Concrete Blog

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!�

How does a normally otherwise, almost 40ish, mom/concrete tool entrepreneur/amateur blogger find herself up at the computer at 1:47 in the a.m.?  It may have something to do with that extra scoup of beans at dinner… OR… it could be a “wicked case of the ‘BLOGUILTS’.  (Just by virtue of my using the term “wicked” one might have easily guessed my age and there probably was no need in disclosing THAT bit of information… but as I stated… the “bloguilts” do hit hard.)What, praytell, are “the bloguilts”.  It has to do with hosting a blog and then proceeding to ignore it for the past two, practically three, months!  Of course blog ideas have been floating around my head and I will do my best to write, categorize, and spell check them in the coming weeks.

Just today we had vistitors stop by the shop to check out one of our concrete screeds.  An absolutly charming cowboy from up near Dubois Wyoming. ( Dubois is a great little town at the gateway of Yellowstone National Park and is pictured above.)  He came through on his way to an antique truck show in Colorado with his son.  His son had seen our screed on the web and they wanted to see it first hand.  NOW, probably the OTHER reason for my nocturnal alertness… I DIDN’T take any great photo’s of the visit… so this is a “text only” blog… oh, I’ll try and find some photo’s to fit the story!

Anyway, our new friend Mac and his son Mark, along with Mark’s girlfriend, Kara, got the full tour… we were all old enough and a complementary can of beer was included.  Mac and Mark assured us that they had a lot of concrete to pour up in Idaho for a daughter/sister.  They were fairly certain that our concrete screed would do the trick… atleast I had the impression that Mac could picture Mark behind the screed!  We wish them a fun time in Colorado and a great trip back to the ranch! 

Well, long story short, that is what Tom and I love about our business model… Tom builds, I tell the story, and our customers become friends.  We’ll see if we can’t get Mac, Mark and Kara to send along a few photos! 

That’s about it for this blog… a little confession is good for the soul.   I think there is a little cake left over in the kitchen….

We here at Trade Tool Innovations experienced a first this past weekend!  We sold our first concrete screed from our shop!  We have been plugging away in the past couple of years, advertising on the internet, making a few phone calls, and don’t get me wrong… we’ve shipped many out!  They have gone up north to Olympia Washington and as far south as Tortola (in the British Virgin Islands).  Everytime we ship a concrete screed out, we put a little pin in our map on the wall.  Over the years it has been exciting to see where they have shipped out and to hear from all those who purchased one.  We had, however, not had a “customer at the door” yet… except for our prototype that Dean Mercil purchased after trying it out for us:).

Back to the story…

It was a snowy Saturday morning in March… the phone rang… it was Mike from Torrington Wyoming, in town for the weekend.  “Can I come over and see your screed”?  He asked.  “Sure” I said.  And the rest is history.

Trade Tool Innovations is about “boxing” your tool for you… not “big box”.  We enjoy staying in touch with those individuals and companies that purchase our screed.  It is a different business model from most companies out there. 

We give Goshen County Construction a big hello and wish them well in all their concrete adventures.  More than that… we LOVE hearing how things are going!

There is really ONLY one way a true tool is invented… out of necessity… or frustration.  When someone is finally frustrated by how things are going… that someone is more than likely to start thinking of better ways to do what ever it is that is frustrating him/her.

 This was a familiar site to young Tom G.  He has been helping his dad pour concrete since he could stand and hold a bull float.  You see, LeRoy, Tom’s dad, is no dummy.  He had three sons and one daughter.  And when it came time to pour concrete… you guessed it… LeRoy would hand two out of the four the dreaded “screed bar”.  So everyother turn was Tom G’s.

As the years passed by, Tom G thought to himself “there MUST be a better way!’  Especially because, I forgot to mention, Tom G was the youngest out of the four syblings and it seemed as if HIS turn at the end of the screed bar came a little more often than his brothers or sister. But enough of sybiling rilvary… it doesn’t play much into the over all story.

Tom G. began to draw out and design his new “better way”!  Sure he’d seen other concrete screeds come and go.  He’d seen the big one that utilizes a couple of 2″X4″’s… his dad even had a notion to use one once when he picked one up at a local auction.  It was a bit big though… kind of awkward to handle. 

Then there were the little “weedeater” type screeds.  Light weight, aluminum board…etc.  But Tom G being the cheapo he is wasn’t about to drain his savings to purchase screed board after screed board so he had the correct length for each pour.

Back to the “better way”… a heavy duty all steel frame (Tom G could weld it himself) that utilizes one wooden screed bar that can be trimmed to the specific length of each pour.  He’d even include a little ditty he made up called “crown clamps”… (his wife affectionatly calls “clown cramps”) that would give a little bend to the board if one needed to slop the slab a bit.

The first TTI screed was born… I guess you could say a boy… it was blue.  Small improvements have been made here and there to help create a lighter weight machine (58 lbs) yet not so light weight that it blows away in the Wyoming wind.  It is a solid “man’s screed”.  The origional screeds shipped out in three separate boxes… but Tom G redesigned the newer red model to ship in one standard size box (did I mention he is a cheapo?).

“Concrete Screed in Grass”

I just gotta know… is the World of Concrete worth it?  I know enough to know that it is a BIG DEAL in the concrete industry.  What I want to know is this:  Is it really worth schleping your concrete company, tools, supplies, etc. to Las Vegas aka the worlds largest “Paved Paradise”?  Do contractors actually take their crews and expect them to attend the many workshops offered by the “HanleyBunch”?  AND… do they actually attend!?!?!? Is it simply a huge showcase for the concrete industry “big guys”?  Because, honestly, our humble company looked at attending…

After parusing the website… nice…. and receiving the media materials in the mail… nice… I checked out the price tag on the function… not nice…

And from what I have gathered from other folks who attend the WOC to promote their business, the crack in the sidewalks are not the ONLY cracks their see’in.  Supposedly… everytime a “boother” (and you know who you are) turns around they are prompted to reach into their back pocket to pay for yet another “extra”.  Forklift help, extension chords, a CHAIR…..  Anyone out there ever been to Graceland?!?!

Anyway, far be it from me to be the gal complaining about the Prom… when I’ve never been…

Also, I don’t want to get the rep. of being a grump.  Someone help me out!  Is attendance to the WOC slump? or chump?  Does a company sell more product than it shells out… or eventually looses in the casino? 

All comments will be taken…

A great new website to check out for all you decorative concrete guru’s is www.concreteideas.comÂ
Concrete Ideas is a great concrete resource to check out. Lots of good articles, pictures and, of course, ideas. This one should be a must read once a month.

Concrete IS the housewives new best friend!  As any wife, mother or female married to her house knows… there is a lot to take care of.  Why worry about extranious things like counter tops and floors. 

Most new homes and upgraded additions include concrete floors and counter tops.  It is both a simple and worry free way to have that “designer look” with out paying the big price…

Renee is in the middle of adding a livingroom/master suite onto her house.  She has wisely chosen to use concrete as a basic medium for each room.  She loves the versatility and durability that concrete provides.  She has also discovered the rich  beauty of concrete.  Her entire livingroom floor is made of concrete formed to look like natural color marble.  She has carried that look up sweeping circular stairs that lead into the existing front room and dining area.   

The master suite includes a large sleeping area, private office, and an outdoor inspired master bath.  The overall plan includes a large concrete counter top to accent the sink. 

We’ll keep tabs (and more photos) on the project as it continues to unfold! 

Concrete is used as a decorating accent in many of today’s homes and yards.  From flooring to outdoor art work, the unique qualities of concrete add to the homeowners experience.  It seems that decorative concrete is everywhere these days.  It is no wonder that the concrete industry is leaning more and more into the “fashion” world! 

 Just try searching for a concrete contractor in your favorite search engine.  A whole host of companies pop up specializing in concrete decoration.  Let’s just call this type of work “Cinderella Concrete”… well… beauty has got to start somewhere!  I admire all of those “Fairy Godmother” contractors out there who can work their wonders with the slushy grey stuff!  Have you ever seen concrete come out of a truck? 

Of course you have, your reading this blog aren’t you:)!  At any rate, even Cinderella got her start by hanging out with the Step Sisters.  This blog will attempt to explore all aspects of the concrete industry.  My interest is peaked MOST by all of the media that is being generated toward contractors, homeowners and the like.  Websites, magazines, direct mailings, concrete training semenars (or as one guy calls it: demonars… I like that one).  How is a guy (or a concrete gal) suppose to sift through all that “noise”? 

 Well, like I said, beauty’s got to start somewhere! If you are the concrete contractor, it most certainly starts with the pulsing beep… beep… beep… and then, well, you know, out comes the slush!