The Next Steps To Growing My Business

Builtbybeck

Hello all,
This is my first post. I hope the discussion I'm trying to initiate hasn't been covered elsewhere. I tried several searches.

I started learning the construction trades at a very young age taging along (sometimes unwillingly) with my dad. I continued to work summers and weekends and through school. I earned an assosiates degree in architecture. I've now been a partner in the business my dad started about 10 years. I've made a decent living, I'm very quailifeid to do the work. the company is very well equiped, and stable

The problem is my dad And I are the entire business. Most of the time we have one laborer, we are the labor, estimators, salesman ect ect ect. We do projects up to about $300,000 and aproach gross sales of $500,000 year after year. On our large projects we hire labor and subs then loose them when work slows. My goal is to build the company to a point of having several full time employees that make there own good living, to get out of the field and into the office where I can concentrate on bidding and managing, and to build a business that has value beyond it's assets.

I seem to be caught in a middle trap. I can't hire qualified people to manage projects untill I have the work to make secure employement for them. And at the same time I can't get a more a steady work volume if I'm in the fierld being my own labor/management force.

I hope to hear from some of you that have broken this barier.

Thanks,
Darin

Grumpy

identify what you do well. Identify what you dislike doing, or what you do not do well.

If sales is your cup of tea you might want to hire someon to manage production or office administration. If you focus on one thing you will do it better, it doesn't matter what that thing is.

if you hire a sales man, pay him based on commission only and your risks are minimal.

consider subbing out labor to free up more of yor time. Perhaps this will allow you to manage multiple projects at once.

Mike Finley

You want to know the sure fire way to get to the next level? You and your dad won't like it but you both need to take a temporary pay cut.

You need to take some of that money going into your pockets and reinvest it into your business if you want to get to the next level. You say you hire guys and then have to let them go when it gets slow, if that is the cycle that keeps repeating and keeping you where you are at you need to take some of that money and spend in on more marketing and advertising, which will bring in the extra jobs you need to avoid the slow times and having to repeat your cycle. Pretty soon you will have a crew in place year round, and you will be making less money, but the infastructure will be in place and you will be able to take advantage of your situation and expand into even more work that you weren't able to do since you keep losing your crew. Eventually you will be back at your current income and then start making even more.

Builtbybeck

Thanks for the quick responce guys,

I've considered hireing a project manager, it's really the responsibillity that keeps me in the field to much, especially when we have a larger project going, it's probably a position I could find a qualified person for and most likely the position I could keep bussiest. (It's also the part I probably enjoy the most).
Thanks for the insight Grumpy about picking the area I want to work at. The problem is that the areas I would like to get away from are not areas I can foresee keeping an employee busy at. I don't really want to put salesman in the field because I do mostly Gov. and insuance work. My estimating tasks are a dreaded task but realy take up little of my time.

I thought of offering whatever job I implement as a salary position to help smooth out the slow times for the new employe, while I transition to my new area. I worry about pulling in a payroll liability that may or may not pan out, but I also understand that I need to take some risk to expand. I thought at one time I would stay small and never put any high value management in place but lately the aches and pains of labororing are harder to shake off and it's made me realise that I won't be able to keep it up forever.

Darin

Tim C

Darin,

You might consider one of the construction lead generating services. It's a great way to let them do all the advertising & marketing for you. I work for one and know that they tend to work pretty well for our contractors.

Another thing you might want to consider is getting a young high school kid to build you a website. A lot of people are searching for contractors online and a website could help you build that presence. You can put your web address on your business cards, post some before an after pictures on the site, list some testimonials from your satisfied clients, and it could help bring you some business.

Also, if you've got an ad in the yellow pages, consider putting your company online with the online version of each directory. You can go to YellowPages.com, YellowBook.com, and Switchboard.com, to name a few. Could bring in more customers.

Good luck

Grumpy

Darin have you considered outsourcing? I am terrible at accounting and I know it. Thus I have hired someone to come in 1-3 days a week to take care of damned near all of my accounting except invoicing. He works a maximum of 6 hours a week and is an independant consultant who works for other guys like me.

If you are spending alot of time answering the phones and other administrative junk that you feel needs to be done but is a waste of YOUR time to do it, consider hiring someone to come in part time. My buddy who is a land scaper has a doctor's wife come in part time and she makes like $8 an hour... She doesn't care she just wants to get out of the house and have something to do.

If you are doing only govt work then I assume the process is plans come from an architect or GC and you do a take off bidding to win. If that's the case only direct advertising will be of any value. You need to hunt out more gc's and more architects and convince them to let you bid. While I use all the methods Tim mentioned, I do not have the same customer base as you do and like I said if you work in govt work you won't get any govt leads with passive advertising.

Builtbybeck

Grumpy,
You hit the nail on the head with, generating more leads from architects and GC's I think thats my next step. I'm imediately going to go after getting on every bidders list in my area. And also try to expand my residential business this spring. Maybe some advertising for the residential side. I realize now that in concentrating so much on my bread and butter I've limited my customer base and also limited my ability to grow.

I do have some family office help acounting only. I don't think I would have stayed sane if I had to do 1099's, payroll, w2's, and pay bills.

Darin

Grumpy

Darin, I took the hard copy of the blue book. My assistant ran it through our scanner and used OCR to capture the names, numbers, addresses and fax numbers of all the GC's in our area. We then sent out a fax to everyone on the list, using winfax pro and making it look like an individual letter written directly to them (important that it doesn't look like spam).

I've received a GREAT turn around using this method.

Sendin unsolicited faxes is against the law.

Jess

For what it's worth, I've seen the industry evolve over the last 20 years from the " lets get a crew together" to "lets find the best licensed tradesmen and form a team". I am a firm believer in plannimg, organizing, subcontracting, and controlling. I sell, estimate, present, schedule, QC, close-out, and fill in gaps as needed. My subcontractors are very loyal because I treat them all with respect and pay better than my competition. The hardest part was weeding out unreliable subs - Now I pre-qualify any potential team members and always check references. I am considering a new management style with my clients referred to as "Partnering" - I learned of it from the Garrison Report - a construction e-letter to which I subscribe. Count your blessings and good luck.

Builtbybeck

Thank's again guys.
I really apreciate your insights. Theres only a few architects in town. I'm thinking about trying to make at least phone contact with them all.
I've just got the paperwork to get on the local school systems bidders list and talked to there engeneer (seems promising). I'm beating the bushes while installing windows and pouring concrete! Unfortunately I see a opening next week without a project so I can speed some time marketing.
Darin

Grumpy

Jess AMen to you since you just described my situation to a T