Concrete Blog

The concrete footers for our building addition are nearly complete. Three of the four sides are done. Tom will pour the fourth wall along with the floor slab.
The building is coming along, between other shop jobs. We have had great luck with the weather, as Laramie is the perfect place to be in the summertime.
The building package is here and ready to put up as soon as we can get the concrete complete. Insallation should arrive in a couple of weeks.

It is time once again, at least in the northern part of the country, to lay a little concrete! I have passed by several sidewalks that are formed up and ready for concrete. I have also noticed that many small and large companies still use the old 2X4 to screed off wet concrete.
After looking through several “Youtube” videos… I have noticed the same thing.
What is your preferred method of “striking off” wet concrete?
Also… I have noticed a tendency to use very wet concrete. Doesn’t wet concrete make weaker concrete when it drys?
Reply back and tell us your opinion!

Things here at Trade Tool Innovations have been busy! This spring (as soon as the ground is thawed) we will be embarking on a building addition. It is hard to believe that the process for our current shop/house began nine years ago on April 15, 1999. Tom was on his tractor leveling out the dirt while the snow still was flying here in Laramie. It took 2 1/2 years to complete what is now our shop/house combination. Since then, we have bought and sold several machines, done a TON of machine work, built many interesting project, shuffled our girls back and forth from elementary school, oh… and sold a few concrete screeds along the way!
We will be posting the progress of our new addition on a new website: www.tipsbytom.com. Don’t worry, our old toolsbytom will remain up and running. We will continue to sell our signature tool, the TTI Screedright Pro, and field questions about the concrete and building industries. Hope you all join us along the way… we’ll try and add photo’s and maybe even a little video!

Lamborghini. The ultimate name in luxury and success. The company began in the 1960’s by Ferruccio Lamborghini, a profitable tractor company owner. He debuted his first car in 1963 at the Turin Auto Show. Legend indicates that Lamborghini had a “falling out” with his friend Enzo Farrari and vowed never to drive a Ferrari again. The rest, as they say, is history.
While the company has ebbed and flowed throughout the past 40 sum years, they have survived because they turn out cars individually and with great care. A few websites I visited noted that just a hair over 2,000 Lamborghini’s were sold in 2006. That’s world wide. One site said that 2007 numbers looked like they may reach 2400. That’s world wide. And those are “record-breaking” numbers.
Each car means something. Each car is carefully and meticulously, built, detailed, delivered, and presented to it’s new owner. Each car will require a six figure check! Doing another simple “google” of “Lamborghini prices” leaves ones mouth open. For the price of a house… you too can own a Lamborghini… did I mention they were “sold out” for ‘08?
If you are the type who really would rather not LIVE in your car… (although, we are talking about a Lamborghini here)… maybe you ought to consider your options.
Trade Tool Innovations would like to think of its self as “The Lamborghini of the Concrete Screed World.” While we didn’t get into the business due to a dispute with anyone… let alone swear off Ferrari’s… we had in mind the same business model as Lamborghini when we rolled out our first prototype concrete screed in 2004. It was blue, and was demoed right here in our hometown. The first one we sold went to New Jersey!
Since then, we continue to manufacture, box and ship each one from our shop. If you want one then you’ll have to call us. While we probably didn’t sell as many concrete tools as the “big guys” last year (just a note… we had our own “record breaking year as well) each one we sell has a name and location associated with it.
We only make so many per year. That’s the way it is. Concrete season is just around the corner. I suppose you could either look into buying a car you’d have to live in… or buying a tool you could make a living with.
Consider it your personal “Lamborghini” of sorts.

Not long ago I received an email from Katie. She had read the piece I wrote several months back on “Concrete that Changes the World”. After mentioning that she enjoyed reading about how concrete helps in the area of handicap accessibility and our camping adventures, she drew my attention to another website: WWW.ConcreteThinker.com . I must say I was immediately intrigued by the name of the site. I like to think of myself as a bit of a “thinker”.

Anyway, I located the site and started to do a little digging through it. First of all… one CAN’T miss the “Sim City” demo on the home page. A great little click- on window that highlights concrete and it’s many environmental benefits. The entire site is dedicated to the challenge for us to think of concrete as a “sustainable resource”. I had to go to my Merriam-Webster tab to look up the word “sustainable” and found this:

1: capable of being sustained2 a: of, relating to, or being a method of harvesting or using a resource so that the resource is not depleted or permanently damaged <sustainable techniques> <sustainable agriculture> b: of or relating to a lifestyle involving the use of sustainable methods <sustainable society>

Concrete Thinker is an enjoyable website. In addition to lots of information on how people are looking at and using concrete in today’s “green sensitive” world, there are real case studies and stories of buildings and structures that are up and alive.

Here is their opening invite to explore the rest of the site:

Welcome to the Concrete Thinker web site, a resource to help design professionals make sustainable design a reality through the durability, versatility and energy performance of concrete. I like it! Love it, Live it, Think about it!

An interesting note:  I just checked our “stats” for our web site, www.toolsbytom.com.  It seems that concrete-types were online yesterday!  Maybe you guys wrestled the computer away from your wives.  The media thinks that the Monday after Thanksgiving is the big day for cyber shopping…. but our stats YESTERDAY jumped two fold! 

Maybe the weather is getting colder, maybe it just that time of year to look for new equipment, maybe it was simply your turn on the computer.  Who knows! 

On a related note… I have pictures that I have been meaning to add to the site… I guess it’s time.  Also seems that you all like to pa-ruse the pic’s along with your turkey leftovers!

On our travels through Utah on the way to Las Vegas we stumbled upon a great place to eat.  St Helen’s of Washington is a little coffee house and sports grill off the beaten path in St George.  LOTS of construction, by the way, in St George Utah.  St. Helen’s is an established establishment and runs like a well timed concrete truck.  Kwan was our server and did a suburb job of keeping our beer and salsa (home made) flowing.�

Great selection:  Philly Steak Sandwich.  I also tried the Greek Gyro.  There was also…. get this…. FREE CAKE!  I asked Kwan if there was some “special occasion”.  He said “no”.  Free Cake is a regular occurance at St Helen’s.

All those driving down to the “World of Concrete” in January should make a stop at St Helen’s.�

395 E Telegraph St
Washington, UT 84780

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Surprise… Surprise… Surprise…..Gomer Pyle: quintessential “little man”.  Gomer ran his own garage in the small mythical T.V. town of Mayberry.  Not the “star” of the show… but Andy and Barny couldn’t get along without him.  I don’t remember Aunt Bee driving… but if she did… I can imagine she may have been buzzing to the local general store in a rambler.  At any rate, Gomer no doubt kept busy changing the oil and spark plugs on the old “squad car”.  Nope, no “Jiffy Lube” or “Grease Monkey” in Mayberry!   Which, believe it or not, somehow brings me to my point…

What Ever Happened to Gomer Pyle?  The little guy who took care of things.  He took pride in his work.  He cared about the product that left his shop.  He knew his customers, and his customers knew him.  If there was a problem or a concern he could easily be found in Floyd’s barber shop. 

Most people look for the “Gomer’s” and stick with them for life.  They are local contractors, hairdressers, and your favorite “mom and pop cafe”.�

Trade Tool Innovations likes to think of itself as a “Pyle-Style” kind of place.  Let us know if that’s your company as well…!

 Okay… I have been sitting on THIS blog idea for some time now.  Those of you (and you know who you are) who follow “celebrity news” might get a kick out of my next stream of thought.  If you don’t care about Hollywood… sorry… skip around to the next blogs.

Several months back a story appeared in the “New York Times”.  The title: “Red Carpet or Rehab, It All Sells” by Eric Wilson.   The jist of it was this:  Celeb.  wild woman, Lindsay Lohan, gets photographed in the passengers seat of a car completely inebriated.  She happens to be wearing a grey sweatshirt.  “American Apparel”, the company that carries the sweatshirt, begins selling the item in great number.

Here is where the cynic in me starts to rear her ugly head.  All WE need is one drunk celebrity!  We can’t pay much for an endorsment… but we’d love to have, say… Bob Vila over for a little steak and brewski.  We could then prop Bob up next to our TTI Screedright Pro… and VOILA… the phones at Trade Tool Innovations would start ringing off the hook! 

So here it is… an open invite to ANY Celebrity who’d like to throw back a few and pour some concrete!�

 This Wednesday marks the 221st anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.  Independence Day, aka “The 4th of July”, is a uniquely American holiday.  Our friend, Bill in England, won’t get the day off for BBQ and Fireworks… although it may be noted in the UK that this was the day “those rebels” broke away from her mother country!

Our little company is much like all of those who purchase our concrete screed.  They (and we) are the folks who braved it out and wrote our own “Declaration” when we quit jobs with benefits, gave up working for “the man” and launched out on our own.  We know what it is like to search out health insurance, pay all the Social Security (AND save for retirement), and work all hours of the day, night, and weekends. 

We are also proud to call our project “American Made”…. all parts and labor originate in America…. all except the engine… but that is a topic for ANOTHER blog post. 

At any rate, we field phone calls and emails each week with questions concerning our concrete screed.  One guy last week asked if we were “very big”.  I hope I didn’t offend him when I chuckled a bit and said “noooooo”.  I used to feel the need to apologize for our “intimate company”, but then I began to realize the benefits of being small. 

We know each customer, whether they know it or not.  We have a small notebook with each name, address, phone number and engine number that sits on our desk.  They are each represented by a pin placed on their hometown.  And we love to hear feedback from everyone.  Sometimes we feel like the “little guy rebel” of the concrete screed world.  But we enjoy every minute of it! 

One more thing… our product is American Made… and so was a special man who passed away early last May.  Alfred J Alleman was 100% American.  Born and raised in the bayou of Louisiana, served our country in two wars, and raised a family in Las Vegas Nevada where he worked for the Nevada Test Site until his retirement in 1981. We’d like to say “thanks for your service and love, Grandpa Red”!

Here’s to all of you who celebrate Independence today.  And Here’s to all who fought so we could be Independent!  May you take the time to put down your trowel and bull-float… lift up a cold one… and watch the concrete dry!�