With the growing danger of natural disasters, the race is on to expand access to programs that safeguard lives from the human-made danger of poorly built housing. With the common mission of building safer, stronger structures, Build Change and Simpson Strong-Tie have partnered for the Simpson...

Goodbye 2020 and Welcome to 2021!!! Our business world has been changing fast, especially this past year, and we continue to move forward through complex issues and how best to provide our goods and services to our customers within the building industry and beyond. But what...

Recruiting production managers is a huge challenge. It’s not that jobs are unavailable, as we usually have several Production Manager openings at TheJobLine.com. It’s finding qualified and willing candidates. Most often, it’s a problem when the move is lateral.  Most...

Last month’s article, Stiles Machinery Is Ready to Be a Part of Your Team, focused on how Stiles Machinery values teamwork and partnerships. This month, I’m proud to highlight Stiles’ strong partnership with MINDA and the newly founded MINDA North America in Granite, North...

This classic phrase brings back many memories and even fits some of today’s challenges. As a child, I can remember family road trips and being bored sitting in the back seat, mile after mile. I would ask, “Are we there yet?”  My dad would always say, “Soon, be...

Many of us started 2020 with resolutions/goals both for ourselves and our businesses, but then our year was turned upside down with the Covid worldwide pandemic and other issues such as lumber prices topping highs we thought we would never see. While many LBM/component businesses are working at...

Take it from me, being there is half of the battle, and Zoom meetings don’t count. This was true 50 years ago when I was working in our office, and it was true last week when I was in front of customers. There may be a price to pay, but the dividends will surely come back to you, as they...

Last month, Joe Kannapell took us on a terrific tour of BCMCs past in his column, The Last Word on 2020 BCMC – Virtually! Because we cannot attend an in-person BCMC show this fall, I’ve been thinking about ways to capture some of the spirit of BCMC. Step 1. See Products Without...

Let’s face it, when a supplier to the industry has been around for a long time, decades in our case, there are certain values that we live by. These values are the support structure on which we build our business. I believe it’s called “commitment to the cause,” or as...

I remember it clearly; I was in the Lounge at Portland International Airport when I got a call from Joe Kannapell. Joe was going to be sharing with the MiTek team in the next day that he would be officially retiring at the end of 2020; Joe has been a part of the industry for more than 46 years....