Preconstruction, Scheduling & Trade Coordination

Heat.

Heat. Heat.

Right

Guys, it It's Thursday. I know there's Susan telling me to rush along already. Normally Susan's in the back and uh that's with the signal she's normally giving me uh that people are getting tired of listening to me ramble and to kind of hurry up and and keep going. But uh it is June what is it? June 25th today. Yeah. June almost 4th of July and almost time to pay rent, right? So all at once. So thank you everybody for tuning in. Obviously trade industry uh podcast right here. Um we over on our new times. So I already make a note of that. Uh if you're catching this for the first time at the new time, it is now Thursday 3 p.m. Pacific time. Um and we're excited to have um not not just one great What did she say? It's 5:00 p.m. Central time standard America's time. No, no. 3 p.m. Pacific time. The only time zone that matters. So uh we got not just one great in the industry, but two greats in the industry on today. Sasha is um out riding a forklift at one of his uh facilities uh for Founders Fence. So, uh he was going to come on, but I'm like, "No, man. Just uh just keep doing what you're doing." Um that's construction and that's fencing, right? We never know. I mean, we can we can say we're going to be somewhere at 3:00 in the afternoon on next Thursday, but we might have had a truck breakdown. We might be out changing tire, might be on a forklift unloading some materials. So, uh super excited to to have you guys here. Uh Dalton, thanks for coming on, man. I know we've had you on like maybe once or twice over the years, but not a lot. So, it's really cool um to have you on here from High Point Fencing. Um and then we're going to go over to Mark. Tell everybody about High Point Fence and uh yourself a little bit. Okay. So, um we we started actually in the the landscaping and um a large acreage maintenance um and then kind of moved into fencing oh probably sevenish years ago. Um, and that's been a good transition. Uh, we can rely on better, higher quality labor than than we could in that industry, which is great. Um, and then I've been in construction for uh, let's see, about 10 years um, just about. And yeah, I've been in been with High Point since uh, 2016 also. So, yeah. Well, that's awesome. Yeah. And I know um we're fortunate enough to uh I mean you're you're also one of our close friends. So we get to chat with you a lot. Like Mark, you're you know obviously like family to me as well here in California. So um Susan I think I think it's like I'm on a podcast with my family in a way here, right? All of us. I want to circle back to you uh and High Point and your whole relationship with your family and the dynamics of that um in a second. But Mark uh with anybody that's not listening uh JC Guri uh is is like a staple in our industry as well. And I know we were running late and I think uh one of the reasons also um is you're you're you're uh you're like a staple here when it comes to event signs and relationship and supporting all the events and everything that we're doing. Even if it's an event you don't go to, I see a lot of your souvenir signs and a lot of your event signs and stuff. So tell everybody about you, Mary. Um, and I feel like everybody watching probably already knows who you are, but uh, tell everybody a little bit about, uh, JC Gur and you and Mark and Mary. Well, JC Gur's been around since 1949. U, they were service industry where, you know, the the pins with your name on it and back in the day of pocket protectors and that kind of stuff. That's that's what JC Gury did. And Mr. Gur passed away in 69, I believe. And Mary's dad bought the company in in 1970 from Mr. Gur's widow. And so he took it from a sales uh as far as specialty company to an actual manufacturer because we were a middleman for fence signs, you know, from the beginning. And Mr. Gary worked in the fence sign industry all the way back in the 1920s. and we got some of those signs on the wall in the front office, but Mary's dad actually took it from being a middleman to actually bringing production in house. And so it's just improved and gotten bigger and uh you know throughout the the years. So it's been 56 years in the same family, Mary's family. So, she's the boss and uh she's done a very good job of uh keeping everybody in line and um we you know do a little more than just the fence industry though. The fence industry is the our longest industry that we've worked in. Um but we're really big in the security industry. Portaotties,

Access control, garage doors, overhead doors, that type of stuff. But uh the fence industry is and the security industry are neck andneck with the the amount of of business that we do. Um and we try to give back to all the industries. We try to support everybody. We go to the trade shows. We'll sponsor, we'll do the uh collector signs and stuff just uh we like to be involved. It's it's all part of the family. And so that's uh you know it's it's still going and uh we're expanding. We moved into a new facility. We made a some major changes in production and we're getting more into automation as far as that that increases the our our speed. So, our lead times are dropping. You know, we're getting a little more competitive with the those digital guys that can crank stuff out in a day or two, but it's definitely not the quality of what we do. Yeah. Yeah. And that's nice when you get the quality at the speed of the guys that are doing it uh poorly, then you've really kind of hit something on there. But like you were saying, I know you serve other industry besides the fence and the gate industry, but I I think the fence and the gate industry is kind of like the Pacific time zone. It's the only thing that matters. So exactly, right? We we do have the most fun in the fence industry. So Susan K. Worley. So uh tell everybody about you. I mean, I know if you watch anything or follow us at all, uh, your your name at least pops up on there or something, either through a comment or post. I don't know. I don't know if it always shows up the same on everybody's screens. She's on my top left. I don't know if she's that on everybody else. On my top left. Okay, I set it up. This is actually the lead screen. If you notice, whoever's running running the whole show gets popped up right here. No, I'm Stephanie Worly. Um, I am part of Fence Workers Association and the Fen Show and Security Expo. Pretty much if you shoot an email to any of our fence show emails or um, FWA emails, I'm probably who answers them. If you call our numbers, I'm probably who picks up because it calls my cell phone. And um so when I when I do much else than that, so I mean let's go way let's go way back. You know, when I found Susan um bartending at this dive bar on the street from my house, I'm like I I saw the talent in her, you know, and I said I said, "You could do more than a bar witch." She was like, "You could do more than serve drinks." All right. No, it was definitely uh it's been uh since the beginning you've been here with us on all this. So that's pretty cool. But um uh we are here to talk about uh I know we're running a little late. I was actually you know who I was talking to today. No, I know when people say that like you're gonna like I think everybody should make everybody should make a guess, right? But but uh anybody listening, drop it in the comments if you had their guess, right? I just got off the phone with Sean Binsky. That's who I was talking to when we were going at three. Um, and he was in the car driving from Chicago because everybody knows that I don't know if everybody's aware that he doesn't work at CMM anymore. He's with uh is Empire Fence, I believe it is. So, uh, reach out to, uh, Empire Fencing. It's more of a I think it's a wholesale distributor. Reach out to if you don't if you haven't heard from, reach out to Sean. Ask him what's up because you know how nerve-wracking it is when you go somewhere new. Um, let him know that, uh, we all still care, you know, even though he's not selling routers anymore, right? Sean, we'll still see him. I know we'll probably still see him over at the um show and stuff popping in and stuff, but it won't be in the same capacity as uh as before. But um let's take a look at uh some of the stuff that we had outlined for today though. Um it was kind of a cool it's kind of a cool subject because I think it applies to it's funny you mentioned the other industries and stuff um Mark earlier because we say pre-construction meeting or pre-construction. I mean, that applies to far more than just pre-construction for a general contractor or for a fence or any kind of construction projects. I mean, we do

Pre-construction meetings for the fence show and security expo. You uh Mark, do pre-construction meetings for um your orders before they go into the shop, right? So, um yeah, but one of the reasons I was thinking this was great topic as well for um Dalton is you guys focus a lot on projects where if you weren't doing pre-construction meetings, stuff could actually fall apart on some of them, right? Oh yeah. Yeah. You know, most of our projects there many other trades on site and we're working mostly through GC's um to try and you know hurt all those cats and and get the project done successfully. So yeah, there's a ton of pre-construction and during construction meetings that happen. Yeah. Because uh I think when most people hear pre-construction, there's a lot of them in the industry, you kind of your eyes glaze over and you're like, h what I mean, what do you you just want us to get together and just look work order, right? Um but there's there's a lot more to than just getting together and looking at a work order. What's the biggest misconceptions people have about um you think about pre-construction meetings? Um I I would think most people think it's boring, unnecessary paperwork and unnecessary meetings. And while it can be boring at times, uh it's certainly not unnecessary. Um you know, the way I look at it, it's it's cheaper to try and solve a problem before you're on site, before you've mobilized out there than it is to uh you know, have a crew sitting on location just burning money. Yeah. And it happens quick. Um Mark, you've got a little experience in this. Uh you I mean you're sometimes people think you know you're in the sign industry and sign business but you haven't just been in the sign industry sign business. Uh you go into the plumbing landscaping. I mean uh you go back quite a ways into construction. Has any of this played a factor in any of those? Well, yeah. I a lot like Dalton, we I owned a landscape company for 24 years and we were pretty good size and we had 80 guys and 30 trucks and we uh did the construction and the commercial maintenance like Dalton. Um did a lot of fence back in the day, but you know it's uh it was all part of the landscape. It wasn't you weren't out bidding fence by itself. And so, yeah, when you at the pre-construction, I mean, like Dalton said earlier, if you got crews sitting there not doing anything, you're just racking up dollars and, you know, running back and forth to pick up parts or, you know, it it you can't make any money that way. It all has to it has to run. And you you have to play well with others when you're in construction because I mean, when I was in landscaping, we were there. We were the very first people there sleeving jobs before anything else gets done. And then you're the very last guys coming in with the fence guys if you're not doing the fence at the very end of the project. And so you you have to do a lot of coordination and and other people holding you up. And so if you if you don't play well with other guys, you can definitely lose a lot of money. We carried that over. We owned a plumbing company for 20 years as well, which we just retired about a year ago. But all of that carries over right into what we do here. I mean, we have production meetings every week. I mean, if we go out there and print 2,000 signs with the wrong phone number on them or or any of that. If if people don't know what the, you know, the right hand's doing, the left hand's doing and and the legs, you know, you you end up with uh just not making any money because you're either doing something wrong or you're you're running backwards and steps are out of whack. And so that planning is the only way that you can be successful. So what um I guess pre-construction I know we I talked earlier a little bit about pre-construction meetings are different in different um industries. So now let's fast forward to you to the sign company and then Dalton obviously with the fence and and not just fence it's construction basically you do uh you know you're at your level Dalton you're almost like a contractor right and and you're talking about getting into stuff a little heavier than just installing some chain link fence. So, um, what do you think the two like define what your pre-construction meeting on the fence on the fence sign or any kind of sign business would be? Well, on our our side, uh, pre the preconstruction meeting is we have a production meeting. So, we've gone

Through we've already got the art approved. We've got got the proofs approved and and now we have the whole everybody in every department is there to go over what is going to happen with that job. So that's that's on a weekly basis. You know, it's every Thursday and that's all the jobs that are coming up for the week. And so it's all broke down. And so if production sees that, oh wait a minute, we got a problem here. This isn't going to work. It's all worked out right then and solved. And so, um, you know, that's that's an absolute must because you can't sell a sign with the wrong phone number on it. You know, now it's going from uh, you know, a $3 sign to five cents worth of scrap metal. So, you know, it's Yeah, we know that feeling with fence materials. We could fill a recycle bin up with uh cut off posts and stuff we ordered wrong and stuff like that and it's like $5,000 worth of materials in there and you get like what 80 bucks let's talk about your pre-construction meeting. I mean just a typical one. I know they're a little different depending on what the project is, but what how would that go down? I mean is that something that goes down on site? If some goes down in your office, what would be a typical pre-construction meeting for uh High Point? I mean it depends. Uh if it's with our crews internally, that happens in the office. It's going over the job sheet, going over any um special safety procedures, you know, if we need to wear FR clothes or gas monitors or anything like that. Um the the real basic stuff um just to make sure our guys have what they need, the right material loaded up, all that fun stuff. um if it's if it's on a project either with a GC or um if we're subbing to other guys um different scopes, it's usually starts with the plans uh and making sure we're all on the same page with the plans. Um then going into the scope, exactly who's doing what, when it's supposed to be happening. Um, and then again hitting on any any safety issues, um, stuff that you need to call out that might be different than either you normally see or different than they might normally see. Um, and just making sure everybody's on the same page that, you know, this is the whole project. This is the piece you're doing. We need to get to the whole project and make sure everybody can get there. Have you ever had a project where uh, you were ready to get going? You did this pre-construction meeting and then everything just came to a halt? like something was so far off. I don't know what it was. Materials crews and you just said I we we you call the customer, we can't start. Yeah. Yeah. It's happened before. Usually it's either material issue um that when we're not providing materials um or another trade that was there before us that just so royally screwed something up compared to what we were expecting that we got to step back and kind of start over with that plan as to how we're going to tackle it. Is there something that every contractor can do before to maybe not have that halt? Like is there something they can do and prepare for before the meeting? Um, know what your scope is and go over the plans? Yeah. Don't clean out the concrete trunk in the planter beds, right? Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. Exactly. No. And and something that's big for me is especially on more complicated projects where there's more trades and more stuff happening is don't just tunnel vision on your scope. Um look at what the whole project is. Uh not cuz you're going to go do the electrical work, but is there electrical work happening near where your fence line is? That might be good to know. Maybe they're burying a line and it's going to end up um or we have we have grounding all the time at cell towers and substations, right? Yeah. that grounding. If the electricians didn't look and say, "Hey, there's a fence going here, guess where they ran their ground line, directly under every single pier, every hole we're going to drill." And it happens all the time. Um, but that that's one thing I would say is is look at the big picture. What else is happening near where you're working that could impact you? Yeah. Yeah. If you're ever curious where to where the irrigation lines are, just call and have a have a fence installed. Exactly. Right. every single line, right?

Irrigation and uh your telecom. The internet is always right along the And now it's an emergency, too. Now it's like the internet goes down. It's not like a It's not like I you know, I missed the old days when I first started it was everything was overhead. Remember that? Those were glorious days, wasn't it? Everything was overhead and you could see the power coming from the coming right over into the top of the houses over here. And only thing that was underwater was basically underground was sewer and water. That was it. And had gas. If it had gas, but I mean if it was old, yeah, there was no gas. A lot of it times it was just uh everything overhead. And I miss those days, man. And even the phone lines would come in, the data lines, everything was coming in overhead. Now all of a sudden, they buried it all. And they buried it all. Guess where? Right on the fence line. So Susan though, let's um this is perfect to have you on here, too. So we talk about pre-construction. How many pre-construction meetings do you have for the fence show? And and then let and then I want to talk about the big one that I know we have every year that goes up like uh it's typically what a week or two out before the show that we have with the property. So everybody understands the pre-construction meeting can happen anywhere, any business you have going on. If you're listening, doesn't matter what you're doing. If you got a project coming up, um pre-construction meetings can apply to anything. So tell me about the pre-construction meetings that happen with uh the fence show. We probably have one full team preconstruction meeting a month um that really focuses on where we're at, where we're going, what we're missing. Um Brian has this uh format that he believes is the fell all system and as long as the marks are checked, then we're on preconstruction planning. If they are not checked, we have not met pre-construction planning. Um, but we we do meet every single week regularly to go into deep dives into each section. But as far as our overall big team meeting, we we do a monthly one and then like you said, I want to say it's actually five days before the show opens, we have an entire precon meeting with the entire property. um AV, um the expo services company, um food and beverage, hotel directors, everybody. Um and we go around, we introduce ourselves. We have a packet about that thick that we have to go through that day and address any issues immediately. Yeah. Yeah. And that and that it was very intimidating. Our first time we walked into that meeting, we did not know what we were doing. Our first year, what 2023? So we we just say, "Oh, the property wants to do the pre like a pre-con meeting or something before our expo." And I remember walking in there, Susan. We went in there together and it was like and of course this is when this whole thing first started and I just was like, "Oh my gosh, what is going on here?" There was like a I almost I don't even want to say round table, but it's like something you'd see where like it was like a you know how they set tables up in a big room in like a square and everybody and there's like a big open area in the middle and we come in and they they had it all catered with like coffee and donuts and things but it was just must have been what 30 people in there from the entire hotel property from the housekeeping to the room reservations to registration to valet to the uh expo service people AV uh security. I mean, you name it. The whole in all the suits, everybody's in there and we're just like going, "Oh, but but reality is we're we're their customer." So, it's it wasn't like they were But it felt like some sort of congressional Senate hearing or something. I don't know, didn't it? At first, it was very scary, very intimidating for sure. We didn't know that we were going to be going line for line and like it made us recognize like, okay, we have done all this and it's in one file that fits into somebody's hand. But it also made us realize those details that we were missing also. So we came into our next one prepared and ready and we knew okay yes that is correct. That is how much food is being served on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, etc. Um yes, this is how many rooms are reserved. Yes, we do have the hotel room block closed now or

It's still open or whatever we need to negotiate with them right then and there. It's actually a really great opportunity for us to start discussing the next year right then and there as well um because of how much value we bring to their property and how much they value they bring to our show. So yeah. Yeah. I don't know if everybody heard we are officially became one of their official events of the property which means no longer are we rotating. I mean it used to be a lot of hey what dates um can we get the whole expo hall? And I mean our event is is one of the bigger events that they do on that property because we got all four expo halls and we take all the um all the training rooms those rooms that are offside of the expo. Then we need some banquet room space and we need other I mean there's a lot of space that we've grown into and we used to have to try to find dates when all that would be available when there wasn't like one smaller event going on in one of the halls or you know some of the rooms were being used for something else. But now they officially block that first week of October for us. So, we get um we get to now officially announce everybody that the first week of October is fence show week, you know what I mean? And it's always the same. It's not going to rotate around. You're not going to have to go and look at your calendar, wonder when it is. So, that was kind of an exciting thing that uh that you get to establish your show as being, you know, obviously one of the main national shows that's established on at a property like that. So, that was kind of cool. But um that's just a one like I said that's just one one case of uh you know of when pre-construction meetings kick in but it could you know it could apply to anything. Um where do you think though um this could be a blanket for either you know any any of you three that want to answer that. Um where do most scheduling failures actually begin? You know I know these pre-construction meetings is when we're actually getting ready to go but scheduling comes into play long before the pre-construction meeting, right? Oh yeah. I think a a lot of the breakdown happens with assumptions. um you know, you're maybe you're assuming that somebody else is doing something when they're not and that could be a breakdown at any point, but that assumption causes the scheduling failures, I think, a lot of the time. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think clear rules and understanding like where everybody is supposed to be working in unison. Agree. Yeah. And and I think I I I I mean to to kind of go deeper into that, I think it's it's because it's really hard. I mean, for us contractors when we're building timelines, right, of what we think and how long we think and we have, you know, some people bid projects, you know, per section, some go per lineal foot. Some, you know, take a look at it and say, um, this looks like, I mean, like you said, assumption. We assume that, hey, this looks, in fact, I I'm guilty of that. I'm like, that looks like a three-day job. Well, how'd you come up with that? This looks like a three-day job. Well, how'd you come up with that? All right, man. It's a three-day job. Okay, let it go. Hey, hey guys, you got three days to finish it or we're not going to make any money. They just kind of and like you said, they're unrealistic timelines that we just kind of sometimes fabricated. So, um you know what what do you think the biggest mistakes then contractors are making when um I probably just gave you one of the biggest mistakes is me, right? Is when contractors are building a timeline. Besides letting me come up with your timeline, what's what do you think's a big biggest mistake you can make? I mean, I don't know if it's the biggest mistake, but one we see a lot is um your your schedule is somewhat reliant on other people, right? Other trades, other companies. So, you you can't fully build your schedule because this is when we're going to be there. Uh because a lot of the time, probably most of the time, um that's fluid, that moves, right? Yep. Um, your job as as the contractor isn't necessarily to build your schedule. It's to take everyone else's schedule and mesh them all together to get the work done, right? Um, you could have to be on five different sites in in the month of June.

And depending on when other trades are finished, when they're ready for you, um, that's kind of more your job than actually building the schedule. Yeah, that's tough. You could bid you could bid five jobs a month apart and they all start on the same day. You know, it's it's just the way that it falls. But you got to stay in communication, right, with the GC and because fencing's on the end, landscaping was on the end, you know, and they've got a end date for the project and you always get compressed at the very end. Your fault. You're the last guy coming in. You got to get done, right? though you can't do your job till somebody else is finished, right? And so, but you have to really be aware with it, you know, of of what's going on on the job. You can't just say, "Well, we're starting on this date and you show up on that date and you're going to be in trouble." Yeah. We had a compressor station that we were supposed to start in I think October and it got pushed and pushed and pushed because of grading permits and I think we actually completed that project in April I want to say of this year. So I mean stuff like that that was a two or three week project that got pushed a handful of months because of grading permits. That has nothing to do with us and yet it's it's messing with our schedule. Yeah. And we get whipped on sometimes as the fence company because like like Mark's saying sometimes we're like landscaping landscaping and fencing a lot of times the last two goes into these things and you know they could have they could have the the GC maybe had I don't know three months contingency in this thing built up right and and July you know say right now July 1st was when it was supposed to be done and they burn up all their contingency on the grading guy and other people and then we get down to uh the fencing they're like okay well this project's supposed to be done by the 1 and they just give you the go ahead on the 25th to finally You're like, you're like, "No, I how I can't do that." Well, you got to put in for extra time. Now, it's liquidated damages. You got in your contract. Look on Look on paragraph four of page 38. It says you're going to put adequate labor on to maintain the schedule. And they start feeding all this crap to you, right? You before and you're So now you now you're in this documentation war of documenting that you couldn't start, documenting every delay, documenting. And that's when the documentation comes into play. like when you reached out to them 30 days ago and you were you were supposed to start according to the schedule and they weren't able to start, you needed to send an email and document it. Hey, uh we're we're ready to go and if they say they're not ready, then a week later you document it again. Document it again because that's all extensions of your time. They can't, you know, they can't come after you later if you kept trying to go out there. So, um but on speaking of contingency, um I I I think this is great because you obviously you both do some landscaping stuff in there, I'm sure, at some point on this, right? But uh you know when it comes down to even on the fencing we're typically always moving something around. But um nonetheless, you think there's a difference in how much contingency we add in for fencing and landscaping? Like do you add any in or do you just figure it depends on the job? I mean what how do you pad your your if you think it's going to take two months worth of labor? I mean what do you put in there for contingency? I mean I don't know if there's a magic number. Um for us it depends on the complication of the whole project as to how much time we need to allow. And then you know and that's for conflicts with other trades or whatever you know scheduling issues whatever. And then um just based on footage you know we'll add I'm throwing a number out there but we'll add 10% labor contingency for those random problems you run into that you know were unforeseen. Right. the uh today we were sitting we're doing dugouts and we had to sit and wait for the GC because the foundations weren't quite right. He's got to figure out whether it's going to work or not. That's not our deal. That's why he's getting paid, right? So that sit around time and wait, you know, you you find an unmarked utility. Yep.

You're still paying your guys. So that kind of thing, but I don't think there's a magic number. you it's something kind of you you learn based on experience and how your company operates. It's experience. Yeah, that's that's the same thing. It all depends on the job. But yeah, it's if you don't figure a contingency where we're located on the very end of the job, then uh yeah, you can get hurt. Yeah. Quickly. Yeah. I mean, I we eaten up a lot. It's funny how there's an issue on a job or something and uh you know and the guys you just you find out that a couple couple drops of rain or something and something's happening and they can't work and they've been then you show up out to the job and and you just roll up to check on them and it's like 10 o'clock in the morning. They're sitting the truck you're like what's going on? Oh well we were waiting on someone and I'm like so you've been in the truck for three hours waiting right and you didn't call on the radio and say you weren't able to work or nothing like it's weird how that works isn't it? But uh but they'll call you if there's a bunch of bees around the hitch or something, you know, and they're having a hard time hooking it up. But they're not going to tell you that they haven't worked in three hours. So your your uh contingency eats up fast, doesn't it? Well, we would have we would have meetings and and you know, everything on the labor side was, you know, was quoted for, you know, x number of manh hours and but we would have meetings with the crews and say this is what you have to get done, right? And and if you're not going to you have any kind of a problem, we need to know about it because, you know, there's no getting that money back. I mean, once you've blown a whole day for nothing, I mean, you don't get it back. And so, yeah, and we always had our crews, you know, they're striving to hit a certain, you know, hit their mark. And if they didn't hit their mark, you know, the other crews would look at them like, ah, you know, we're we're over here and you guys are over there and, you know, we're doing better than you. So it it it was a little bit of competition just not to have those kinds of problems, you know, but um every company's different. Yeah. Yeah. So let's um let's talk for a second about coordinate, you know, coordinating the trades and let's let's try to let's try to take some some of the knowledge that all of us have and kind of feed it into maybe uh three or four things here and getting everyone moving in the same direction because obviously it's different. Every company handles things a little bit differently. Um every crews are different. I mean, and where you where you are across the the country is different. I mean, Vegas, we're on an island, and you know, it's got to go four hours to find anybody else to work. You might as well be in the middle of the ocean, right? So, you're you're dealing with the the pool that you have there. So, maybe you deal with your your uh installers in the market a little differently. Um, you're pretty similar out there. I mean, there's not um you know, you got some cities, but Dalton, you got quite a ways to go, right, outside of where you're at to to find more people. Then you got Mark. He could throw a rock and hit he could hit five million more people, Any direction there's millions more. So, it's a different scenario. But to get everybody moving on the same direction um and working with multiple trades, what's what's your solution on that? I mean, how do you like if you go out on a project and um there's there is a you know, you happen to be kind of tied into working coming in right behind the landscaper and the irrigation and maybe maybe there's a gate operator going in. So the electrical guy's there with the concrete guy, right? And you you've got to somehow coordinate this because there's an automatic gate going in or something, right? What how how do you coordinate that? Do you keep a separate list on that? Do you have a contact list and you regularly talk to them? Dalton, what's your what's your kind of system on that? I mean, I found the best is to just do a face-toface meeting on site. Um, and again, sit down with the plans, even if you mark it out on site, you know, paint it, whatever. and try and get everybody looking. This is exactly what's happening. This is what needs to happen. Here's what you're doing. Here's what you're doing. Great. Great break. And you know uh also as those processes are happening. Um we

You know power for the gate operator ends up it happens. But that was something that we could have prevented right with meeting and sitting there and talking. Yeah, I think um I don't know if Dalton broke up at your end. He broke up on ours. Yeah. Okay. Oh. Oh, he just Man, I feel like that was some really insightful stuff, too. That was probably the only golden nugget of the entire show and it happened right there. To go to his class. That's right. That's what it sounded like. So now you got to come to Las Vegas just to find out what Dalton said and go to his class and hand October 5th to the 9th in Las Vegas. Uh get registered at fenceshow.com. Uh Dalton, you're going to be teaching um a class during this too. Uh tell me a little bit about that. I know I know you've uh are working with Veronica and Susan and everybody on this. Uh what's going on with that? Yeah, I know. I've got a couple classes I'm presenting. Um, just kind of covering some operations stuff. Um, I know some safety and accountability stuff. Um, so there's there's a handful in there. Um, anybody who's in charge of uh people, you can come to those classes because that's going to cover all that. Yeah. Yeah. And is it going to be I mean, well, you do a lot of the working with other trades, so it's going to teach people how to point fingers, be like, it wasn't my fault, it was that guy's fault. So, I mean, that's a skill, right? There's a It's a very short class of just point point and you're done, you know? So, what's going on here? Why is that fence in the wrong spot? I don't know. It was Jim. I mean, that's where he told us to put it. Who's Jim? He was just He came out of your office. I don't know I think he's with the landscaper. You should go talk to them. Yeah. So, so, um, speaking of fingerpointing, I think that's the I think that's the hardest part of, uh, you know, even when I'm talking to, um, customers that want to have maybe an automatic gate and a fence and something else and have the concrete done or something and they're always trying to get us to do the whole thing. why why that package is so attractive and you ever wondered why it's like it doesn't make any sense to you when you're making the bid sometimes because you're like all I'm doing is taking his bid marking it up and adding it to mine and selling it to you and they know this but why are they willing to do that and I've talked to people before and some of times the sales pitches it's because it's because if Dalton is installing the fence and he's also responsible responsible for the concrete operator pads the concrete for the track and the uh gate operator everything going in he can't point the finger anymore at that guy because that guy now works for him the same basically as his installers. So, um do you see that happening sometimes like the advantage for is there an advantage for you as much as it is for the customer when that happens? I mean it's certainly the convenience for the customer um because then they've only got one point of contact, right? They've now shifted all of the responsibility for the whole project onto say me and then it's my responsibility to make sure everybody else is in line and getting their stuff back. I think that is worth a lot, especially in this day and age. It seems like everybody's so busy doing other stuff. Um, that convenience alone is worth it. But, um, from my point of view, yeah, it shifts the the blame and the accountability off of anybody else and gives it to me, right? I I am now accountable for, you know, ABC Concrete's work. Well, guess what? I'm going to be paying a lot more attention to ABC Concrete's work now. I'm going to make sure they do it right and I think at the end of the day the customer ends up with a better uh end result than if it was all farmed out separately. Yeah, I agree. I uh I push for if it is a project I try to push and the gate operator and stuff like that. And I explain to I mean you you don't have to lie about it. I mean you're basically getting paid no different than a a general contractor that's coordinating other people and they're charging for that. So if you are ever adding something in there and you're legal, obviously do it legally. Don't don't you

Know illegally contract with people that you don't you're not licensed to do. But as long as it's all done I know I feel like I should put it there should be like a disclaimer at the bottom of my face, right? Because uh but but nonetheless, yeah, you want to make sure you're doing everything the right way, but um definitely go in and and charge for it because uh you are shifting that liability kind of like what you said over there. And sometimes uh you end up have to pay the deposits. It's funny how you're bidding it to the general contractor. I know you've gotten into this before, Dalton. I'm sure Mark you have where you got someone else working for you and you've got the big contract. Well, this person working for you is a smaller part of it. He still wants his 50%. And you're now putting out, you know, $5,000 for equipment and you haven't even built the job yet. Yeah. Yeah. We run into that a lot for government work. They want to put deposits down. So then we're eating it and, you know, floating that until the project's done. But it's that's also why it's important to find um subs that are that are good that you can count on because then there's less risk to you because again you are taking on that risk um by subcontracting stuff out and plus never take uh somebody's word for it if they tell you you know they want you to do something extra and they'll pay you for it and you don't do it without a change order. You get it in writing because you will not get paid. too. Yeah. Yeah. Nothing without I mean I I love that when they try to say, "Oh, you have to do it. You have to do it." I'm like, "Man, I don't have to do anything." But yeah, that's what she'd be doing right now. She's like, "You look too comfortable." Right. She hates it when I'm enjoying myself. So, um, she was a cheerleader apparently. But it does speed up the coordination meetings and the documentation. So, one last final thing on this part before we let that um that you know that talking about working together and moving in the same direction. Um the documentation I kind of briefly touched on earlier. Um definitely if you're doing these pro these type of projects and you're working with anybody that whether it be the general contractor and you got subs involved um documentation is probably the number one thing. You may think you don't need it, but how many times have you went back uh either one of you guys and referenced some sort of documentation that you did 6 months earlier, whether it was a photo, something? What um what what do you do for documentation, Dalton? I mean, photos of everything. Um before you even get there on site, send somebody out there to take photos. um having copies of everything as far as your contract scope um having all that ready and then any change, any issue, anything that was unforeseen um gets photos and documentation and you save all that and you save it forever because who knows when you might need it again. Yeah. So, I think that um I know I'm asking all the questions, Susan, because Sasha, I know you you I I feel like I'm I feel like I'm hogging it, but this is a subject that I love. I mean, it's it's kind of cool. Yeah, that's why I'm letting you that's why I'm letting you have the spotlight, but I do have it documented about the raise you promised me. Oh, did you take pictures? Well, according to my note, it says, "You are full of BS." But that's my note. I got it right here. You got it all right there. I noted it, you know. So, uh, but so, yeah. So, I want I do wanted to bring up though, um, we're talking about and sometimes people are listening and thinking this is just because I know Las Vegas Fence does commercial industrial. You guys do a lot of commercial industrial. Um, Mark, you've done a lot throughout the years. So, when we talk, we're talking as if it sounds like we're talking about large projects where there's tons and tons of trades. Um, this applies though, um, I believe to whether you're just going out and working directly for the property owner, whether it's homeowner or not. Um, so what principles that we were talking about here do you think apply to just the average fence job? I mean, forget about all the trades and and you know, subs and stuff. What do you think that what applies over to a normal job? I mean, documenting everything. Exactly. Same pictures, same documents. Yeah. Yeah. And obviously on a on a

Simple project with less moving parts, there's going to be less to document. At the same time, still do it. Get in the habit of doing it. If you're ever on a site with more stuff going on, if you're dealing with homeowners, but yeah, if you're working with homeowners, because we did a lot of custom houses, you have to really kind of do a little handholding though because customers don't I mean, a GC knows a whole lot more about the job, construction job, than a homeowner is going to. And and so you got your scope of work has to be spelled out and what is your responsibility because you know when they they see your price they sign a contract and a lot of times they include a lot of stuff in their head that's not No, that's that's a great point, Mark. I mean you should have on your contract everything you're including and everything you're excluding. I mean stuff like are you going to hand dig holes? Are you going to hydroac holes or is that an add-on? Um, Anything. Are you rock drilling? Do you foresee yourself having to rock drill? I don't care. Put it in an exclusion then. Right. Like anything to cover your ass and make sure that you're not footing the bill at the end of the day. Oh yeah. We've had to jackhammer out holes for plants and and trees, you know. I mean there is a you know in the DG where you you cannot use a shovel and and you have to cover that stuff ahead of time. And otherwise you know now your labor costs have gone up 30% because you know you're still got to put the stuff in the ground but if you didn't make provisions for it in the in in the beginning the customer doesn't want to cough up any more money. Yeah. Yeah. you know, and and we got a project going right now where um we went out and installed the job, customer, it was a great job, all that. And then we get a call and the all that was wrong was the lock, the the type of handle they used on the gate wasn't what they you know, he's saying, "Oh, the salesman said this and the salesman said that." And then I'm looking at the the paperwork and it was it wasn't documented exactly what type of what type of lock, what type of latch, all this stuff, right? So then um then you got your sales guy saying, you know, which was actually when it went and actually bought the it was at the hardware store. I called the customer and I asked him whether he wanted a knob or whether he wanted a handle and the customer said he wanted a handle and I believe all that happened, right? So then they purchased the there was a couple couple locks or handles with the handles on them. They go and they install those. Meanwhile, kind of what we're talking about, you sent your crews there. So it's not just a $50 handle. It's a It's one that you sent a crew that's, you know, build out at thousands of dollars a day out to install after the fact, right? So then you install it and then uh you're trying to collect it and you get another call and now they're angry and they're like because maybe the guy you were dealing with, boss said something says, "Well, I told the salesman I wanted the handle and here's a picture of the handle I wanted. The job's been done for a while. It's been closed out. We got a signature on it, right? saying it's been done and um the closeout document and they're saying this is a picture one. First time we've seen it. First time anything's ever been documented about the type of lock and stuff and now you've got a unhappy customer and or it's going to cost now this one little $50 lock is now costing you $1,000 if you want to make the customer happy, right? So, uh, it's amazing what that little little note on the on the order form or a picture or anything instead of doing a a verbal over the phone, hey, do you want a doororknob or you want this? It should have been a message and then it should have been here's a picture of what we're going to provide. And that would have that would have been a $1,1500 savings on an email, right? Well, and even if you have that phone call, let them know, hey, I'm gonna follow this up with an email. uh confirm that this is what we talked about. Yeah. Per our conversation. If I had a dollar every time I have an email that started off saying per our conversation, you should just that should be that should be burnt into your mind. Per our conversation. Now, it doesn't, you know, if they reply back anything at all, they just agreed to whatever you talked about on the phone and then you documented it

Anyway on your email. Per our conversation. You said you wanted blue RAL number 40556 and then you leave it at that. Right. Is that why you don't answer any of my emails? I don't want anything documented. Yeah. Right. We logged all all of our phone calls, you know, were in our CRM. And so, I mean, you typed in real quick what I mean, even a just a, you know, a simple phone call was always, "All right, talked about this. You gave approval for that and then you can follow up with the email, but but we just then you can search it really quick, you know, on your CRM, your call dates and stuff, but documentation is the key. And it's so much easier today with with, you know, cell phones and everything else. I mean, in back in the day, we had disposable cameras we had to give to the crews, right? And no matter what, they had to go out there and take the the the pictures and then we had to get them developed and, you know, but I mean, it it progressed when digital cameras came. But now now there's no excuse for not documenting the job, I feel like we should make like a video of that, Dalton. We should, you and I, we should give our crews like like those disposable cameras and just and just start hand them out and say, "We need you to start taking pictures with this from now on and uh just have them look at them and go, "What is this?" About some of the pictures we might get back. We're doing that on the fence show having just a bunch of disposable cameras we hand everybody and they just drop it in the bin on the way out. We did we did that originally with the crews so that if they ever had any accidents, that's how we started. There was there was disposable cameras in every glove box. So if they got in a fender bender or whatever, somebody got hurt, they could snap all the pictures. But then it progressed to then job photos and that kind of stuff. Yeah. So I got one more thing. Um I want to do I want to do a full throttle challenge uh question before Susan gets into the full throttle education preview of stuff. So um so this is for both of you guys. Um, if you could force, and I feel like we kind of went over a lot of this already, but if you could force every contractor in America to do one thing before starting a project, what would it be? I would say probably a job walk with everybody, every trade that touches the work you're doing. Um, at the beginning of every single project and then throughout every single project. Um, just so everybody's on the same page. Oh, absolutely. I would agree with you. Um, also I would I would get contact information from the guys that directly affect you. Um, because it's so much easier to get on a phone call and say, "Hey, Joe, um, this is going on here." You know, if you have to go through the GC or anything on a on a commercial job, there's a time lag that happens. But if you can avoid, you know, the fingerpointing and all that with a quick phone call. Um, I mean, that's what we used to do. We would just, if there was somebody was going to, you know, the concrete guy on the curbs or, you know, something, the electrician that, you know, it's if you get on a firstname basis, at least you have a contact, it helps a lot. Yeah. Yeah. I guess mine would be um make sure every person in the truck reads the work order before they leave the yard. I don't care if it's the helper, if it was the guy that you just, you know, and if he's only been there a day, two days. I think it's I think I'm I'm the first one to say slow down in the morning. And everybody's always uh you know, in such a rush sometimes to get out of the yard and they don't double check the tools, the trucks, and uh you know, all that stuff is going out. So, I think that if you've got whether it's one guy or four guys in that truck and sometimes you got double, you know, four doors and two guys to four guys going, I think that uh if that work order wasn't sitting in each one of those guys' hands for five minutes while they read it, um something could go wrong because sometimes even that new guy will catch something, you know. Yeah. But, uh I think that's it for that. But Susan, let's talk about some full throttle education. Let's do some uh preview stuff. I know I feel like we uh we really kind of braided them with

Questions already. So without getting them too deep into questions, look at his cameras doing that cool thing. Oh, it keeps moving. All of our cameras have that cameraman. He was doing that the other day in one of our meetings. I don't remember. Yes. And I didn't like it and I made them turn it off because it kept getting closer to his face. Yeah, I like it. I'm gonna figure out how to turn it on. Yeah. That way I can I could be standing behind us walking around and the camera will be following me while we're talking. and I could be on the dry race board asking questions, but uh you know, examples on there. Um let's talk about the full throttle education. Um Dalton, um we're super excited you're going to come and and and teach some of these classes. And obviously anybody that enjoyed this conversation at all, imagine that with you when you really got everybody sitting there with some workbooks and and being able to raise your hand and ask some questions. And you know what? Don't raise your hand. Just belt your questions out if you want. Um you know, no, raise your hand, please. We encourage the heckling, but you know, Dalton, you suck. No, you don't do that. I know you had mentioned um what they can kind of expect from your classes and um who should attend, but what's one thing you think that the attendees will actually be able to immediately take back to their businesses and implement? I think um accountability whether that's you with other contractors or you with your team um I think that's going to be a big a big focus um and not like you know reprimanding but just everybody being on the same page um and and building that communication between all your folks. It's a big deal. That's a big deal. What are we doing? We doing rapid fire. I say we do some rapid fire questions for rapid fire. Rapid fire. I purposely did not go down. I I never read the rapid fire questions prior. Um I don't even know where Susan gets them, but uh because I think it's kind of I think it's better if I don't read them in advance and then um in case I want to answer one honestly too. Um we got to be honest. I'm gonna rotate between um both of you guys on this one. So, uh, Mark, um, I'm going to start with you. Okay. One scheduling tool every contractor should use. Pencil and paper. We're We're uh Yeah, we were old school back in the day, but um, definitely I mean, timelines for me is uh is super important. Um, and it's the same thing in the sign business, right? We've got constant, you know, constant jobs. I mean, we've got 40 jobs going on at one time in the shop and it's it's it all has to go in a certain order, right? And so that's why every morning every, you know, of course, we got a great production manager and he'll he'll sit there and just line out the whole day and he does it in like 10 minutes, right? And everybody knows what's going on. But without that little 10 minutes of scheduling, right, things could go quite wrong. So your tool would be scheduling, whether it's pencil or paper, Excel, whether it's one of the software programs that are out there, Um I think that's I think we can all kind of agree agree on that. And talk about your your your foreman out there. Does anybody know how long his foreman's worked for him? 40 years. Yeah. That's that's impressive. I mean, you got to have one hell of an outfit to keep someone 40 years, right? Oh, yeah. Yeah, we are. We got a printer's been here 37 years, 25 years. I mean, uh, it's Mary's been here 45 years. Odds are if you took over your parents' fence company and they used to buy order their signs from JC Guri before you took over. Odds are I really Yeah. Guy Dalton. Odds are the same people making them is what I'm trying to say. That is nuts, right? It speaks volumes to the the ship you guys are running, right? We appreciate that. Thank you. It's pretty cool. So, we have the best team. Bye. Big rapid fire. That one wasn't so rapid. So, this one's for you, Dan. Rapid fire. Round fast answers. Biggest preconstruction mistake.

I would say not understanding your scope and um having it in writing in your contract. Yep. Very. We're under bidding the job. Wow. Mark, we hope we got past that point. I still haven't got past that. So, I mean, I'm still trying to work. So, so Mark, coffee, energy drink, or both? Oh, I have both. I'm good for two cups of coffee and three monsters in the day, right? I made coffee and this is probably my third or fourth one. I've got to get back on that morning. You do you do uh monster? Monster. Yeah. Are you a coffee drinker, Dalton? Um I if I have time, yes. I usually go for the energy drink because I can just pop it out of the fridge and take it. Yeah. Yeah. And do it quick. Okay. So, um Dalton, one habit that separates great project managers from the average ones. Communication. Yeah. the I mean that that's what'll make or break both the project and the relationship um between contractors. Awesome. Only two more you guys. This is one's for Mark. One reason contractors should attend the fence show because they need to buy fence signs in booth 715. Shameless plug. I love it. So So you're talking about for the show specials on your fence signs. Is that what it is? Yeah, we are going to have some show specials, right? And we are going to be able to, you know, design right there, you know, uh, for people who who, you know, if they got logos or anything else, um, we're going bigger and better. We're going full throttle. Full throttle. Hey, um, Dalton, one last question. Favorite project you've ever worked on? That's a tough one. Yeah. I don't know how I would answer it. Favorite project? Um, it was both my favorite and my most hated. Uh, we did a project that was uh it was buildings for some um endangered ferrets. Um, and we did we did footings and the whole uh the pen pen structure. It was basically a steel building and instead of tin it had wire. Um, but that was both full of headaches and just massive pains. Uh, but seeing it done and being able to do that project was was pretty cool. Yeah. Yeah, that'd be a cool project. I did I did a gorilla cage once. Um, and that was kind of cool because we had to uh we built the cage. Obviously, it was all heavy wire. wires, bolts, nuts, but uh we had to weld every nut and bolt because the gorillas were so strong that they could actually undo and even if you got it in there with an impact. You couldn't tighten you couldn't use a wrench or pliers or a socket or anything to tighten it to the point where they couldn't undo it with their fingers. So, that was kind of a cool project, but scary at the same time, right? Yeah. Because uh if you screwed something up, right, they could tear this apart and get out, I guess. So, that was uh that was my gorilla cage. It's funny how it's animal related for both of us, right? Any any uh thing I see Kent um down in uh San Diego. I don't if you follow any of his stuff, but he does all the stuff at the zoos and stuff. Have you seen some of those? those crazy to watch. Yeah, we're actually getting into some more work at uh our local zoo and it's it's fun work for sure. I mean, it's totally different than regular commercial work. Yeah. Yeah. So, Dalton, Mark, thank you for um joining Susan and I. It was really cool. Anybody that's listening, if you're serious about improving um project execution, profitability, reducing headaches, you don't want to miss Dalton's full throttle education series um and sessions that he's got going on at the show. Um it's uh just from this conversation alone, hell, I'd like to sit down and have you give me some advice on projects I got going. So, hey, we've sat down a couple times and talked back and forth. So, I know it's the the blue bar. We got to meet at the blue bar. So, yeah, afterwards we'll all be meeting at the blue bar and you can get uh get some uh get even get some even more answers on stuff. Uh Susan, how are people going to get registered for this and how do they sign up and and get more information to uh not just go to the sessions and and see Dalton and all the other there's what 30 there's over 30 or

40 instructors of this thing now. This is the most full throttle uh groundbreaking educational series that we've ever put together at a show. So, how do people get involved and find out? And I hear you're looking for you got a few last minute instructors for a few classes and this Yes, email me susanfinshow.com or give me a call. My phone number is all over social media. Um, if you go to fenceshow.com, you can also reach out. You can see the instructors that are currently instructing and vote on them. You can register for the fence show. Full throttle passes are $150 right now. That's a deal. How much prices?$1 150. That includes a t-shirt, food and beverage, all the education, including Dalton's class. What? Crazy. And you know what? If if you get a full throttle pass, I could either make sure Brian speaks to you or doesn't speak to you depending on your Just let her know. You should put that on there and give everybody a sticker so I know who to avoid, right? That doesn't want to talk to me. Not me. I love it. It just be everybody be everybody that works for us would have one of those on. But so $150 I don't this is unheard of education for $150. I mean it it Susan that can barely even cover the cost of doing the education. I mean that's crazy because I mean I could drink and eat $150. So I It's true. It It's definitely priced to let people know that we care about their education. We care about small mediumsiz businesses. We care about this industry and helping it grow. So, yep. And um so la last but not least, you guys, what's the call to action right now? You guys get over to fencow.com. Right. Absolutely. And get registered for the fence show. Upgrade to the full throttle pass. If you've already registered in the past, you can actually go and uh go to the same registration page at the top. You can um click on um I believe it's login or something to your account and it's going to send you a magic link there called if you ever done any of those to where uh give you a link to log in and you can actually upgrade your pass from a a regular pass to a full throttle if you want while the passes are still discounted. Um and do that and you can vote for your favorite instructors as well. Dalton, you're on there. Everybody, you know, there's a lot of instructors in there. We're voting for um your favorite instructor. I haven't looked at it today, but uh it was uh growing pretty quick. So, that's pretty cool. So, everybody, fenc.com, get registered. And remember, if you learned anything today, the fastest projects aren't always the best plan projects. Right. Right. What about best fence sign? Just saying. Great planning. Where did she come from? Let you go full throttle when it matters, you guys. Mary, get back over here. Am I in trouble? He's coming. You can tell we share an office. We share an office. So, I'm just his sidekick. We were just talking about what an amazing company that you and your father and everybody has built. The fact that you've got um your your shop supervisor, everybody's 40 years. You've got people coming on 37 years and the 20s. I know if anybody's ever been over to uh JC Gur's office, you'll see this this wall of fame we call it. And it's pretty cool. You see 10 I mean there's a whole stack of people that have been there 10 years. A whole stack that have been there 20, a bunch that have been there 30. Now you're seeing um I I I think you see one or two people starting on the 40-year line if I remember last time I was there. And we've they're all signs. We kind of make signs. So their names on signs. Yeah. It's a sign on the wall. But that's kind of cool. So um I know you'll be running some show specials coming up at the fence show. Uh we appreciate all your support. Um, if you follow anything we're doing, you'll see um, Mark and Mary and JC Guri all over it because you guys are just amazing for our industry and um, you know, I know you guys have been um, someone we've really leaned on for um, assistance and stuff too. So,

Thank you guys for what you do. Dalton um, we'll see you shortly. Next Thursday, 3 o'clock Pacific time. We'll see you guys back here. Same time, same bat channel. See you guys later. Bye bye.