Quality-minded builders, remodelers, developers and contractors rely on our customer satisfaction surveying to help them provide exceptional service

On the morning of Tuesday, September 28th from 7:30 – 8:30, GuildQuality and Remodelers Advantage will be in Grapevine, Texas at the Riverwalk Cafe inside the Gaylord Texas Resort and Convention Center (where the Sunbelt Builders Show is being held) to host a complimentary breakfast for members and prospects.

Whether or not you’re attending the show, stop by and see us. It’s a chance to meet with quality-minded building professionals, such as yourself, to discuss what it is that we all endeavor to do; deliver an exceptional customer experience every time.

If you’re interested in attending this breakfast, please RSVP to Erin Rosintoski or call 404-961-6124.

Over the last year or two, several people have suggested that I reach out to Maggie Geoffroy of CDCI (Construction Data Control, Inc.) — another Atlanta-based technology company that serves homebuilders. Last week, Maggie met Glenn McNairy and I for lunch, and we had a great conversation about the building industry, the technology serving it, and the web in general.

From their website: “CDCI’s integrated packages provide estimating, scheduling, accounting, and cost control in a manner developed expressly for construction firms.”

CDCI has definitely been around. Maggie’s father started the business in 1979, and they now have well over a thousand homebuilders using their software. Many of those folks have been with them for decades.

I am interested to know if any of our members use any of CDCI’s products. If so, please let me know — I am hoping you can share your experiences.

I’ve previously mentioned Toll Brothers as a company that seems to see the forest for the trees. This BusinessWeek article reaffirms my impression.

Considering the challenging environment, Toll Brothers seems to be making all the right moves – but what are they? For one, Toll Brothers is simply doing what homebuilders should do, considering the glut of homes on the market now. “We believe that reducing new-home production until the current oversupply is absorbed is a key step in bringing housing markets back into equilibrium,” Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Robert Toll said in a statement.

Now that doesn’t seem so difficult to me, but given the machine that is a public national homebuilder, cranking back production is apparently a whole lot harder than you would think. BW goes on to point out a few other things working in their favor: Toll Brother’s build to suit strategy (they’ve got contracts before the break ground), and “fewer than 2% of their inventory falls into the subprime category.” Add into the mix an unwillingness to accept loose contracts, and they’re looking pretty good, all things considering.

The young software company SMART Builder Solutions (read a review about them from one of our members) recently invited me to be a speaker at their forthcoming “Committed to Success” Homebuilder Series on September 19 in Atlanta.

I’ll be joining a few other speakers:

Scott Sedam, True North

Tom Bradbury, SMART Builder Solutions

Don Evans, The Evans Group

Daron Powers, True North

This is looking like it will be a pretty good time. Not only will I get to speak with a bunch of Atlanta-area homebuilders, but I’ll also get to spend some time with some great minds in the building industry. Nice. As a bonus, the event is at the Braves Stadium in the 755 Club, and will include a tour of the stadium and excellent seats for the game against the Marlins.

There are fees involved and there’s an early sign-up discount. To read all the details, visit the registration page and click on More Info.

A couple of months ago, a developer member in Oregon invited us to visit their community under development in Bend. We finally took them up on the offer, and spent the early part of this week in Bend and Portland.

Brooks Resources is pretty far along with NorthWest Crossing in Bend — it’s an impressive and well-executed traditional neighborhood development. After touring the community, we participated in a meeting with about forty of their homebuilders, salespeople, and marketing folks. Heather Fricke and I gave a brief talk on customer satisfaction’s impact on sales and marketing within a community, and then introduced their sales and building team to the customer satisfaction surveying program that we’re rolling out at NorthWest Crossing. We had a great time, and are appreciative of all the hospitality we experienced in Bend. Special thanks to David and Romy for your gracious introduction to a beautiful part of the country.

From Bend, we rolled on to Portland for a few sales calls and a (mini) member meeting. Two of our Portland members joined us for supper at a new restaurant downtown. I don’t have all that much opportunity to spend quality face-time with our members outside Atlanta, Charlotte or Charleston, so I really enjoyed breaking bread with Jenny Cowdin of Equity Quest Homes and Mick McGuire and Joe Bauschelt of Intex Custom Homes.

I especially enjoyed hearing first-hand how our members are using GuildQuality’s customer satisfaction surveying and performance reporting. They were also a great sounding board for our upcoming service enhancement plans. Thanks Jenny, Mick, and Joe for coming out.

As exhausting as these trips are, it is great for me to receive the strong affirmation of the strength of our offering. All told, we may have spoken with over 20 building companies during our brief time in Oregon. I took away this message: regardless of whether they build 5 homes a year, develop hundreds of lots, or remodel 1,000 homes, service excellence is critical to their success and something they are all passionate about. The leaders in our industry are laser focused on delivering an exceptional customer experience — in part because they know that satisfied homeowners bring them greater success, but also because they take their job seriously.

Builders, developers and remodelers are shaping the world in which we live and dramatically impacting the lives of their customers. The fine folks we met in Portland take that responsibility seriously.

A few weeks ago, I met some folks at SMART Builder Solutions, an Atlanta-based software company that helps builders streamline and systematize their processes. Turns out, a handful of our members use SMART, so I asked them if one of their clients might be interested in writing a product review that I could share with our members. A few days later, Greg Bennett of Greg Bennett Homes forwarded me the following (images courtesy of SMART).

“First, a little about me. I started my own home building company about 3 years ago. Before this, I had worked at a large builder for 20 years. I learned a lot about building during this time and it taught me the benefit of keeping things simple. So far, Greg Bennett Homes has managed to build and sell 120 homes per year with only a handful of people in the entire company. We couldn’t have done this without SMART Builder Solutions’ WorkSMART solution. We went with SMART for three reasons: The system is complete, which helps us keep things simple and provides one place to record sales, track construction and purchase orders, etc. As a small homebuilder, the last thing I need is another system. The one stop shop concept definitely works for us.

“Secondly, the system is customizable. Unlike the other systems I’ve seen out there, WorkSMART can be tailored to a builder’s specific needs. While the system has a basic set-up that should suit most builders, I wanted some customized things, particularly in dealing with our specific flow of business. It was not a problem to accommodate this. Lastly, it is web based. For us non-technical types, this means that all you need to access your system is an internet browser such as Microsoft Explorer. We can access and update our data from anywhere at any time and we don’t need IT support if something goes wrong. All the data is on SMART’s servers, not mine.

“So far, we have finalized system implementation in all aspects except in the areas we deferred. We recommend WorkSMART for builders who want to keep everything in one place or if they are tired of an old system and spending a lot of time on IT issues. As an added benefit, the folks at SMART Builder Solutions really know a lot about home building. They are not just dealing with the software; they can help you deal with specific issues facing your company.”

Thanks to Greg Bennett for sharing his experience with SMART Builder Solutions. If you’ve had a great experience with a product or service, and you think our members would be interested in hearing about it, please let me know.

Last week, GQ packed up an “econo” van and 10 of us (including 2 non-swimmers; one of which tried to unsuccessfully back out) made the well anticipated two hour trek to the Georgia / Tennessee border to battle the Ocoee River.

I did a little research on the Ocoee river since the trip and found the history to be quite interesting. The riverbed was dry from 1912-1978 as the water was diverted to an elevated wooden plume and directed down into a water power plant. The plants were condemned in 1976 and the river flowed freely again two years later in 1978. In 1984, whitewater enthusiasts formed a council and, backed by Congress, made it available to the public. Since then, the Ocoee (class III – VI rapids) has hosted international slalom events, kayak rodeo championships, and, in 1996, the Olympic Slalom.

When we arrived, the river guides corralled and prepped our groups (GQ was split into two groups of 5; one non-swimmer in each raft). In doing so, they warned the non-swimmers that it was their last chance to back out. We had them each surrounded and at arm’s length; a strategic formation. Their faces sank.

We entered the cold river water with our guides screaming to us that this first rapid was a class IV and would be the most dangerous. Since then, I’ve researched the river grading system which categorizes class IV rapids as “Difficult rapids with high, powerful, irregular waves; broken and confused water; often boiling eddies; strong stoppers; ledges; drops and dangerous exposed rocks.” Both rafts got through the rapid just fine, however, lost sight of one another. 3 or 4 rapids later, our rafts were reunited. I gave non-swimmer #1, the inquiring thumbs up. Her mouth formed words very slowly and deliberately … “I … FELL … OUT” … and let out a laugh.

Our raft felt confident and strong. We were, after all, intact and without incident. Non-swimmer #2 even got out during a swimming rapid to float with us. Shortly thereafter, as luck would have it, we approached a rapid named Double Trouble (containing two “ledges”). Somewhere between the first and second ledge, our guide began to scold us as we found ourselves sideways going into the second ledge. We were toast. Quite literally, 3 of us (including non-swimmer #2) popped out into the river like toast out of a toaster. We were able to get non-swimmer #2 back into the raft in no time flat. She thanked me for “saving her life”, and I let her believe I did.

We all had a wondeful time and for “non-swimmers #1 and #2″, it was a primal experience.

2007 Guildmaster award winner Windsong Properties will be featured on the August 25th episode of the Savvy Homebuyer TV Show airing at 12:30 pm on CBS. The Savvy Homebuyer is a 30 minute show that “strives to find the best builders to showcase their homes and the products that go in them”. Congratulations Windsong. We’re proud to have you as part of our community of quality-minded building professionals and look forward to watching the show.

A couple years ago, Paul Stell (developer of Vintage in Lubbock, TX) introduced me to the following story. Not only is it a worthwhile and inspirational read, but it has an interesting history (more about that here).

I was reminded to share it here because GuildQuality has lately started giving out a Garcia Award to the employee that most embodies our core values: Integrity, Stewardship, and Improvement.

Each quarter (we just gave out the second award), our employees nominate three people among our team, and the person with the most nominations is declared the Garcia Award Winner.

Every day, we strive to empower our builders, remodelers, and real estate developers with the information they need to deliver an exceptional customer experience. Customer satisfaction surveying for building professionals may be our overarching focus, but we all have different job responsibilities, and sometimes it’s easy to lose sight of our own impact on the entire company and all of the members that we serve.

Our Garcia Award prompts us to take a moment to reflect on the qualities that make us successful, and help us to “carry a message to Garcia.”

“A Message to Garcia”, By Elbert Hubbard, 1899

In all this Cuban business there is one man stands out on the horizon of my memory like Mars at perihelion. When war broke out between Spain & the United States, it was very necessary to communicate quickly with the leader of the Insurgents. Garcia was somewhere in the mountain vastness of Cuba- no one knew where. No mail nor telegraph message could reach him. The President must secure his cooperation, and quickly.

What to do!

Some one said to the President, “There’s a fellow by the name of Rowan will find Garcia for you, if anybody can.”

Rowan was sent for and given a letter to be delivered to Garcia. How “the fellow by the name of Rowan” took the letter, sealed it up in an oil-skin pouch, strapped it over his heart, in four days landed by night off the coast of Cuba from an open boat, disappeared into the jungle, & in three weeks came out on the other side of the Island, having traversed a hostile country on foot, and delivered his letter to Garcia, are things I have no special desire now to tell in detail.

The point I wish to make is this: McKinley gave Rowan a letter to be delivered to Garcia; Rowan took the letter and did not ask, “Where is he at?” By the Eternal! there is a man whose form should be cast in deathless bronze and the statue placed in every college of the land. It is not book-learning young men need, nor instruction about this and that, but a stiffening of the vertebrae which will cause them to be loyal to a trust, to act promptly, concentrate their energies: do the thing- “Carry a message to Garcia!”
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