Video Transcript
Brice Raynor Speaking:
Especially here in the northeast, but across the nation, people want to get their projects done more quickly. And so are a lot of our products can reduce the time it takes to build and the project completion, we can take days off of that.
So for instance, a customer’s building a deck, could be a homeowner, could be a contractor building a deck in Arizona, they could purchase our products and install them within half an hour, they can then turn around and start building their deck. If you mix concrete on site, and it’s raining, or it’s really cold, or too hot, there’s a lot of variability I think. And that affects the concrete mix and concrete mix is affected, the lifespan of that product is affected. We take all that out of it.
When I turned 22, I decided that I didn’t want to work paycheck to paycheck anymore. And so watching my dad, you know, come up through his business career, he’s always very business savvy, and, and driven that way that that might be a good path for me. And so I decided to start EZ-CRETE in 2007, after acquiring a volumetric batch plant, and it was pretty rundown, it was me running it as a side gig really, and, and that grew into a very small precast business, we started pre casting single piece deck footings. So I could make one at a time. I think the first year we sold maybe 13 in total.
Shortly after that we developed our EZ-TUBE product and to keep up with demand that required that I outsourced production. So we outsource production for a year or two, until we got enough bankroll to fund our own operation. Most of our processes are automated, reduces a lot of labor off of our employees and streamlines our processes makes us a lot more efficient.
Our flagship product is EZ-TUBE—it’s a stackable modular deck footing. We have a pattern here in house. It’s a solution to a problem with precasts, and that it’s reduced a lot of the weight, because our products are so streamlined for the end user, the install of our product actually saves you time and money in labor, because you can put these products in so fast and you can start building right away, your labor cost goes down significantly. EZ-TUBE being the flagship product has really set the standard for innovation. All of our products here are made in house and they adhere to stringent quality standards, you know you’re getting a good product, they’re innovative. We’re not afraid to develop shapes and outs if a particular customer has a has a challenge as a shape, they may, we can make it.
We’ve proven it time and again, as we more fully automate, we would really like our employees to think more like technicians, and not not like laborers. And so machinery that we have now takes the heavy lifting out of precast. We really look to everybody on the floor and everybody in the in the business for input. Some of the ideas these guys come up with are so paramount and drive the business, we’d be foolish not to listen to them.
I think we’re family oriented, we like to have fun. I think the guys can appreciate the efforts that EZ-CRETE’s making to make their jobs easier. And also, I think they appreciate the fact that we spend a lot of time and a lot of resources on training. The greatest triumphs could be as small as hiring my first employee. And when you do that feels so good to be able to say “I’m helping this individual save for retirement or pay off student loans or purchase a new vehicle, take their kids to Disneyland”. Those types of things are very rewarding. And looking back on the last 15 years or so, I think it’s that sort of determination and things that got us here that I’m proud of.
