The Fence Supply Chain Conversation Nobody Is Having with Omega Two and Builders Fence

Hey,

Hey.

All right. What's going on everybody? We're live here. It is Wednesday, October 30th, and I consider this a special day. I haven't seen Estie in a while. Probably since uh I think what was that? September 11th. Mario, did I run into you at the fence shell? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, we did. I did. That's what I thought we Yeah. So, thank you guys for coming on. We got uh Mario from Builder Fence Company and we got Estie from uh Omega 2 Fence Systems. Uh I've had a lot of experience with them over the years. So, uh without further ado, I want to bring you guys in. Estie, why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself and uh you know, what what got you into the fence industry and a little bit about your company? Awesome. Uh so, I started as a a rep for Omega Fence, which is uh located outside of Montreal. So, I started about 20 years ago and I was a college student um answering a wrong ad and um I thought I was supposed to be doing data entry and ended up learning all about the fence uh business and kind of loved it since then. Um and then the last 11 years I've been direct with Omega as one of their managers. And so, um, my my passion is education and and kind of getting the whole industry to step up and learn and make fencing look nicer and more important instead of just an afterthought that somebody puts it on there. So, um, our company, we have independent reps that work with the specifiers. So, landscape architects, architects, about 65 of them all over the US and, uh, and Canada. And, um, and then we work with installers and, uh, offer a lot of education. So, yeah, it's a little bit about me. Yeah. Well, I mean, I know we go back a little bit and I'll get into that in a second, but appreciate you coming on. Thank you for taking the time. It's a little later for you, too. Um, Mario, uh, you go way back in the industry through multiple companies, man. Uh, let's let's hear a little bit about you. Um, yeah. So, I'm Mario. I'm the regional sales manager with Builder Spence Company. Um, I've been in fence for a little over nine years. um in on the sales side of it. Um but I did get my start with Master Halo in the weaving department. Um so I do know Chain Link very well. Um you know been working with it for a long time. Um so I've been with the builder fans for the last three months. Um it's been a been a nice been a nice ride, nice change. Um before that I was with Merchants Metals uh for the previous eight and a half nine years there. Um so I I know distribution very well. Um, yeah, Builder's Fence, great company to work for, 65 years in the industry. So, if you've been selling fence with any time within with anybody within that time, you you probably bought from Builder's Fence. Um, definitely looking to grow and and and get it going. Yeah, definitely. Um, Builder Fence, if you're on the West Coast, you know who builder I mean, you know, probably not as much on the East Coast, but if you're on the West Coast, you know, Builder's Fence. I know I personally been buying from them for probably a good 20 20ome years um, over at Las Vegas Fence and other companies throughout the years. So, um, it's, uh, I'm honored to have you guys on. There's no doubt. Uh it's you guys have been a big part of my life and helping me grow my company. Um but and Estie when I I remember I I was doing a project locally and uh I needed these lubert fencing. I saw some pictures some Did I ever show you the pictures of the fence that I actually built before I called you? You know, I'm going to go I I probably have some samples of them here. Next time I see you, I'm going to bring them. So we tried building uh you guys have these amazing louver panels that we can buy that and you can build fences out of them and stuff. And I had this huge it was like 10 foot tall gate that was like 30 some feet long. And I bought all these pieces of metal. We had break we made jigs. We were going to build these things and we tried to build louver fencing uh panels and it was just a disaster. I mean a complete disaster. It was wavy. It was like this cra I mean it was just it was a hazard. It it was just a hazard to fall apart and it was just a ton of money and time. So we ended up um trying to I was in a rush. I was in an emergency to finish a job. So, um, I tracked your stuff down and, um, there wasn't a local guy here that had the stuff I can get a hold of. So, I I started calling your, uh, location up in Canada. Nobody was there. Nobody was

There. And, um, like, "Well, where are they?" Finally, somebody somebody in your office, maybe you shouldn't have said it. He told me where you were and you were at like Fence Tech in Indiana, I think. Indianapolis or something, right? That's right. And, uh, it was probably the first Fence Tech I've been to in like a decade or more, right? And I'm like, I get on an airplane and I fly down there. I think I placed an order. I helped you help me out. I'm like, I need this stuff. And uh I was so surprised and this kind of why another reason why I wanted you on here um with a lot of times people don't realize that okay you're in Canada, you're somewhere else like that. It does come down to the companies having their logistics down and understanding what it's like to get product transported from there. It's one thing to have it all sitting in a yard. It's another thing to figure out how you're going to get it to those uh you know to those actual fence companies and to those suppliers and everybody uh you know efficiently so that they're they're not left hanging and wondering where their stuff is. And I just remember like five days later this stuff, four days later, whatever it was, there was a truck driver sitting in front and he drove straight through uh to bring the stuff down. And I I mean from Canada. So you guys uh you know, bow to you guys. That was crazy. There's times you can't There's times you can't get stuff for in four or five days from California. So the stuff from the other side of Canada, that was crazy. there was a crazy weather and they canceled the flight. And I remember driving from Denver to uh Indianapolis just for that uh show like straight through. And I remember we placed the order and I was thinking to myself, the truck driver beat me back because the the stuff got probably got there before I did. I had to end up driving back because of the crazy weather that we had. But Yep. Yeah. Yeah. So that was awesome. So and I think so I think you guys are a good example of um of crossber you know stuff that's coming you know from crossber stuff as well whether it's coming from somewhere else a good example that um stuff's changing the way business is done is changing a little bit and um you know how how stuff is transported around the country and whether you use your own trucks and one thing about builder fence is um they have a lot of their own vehicles and a lot of their own trucks and I think that's been one of their main advantages even up in the Las Vegas area is that uh you know they're coming uh on a Wednesday and Friday you know into Las Vegas and whether it's uh you know six tension bands or half a truckload full of material and you just can't quite pull that off with LTL trucks and stuff. So I think uh that's something that I think that a lot of the distributors have went away from is having their own trucks and um I don't know if that's hurting or helping because I guess I don't own a distributorship on that level that's using a lot of LTLS. So um I' I'd like to get into that a little bit further but um Mario, what do you um you know kind of getting into it. What do we I guess a lot of times we say we throw words around there like supplier, distributor, uh you know, and we loosely say it, you know, as if everybody in the world understands what that means. Um what's your opinion of of how that that chain works from a manufacturer all the way down to the end user. What do you what do you call those tier levels? And I know it's different in access control than fencing and stuff. What do you what do you consider those tier levels? So I I mean I would consider, you know, someone like Omega to be a supplier, right? they're they're somebody that I can go to that I can get a quote from, I can get pricing from that my end user GC can't go direct to, right? Um, so and they'd rather work with the the bigger the bigger distributors, right? Because one, we have the volume, two, we have the customer base that they don't have to go and chase after, right? It kind of just walks into our door every every morning, you know, somebody needing something fence related, right? Um, so that that's how kind of I look at it when it comes to a supplier and a distributor, right? I'm I'm on the distributor side. We want to get you the material as fast as possible and the suppliers want to do business with us because of the volume that we bring to them and help them move their material faster than them having to go out there and find the business to to move it

Themselves. Okay. So, that's interesting. You consider a supplier like the manufacturer. Yes. Okay. Okay. And and I think I think that uh this is where in lies some of the confusion I think in our industry when we start talking to people and we start talking about direct sale this that um I consider the supplier the same as a distributor and you've got manufacturers and you've got like uh just two different terms we call a supplier we call it a supplier in the fence side we call distributor on the um access control and like gate operator side. So that's interesting that uh you look at the supplier as being the manufacturer. Um and then what what do you think below that? What are the there's still a couple levels left even below the supplier, you know what I mean? The manufacturer and distributor. Where would those be for you? You know, that at that point um when it comes down to that, you're looking at a an operation that's either going to be doing some type of counter sales um somewhere else in the realm of like maybe a a Lowe's or a Home Depot that also stocks, you know, the product but in minimal quantities um just to be able to, you know, have, you know, different options for the public. Um, so when you look at that, it's just it's one way for me to look at it. Um, but at the end of the day, everybody has their own opinions when it comes to what they think a supplier or distributor is going to be. Um, so you have some smaller guys that'll feel like they're distributors because they stock a couple pellets of chain link and, you know, a couple bundles of pipe and you can, you know, any any average Joe can just walk in there and buy it from them. Um, but when it comes to that, I think it becomes a c a cash flow thing. you know, the banking behind you, you know, the job accounting, stuff like that. Stuff that, you know, some companies can't can't offer uh where bigger distributors, some somewhere like a a builder's fence can do for, you know, smaller companies. Yeah. So, um I could show those dealers or um dealers or obviously u fence companies, things like that. And then you've got the end users. So, I mean, I guess my model is still the manufacturer, the dealer supplier or the distributor supplier is the same. And then you've got the dealers and the fence companies and then the end users. So, it's interesting um how just the first conversation we're we don't you know we're not 100% in agreement on it. Um Estie, what do you consider that chain? How do you consider that flow? And and you're from Canada, so uh you know I mean you guys don't even say zero, you say zed. So you might have a whole another not me. I'm from Colorado. But uh you know um no so so we you know we consider suppliers and distributors kind of uh you know on the next level from the manufacturers. um you know they supply to local installers if there was missing some parts and um and distributors oftentimes also offer the extra benefit of a one shop stop you know for chain link and ornamental or louvers. So if you're going to go to a distributor you're able to get multiple panels from there where the distributors will contact us in order to get whatever is specified that's on there. And so for us it's kind of um you know we have the the factory, we have our you know independent reps that are out there getting the jobs which trickle down to the installers. The installers then will either reach out to us, a GC or um a supplier or a distributor in order to get some pricing. For us, you know, at Omega, we publish our prices online. So a lot of people will go on to our website in order to see, you know, what what pricing. Um, but there's also a relationship that we have that we um hold close, which is our distributors and suppliers that are able to provide sometimes even much better credit terms than we can. And like I said, they can go and kind of buy everything together. Um, not just the Omega fencing that's on a job, right? Yeah. And um, I couldn't agree more with you both of you guys on that. I mean, it's it's it's it's weird how our industry for the last 5 10 years has completely changed a little bit. I mean, we used to have I mean, it was really simple. We had manufacturers, distributors, and dealers. And then the dealers sold to all the end users, you

Know, and so it really was only like there was really only three before you got to the end user. And now we've got these hybrid models. And I I look at that what you said. There's that guy with the pallet of wire and a couple sticks of pipe. And he's in a maybe a local market. Those are more your local suppliers in a way or distributors. And um they are a hybrid model of it. And those guys for a long time have been servicing a smaller area to where it's kind of like what um what she was saying. Sometimes you guys have better terms and things like that on um you have better terms and things when it comes down to helping fence companies. Well, on the local level, sometimes they can actually these guys are only looking for a you know 50 ft of barb wire and uh you know sometimes a local level they'll break down 50 foot rolls into 25 foot rolls or you know things like this. So I think there's a kind of a a need for all of it. And in some areas those um those smaller hybrid model you want to say is suppliers but you're either a supplier or distributor you're not. I mean you're either selling to other fence companies and landscape companies and GC's or you know or you're selling to the end user. So I think anybody that's above selling to an end user is probably a hybrid model of the you know of the suppliers. So that's interesting. The point of view is from all over. It's uh yeah it's just already all over the place. So, um, that being said, since I think we all kind of, if we're calling suppliers distributors the same, um, which in this case we kind of we weren't, um, and I kind of preloaded this. So, if we're calling suppliers and distributors the same, um, who do they ideally service? You know what I mean? Who does a a supplier and a distributor, we'll call a distributor, in this case, someone that's buying from the manufacturer down, who do you think they would be servicing? Who's their ideal person they should be servicing or or, you know, is servicing? What do you think, Mario? Um, so that's that's kind of where I get my idea from as a manufacturer being the same as a supplier. Um, because as a distributor, I'm still a customer. Um, I'm just you're just the supplier is just servicing me in a different a different type of way that I'm servicing my public. They're selling to me in bulk. So that way they're supplying me with the product. Therefore, I can distribute that product in a more in a more economical fashion. Right? So instead of buying, you know, two truckloads of wire, I can now sell these customers a pallet of wire. I can sell them 150 ft of wire as a distributor um and then they can go and install their jobs and do what they got to do as that. So that's that's where I kind of get my idea as a supplier, distributor, and then a dealer. Um kind of breaks down. And like I said, again, opinions are all all going to be different, but that's just kind of how I look at it being on the distribution side of it. Yeah. So um distri distribution sells I think Sasha here says distribution sales is one selling products to the contractor or the end user. So you think the ideal uh for a distributor the ideal customer is probably the end user or even the the contractors themselves. Of course always. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. That's interesting. Um yeah. So what um where have you seen anything changing you know right now with the customer base that's happening? Um you have because you've been seeing a lot where um you know the end user is now being able to go direct um whereas before they you know pre-COVID it was you know you had to follow through that chain right you go to distribution distribution then goes to their suppliers and the manufacturers to get the material in and now you you're seeing a lot of it where they're cutting the corner and you're able to go direct depending on the supplier you know if they're they're willing to go that route. Um but you that's that's kind of what you're seeing more of these days. Yeah. So it is kind of changing. You think that in the last few years? I think I've noticed a lot. I mean, you know, now that we have FWA and and I'm doing the fence show and all this, I talked to a lot more people and a lot more fence companies than probably probably in the last two years talked to more fence companies than most people talked to in a lifetime and even myself before then. So um I get feedback from here to the east coast and it's completely different model even that happens on the east coast to you know to the to the west coast and then I I you

Know I've talked to people in Europe now and other places and they live by a whole different set of rules. It's like everybody sells to everybody. It's the It's the There is no uh I don't even think there is distri distribution. It's just if you got a product, you sell it and it's like they don't have the same um and I I don't know if you guys sell on, you know, on to those other countries and stuff, but you notice that it's the it's just everybody's telling everybody and it's like there's not there's not even the politics at all that we have over here, you know, in the US on it. And um I found I found you know one of the things I found as I was getting into this and more and more talking to the fence companies and and obviously that's the main people that we talked to were the the small to mediumsiz fence companies and um I think they felt like they were the lowest on the totem pole. Like uh it's the weirdest thing. It's it's like if you call somebody up and say you want to buy something, you don't want to mention that you're in the fence industry and you're calling fence suppliers. So it's like if you mention you're a fence person like well hold on hold on. So you're a fence guy. Um, first we got to have you fill this application out, decide if we want to sell to you. Then we're going to put you on the worst possible pricing terms we have. If you're anybody other than a fence company, you get the best pricing in the world. So, if you're a, you know, a box store, if you're a general contractor, if you're anybody outside of actually being a fence installer, uh, you get the best pricing. It's just they fight for that. You're like, well, you know, they don't fight for the fence companies, but they fight for everything else. That's what it felt like to the fence companies. And that's the feedback, you know, we get a lot from from everybody else. And I know it to be somewhat true. It's like, you know what I mean? It's it's like one of those those things that just kind of somewhat does happen. And um I think that um we kind of lost track of of what the core customers were for this and we started chasing the wrong people. And then I think it may have opened up the door now for um you know, markets outside of our distribution levels and outside of even our country and stuff to come in and swoop in and say, "Hey, you know what? You ain't got to fill nothing out over here. uh you ain't gota we don't care what license if you have C-15, C-25, C-13, we don't question a general contractor on what kind of license he has, but if you're in the fence industry, we want to know exactly what license you have. Well, these guys aren't uh aren't asking those questions and like so I think we kind of open the door up and I I can tell you that fence companies are pretty damn loyal to the distribution. I know um you know it's really hard to get into even Las Vegas fence as a new manufacturer or anything like that to even talk to us because we stay loyal to you know who we buy from because I think that the distribution is huge and builder fence alone has is probably one of the main reasons I was able to grow and become you know the company that we became and if it wasn't for that you know distribution level when you need it when you first start out and all that stuff. So, I think that we got to do a better job for the distributors to to keep creating new fence companies because the fence companies need to outgrow you guys. You know what I mean? In in an essence, they need to outgrow. At some point, they're going to get to the point where they can afford to buy a truckload. And we have to encourage that. Hope that they have sons and daughters and people to take over their companies and and even train their brothers and uncles to start fence companies and start smaller companies. So, um I yeah, that's why I like these kind of dialogues. I like to get that stuff out there. So, I think they're supposed to outgrow all of us and become a big enough company um you know to uh to go and and and start buying direct if you want to call it or whatever it is. So, let's build some new fence companies. Let's get out there. I think for us, you know, we're a third generation uh family, so we're definitely a family-owned company. And um for us, it's always been about the reputation and the relationships. And so, we do sell direct to some contractors. And everybody has different discounts obviously by you know what they've done business-wise but we want to be able to control that relationship and be able to to control our reputation

As well because often times if there are you know three different phone calls or emails that are being transferred. Um you know it's always easy to point a finger at somebody whether you know it's oh they never did this or they never did that. Um but we want to we kind of have an open door policy. you can call us and um you know we don't share discounts with one another but we can share other information and get on a conference call all together. So for us it was um it was a decision that we made about 10 12 years ago I want to say where we decided that to open up the doors to some of the fence installers as well purchasing direct um you know the the change going back to your question about the change in the industry that I've seen um kind of postcoid is that uh end users homeowners are now calling us direct and we're not quite set up for we do a lot of custom but we're not quite set up to where we're the home a depot and you know this is something They don't, our trucking companies are not ours that, you know, we use a third party. They deliver it and we get phone calls like, "Well, can you drop it off in front of the door on, you know, at 2:15?" And um and so that's where our suppliers, our local distributors, and our installers really are are our go-to because we now have the relationship with them where we can send them their way. So, it's not just them calling us in order to get the the product. We can say, "Hey, so and so has our stuff in their yard. This is who you should contact." And most of the time they have somebody that they work with that can do the installation on a residential, not just on commercial. Yeah. Yeah. So I agree. Um there's a need for all of it. I think there's a need, but they again I think they have to outgrow it. If we truly want our industry to grow, we have to encourage people to outgrow us. Um even me at the at my level here, I mean we sell to a lot of fence companies locally. Uh a lot of fence companies, they start off as either landscape companies, they end up getting their license, they got fence companies, and you know what I mean? Honestly, even um to Builder's Fence, I I guarantee there's I I know because I'm still good friends with a lot of them. Well, they started off buying from me and eventually they see Builder Fence on the side of the iron panels or whatever it is they call direct and now they're buying um they're getting regular deliveries from Builder's Fence. And I encourage that because when they're buying them from me, I'm buying them from you and I'm marking it up. So, at some point for them to grow their company, they have no choice, you know. And then I think once the distributors um stopped you know at some point they like I said stopped focusing on on the fence companies started focusing on uh fighting with other manufacturers the war between distributors. They start going on pricing to the bottom. They start chasing the jobs that had nothing to do with um fence companies. The fence companies had no choice but you know if they're going to bid a job to a general contractor and there's two distributors that are buying directly from uh Omega 2 that are bidding it. We have no choice but to call Omega 2 and say hey we'd like to bid this job too. we can't buy it from um manufacturers or distributors anymore because we can't, you know, we can't even bid in our own cities because the the distributors are bidding it. So, at some point, we end up getting rid of distribution. The distributors do it to themselves. They cut themselves out of uh the rest of it. So, I'd like to see it get more back to a a traditional level of everybody focusing on staying in their lane, but we can't be ask distributors can't ask uh in you know, installers to stay in their lane and manufacturers stay in lane if they don't stay in their lane, too. So um it's uh it's going to be interesting to see what happens in the next uh you know two to five years. But inventory has been something that I saw has changed as well. You looked at the inventory levels before 2020 and uh distributors and and suppliers. I I keep saying by the way when I say suppliers I'm still considering those distributors. I got manufacturers what I consider you guys up there. So everybody else that's in between the fence companies I consider like a supplier distributor. um they stocked a lot more, right? And um I mean, Builder Spence is always really great about um filling the orders. It's not very often is there a lot of back backordered stuff, but you um and same thing with a lot of other suppliers, but I've noticed there is with some there's

A lot less inventory they're carrying. And that means every time you call up and you place an order, they're just placing the order directly now with Omega 2, and Omega 2 is drop shipping it to us. So, if the suppliers stoping the stuff, do we even need the suppliers or the distributors anymore? So, I I wonder what happened um to that. You guys notice there's less inventory now being stocked by the distributors? Um if you if you I was gonna say you want to take it. No. Yeah. I was just going to say some instances. Yes. You see you do see it um as it's you know some of it's not a high volume mover. Um so they take up space in the yard right and and have something in the ground that you know is just going to sit for six months where you know you can get it in in two three weeks for for somebody who needs it for you know job to job base. Um, I think that's kind of what you're seeing on on some of those on some of those products when you don't have, you know, a high volume, high moving product that's, you know, it's going to move quickly. Um, you know, taking that risk of sitting on it or it getting damaged, getting moved in the yard, you know, weathering, whatever, whatever the case, you know, that's that's one of the the the risks of the loss, you know, the profit that you don't want to, you know, sometimes you don't want to take the gamble on depending on the product. Yeah. Yeah. We see that with our distributors as well. they they don't want to stock just because trends change. If uh black was the it color, it's green or gray or court and steel or whatever it is. So for us, we decided, you know, we'll take on the liability and we'll store inventory at our factory and offer a quick ship program. So, you know, yes, it's coming from Canada, but like your experience, it was there within 4 days. We can have, you know, something out there just because our distributors weren't a able to front and guess. there's no crystal ball as to what product or what panel or what color or height is going to be the next thing, especially when it comes to some of the, you know, welded wire kind of product. so yeah, so that's why what we did is we started to to do a quick ship program and hold a lot of that stuff at our facility to take kind of the pressure off of the distributors that we were working with. Yeah. So, have you noticed I mean as a as a manufacturer and I've kind of been on all these different sides of it and you know throughout the years in a way um even dist distribution side we've distributed a lot of access controls and fence and we still ship a lot of material even ourselves out of Las Vegas. So have you noticed that and I even at my level if I have it in stock I push it. So um if somebody called up looking for something and I got something similar I mean I'm guilty of it. It's it's we all are. If even if they looked up Omega, I'm not saying I stock something like Omega 2, but say somebody goes and Googles Omega 2 and they land on one of my websites that I happen to have some pictures of Omega 2 on there, but I've got, you know, I've got this other manufacturer Omega 1 that's in stock or whatever you want to call it. You know what I mean? I just made up, but anyway, and I happen to have it in stock. Um, don't do you feel like as a manufacturer that if they don't have your product sometimes they might flip it to something else if they were stocking something? So, of course. Yeah, of course. That's just common sense. I mean, we don't like it uh because often times if Omega 1 isn't, you know, our reps spent three years working on the project with the architect and you know, it might look the same. So, Omega 1 and Omega 2 might look to to stick with the same name. So, I don't mention anybody else, but it might look the same, but might one might not have the same guardrail capacity testing as another. So, you know, it could be that yes, you push whatever is out there because this looks very similar to this other product. Um, and our reps, you know, they work on commission and they worked on it for three years. So, we'd like for them to be able to get that sale. But, of course, if you've got stuff that's sitting there in the yard, you're going to push that stuff. You're not going to push, you're not going to buy and bring in new inventory when you've got something there that's similar. We see the differences. And, you know, the three of us have been in the industry long enough to know that there's a

Difference between a six gauge and a 4 gauge. And if you're pushing something that looks similar, but it's a four gauge instead of a zero gauge, are they really getting the same product? Um, so I think it's it's it's also educating um what the need is for. If if it's for a rooftop guardrail, um, we'd like to have the the distributors really reach to us and be honest about it. Know that they can come and say, "Look, I have this stuff. Do you think that this is a comparable?" And we will tell you the truth, yes or no. Um, I rather somebody be upfront and tell me than um have them provide something on a rooftop that's going to fail or a child care facility that's not going to meet code. Yeah. Yeah. So, um, Mario, do you you find that I mean, is it when you have stuff that's not in stock, do you think that on the, um, distributor distri I'm saying distributor at this point, distributor level, do you think that the companies, um, outside of you've been to multiple companies now. Do you think they do a good enough job at telling, you know, because if you think about it, they do a lot of work to get set up and and to start, you know, and they commit a lot of their marketing and everything and sometimes they sign deals to with, you know, with distributors to sell their product. Do you think that the suppliers and the distributors do a good enough job letting everybody know, by the way, we're we're we we have their products available, or is it just something that's a line item that the sales people don't really even know about? Sometimes I think that's sometimes what gets lost in translation um is what you do have readily available on the ground ready to go or who you can get it from in a in a timely fashion, right? Um and I think that's why the manufacturers or the suppliers they need more distributors more more distribution so that way you know people can understand what the product is be able to educate the their customers on what the difference are because like you said SD it's you know sometimes that six saving that that money from a 4 gauge to a zero gauge it looks good sounds good but when you have a salesperson who understands the product and knows the specs and and what what it what can happen if it if it the code is not met or the spec is not met um you know educating your customers on that end and being know make sure that they're making the right decision when it comes to purchasing the product um for the betterment of their company. I think that goes a long way as well. So when you have more distribution u more people out there selling your product um the more that the more educated they are the more they can educate the end users on how the product actually works instead of trying to find a shortcut just to save you know a couple bucks right and I think it comes down to communication and being honest. I think if distributors and manufacturers communicated, you know, uh, a lot more freely. Instead, it's, oh, I don't know the project name. It's ABC. Well, if we knew the project name, then we're able we're able to pull it up and see in the notes for the last three years or two years that we've been working on it. Yes, there's a reason for this gauge or no, you don't there's no reason, you know, go ahead and do that. So I think it's just open communication and not holding everything so guarded knowing that the relationships that you have with the distributors are going to be you know upheld and are going to be cherished and we are you know working with the distributors or working with the customers that we have without undermining them or cutting them out of the deal. Um we know who buys through which one of our distributors and if they contact us and and ask for a quote we send the quote to our dist to the distributor. We don't send it to them because we know that they purchase from that. So, just knowing that you can trust the people that you're working with and have that open communication about this is the project name. Getting that project name as simple as that would help us pull up the notes to see if you can switch it out to something that you have in the yard or if it's something that really needs to be, you know, met because of code or whatever reason. True. Yeah. Yeah. That transparency is tough. Yeah. It's tough even on the fence company level. I mean, you know, there's stuff that gets specked out, you know, in projects down even us as fence companies. Now, I'm talking as the fence

Company, not the, you know, because material, we 40 to 60% of our business is material sales, you know, out of Las Vegas, but, you know, that's still a large portion of our business is um Las Vegas fence and and the actual crews that go out and whenever you call to try to get a quote and they want the the project name, we're all like, "Oh, Smith, it's uh it's going to be uh we're building at our yard. We're building a fence around our property here." We don't want to tell them because we feel like we don't we feel like we don't um as a fence company, we don't trust anybody. We don't trust um that information with our suppliers. We don't trust that information with the manufacturers we're trying to get a price from. And I think that's just because of the um and so it would come straight from um we got to figure out how to fix that right down to the fence companies. Why are they so afraid to call and give a customer's name or a project and stuff with the people they're they're buying a million dollars a year worth of materials from. You know, I think it's because of the history of the industry. It didn't used to be where you know, it's definitely changing, but it's not quite there. and the history has left a lot of people feeling like they got burnt. Um, and I I completely understand because 19 years ago it was completely different. Now I don't do a quote without a project name and it's because I can pull up the notes from the architect and sometimes I can save them $50,000 that they would have under bid it and had to, you know, lose it because they would have been awarded where I know that the architect wanted all curved panels, let's say, instead of straight panels with angle brackets. So something like that. I think that the more the more relationships we can build and the more honest we are and upfront about things um and not kind of you know protecting our own and we're we're only trying to succeed on our own I think the better the industry as a whole it'll be will be but also these kinds of issues that are coming up where nobody wants to share a project name nobody wants to tell them do you mind if I switch it out I'm not going to be thrilled but I'm not gonna I'm not going to work against you yeah I just I got we got to figure out um how to break that it's really tough and I think that as I think what's going to happen is as us older guys to get out of the industry and that our kids and everybody take over they won't have that animosity they won't remember they won't remember when it feels like uh you know and maybe things have changed and hopefully it's getting a little bit better where you would you would say hey I'm bidding this project and it's the Amco factory or or I don't know I'm making names up now the you know a factory that's being built here locally or something and um you'll and and you go to find out they'd call their their favorite person that they sell the materials to locally and say hey did you know there's a 20,000 foot job going on in your you better check this thing out. It's up in Henderson and uh you know and if it's a a lot of the products were um being specked out in projects here locally that if we hear certain names u maybe it's a Marristar or whoever it might be or one of these other companies to where us um fence companies we're not one of the one or two people that buy from them directly in Las Vegas we don't even bid it because it's not it's not even worth it. You call up and say I need to get a price on it and they're like going well you got to call the distributor. Well the people we're bidding against aren't. So, it's almost like we're picking and choosing. So, I think as as us as uh fence companies, we're getting more nervous about releasing any information about the project we're bidding because we feel like uh we're going to lose we're going to lose the project if we do. So, um I'm super super excited about the direction it's going, but I think if we don't get some transparent like this conversation we're having, if we don't get everybody together, we're going to lose this we're going to lose this this great industry that we built and it's just going to be um this whole distributorship model will be completely gone. It'll just disappear. It'll all be um like the rest of the world basically where everybody's just buying directly and you're going to we're going to go back to I think more local distributors. There'll be more local suppliers and distributors on our you know at our level like Las Vegas fences. It'll just be a bunch of us in the local level

Selling materials. Um do you see something like that happening in the future if we don't change something or and keep in mind this I don't want to be projecting my opinion into your heads but do you you know how do you see it in five years if we kind of stay on the path or if we don't do anything? Uh I'm an optimist. I don't you know I believe uh people that are leading the industry. So you know for me I'm in a position of of upper management. Um if you are doing the work and you did a takeoff and that is the bid that you send us. Somebody else calls me as as much as I like to hang out with them or that they're a great person and they say do you mind giving me this bid? I'm not going to use the hard work of somebody else and just pass it along. So for me, because I'm in a management position, I then tell everybody else as a company policy, the person who did the work, they're the ones who are going to get what they need. We can't just go and and share the hard work that somebody else did um and pass it along to somebody else. So yes, I'm an I'm an optimistic um person. I do believe that it's going to change. I do see the change. I'm lucky enough to where I travel around the US all the time. I'm in a different state. I was in Texas last week. Um, you know, I'm up in the mountains in Colorado this week and so I'm starting to see that change already. So, I'm very hopeful that yes, um, we are missing that human connection. We are missing I think we kind of swung the other way. It's kind of like we were talking about earlier about the selfch checkckout lane. Um, eventually it's it's going to it's it's, you know, it's it's not working. People want that that connection. People want that, you know, local person to talk to. And that's why we have reps that are everywhere local because the person in Boston is not going to be able to talk to the person in Mississippi the same way. And um I do see that change happening. Yeah. Yeah. How about you, Mario? I know you've been I mean you've got an extended background. Oh man, I feel like No, I I agree. It's a service. It's a service. No. Yeah, it's it's definitely a service service that uh that you provide for your customer. And um at the end of the day, you know, it's really it's really that that's really what it comes down to is, you know, being there for your customer and and whether they're going to get the job or not, that they can lean on you for your expertise in the industry. Um and being able to help them grow their business, whether it's whether they're buying the product from you or not. Um but I think that's what that's that's what is lacking a little bit and that's what really we need to get back to. Um you you hit it on the head, Brian. It's it's it's if not then it's it's a loss for everybody at the end of the day. Yeah. Yeah, it'll take out small fence companies. Yeah. If we take out small fence companies, then um we're stuck with, you know, we're stuck all chasing the same two 300 companies that that are already outgrown the distributor levels. So, uh it'll just it'll just disappear. So, um yeah. So, um you know, not I appreciate you guys coming on because I consider both your companies um people who have really kind of nailed it when it comes to customer service and you know, um I appreciate that on that point. So, I wanted you guys on here for that because this is a a really kind of a um this is a big subject for me and I I really kind of want to see us going in the right direction. So, I look at you guys as leaders in this, you know, and pushing it kind of forward. Um so, that being said though, social media is is a you know, I'm a living proof. Social media is a big factor in our industry, bigger than we even thought it was. I think we kind of all dropped the ball on it. Um and um we're all now kind of playing catch-up a little bit, you know, on the social media. And um how do you think that plays into your guys' stuff now? Do you see it differently now than it was like a couple years ago even, you know, even a year or so ago? And do you use it more for just getting information out to um on on your level, Mario, it's going to be a little bit different? On theirs there, it is to get their product out, their information out, but you have a different responsibility you have to get this information out to your um you know, whether it be through Twitter, updates on whether your company's in business or out of business or you know, or closed today or for the holiday, things like that. So, and then and then

Actually letting people know what products you carry. And maybe that is Omega 2. Maybe another way for you to, you know, encourage Omega 2 into being um, you know, working with you even more closely on sending customers over to you is if they can see an active reach from the distributor saying, "Hey, by the way, here's some um we're out in our we're out in our yard doing video showing your panels and your products and and you know, doing uh letting everybody know that you're selling their product. So you're not just uh you know one of the people on their list of they can call. Um how do you uh Mario first I'll start with you. How do you think the social media's changed for the distributors in the last year or two? Um it's it's it's gotten the knowledge out there. It's gotten the product out there. So people want the the next the next best thing, right? The next new product that's coming out, the new wave of fencing that's being installed in in everybody's homes. And you know, it's it's given everybody that that luxury to not have to go digging for you. You just, you know, you open up your app and then you see somebody install something new at their house, a new fence. Um, you know, these distributor or these dealers are using this now to show how they do business. You know, how quick they can get a fence up. You know, what what the project looks like from the beginning through the end. So now you really get to judge people based off of what you're seeing instead of you know just reading somebody's comment that they left the review like hey you actually get to see what the work looks like um without having to do you know too much digging for it. So I I think it you know social media has came a long way and I think the fencing industry has been behind for a while because we we we are feet on the ground right these guys are out there installing fence daily you know so who has time to sit there and upload videos all day and and but you know you take a little bit of time and and it'll definitely definitely benefits for sure all the way around you know even even if for us as a as a distributor um just to let our customer base know what we're doing and what we got going on. I mean that's it's huge because everybody wants to know what what's going on. Yeah. Do you guys see yourself doing more videos and more um pictures and images of the actual manufacturers that you guys are repping? I mean, because you it's a big responsibility. I mean, I I look at it like when when I'm selling somebody's product, I look at it as a huge responsibility that some manufacturers trusted me with um with the livelihoods of their their company, their family, their, you know, the people that work there, everything it takes. When you when you agree to sell somebody's project or product as a distributor, it's a big responsibility. Do you guys think that um distributors right now are living up to that with uh actually marketing it through their social media platforms? Social media doesn't cost anything. So, uh you know, do you think that that that's being done right now by by most of the distributors? And you've worked for three of the the pretty goodized distributors. Do you think they're doing that to to promote say Omega 2, you know, as your as one of your manufacturers? I not as much not as much as we should be. we we could definitely be taking the advant more advantage of of the social media side of it. Um because it you know you it's endless reach, right? Um but again that that's just having somebody dedicated to social media daily. Um that's something that you don't really think about when you're running a company, you know, this size and and and until you get into that realm and understand what social media can do for your company. Um, I think that's where you got to really sit down and see the benefits behind having a presence in social media because if you you're just posting once uh, you know, once a week or once a month, you know, you're never going to get the you're never going to get the the volume that you want. Um, but if you're constantly up and you're constantly throwing in everybody's face and you're sharing videos and, you know, you're you're reaching your reach is growing every week with the new stuff that you're posting and people want to follow you and you're making it interesting. I think that's where that all comes from. But you have to be really creative, especially in this industry. Yeah. Yeah, Estie. Um I know on a

Different side of it and I know hopefully I was asking some questions that are relevant to you guys as well because I know you guys as a manufacturer um everybody wants to sell your stuff. Everybody's always eager to say set me up as a distributor. Um do you feel that the every you know when you set people up do you have any kind of like um any kind of guidance? You're like hey you know what if I set you up are you guys going to be pushing our product and do you ask them how are you going to push our product and and things like that or do you see social media being part of that? Yeah. So, I mean, obviously our social media has been um going strong for several years just because we deal with a architect and landscape architect, designer community, but we're definitely seeing the um the change in distributors starting to do that. And what we do is we know that a lot of times they don't have that full-time person that's able to do the videos. And so, we work with them. We call them out when they send us photos of some of their projects. We'll tag them. And now they actually have a page that we can tag. Um and so we, you know, um we offer them. It used to be just u can you send us our logo your logo so we can put it on our website but you kind of get lost in the you know 30 other logos that are on there and so we try to be a little bit better of a partner so that we uh get a little bit better of a return from that investment um by helping with our marketing department in a hand with them. So whether it's helping them with their website to put some more information, embedding some of the videos that we have done into theirs or their insta our installation videos um which we decided you know for language barrier we just don't use any language on there it's just a video so that people can see how to install the product. So we kind of work hand inand on it. I don't think that a lot of the distributors are quite to the level of where we would like them to start doing things on their own just because they don't have a a full-time marketing person that's there. Um, and they do get caught up in the, you know, moving inventory out. Um, but we we work hand inand with them. We'd like to see it all, you know, step up a little bit, but um, we'll work with what we have. Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, hopefully with FWA even this and all this stuff, we're doing the fence show. I'd like to get more um in touch with the distributors and the manufacturers even closer and say how can we come up with a system that that helps promote us all um nationally on our level now because I think um what what they don't realize they have that um people you know whether it's going to be the European markets, Asian markets, everybody trying to come into the US, what they don't have is that network that's already in place. But they will they will get it eventually and it's not going to take very long to get it. right now they're being blocked, you know, from the groups and they're being blocked from all this because they they haven't figured out how to market in the US yet. But, um, right now they could dominate it. All the distributors and everybody could dominate it if they just kind of got together a little bit. Not when I say got together, I don't want some antirust thing to be going on about marketing or something, but you know what I mean. they got together and um as a as a community, the whole industry and said, "Hey, we're going to start really marketing these manufacturers on a level that they deserve for um the commitment they've made." Like you said, SD, you made it. You guys made that commitment that you're going to take the risk and liability and stock all this stuff that you have no idea that Mario is going to even try to sell. I mean, talk about a um leap of faith, right? I'm not I'm just using you, Mario, because you're on here. But I trust Mario. No, no, I could be like, "Send me a PO." But, um, yeah. So, yeah. So, I mean, hopefully we can circle back to this again and, uh, see where we're at in a year on that. And, um, maybe we need some outlines of what we got to do. But, I've noticed that there's a lot more, um, distributors. They just they're all about signing people up and and they just got this massive list and, you know, how many people can we get signed up? How many people get signed up? Let's narrow it down maybe to a smaller group that we can actually you can market. If we don't have time to do social media on a daily basis, you don't have time to

Sign up any more manufacturers. So, um, it's probably time to trim it, just time to trim it down, right? But, um, one last thing I want to get into. We also see Oh, sorry. Go ahead. No, go ahead. Go ahead. No, I'd love to hear. And we see that the return on investment. I mean, you Yes, you do have to have somebody there, but it makes social media is so easy these days. You can schedule it ahead of time. It's the consistency. And we we now have, you know, installers that send us pictures when they're on a job site. I can't tell you the number of text messages that I get with photos knowing that everybody else that we're connected to then will see their stuff because maybe they're not connected to a whole lot, but it's all about working together. So, when we send it and an architect sees it, I call them out. Next time they're trying to get a quote, they're going to go to that installer or that distributor direct because they shared it. So, it's also helping them grow their company um from 20 followers to the thousands that we have by just re-sharing something that they send us in the way that we can because we do have that marketing, you know, department. Yeah. Yeah. Very true. Yeah. I think it's great. And um the last thing I wanted to get into is I think we're um the, you know, is the shop drawings and you get into shop drawings and technical data sheets and and things like that and some of the companies have this figured out and some are just uh you got to make them yourself. Um, Essie, you you guys deal a lot with architects and and stuff like that. So, you have a massive amount of uh drawings and I know other companies like Amerristar and some of the other ones. There's people that do a lot with architects and stuff. So, they have these shop drawings in place. Um, do and I see some distributors did. I know merchants did a really good job with shop drawings. Um, and I think Masters did. I think Builders has a a certain, you know, a certain amount of them you can get online. Um, do you think that uh there's enough of that available for the fence companies? these smaller I'd like to see these smaller guys be able to go and bid some of these larger GC jobs and and things like that. And I think that if we don't, you know, if we want to continue as a distributors to to get these um these larger orders and stuff, if we don't help these smaller fence companies get these larger jobs with the general contractors and stuff, we don't help them with shop make it readily available um you know, without them having to sign up for some some crazy amount of software or something to try to make the drawings. Um, do you think that there's um a better way we can try to maybe reach you think it's already successful enough at it or you think that we could do a better job at trying to get shop drawings and things out to the small fence companies when they I definitely think it definitely 100% definitely need to have more of it definitely to get it out there. um it has to be readily available um because the customers are depending on us for that information um in order to send in a bid or to close a job or you know to they have an inspector on site and so being able to have those readily available at any given time for a customer's want and needs I mean that's you couldn't ask for it more and that's one thing that you that we lack a lot in this industry is having that information readily available at all times. Yeah, we have it on our website for people to download. We send it out with a package of drawings with every quote. I think, you know, uh, full disclosure, oftentimes it seems like the distributors might not necessarily know enough about our product. They just kind of forward it on. So, um, I think there's no shame in not knowing something. Having that conversation of, hey, can you get in here so that you can teach our sales department or our estimators the difference between this product and this product? And, you know, they look the same to me on the drawings, but if you look real close, you'll see that the gauge is different or things like that. So I also think that there is also a little bit of time, a little bit of education goes a long way is just having us in there as a manufacturer to educate them so that when we do send a packet of drawing, you're actually able to know and when your customer calls you back not

Understanding something, you can then answer that question as well because that's what's going to make the difference between some of the other companies, you know, that are trying to come in and take the business from companies like ourselves that have been around since '92. You know, it's that relationship. it's that yes, you can come to us and we will explain it to you and we will help your customer um you know without cutting you out of the deal. We can answer those questions but I also think it's about asking hey can you come in here so that we can actually educate the rest of the team on the product and when you have a lot of manufacturers that you're distributor for maybe you don't have the time and maybe you're not able to learn all of the different products that they have but knowing when to ask can you can you let me know you know what the difference is. Yeah, I I think that's the struggle of um growth for uh you know, sometimes we we get in such a hurry to try to be the biggest fence company or the biggest uh distributor supplier, the biggest and um we start to lose what we started with the core of of service and knowledge of the products that you're selling and and then you hire, you know, maybe maybe Mario was the most experienced guy in Omega 2 and he's the one that went up to uh Canada and learned everything about it and then he moved on and went to another company. now there's really nobody that that knows your product anymore. So um and maybe that's where that continued education probably in the products is almost as as valuable of um uh you know of a thing as we're talking about licensing and and and regulations and all that. Well, we're not even we're not even at that point. We don't even have all of our professionals even understand the products yet. So um great. I you know I I couldn't have been any happier having you guys on talking about this. Um you guys were great. I don't want to take up too much time. I know um you guys are busy. It's later for uh USD uh Mario. It's uh California, so they're probably about ready to close the bars in a minute, right? Really, everything shuts down early down there. But um just got this this Yankee Dodger game going on right here. Oh, dude, you already got your gear on, right? You're ready to go. But um thank you guys for coming on. Any last minute things any either one of you want to say uh say to the audience and everything before we go? Uh, no. I just want to say thanks Brian for having me on. It was a pleasure being on. Um, I I I look forward to watching these podcasts. They're super cool, super informational. So, no, man. You're doing a great job, buddy. And and you know, the the show this year was a was a great turnout, man. I I loved it. It was It was really good. So, no, keep doing what you're doing, brother. It's uh it's working for sure. I appreciate it. And And while while you're on that subject, I want to say uh thank you to Essie. She was the very super excited about next year. You were the very first person to not only select your booth, pay for your booth. There was nobody taking your spot. That was yours. You claimed it. You weren't nearly without it. I beline to to get registered. I got mine. You had me excited about 2025 before this show was even over. So, thank you. Uh thank you. And and builders as well. You guys picked your booth, so I appreciate that. But uh the excitement and energy um from Omega 2 uh was just amazing. So I want to thank you guys for that. Um looking forward to next year. I'm sure I'll be talking to you guys before then. We got lots of stuff going on. Bunch of social events and things happening. So um have a great evening everybody. If you're watching this uh live, thank you for watching. If you're watching this pre-recorded, thanks for watching it pre-recorded. We will talk to everybody later. Um have a great week. See you later. Thanks y'all. Bye.