more than just their two cents. They’re embracing the whole company because we’re all taking advantage of what we’re putting into it.”

Clients also love it, he adds, and architects use it as a selling point. “It makes perfect sense for people to hire a general contractor where everyone knows what’s going on and is trying to make the whole shift more efficient. It’s been a very interesting program for all of them to follow and contribute to, and it’s all very well managed by a third party,” Dimitroff adds.

“Everything is very easily accessible. You can see where you stand and where your projected earnings are for the next six months, where you’ll be in 10 years if you stick around. It’s a huge blessing, and accolades to all of our superiors who thought it was a good way to go.”

It’s a huge milestone, understanding and learning how to navigate an ESOP, adds Kirk W. Allen, General Superintendent and Member of the Board of Directors, as this has also been done without an added CEO.

“That’s been one of our learning curves,” Allen says. “We just did a review on that, and if we look at the revenue stream, we’ve done extremely well this year. It’s one of our best yearly performances.”

Making the transition to an ESOP, working under the tutelage of an executive council, dividing the workload amongst a group of people, and then looking at it from a financial perspective, it’s clear that the team’s success has been a group effort.

“That’s been an amazing thing to see happen. We’re still looking for a CEO, but we’re not under the pressure we thought we might be under to have that kind of leadership,” says Allen. “It’s one of the challenges for everybody to dig deep in themselves and find out what they’re made of and how to bring the best to the table. That’s been a big deal for us going through this first year.”

Success going forward is now in the hands of every employee, he says, as everyone has a stake in the company’s growth and contributes to ideas, execution, and the spirit of the company.

“I think it’s going to take five years of practice to really get the sense of how well it will work and can work. But so far, it’s been a great transition.”

Construction with a vision
Other accomplishments include hitting guaranteed maximum prices, budgets, and schedules for notable projects, such as Wyoming’s historic renovation of 200-year-old barns, giving them complete 2020 upgrades and then connecting them to an 8,000-square-foot modern entertaining annex.

“We tend to use all local subcontractors or those that are within a 100-mile radius, to limit our footprint and give maintenance and service contracts after that home is completed,” Dimitroff says, referencing the design and efficiency of the standalone, unique structures. “It’s pretty fun to work with architects that have a vision of what we’re capable of. Because of that historic work and experience from San Francisco, we’re filling a unique niche here where we try to do it all, with a focus on the modern.”

And while projects ebb and flow, the company fills any voids with smaller architecture firms and remodel work to keep current. “The bigger projects are more spaced out now,” says Dimitroff. “Two at a time for the next year-and-a-half to two years is where we are. We’ve got three massive projects going concurrently at different phases.”

A culture that works
While the project management team’s expertise and knowledge set the company apart, so do the company culture and family dynamic. “We have huge benefit packages, so people have enough time to take care of their personal lives and their families and enjoy vacations and time off,” says Allen.

For both California and Wyoming, there are multiple weekly management meetings dealing with everything from labor allocation to project updates, higher-level scheduling, and long-term business development.

“Planning-wise, we try to stay six months to a year ahead of where the company is going to go,” Allen adds. “We’ve got great competitors, and I think we’ve all really learned from our past mistakes.”

What truly sets Matarozzi Pelsinger Builders apart, however, is the camaraderie between the employees in the field and the management team.

“The relationship between us and our field guys is without a doubt one of the best I’ve seen,” Allen says. “We try to introduce them to new technologies, new materials, new ways to do things, and create goals with them, so their level of excitement and their learning continues. That’s one of the things that makes us incredibly unique.”

There’s also great pride in the projects and work they do, he adds.

“We’re a highly self-performing company; we’re not just management. About two-thirds of our staff are builders and can frame, finish, trim, and install all the sophisticated packages that we can put together. So, if ever a challenge comes up that our subcontractors can’t handle, we can take care of it. And that makes us unique.”

Training is also a significant aspect, he adds. “We’re always looking for ways to train our people and make sure they have the best tools available. Our employees also work 52 weeks a year. They have very little downtime, and we create projects just to keep our team busy. If we ever ran out of work, we’d always be willing to do new things and make sure our people are working.”

Builders first
The construction business, of course, has its high moments and low moments as well as shifts in focus. “But in our case, we’re always concerned about our builders,” shares Allen. “The company has always been interested in keeping our guys fully employed throughout the entire year. It makes us special. It brings a sense of pride to their work and achievements.”

But what Allen thinks is truly unique and important is the service Matarozzi Pelsinger Builders provides for its clients for years after projects are finished.

“Some of our projects are sophisticated and hard to understand and maintain,” he says, and explains that the company has a special service division that takes care of its clients long after the projects are completed and they’ve settled in.

“We speak with them; sometimes we have their keys for months while they’re on vacation. We come and do maintenance of their property so that we can keep those properties working as efficiently as possible,” Allen says. “That’s a relationship we have that goes beyond just the act of building their houses. We stick with them for as long as they allow us to be around. It’s another important thing that makes us special.”

The post Taking Care of Business – When Company and Client Come Together<p class="company">Matarozzi Pelsinger Builders</p> appeared first on Construction In Focus.