Bulding my green construction Business: Series Announcement

Mark,

Thanks for your query on my postings on YouTube.com.

I thought, given your query, I might send you a note or two about me and what I am doing.

I have been in construction for the past decade. I worked in the sales, relationship managment, and project management area as a primary for years. When Hurricane Katrina came I thought things would get busy but better in many ways; but I was very wrong. The Contractors got worse in so many ways. Environmental practices, safety, quality, and price fairness went right out the window. I worked with several contractors who were out and out frauds.

In short, I found that my wish for us to build it back faster, better, and greener had been a distant chance at something that would not happen. Instead, it has turned into slower, financially fraudulent, worse environmentally, and overall poor quality. After getting screwed out of some 30K in income from one contractor and 10K from another, I made the decision to build something under the framework and the principles that I valued. This meant I would build Spry Construction as a means to provide respect for the customer and the environment.

More still, I realized that I would be able to take low and fixed income people and renovate their homes using energy saving methods and materials to reduce the overall cost of operating the home. This generates a higher quality of life for these low income people and really does not raise the cost to any substantial way.

As for this as a marketing method, it absolutely works. I am winning bids based on the fact that my green building mantra can be translated to "caring" for the customer long before we sign the contract. I have effectively differentiated my company from others when I am competative because we care enough to protect the customer from things that can hurt them or cost them more money over time; and this seems to matter. A great example; I have two customers right now that have bad allergies, and asthma in their family. When I explained that we would be using paint that would not "gas" over time and what the gas has the potential of doing...I got the deal...just by cutting out a few carcinogens and taking care to address air quality.

This feels good because it works in marketing but it works because it is right. Once a customer gets a tiny bit of education on this subject, it just clicks for them in an emotional way that brings the deal to close and creates a wonderful result for the world and the client.

I hope this has helped in addressing your query.

Please feel free to give me a shout should you have any questions or comments.

be well

Paul Herring, Owner
Spry Construction LLC
paul@spryconstruction.com
504.570.3384