David Brown 17:15
Well, in projects retail like this, you know, with coffee, or any restaurants, dealing with the health department, you’re dealing with the sanitation, you’re dealing with the building department, you’re dealing with the fire department, and each of them have their own set of guidelines and rules. And at any given day, an inspector from the health department can say, I want a grease trap. And this is where I want it. Right. And the next day, we’ve been in a building a building inspector, who says grease trap is not in the right place. I don’t like this type. I don’t want this type air it out. And those city departments don’t talk to each other. And so that’s again, part of navigating. Okay, well, we’ve got a problem. The big one, everybody in
Greg Owens 18:04
the room, and I’ve seen those personalities clash, right. And then you know, and then the owner and the contractor is ultimately responsible for it.
David Brown 18:13
Right? Making the throw our hands up, you know, going back to the building owner, listen, I you know, I’m really sorry, but this is the way it shows it on the plans, and it was approved by the city. And now I have an inspector who’s wanting to do it go rogue. And then the other inspector saying no. And you know, to be honest with you, it happens more in San Francisco than than other cities. But San Jose, and in that county is is pretty different. Yeah.
Greg Owens 18:44
That’s interesting. Katrina, did you have a question?
Katrina Stephenson 18:46
or comment Really, I guess that I know, San Jose passed there a few times. That is surprising and interesting to hear. Because there are a lot of restaurants in San Jose. I mean, I just pass through a few times. And there’s a ton of establishments. So that makes sense. It would be difficult.
David Brown 19:04
Yeah. And it’s the end of the day, the health department has to sign off first. And then then the fire department, and then the building department. So the building department wants to flex their muscle, grow their chest out saying, Well, hey, I’m the last line. So you better do it my way. But you’re stuck. Because a lot of times you can’t get there until you massage this. And of course, that brings additional costs that are unforeseen by anybody. And then we get to the education over again. And you know, even before the project starts, we try to tell our clients take you know, come in there with 10 to 15% contingency on a what if we’re going to try not to spend that money but in this situation where we had to dig out what we did and redo it. It’s it’s money that
Greg Owens 19:58
yeah, that’s so true. So, and tell me more like, How did Metcon get its start in, you know, what’s the what’s the background, or the the origin story of Metcon?
David Brown 20:11
Yeah, so Metcon is taken? Well, this goes back to the early 80s, we were mag tech Corporation are mag tech company. And we did the mountable walls, we were in with Jack Diamond company and sort of, you know, the 70s and early 80s when the mountable wall systems were really popular, and they would consider furniture and put them in, take them out, you know, they were just finally over g rock, two-foot by 10 foot or whatever lakes have. And so, you know, that’s kind of, you know, the start in the beginning of mag tech. And that kind of went through the process. And again, we had several clients, mostly in the East Bay, popular with a demountable walls in the East Bay, I wasn’t familiar or I’m 57 now, but back then I was young and dumb, and go into the city for much work to be honest with you, because we have so much to me. So I’m not sure what San Francisco’s design was, and what they were, you know, doing it though particular. And like a lot of companies, you kind of, you know, you can fall victim to your own success. And that’s what, that’s what mag tech, the we, you know, it didn’t become a victim of their own success. And then you start taking chances, the the owners got in a little bit of trouble, one of the one of the workers, but good friend of mine, we grew up together, he saw the writing on the wall and went and got his license. And when things went south for mag tech, he went to all the clients and say, hey, look, apologize, we got to go through this right here, but we’re going to keep all the same employees, we’re going to give you the same service, we’re going to, you know, it’ll be transparent, you won’t feel any effects of, you know, this transition that we have to, and then we, you know, we kind of grew to the next level demountable walls then became obsolete, because they weren’t considered furniture, you know, I wouldn’t want to say kind of late 80s, mid to late 80s, they became furniture. So there was no real benefit for the install on that system. And so, you know, then it just became, you know, drywall and all of the goodies that general contractors do, and then once again, fell victim to the, to the success, and that owner got into some trouble. And then my brother, he went and talked to, you know, kind of our main, our main client, and we just had one, and this was, I want to say 2005 2006 when things went bad with the economy, and we were really struggling, you know, with the whole housing crisis and all that stuff. My brother, we got time. Oh, tough, really tough. So my brother went and got his license spoke to our main client, we only had one at the time, because it was just a terrible time. And it kind of rebranded itself. And with that client, I think at the time, I honestly, we probably had three or four employees as all and then that one client just kind of helped us through some bad times. And, you know, here we are, I think at the height of our company a couple of years ago, pre-pandemic, we were 55 to 70 employees or so something in that range, and in doing 35 to 40 million in that range. So we’ve really come a long way, rebranded ourselves, and then kind of expanded our client base. So it’s been, it’s been a crazy ride, we’ve been through, you know, three of the of these processes where you, you know, you kind of pull up the bootstraps, you get going, you, you know, you start having success, and then you fall victim to that success. And then you have to start over and rebrand. Yeah, that’s a great,
Greg Owens 23:57
that’s a great story about sort of educating people on what it’s like to own a business. Right. And, and, and people think that it’s like a, it’s a straight line that that line keeps going up, right? Like you get started, you learn more and you keep you keep growing and you keep getting better. And the reality is, is that that line is a such a squiggly line. It’s like you learn some things and then those things become obsolete. Like you were talking about these these moveable walls, like and then all of a sudden everything drops, right? And then you have to rebuild from scratch again, or where you run into new challenges with the economy dropping out from underneath you and you just have to reinvent yourself as a as a company. Absolutely. I know for sure, like my company here. McCarthy Painting’s had to go through multiple different iterations of that for sure. Right. Yeah. It’s such an interesting like history there of Metcon and I’d like to get into a little bit about your, your, your background, and how you got into this because part of what I’ve been doing on this podcast is Just sort of educating people to the different types of career opportunities that are out there, right. And so there’s so many different career opportunities that I think a lot of up-and-coming younger people that are looking at, these things don’t even realize exist, right. And we’ve learned Katrina and I have learned and think it can be all kinds of different ways that people stumble into some of these types of careers that they never knew existed, but they absolutely love because they get to do what you were saying earlier, problem-solving and that kind of stuff. Katrina, you have a question?
Katrina Stephenson 25:37
A lot of rebranding, I’ve noticed a personal rebranding. Definitely.
Greg Owens 25:44
Yeah, that’s a good summary of it.
David Brown 25:45
Yeah, I’m a I’m a really good example of that. I was born into a construction family. So mag tech was started and founded by my uncle and my father. And so you know, growing up at age 12, during the summer, guess what you did? Yeah, up in the truck swept up the job site. You loaded the truck with debris, and you went to the dump. And so those were my summer jobs. And, yeah, so it’s, you know, when you’re in a contract and family, it’s like, No, you know, that’s waking up at 4:30. And you don’t really have a choice. You know, so, you know, just growing up into that, and, you know, finishing up high school, and then trying to figure out what it is I wanted to do, you know, working with family can be difficult because there’s no, there’s no process to advancement. And so, you know, you become really good at cleaning and going to the dumps, you’re pretty much just stuck there. Right. And so, my brother and I, that was kind of our experience. So I had had, you know, a few other jobs just because I didn’t, really wasn’t interested in, you know, hanging out, just doing the same thing over and over again. So I tried to sell shoes I, you know, when, you know, I worked for Domino’s, for a little while, I managed a Wendy’s in Salt Lake City. And so I had done a few other things. And then that just said one day says, You’re not doing this anymore. You’re coming to work for us and period. And that’s it, you’re moving to California, and you’re going to work for us. And my brother and I did basically he didn’t have a choice. So we were actually putting the glue on the sheetrock vinyl covered. And we hadn’t done that for so long. My my brother had given up he said, you know what I’m not dad’s never gonna put a hammer in my hand, I’m never gonna be able to build anything. He’s not teaching us how to read a plan. And we’re just in the shop, building these roundtables every day all day, and then making deliveries. And he left. And he went and forged his own way, in construction and got involved in some really heavy roundups and engineering and big steel jobs and that kind of stuff. And boy, he was, he was on cloud nine. And, you know, I just couldn’t break away. So eventually, it just was bad, you put me in the field, I work next to you, I’ll do whatever, I’ll screw sheetrock all day if I have to, but I’m getting out of the shop. And he finally gave in and got out in the field. So you know, hanging sheetrock doing doors, door frames, glass sections, all the reform stuff that we, you know, that we did as a company, from there, eventually, you know, became a foreman. After that came in superintendent, General superintendent, then I, you know, went to the office and became a, you know, kind of a project engineer and a project manager, estimator, and then eventually to where I’m at now, which is sales. And so, you know, I have that experience of, kind of that young guy who ends up being a janitor, and then one day ends up being the sales guy for, you know, that whatever company, so there isn’t any part of construction that I don’t know, or that I haven’t actually physically done myself, which also is an advantage to estimating and, and, and ultimately selling objects.
Greg Owens 29:06
Yeah, no, I, your experience is very similar to mine working in family, like I had to, I did all the grunt jobs, you know, when I was working for my uncle at 16 years old, like and it was, and getting into big arguments with my uncle, like, hey, like, and, and also like, I found myself like grabbing the sprayer learning everything about it, like so that I became the go-to person that could fix it that could, that could, you know, paint with it that can use it for different ways, in different ways. And then people really started respecting who I was as, and I was, a lot of times I was much younger than the other painters, right and so, but it was it was it was a big fights. We had some big fights about like, giving up brains, right, like and giving in sharing knowledge. And what I’m really excited about is today, these days like I’m watching, we have a One painter, Ted who, who is training a young guy how to paint and, and he’s already got on spraying right away, right. And when I my experience around that kind of stuff is like they didn’t give you the hammer, they didn’t give you the cool tools until like you were in their mind you earned it. But that’s no fun, right? The fun part is like putting on finished coats with a sprayer and that kind of stuff not prepping for six years of your life. Right? That’s, that’s a great, that’s a great path. It’s,
David Brown 30:30
it’s, you know, it’s just a different time that we live in as well, you know, we’ve, we’ve really evolved into this sort of fast food society where I want it now. And you grow up with that mentality, because hey, you want a burger, you go to McDonald’s, you can get it now. Right? And so everything just accelerates that timeline accelerates in people’s progressions. And on the flip side of that, you know, people are smart, and you know, people are content, the younger people are more can be better problem solvers, as well, their their way of thinking becomes that fast food mentality as well, that fast-paced like, okay, I, you know, if I do this now, and so some respects us old-timers in the business who’ve had to go through those, those struggles, that’s the way it was back then. You know, Yes, you did prep work, and you cleaned for four years before you got a hammer. or four years before you got to brush and you’re right, another couple years before they give you a roller and then there’s a few more years now they’re giving you a sprayer. That kind of thing. It’s just it’s just different. I can’t say it’s better or worse. It’s just
Greg Owens 31:41
totally, absolutely Plus, you know, like, I’m always blown away. You can use YouTube to like learn anything, right?
David Brown 31:49
Well, that’s dangerous.
Greg Owens 31:50
It’s dangerous, but it’s pretty cool. I mean, like, I’ve got painters that watch some don’t watch, like, we will have them if they’ve never done putting on like vinyl wallpaper or something like that, right? We haven’t watched a bunch of YouTube videos on how to do that, to have them do a couple of practice walls. And they’re pretty, they get pretty good at it really fast, right? Back in the old days, you’d actually have to be with somebody and work with that person. A bunch of times, right. And so we can speed up that process of learning, which has been really cool.
David Brown 32:23
Oh, for sure. We there’s there’s better teachers these days. And when we grew up, yeah, it doesn’t really teach it. It was you had to watch. You had to watch because nobody was he was teaching. Just had to figure it out.
Greg Owens 32:36
Oh, man. And like, like Katrina mentioned it earlier. Like, I watched some TikToks. And I make this amazing. Mayonnaise with dill and garlic. And it’s like, comes out. Perfect. Right. I learned that in a one-minute video. Yeah, I really, really
Katrina Stephenson 32:53
TikTok is dangerous. I had to delete it recently, myself.
Greg Owens 32:58
Oh, you went down a rabbit hole?
Katrina Stephenson 33:00
hours. Do you know about TikTok Dave, Do you have one?
David Brown 33:03
I don’t have a TikTok. Yeah, I get, you know, I get, you know, little videos now and then. And I’m saying but yeah, this whole social media, you can go down that rabbit hole pretty quickly. It’s been time, you know, fascinating. But yeah, it’s a waste of time. It can be.
Greg Owens 33:21
It can it can be. I mean, it’s, it’s, yeah, it’s and you know, the some of the smartest people on the planet are trying to make you addicted to it. So, you know, I don’t like to let them win. And so I try to limit the any kind of looking at that stuff and just use it as a tool in my life, right? Because I don’t like thinking that some young 20-year-old figured out a way to get me addicted to this because, you know, they they’re watching your brain chemistry in her like, feed the more of these kinds of videos and they’ll stay on, you know, death or talking directly to my monkey brain, right? Oh, exactly.
David Brown 33:54
It’s, it’s crazy. Because next thing, you know, your phone’s blowing up with that exact idea and process that your monkey brains, brain that, you know, working at.
Greg Owens 34:07
And I don’t I don’t view any one of these companies as like, like, out from my best intentions, including like my apple or any of these things right? Now. They’re trying to get my attention constantly, right? And so if a young person or person that’s looking at transferring or, or switching careers and wanting to get into the construction industry, what kinds of suggestions do you have for them? And at this day and age, what have you seen, that’s
Greg Owens 34:36
like, you feel like works the best?
David Brown 34:38
Well, to be honest with you, I think, you know, going to school and getting into construction management is probably the first place I would, you know, point you in a direction. It’s, it gives you at least a leg up without having to you know, start at the bottom and you know what work your way up, because, you know, we talked about the advances in construction, it’s still a little bit of a Neanderthal way of moving up the chain, in construction, you know, it’s still, you know, it’s still keeping its old ways, trying to, and you know, if that, you know, person from advancing up the chain, so kind of going in that direction, and then, and then getting a feel for what type of construction, you know, interests you, you know, I’ve got a brother who’s an electrician, and I’ve got a, I’ve got a nephew who is doing glazing, they both work for us, but they didn’t like it, it didn’t fit their personality, or what it is that they want to do, or their lifestyle, which is great, really understanding yourself in your lifestyle in what is going to work for you best, because listen, if you don’t love it, you’re not going to succeed. And, you know, the short term that could possibly be there for somebody is just going to be, you know, miserable if you don’t, you know, really love this. And that’s kind of my, you know, my biggest advice is you know, go to construction management, figure it out, and then do an internship, take a couple of summers, you know, kind of feel it out, go, you know, go to work for a painter, but to work for drywall, go to work for a mechanical or a plumber or GC, you know, spend, you know, spend a month in each of those fields and, you know, find out which one you’d like, and then make it your own.
Greg Owens 36:21
That’s, that’s, that’s great. I mean, like, try different, different aspects. There’s so many different types of industries in the construction industry or facilities management and property and property owner. I know. Katrina’s husband, John, he, he found his like niche of leak, leak detection. So he’s a plumbing plumber. But it’s really specialized in leak detection, huge for sure is like so important right now with California going into another major drought, right? That’s an art form is that and he loves his job. And he has like, five or 6,000 people on Instagram that follows him and the different types of projects he gets into 7,000 is growing. Yeah. And
Katrina Stephenson 37:04
climbing. He really enjoys it. And he started just like that. He started in the trades with fire and stone fireplace installation and working for Maverick Construction out of high school. And here we are. Here he is.
David Brown 37:20
Yeah, that’s, that’s really the key, you know, to anything, I just, when I talk to people and whatnot, I say that you really got to love it. Construction isn’t for everybody. Yeah, you know, you can, you know, make a buck here or there and, you know, do your thing. But end of the day, it’s, you know, the hours are miserable, the long days, the rejection letter, you know, the labor I mean, you know, our our guys are getting up at 4 am. And getting on a job site at 5 am. And, you know, if you’re out in the field, you know, it’s one thing you know, you start at five and you’re done at one. But if you’re not in the field, you really can start a five and then that eight, there’s no, you know, there’s no set time. So unless you really love the business and willing to put those kind of hours and do it because you love it so much. It’s not for you. Unless Unless you unless you want to be a worker bee which is which is fine, because the world needs worker bees.
Greg Owens 38:17
That’s true. Yeah, that’s, that is true. Yeah, we’ve got some really happy painters that are that are helpers. Right? And, but they really enjoyed it. I want to take that journeyman position, they don’t want that responsibility. Really, they really like to be doing their thing and being able to you know, follow the person that’s in charge and work every day. And that’s that’s a perfect place for them. And their personalities.
David Brown 38:44
Exactly Exactly.
Greg Owens 38:47
This has been wonderful talking to you today. what’s what’s a few things that you’re looking looking forward to on our horizon here as we approach spring and summer, the end of spring and the beginning of summer, what’s what’s going on for you and your life and what’s what’s what’s exciting out there.
David Brown 39:03
So, just on a personal level, I’m I’m very much an outdoorsy person. And, you know, this pandemic I’ve gained the weight and just been kind of miserable. And, you know, these last three weeks as things opened up, you know, we’ve gotten, you know, we’re able to do more things outside last week went to the racetrack last Saturday. I love the ponies. You know, we’re all set. You know, we’re going to be a golden gate again this Saturday and it’s the Kentucky Derby. So, right, you know, being outdoors and doing things. You know, I taught baseball and I coached baseball for so long and you know, just, you know, getting to the ballpark. Again, so, you know, we haven’t been able to do for a year. You know, on a personal level. I’m just excited that we get back outside, start doing some things and maybe travel and, you know, sit by the pool again at a hotel and not have to worry So that’s kind of that’s kind of where me and my family is at right now is we’re just anxious. In life rolling. Right? And no, you can’t really prepare for that long pause of the pandemic. I mean, when nobody wants people, she just did the best you can. And I know, you know, some, some did better during the pandemic, and some did worse. And, you know, we just live through it. Something we’ll be able to tell our grandkids one day imagine,
Greg Owens 40:29
I think Jeff Bezos and Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg made a few extra billion dollars in that timeframe.
David Brown 40:37
But yeah, at least, anyone?
Greg Owens 40:39
Right, right, right. But well, Dave, it’s been wonderful to talk to you here on the podcast to get to know you a little bit better and wish you a really successful and lots of fun summertime and getting out there and activities and hiking and being outdoors again, because I know I enjoy all those kinds of things, too. And it’s been it’s been wonderful to be able to start doing that more and more things open up.
David Brown 41:04
Thank you very much.
Greg Owens 41:05
And this has been this has been the Watching Paint Dry podcast and stay tuned for more episodes where we’re talking to more contractors and facilities, managers, building owners, everybody else in this entire industry. Goodbye, everyone.
Outro 41:30
Thanks for listening to the Watching Paint Dry podcast. We’ll see you again next time and be sure to click subscribe to get future episodes.