May 16, 2025 • 66 mins
Ever wondered what it takes to build a thriving, diversified business in the shed industry? Norman Eicher of Mountain View takes us behind the scenes of his remarkable journey from humble beginnings to running a multifaceted enterprise that's continuously expanding.
Starting with a simple construction company that added shed sales in 2009, Norman has methodically grown his operation to include a truss plant, metal fabrication facility, and a full-scale lumberyard. The conversation reveals fascinating insights into his metal manufacturing innovations, where his team has developed techniques to produce trim pieces every 15 seconds rather than the traditional 30 seconds per piece. This kind of efficiency has allowed his metal business to nearly match his shed sales in revenue generation.
What makes this episode particularly valuable is Norman's candid discussion about business relationships and profit margins. "If my employee isn't making me money, why is he here? If I'm not making Sam money, I need to figure out what I'm doing wrong," he shares, highlighting a refreshing perspective on value creation throughout the supply chain. Norman articulates why being upset when others profit from your work represents a problematic mindset that limits growth and cooperation.
The episode takes fascinating detours into Norman's background – building rafters at age 12 for $2 an hour in Southern Ontario, his time in Illinois learning the shed business, and finally establishing his Tennessee operation in 2006. His approach to quality, particularly in customer interactions, underscores why superior service trumps price-cutting. "If your price is within 15%, they will buy based on your personality and your way of approaching them," he notes, explaining why one of his salespeople consistently outperforms expectations.
Whether you're directly involved in the shed industry or simply interested in business growth strategies, Norman's philosophy that "quality will long outlast quantity" offers timeless wisdom. His predictions about market consolidation and insights on keeping transportation in-house provide food for thought for anyone navigating similar business decisions.
Ready to learn more about diversification strategies that can weather market fluctuations? Listen now and discover how innovation, relationship-building, and unwavering quality standards have positioned Mountain View for continued success in an evolving market.
For more information or to know more about the Shed Geek Podcast visit us at our website.
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This episodes Sponsors:
Studio Sponsor: Union Grove Lumber
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Sam (00:08):
All right, guys.
Welcome back to another episodeof the Shed Geek podcast.
Friday fun days with SamBasseter I'm your host, Sam
Byler and guys, I'm so excitedabout being here today.
Man, I got to get back to doingsome of these live.
I'm depending on these zoomcalls all the time and it's it's
not near as good as when I canshow up in person, and we were
(00:31):
going to do this one in personand things just don't always
work out.
Now I'm kind of under a travelban till I get my back figured
out a little better.
So anyway, I am here with NormanEicher from Mountain View,
Belvedere, Tennessee, back allthe way to where we had the
first big bash.
(00:51):
We had the Montana one, but thefirst big Tennessee bash.
We were over there at thecommunity center and then we did
all the activities over atMountain View.
And then we did all theactivities over at Mountain View
and Norman was kind enough toreach out to us way back in the
early stages of planning saying,hey, anything we have over here
you're welcome to use.
(01:12):
Man, you guys were fantastichosts.
How are you today?
Norman Eicher (01:17):
I'm doing fine.
Thank you, Sam, for the introthere.
Uh, yep, my, my background was.
I remember Sam coming in here.
This curly-haired guy walks inand I'm like, who is this?
And we kind of hit off and beenfriends ever since.
Sam (01:31):
Absolutely.
Some days I wonder how the bashwould have gone if we'd have
been as good of friends as weare now.
If we did back then, we'd haveprobably gotten some trouble
back then.
Norman Eicher (01:43):
We'd have probably gotten a lot of trouble
.
Sam (01:45):
Yep, so you guys didn't start out originally as shed
builders did you.
Norman Eicher (01:52):
No, we did not.
We started out as aconstruction company and then
bought a property on a dividedhighway, had someone here here
decided we wanted to sell somesheds.
My partner and I at that pointwere both had a background in
sheds.
I had worked for my unclebuilding sheds from a very young
(02:14):
age, and then my partner'sfather had a kind of shed
company in Illinois that he soldsome sheds at, and I had worked
for them there as well.
So we were both very familiarwith selling sheds, and so we
actually found a supplier and westarted selling some.
At that point the supplier onlymade treated sheds, so we were
(02:37):
into the metal.
Metal siding, metal roofing iswhat we promoted.
So we started playing aroundtoying, building a couple metal
sheds, building everythingvertical, nothing horizontal, um
, the typical way you would seeit, put on a pole barn or
whatever, and the company's justgrowing from there.
(03:01):
We would have opened doors herein 2009.
And then in 2014, we would haveadded a trust plant.
And yeah, we've just kind ofbeen adding on ever since.
I think there's some more inthe plans, oh no, some more I
(03:22):
don't know how far that?
oh yeah, no, we need another,another.
I've got scheduled to buildanother 80 by 400, so wow you
guys.
Sam (03:33):
So talk about the metal side a little bit.
You guys do all your own metalstuff we do.
Norman Eicher (03:38):
We put a roll former in of our own in 20, 20,
2021, and that's continuallybeen growing as well.
In 2021, we would have addedabout 30,000 square feet here,
and in 2022, we added another20,000, and I'm looking to build
(04:05):
another 32,000, so, okay, how'syour?
Sam (04:11):
so I think the last time I was there maybe, I don't know
one of the last times I wasthere you had started playing
around with not bending trim butrolling trim.
Are you still?
Is that a secret, or are wetalking about that, or?
Norman Eicher (04:25):
no, that's going.
Are you still doing it?
Oh yeah, we still.
We still do a lot of all ournormal trims are pretty much
rolled.
It's just so much quicker.
Um, just give you an idea.
Yeah, a piece of j channel, ifyou do it on the break, is going
to take you probably around 30seconds or so between 20 and 30
(04:48):
seconds to make a piece of jchannel, and the other day two
of my guys ran in 1200 pieces ofj channel in just under five
hours.
Oh wow, and it's very easy.
There's nothing to it.
Sam (05:03):
A lot less stressful, a lot less action, involvement.
Norman Eicher (05:08):
It's just so much quicker.
Nice, that works out to a PCJchannel about every 15 seconds
and you could never maintainthat doing that on a break.
The key being maintain yeah yeahyou can probably do one or two
(05:30):
pieces and then you're going tobe done and not do a maintained.
It's just not going to happen.
Yeah, yep.
So so we, we ran, we rolledfour metal and two different
profiles in a 36-inch widescrew-down panel, and then, of
course, we do board and we dostanding seam, and we have.
(05:52):
Last spring my two bigpurchases were a brand-new
automated saw for the trussplant and a double-bend
VarioBend.
So I have a double folder fromvario bend.
It folds both ways fullyautomatic with the fingers.
It's really, really sped up ourtrim side wow, probably this
(06:16):
year, my big pushes.
I'm going to have to add onagain and then do a slit line
with nesting function and, youknow, automated functions on it
to get my speed back up to whereit needs to be.
Sam (06:33):
So what is and I don't know , this probably might not even
be important to you, but for aguy like me sitting and watching
is do you do more trusses?
Do you do more metal?
Do you do more sheds?
Do you do more metal?
Do you do more sheds?
Do you not care?
Norman Eicher (06:46):
you just roll them all wherever they go dollar
wise, we're doing more in shedsdollar wise, you do more sheds
yeah, dollar wise, we do more insheds and the metal side is
going to be almost even withthat this year.
Sam (07:04):
Okay.
Norman Eicher (07:05):
But then I've added lumber.
We're a full-scale lumberyardas well, and that's been a
struggle.
We're in the south, a verytight-knit, close community and
everybody knows everybody.
Yeah, and any new kid on theblock, he's looked on with
utmost suspicion.
I get it.
(07:28):
He's got nefarious, uh, he'sgot nefarious ideas.
Um, you know, even if I do thesame as what my local lumberyard
is, um, it's not good enough.
So, yeah, it's a learning curveand it's it's building to
putting the right people in theright place.
And, yeah, on glick, uh, togive you feedback, to help you
(07:53):
make you better.
Sam (07:53):
So, oh yeah, absolutely so does.
Uh, on your trust side, do youhave I can't remember if we
talked about this or not do youactually build pole barns or do
you just supply all thematerials for pole barns?
Norman Eicher (08:09):
We currently have two of our own crews building
pole barns, and then we'll stillsub some out.
Sam (08:13):
Okay, yeah.
So that's where the lumberbetween that and sheds.
That's where your lumber demandcame from, anyway.
Norman Eicher (08:20):
Yeah, so we were stocking most of the stuff you
needed at a lumber yard anyway,so it just made sense to add
some more and then try to try tomove some of it.
Yeah, and that and that keepsgrowing.
It's that's.
That's been a very interestingpiece.
Yep, it's a lot harder to getinto than I anticipated.
Sam (08:44):
Yeah, yeah, that's interesting.
Locally here we have Yoder'sBuilding Supply which has been
around.
They're obviously not a new kidon the block but compared to
Lowe's Home Depot 84 Lumber someof those guys they would be
(09:04):
considered that.
But locally here they kickthose guys tails um.
Yoder's probably supplies morecontractors than five or six
lows locally put together.
Yeah but, so my local loads.
Norman Eicher (09:20):
yeah, my local lows in home Home Depot are a
joke.
They don't do anything.
But I've got a local lumberyardjust down the road.
There's two decent lumberyardswithin 15, 20 miles.
Yeah, the one I've always had avery good relationship with.
(09:41):
The other one has been paranoidof me ever since I started here
.
Sam (09:45):
So uh, uh, yeah.
Well, I'll tell you the samething.
We tell shed companies, youknow, when another shed company
moves in, I'm like if, if youbelieve in your product, you
worried about anybody else?
If?
You believe in your service.
Uh, you know, product orservice.
Pick which one you want to beand build on that.
(10:06):
I've preached this for years.
Everybody knows this about meCompetition is good.
Competition is good for me,it's good for you, it's good for
everybody else.
Norman Eicher (10:17):
That's what I find.
I've got two shed companieslocal.
I go to church with one thatbuilds for one of them.
The other one I know well.
We back and forth.
We built his.
He added on three times in thelast 15 years and we've done all
three additions to his shops.
Yeah, yep, we've had a goodrelationship with them.
(10:39):
I try to you know what withthem.
I'll even go as far as they'llcall me and go hey, we ran out
of hinges, do you have any?
I'm like, yeah, just here's abox, just replace it.
That's how we've always workedand I appreciate that.
That means a lot to me.
Sam (10:56):
Oh, absolutely.
Yeah, I agree that's.
That's important.
So so it sounds like one of thethings I always try to figure
out is where are you headed next?
What are you doing next?
Sounds like your metal'spicking up.
You're headed back harder onthat.
So do you have?
Do you like supply stores withmetal, or are you strictly
(11:17):
selling to public?
Where's your metal go?
Norman Eicher (11:21):
combination.
Uh, we got in with some chickenhouse guys.
We're supplying some chickenhouses and we just became a
Lowe's vendor about two monthsago, so we're starting to sell
some to Lowe's and that's aweird market.
That, right, there is a weirdmarket.
I mean, they have brand loyaltylike I've not seen anything
(11:42):
like we'll do lumber packagesfor them.
That I'm just like how Icouldn't sell to a contractor
locally for what I'm chargingthem and they don't care.
I don't, I don't know, is it?
I don't have an answer for that.
(12:02):
I guess I'm not in that longenough, but I'm not.
I shouldn't.
Maybe.
Maybe that's a secret.
I shouldn't have an answer forthat, I guess I'm not in that
long enough, but I'm not.
I shouldn't.
Maybe that's a secret Ishouldn't have passed on, but
that one there has been reallygood for us.
Sam (12:12):
That's interesting, yeah, yeah.
Well, I know you know the samething here locally I don't.
20 years ago, 25 years ago,Lowe's started outsourcing
trusses, you know.
So our Lowe's around here, oureconomy is so dadgum crazy which
(12:32):
I know it is there too, and youyou've got Huntsville pushing
up from the bottom there too.
But like they startedoutsourcing trusses and packages
and some stuff like that, justbecause they weren't able to
handle it all in-house.
I remember walking into theSeneca Lowe's and there's an
overhauled truss hanging upthere and it says overhauled
truss on it.
They're like yeah, if you gettrusses, it'll be delivered from
(12:54):
overhauled truss.
I know they do that kind ofstuff.
Norman Eicher (13:02):
Lowe's does not have their own plants, they're
just simply like a Walmart ofbuildings, moving Yep.
I don't quite understand someof the loyalty that they
generate.
But then, on the other hand, Iguess if you have a Lowe's
(13:23):
account, they sell it to you ata certain price and then you get
a discount which your invoicestill shows If you're doing cost
plus.
I guess I understand some ofthe games that contractors like
to play.
Hey Sam, here's my invoice for$2,000.
And Lowe's says well, I'm acontractor, I'm going to give
(13:44):
you five percent or eightpercent off of that invoice.
So it puts an extra percentageback in the contractor's pocket
by doing some of the things theydo.
Sam (13:54):
Well, I, I mean, yeah, I've , I've had a pro account with
Lowes for, oh my word, longbefore I moved to South Carolina
.
So for 25, 27, 28 years thatI've had a pro account through
them and, yeah, I get.
You know you, you get the, youget the discount on your
(14:14):
packages, so to speak.
You get special sometimes.
Now they have it to where if I,if, even if I don't use my pro
card account, like to pay for it, they have my credit cards
registered on there to where Iclick I collect rewards and then
I use rewards cards to pay forit.
(14:35):
So I'm getting three to fivepercent off of their side and
I'm getting three to fivepercent off my credit card side
and then I'm getting fivepercent off my packages.
It'll it.
It adds up to where at least ittakes some of the stress off of
some of the purchase you haveto make outside of your business
.
Norman Eicher (14:54):
Stuff you're doing, it does it adds up and
and that's that's one thing II'm seeing play out in the
contractor world that I that's agame I've never played.
I'm a gc in Tennessee andAlabama and you know I've always
bought my stuff in quantity,wholesale, whatever, and I've
never played the game of okay,I'm going to build it, cost plus
(15:15):
.
I go to the lumber yard and getan invoice and knowing that my
invoice is going to be 5% less,yep, if I pay it on time it's
going to be 5% less than this.
So I'm building the house for20% above cost.
So technically I can gainanother 5% of that.
(15:39):
So I understand why guys aredoing it.
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Tomorrow I have a fullyfinished 18 by 40 cabin.
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(16:05):
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(16:26):
Ah, that's right.
You're talking about the onethey had up at Michigan at the
Shed Show, that monster meal man.
That thing was awesome.
That's right, it's the oneyou've seen at all the Shed
Holler barbecues.
Man, yeah, there's nothing likea little diesel donkey to make
my day go so much better.
Sam (16:46):
What up Are you still in the window business?
Norman Eicher (16:52):
Yeah, still I am, I need some windows.
Sam (16:58):
I don't need a semi-load of them and I know that's what you
like.
That's basically what you'redoing, right.
You're not selling basic.
I mean, you're like sellingwindows out by the semi-loan.
Norman Eicher (17:08):
No, no, we're a retail location.
We deal with a ton ofcontractors.
Sam (17:14):
So have you thought the reason I brought that most
people.
You might be wondering why inthe world is he bringing up
windows when we're talking witha shed conversation?
Have you ever thought aboutpushing it on the shed side?
I have not.
Do you want to sell windows toshed manufacturers?
Norman Eicher (17:33):
No, I guess I've just never really thought about
it.
I have enough to take care of.
That's going to be an idea Ineed to pursue at some point,
probably, but probably not today, because I've got.
Sam (17:47):
I've got other things I need to take care of, so yeah,
so you don't want everybodyblowing up your phone right now.
They want to get winded fromyou.
Norman Eicher (17:57):
I'd be happy to do that.
It just it'd be hard, dependingon where you're at, to get them
to you efficiently and costeffective yeah so that now
you're mimicking exactly whatyou told me about buying metal
from you.
Sam (18:12):
Remember, I pushed you hard to get metal down here for us
and you, you're pretty, you'repretty logistically savvy to the
fact that you've got animaginary line out there that
you stop at or all of a sudden,it just doesn't become cost
effective.
Norman Eicher (18:28):
It doesn't become cost effective to ship a
finished product that far.
Your volume has to be so highto make that make sense and I'm
going to share a little bit whyI see that happen.
(18:48):
I was purchasing out ofSouthern Indiana for years and
because I didn't like thequality and what I could get
locally Yep.
Like the quality in what Icould get locally Yep.
The extra I was paying in priceand the aggravation and
frustration of making thathappen made me probably a lot
(19:09):
more aware of at some point.
Logistically it doesn't becomepractical because you're going
to pay more in shipping thanthan your items are worth.
Sam (19:19):
Yeah.
Norman Eicher (19:20):
If you, if you and you have to run that ratio
and make that make sense.
And that's kind of the same waywith shed companies.
If you, if you start, if youstart hauling a finished product
300 miles, it's hard to makethat make sense.
It's hard to make that makesense when you can haul a raw
(19:43):
product and have someone buildit 20 miles from there.
And then you have, then thenyou, you just set up another hub
and you keep going.
Sam (19:53):
Yeah.
Norman Eicher (19:54):
Simply because you know sheds is an oversized
community, trusts is anotherthing.
That's.
It looks a little difficult,but for me I kind of run
everything on a case basis.
If you're talking $30,000 worthof product, there's enough
overhead there to swing some ofyour logistic cost.
(20:16):
But if you're talking somethingdown running at like a 5 of
five or six percent margin,there's not enough.
There's no money in it by thetime you pay shipping.
Sam (20:25):
Yeah, that makes sense.
Norman Eicher (20:27):
It's not just as easy as shipping it with UPS.
Sam (20:30):
Yeah, but it is amazing to me how many times I see sheds
getting shipped four, five, six,seven states away.
Pennsylvania is still famousfor doing it.
Norman Eicher (20:42):
I can't make that make sense logistically.
Sam (20:44):
Yeah.
Unless they're.
So the argument that I've heardalready.
Now some of the stuff that Isee shipped out of Pennsylvania
to Texas, to Arizona, toColorado, to California, is back
to what you're talking about.
You're talking $100,000 to$120,000 loads and up, and then,
(21:05):
like you said, there's a littlemore pie in there to split up,
but it's still.
So often I'll see a load ofsheds, you know, Pennsylvania
truck, a load of sheds goinginto Florida, Pennsylvania truck
, a load of sheds going intoFlorida, Pennsylvania truck,
load of sheds going, you know,past me here somewhere, and it's
just, it's mind boggling to me.
(21:26):
And those guys aren't crazy,they've been doing it a long
time.
Then they still figure out.
Now, some of those truckers,they will they back.
Like Omar transport, he'llbackhaul, he's got his trailers
built to where they can hauljust about anything on a
backhaul.
As to where I'm more of the guy, I'm not even going to spend
(21:46):
time to try to find something.
Bring back.
I'm going to go back and get mynext one and go again.
You know, I don't.
I don't want to fool with that,which would be the same way if
you're delivering metal, youwant to do your four or five
drops and go back home.
Norman Eicher (21:59):
Yeah Well, so I'm going to give you a little
scenario I don't think we'veever talked about.
I had a company fromPennsylvania reach out to me
about some sheds going on to agovernment project down here.
They held a government contract.
I built them to their specs.
I think we did close to 20sheds.
Sam (22:20):
Yep.
Norman Eicher (22:21):
Went down to an arsenal in Alabama.
So in those specific scenariosthey have their contractors that
they want to use or have to useor something like that.
So I totally understand atthose points.
Yes, at those points.
(22:43):
Yeah, yes, he made, he made ashe made more than I did by
having that contract and justgetting me to do it locally.
Yeah, bank on that, on thatproject.
But I, if he wouldn't have usedme, I would have had no way of
getting the contract, becausethose contacts and those
contracts take a long time tobuild and maintain.
Sam (23:02):
Oh, yeah, yep, I locally.
Norman Eicher (23:04):
I do a lot for the government simply because I
carry the proper insurances andall of that stuff and there's a
lot of people that don't.
I guess I just got a job theother day that somebody else was
cheaper but they didn't havethe proper stuff and so we ended
up with with the project simplybecause there was nobody else
that could do it.
Yeah, yeah, but that takes alot of desk work sitting here
(23:29):
behind in a desk chair gettingthose, getting everything
crossed, every dot, everythinghas to be dotted, everything has
to be done right.
You have to have the rightaccounts, you have the right
paperwork on file, you have tohave the right insurance, you
have to have I mean, there'sjust the listing.
For those type of projects.
The money is lucrative.
Sam (23:49):
There's a lot of back-end work that goes on to get it yeah
, I was gonna say I've talked tosome of those guys that have
those contracts and some daysthey're even like was the back,
all the back work that we did?
Was it even worth doing it?
And they're like, yeah, if youcan keep them, if you can keep
them and keep going at it, butit does it takes.
It takes a.
I mean that's, that's four orfive years ago.
(24:12):
Yeah, hold on.
Seven years ago, 2018.
Seven years ago, I did aproject for Michelin and it was
the same way.
It was so many hoops and stuffthat you had to jump through to
get ready to do this.
You know, I mean, it wasn'teven that big a project.
It was big for my woodworkingshop at the time.
But after a while you're like,can we just get the project done
(24:35):
?
I mean, you know and's, butthen once you were done, you
know, when they needed somethingelse done, it was done.
You were, it was a breeze.
Yeah it was a breeze.
Norman Eicher (24:45):
So but and here's what I'm seeing a lot, a lot of
the smaller guys don't have theoffice staff or the personnel
to handle the paperwork thatneeds to go be done on those
projects and so, yeah, that'sgoing to see someone very large
get it.
And you know, on those things,you know, on a 17, 17 shed
(25:08):
bundle you're talking, he heprobably made 80, 90 000 on top
of what he paid me.
Basically, he priced him comingout of Pennsylvania, priced him
delivery coming out ofPennsylvania, bought him from me
for the same price.
He could have got him out ofPennsylvania in pocket of the
(25:29):
delivery fees.
He did very well, I don'tbegrudge that because I know
what goes on to make thesethings happen.
Yeah, it's really really hard,could?
Sam (25:42):
we ever go down a rabbit hole on that?
Why is it so hard to understand?
That's not a word, that's notwhat I'm looking for.
Why is it so hard to be okaywith somebody making money off
of you making money?
Where did we get off on that?
(26:03):
You know what I'm saying andlisten, I'm going to preach
straight at shed haulers for aminute right here.
They want to always cry aboutthe fact that the big man is
making so much money, you know.
And why aren't they making more?
When they're making money,they're doing good.
You follow what I'm saying.
Norman Eicher (26:24):
Oh, I follow what I'm saying.
I'm going to come at it fromthe other perspective, so I'm
going to play.
I'm the big man, you know whopays the insurance.
Sam (26:36):
Yeah.
Norman Eicher (26:37):
Who pays when that shed blows apart on the
road and somebody gets killed?
Sam (26:44):
I'm I'm glad you brought that up, because we can't get
some of the big men to pay forthose they're like.
It's on your trailer, it's yourproblem um, so I'm gonna share
that I.
Norman Eicher (26:55):
If something like that happens, I feel I'm in the
boat as much as anybody else.
That's why you're one of thegood guys.
I don't know about that, Sam,but then it comes down to if
there's something wrong with theshed who pays for it?
Even five years down the road,if that thing starts leaking,
who sends somebody to fix it andtake care of it and make sure
(27:19):
the customer is taken care of?
And I'll just share.
Sometimes there's heartburn inwhat I'm doing because it seems
every time I turn around there'srisk.
I'm putting myself out there.
I'm taking all the risk.
Yes, I'm, I'm taking all therisk.
(27:40):
Yes, I'm making money, but atthe end of the day I'm also
putting myself out there andtaking a ton of risk.
Um, you know, if I purchasedthat a hundred thousand dollars
worth of material and the bottomfalls out, um, you know, the
anticipated 25% tariffs don'thit and the, instead of material
going up, it goes down.
Who takes that hit?
(28:01):
You know you have a lot ofmoney in play that it feels like
at the end of the day there'ssometimes not a lot of rewards
for the back-end effort that youput in.
Sam (28:18):
Yeah, yeah.
Norman Eicher (28:19):
Who makes the sure.
You know it's like I'm payingoffice staff to you know,
process the order.
Make sure it's done.
Make sure taxes get paid.
Make sure my dealers get paid.
Make sure that you know if wehave lots that everybody gets
paid.
Make sure that there's enoughmoney in the bank to pay the
haulers.
It's just you.
Sam (28:42):
You know, yeah, there's money coming in, but it a lot of
times it tends to go out justas quick, and most times, if I
can get them to listen longenough, it's like, look, you do
the same thing.
You don't know where your fuelcost is going to be.
You don't know where this isgoing to be, you don't know
where that's going to be.
It's the same way.
You're not going.
You don't want to haul forcheap, you know.
So it's um it.
It works both directions.
The thing that frustrates me iswhen, when they find out, or
(29:08):
when somebody and I'm saying itgoes either direction on this,
when they find out that youmight have made extra money on
it, or whatever they're like.
Oh blah, blah, blah, blah.
You don't want to run off aboutthat.
It or whatever they're like ohwater, blah, blah, blah.
You'll never want to run offabout that.
And I'm like, since when?
If, if I tell you that I'm ahall sheds for you and you're
going to pay me five grand aweek, why do I care?
(29:28):
If you make five grand a weekor 500 grand a week, what
difference does it make, doesn't?
None so?
So that's why, yeah, that's whyI feel like too often we kind
of forget the part that we allneed each other.
And if he makes good this time,I'll make some somewhere else
(29:49):
sometime.
At the end of the day, we're allstill moving forward am I too
harsh to say?
Norman Eicher (29:59):
that's a little bit an Amish mentality, Amish
Mennonite mentality that I can'tstand.
That if another Amish orMennonite makes a dollar on me,
I see that.
I see that a lot.
Somehow we think we're entitled.
You know we're not.
We're not entitled to anythingin life.
No, there's nothing that I amowed.
(30:21):
We're not entitled to anythingin life.
No, there's nothing that I amowed.
Sam doesn't owe me anything.
I've tried to go out of my wayto help him but he doesn't owe
me anything, just who I am.
If Sam puts a deal together andI tell him I'll sell him that
shed for $9,000 and Sam can sellit for $18,000, guess what?
(30:43):
That's not my.
I agreed to sell it to Sam for$9,000.
I don't really care what Sammakes off of it's not why is
that why?
Does that.
Why should I let that bother me?
Sam (30:54):
I don't know, man, I don't have the answer and I guess I'm
asking that, trying to makepeople think like why?
Should.
Norman Eicher (31:02):
I let that bother me.
Sam (31:04):
Yeah.
Norman Eicher (31:05):
You know, Sam's got costs, he's got to live too.
So if I'm not doing something,if I'm not making Sam money and
he's buying product from me,then I need to go.
I need to figure out what I'mdoing wrong, because if Sam
can't make money on it, thenit's no use for him to do it.
There's no reason for him to doit.
Sam (31:23):
Yes, this is true, and then if we don't have each other,
we're not getting our jobfinished.
Norman Eicher (31:30):
Yeah, and that's kind of the way I view employer
employee relations.
Oh, absolutely Same thing.
If my employee isn't making memoney, I can't afford to pay his
taxes.
I can't afford to pay hishealth care, I can't afford to
give him a bonus at the end ofthe year.
I can't afford to have a deskfor him to sit in.
(31:53):
If he's not making me money,I'm paying for the space for him
to be here, and if he's notmaking me money, then why is he
here?
Sam (32:03):
Yeah, because pretty soon neither one of y'all are going
to be there.
Yes, yep, good point.
Norman Eicher (32:11):
So I think we need to get it through our head
that if we're not making theother person money, there's
something wrong in what we'redoing.
Yeah, yeah that's, that's fairsorry I went off on a rant there
, but that's just no, no, no, no, no.
I just yeah, I agree, I I have.
That's bothered me likesomething crazy.
(32:32):
I see these and particularlyI'm still beachy Amish and and I
see that in that culture theyjust if another man makes a
dollar on him.
It's just terrible.
I can't see that why.
Sam (32:52):
But we're okay going to Lowe's and letting Lowe's make a
dollar off of us.
Norman Eicher (32:56):
Yeah, we're totally fine with that.
Sam (32:59):
You know what I'm saying.
Yeah, Shannon's going to belike man.
I don't know where these twogot off on this.
Why am I not in on thisconversation?
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Sam (34:54):
So we you know I don't think I ever heard the term race
to the bottom until I got toknow Shannon Latham, and he's
constantly harping on the andDave Miller.
Dave Miller, when I firststarted, you know, working with
him on the rent to own side umfact, Shannon might have stole
it from Dave, to be honest withyou, because Dave is, you know
(35:15):
he's he's always been of theopinion that you know we need to
quit this race to the bottom.
You know rent to't companies doit, manufacturers do it, shed
lots up and down the same road,you know it's.
It's like uh and home depot andLowe's don't do it.
You know they might run aspecial on something to get you
(35:35):
in the door to see everythingelse.
You know I remember back in theday, man, this all the way back
in the early 90s, when you knowsometimes they would run a
special on studs or they wouldrun a special on studs or they
would run a special on plywoodor something.
You know where you could.
You could get it dirt cheap butwhen you were in there you
bought everything else youneeded to and you know it's it's
(35:59):
.
I've noticed we're gettingtight again a little bit.
And on on the shed sales, theprofessionals shed sales
professionals page, I've seen itcreeping up again where some
dealers are starting to fussabout other dealers' prices and
stuff.
It's so hard for me not just toshake my head at them and be
(36:19):
like, come on, guys, but it getsinto you that man.
He's selling that 10x 16 for400 bucks less than I am, and
it's like it's not the same shit.
Norman Eicher (36:32):
My question is go look at the sheds.
Sam (36:36):
And.
I would tell my guy to go Tellthe customer.
Go look at it, You'll see whatthe difference is.
Norman Eicher (36:41):
You'll see what the difference is, but I
guarantee you over 50% of yourcustomers will buy based on your
personality and your way ofapproaching them, versus what
your price are.
If your price is within 15%,they will.
What's 15%?
Sam (37:02):
Nothing to them If you walk out there.
Norman Eicher (37:04):
I have a salesman here that I will put up against
anybody I've ever run upagainst.
Older gentleman People love him.
Comes out with his cowboy hatand his cowboy, his starch jeans
, you know, stand up bythemselves.
Yeah, well-dressed, well-spokenPeople love him.
Yeah, spoken people love him.
(37:32):
Yeah, we sell more shedsbecause of him than you ever.
It's just his personality.
So if you come across as you'resome bum, you don't care what
you look like.
You're here to sell them thecheapest thing that that you can
put slap together and get tothem versus I care about you.
Here's what we're doingdifferent.
Here's how we're different.
We try to take care of you.
(37:54):
We try to build somethingdifferent.
This is why we do what we do.
If you're within the ballpark,people will buy.
Sam (38:04):
I agree, yep, and I still know those.
I've still got them.
There are some really goodonline salespeople out there.
I've seen some of their numbers.
I know what they can do and notat all knocking on what they do
because they're good at it, notat all knocking what they do
(38:24):
because they're good at it.
But there are four or fivepeople that I know in the
southeast that sell just as muchdollar wise that do very little
online.
Norman Eicher (38:40):
It's all based on their personality based on
their product knowledge andbased on they sell themselves
before they ever sell theirproduct.
And it still works it.
It works, it just does, and youdon't have to be a car salesman
uh no, to make it happen.
Sam (38:57):
No, I'm even starting to see some of that shift in car
sales if you like car?
Magic, changing some of that.
Norman Eicher (39:03):
You walk out there and you're confident in
yourself.
You're well-spoken, you knowwhat.
You know, your product.
I promise you you will sellsheds.
Sam (39:14):
Yep.
Norman Eicher (39:15):
But the flip side of that is stay in your office
and let your people just wanderaround the lot, not go out and
talk to them and then come whineto me.
You can't sell sheds, it justwon't sell.
Sam (39:30):
And that is not a hypothetical situation either.
It happens.
Norman Eicher (39:35):
Look, I've been doing this for over 20 years.
I know how to sell sheds.
Sam (39:48):
I was here by myself on a Saturday, one Saturday Sam, from
9 o'clock to 2 o'clock, I soldsix sheds.
Yep, it happens.
Let's get back to what you'redoing with sheds.
You said that originally youstarted out with wood sheds.
Norman Eicher (40:00):
We were selling you were selling somebody else's
Correct.
So we were.
I was a little interestingthere Through a family friend.
They brought us some sheds.
They didn't want to, but hetalked them into bringing us
some sheds.
(40:21):
They set us up three or foursheds and we were like it's
really hard to sell sheds withtwo or three sheds, ended up
borrowing some money and buyingwholesale for a couple of years,
and then, and during that timeis when we started building
metal sheds and and then at somepoint they said they would no
(40:43):
longer, they don't want to dealwith us anymore, so we started
building our own wood sheds.
Sam (40:49):
I was going to say you build wood sheds.
Now what point did you?
Yeah, so do you know what's theratio these days?
We sell.
Norman Eicher (40:59):
We sell a little better than 50% in metal.
Sam (41:03):
Okay, so metal still does a little bit more.
Norman Eicher (41:05):
oh yeah, we're doing a wood green, a lot of
wood grain stuff now yes, that'sright, you are doing wood grain
some pretty stuff yeah you knowthe wood.
You never have to paint it, Sam.
It's so much better than wood.
Yeah, you're much better.
Still looks like wood.
You know you can have wood look, but it's so much better.
Sam (41:26):
I'm with you, still doing your double wides and stuff.
Norman Eicher (41:31):
Oh yeah, we're still doing.
I heard that one of the biggernames in the shed industry is
starting to do double wides now.
Sam (41:42):
Oh, you heard something I haven't heard yet, but I've been
stuck in the hills of NorthCarolina for seven months.
Norman Eicher (41:50):
I heard old Hickory's doing double wides now
.
Sam (41:52):
Oh nice.
So way back in the day I usedto get double wides from a
company called Robin.
Robin is a 50-year-old shedcompany from down in South
Georgia.
Robin is a 50-year-old shedcompany from down in South
Georgia and I used to buy shedsfrom them because I could get
double-wide garages from themand they actually would build a
(42:15):
30-foot.
How do I explain this?
So you could get a 12-by-30building and the roof ran the 30
, the 30 foot way side gable, soto speak.
Yep, and when you did that, youcould go as long as you wanted
to go with a 30 wide building,12 foot at a time, and keep
(42:37):
slapping them things together,one right after the other one.
I did one one time where Idon't remember, I think it was
seven or eight of them.
I did one one time where Idon't remember I think it was
seven or eight of them and wealmost had a 30 by 100 foot
building Set with still has thefloors blocked them up and
everything bolted trussestogether.
Norman Eicher (42:58):
Hmm, but that roof slope must have been like
what.
Sam (43:03):
A lot, probably Maybe one and a half, and that was back
when it was that metal that whenwe put like when we connected
them together you would bend itover at the top and run it down
the other side it was.
Norman Eicher (43:16):
it was like I don't know if it was aluminum.
Sam (43:19):
Yeah, it was like it was like almost a corrugated pattern
.
But no, you would just slap thesheet up, go up at the top and,
very carefully, just fold itdown and send it down the other
side and that's how you put themall together.
I still think yeah, because themiddle sections wouldn't have
(43:43):
no gables, they'd just be open,and you would double truss, bolt
that truss together, bolt thefloor together and slap that
piece of plywood in the floor.
Norman Eicher (43:52):
How many do you?
Sam (43:53):
want.
No, I don't want to do thatanymore.
Norman Eicher (43:57):
I'll get you as many as you want.
Sam (43:59):
I bet you will too.
Norman Eicher (44:04):
No, I'm serious.
If that's what you want, Sam,I'll be happy to do it for you
nope, nope, nope, nope.
Sam (44:10):
I think I'm done with those days.
I think that probably made meold before my time.
And that, listen, we weren'tsetting those on slabs either,
we were blocking them.
So you'd start on the groundand you go out 50 feet and
you're, you know, there.
You know, tell them where youwere off the ground.
Norman Eicher (44:28):
Yeah, yeah, and you know customers always right.
Just started the job thismorning on the construction side
that the customer said he shottransit on four inches off in a
30 by 30.
I think he measured he gotmessed up between four inches
and four foot because it's fourfoot off.
Sam (44:49):
No way, yeah and 30 feet, we've been there.
Norman Eicher (44:55):
It's pretty level .
Pretty level Four inches off,four inches off.
Sam (45:00):
Well, now you know.
So the bad thing about atransit is, if it's not a
self-leveling one, you don'tknow what you're getting.
Yeah, yeah, I never.
I just bought me a new transit,probably two months ago, and
(45:22):
these are like when I wasresearching them or whatever all
these new transits you get itjust close and the things
self-level themselves.
You know, back in the day whenI started, we were looking
through the rifle scopes, youhad to have that thing set for
different, like you would spinit all the way around, spin it
over here and spin it there andadjust it, because there was no
(45:42):
self-leveling involved.
You had to be, right.
Norman Eicher (45:45):
Yep, my dad had one of those for years, that's
what.
I did.
I got into construction.
It's, pop it on, hit the button, walk away from it.
By the time you get to whereyou want to go, it's running and
you're good to go.
Sam (46:01):
Yep, I'm sitting there and I'm like man I don't know if I
trust this thing or not Justbecause I don't understand it.
Norman Eicher (46:12):
Yes, sir, Yep.
No, you were asking about wherewe started from.
Typically for me, at least someof this stuff is so.
I've done it all my life.
So if I see an opportunity, Itry to capitalize on it, jump
into it and yeah yeah, great, mycompany's grown beyond the days
(46:37):
where it was just me.
It's been an interestingjourney.
Sam (46:43):
Yeah, it's hard to let, and I know you're enough, like me,
that it's hard to let some ofthat stuff go and let somebody
else take care of it.
Norman Eicher (46:52):
Yeah, but I've learned, if I don't, I'll go
crazy.
Sam (46:55):
Yeah you will in a hurry, yep.
Norman Eicher (46:57):
There's and there's people that are better
qualified to do some of thosethings.
I'm better.
I do better at being theinnovator, the creator.
I'm the one that comes with theideas.
I can do a lot of theimplementation, but when it
comes down to being here makingmy people do the job, I want to
get the result I want to.
Somebody else can do it so muchbetter than I can.
Sam (47:19):
Yeah.
Norman Eicher (47:20):
It's not my gift.
Yeah, I'm trying to do betterabout that.
Sam (47:30):
Let's go back even further.
Nobody's originally from thatarea.
Norman Eicher (47:37):
No, I was born and raised in southern Ontario,
a little town called ElmerOntario.
Yeah, I heard of pathwaypublishing.
I grew up just quarter milesouth pathway wagler printed.
Printed all the family lifeyoung companion blackboard
bullet all the books my mom wasuh.
(48:02):
So I grew up my uncle there.
He told me he built his firstshed in 75.
And he still got it.
But I would have.
My sister would have workedthere for 12 years and I used to
go back there after school wasover and work for another three
(48:24):
hours after school buildingrafters.
I would have probably been 12,13.
This is interesting.
I know I'm pretty young yet,but at that time when I started,
they paid me $2 an hour tobuild their rafters for them.
Sam (48:40):
Too bad, you can't find that guy now.
Norman Eicher (48:48):
A lot of things have happened since then.
Sam (48:51):
When did you leave Canada?
Norman Eicher (48:53):
I left in 2003.
January of 2003.
Been out on my own ever since.
Sam (49:05):
Went to Tennessee from there, or did you stop somewhere
?
Norman Eicher (49:08):
along the way.
I spent four years in Illinois.
Sam (49:14):
That's right.
You said you had an uncle thatwas over there.
Norman Eicher (49:17):
Yeah, I had an uncle over there in Illinois.
He was buying and selling sheds, delivering sheds, buying and
selling sheds, delivering sheds.
So from 2003 to fall of 2006,.
So almost four years I wouldhave spent there.
He built gazebos, sold sheds,built Paul Barnes.
(49:39):
We did Conklin roofing sprayfoam for some of those years as
well.
So we've been involved in someof that as well.
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Sam (51:32):
I had my Conklin spray foam years too, back in the early
90s.
Karen's my wife's uncle waswell I know.
For years he had plaques on thewall.
This is before all the bigshots showed up, but he was the
Eli Yoder.
Eli Yoder I didn't know if shewas kin to like the Utsi boys.
(51:53):
No, I'm actually kin to theUtsi boys, but we're n ot going
to tell anybody that.
But that was before they evergot into it.
So but yeah, him and Marvin,Yoder, Yoder and uh, oh my, I
hope he's not, he doesn't listenbecause he'd be like, come on,
man, you don't remember my name.
Oh, I can't think of the otherone, but they ran Yoder's.
(52:15):
There was a couple Yoder's thatran big time out of Montezuma
area, Macon Columbus, down intoValdosta, down into into they
got up into Atlanta a little bitand man there for four or five
years.
They were big.
I mean it was crazy Really.
(52:35):
Yeah, eli's still, him and hisson still run a full-time foam
conkling coating business.
Marvin's actually buildingsheds for Premier in Montezuma.
Now he wants to get back tofarming a little more again.
(52:56):
It was a big deal.
I don't know.
They started about 87, 88 iswhen they first started getting
into it and yeah they.
Eli's a little more relaxed nowthat he's older than he used to
(53:18):
be, but man, he used to selllike crazy.
It was crazy.
Norman Eicher (53:23):
I see, and so I never was personally signed up
with Conklin, it was justthrough my uncle, and what?
We had done there.
A lot of people have madereally good money at it.
It's a multi-level marketingthing that I don't care much for
.
Sam (53:40):
Eli never did that part of it either.
None of those guys really did.
Ronald Yoder he's still big inMontezuma area with a coating
business.
Oh man, yeah, there's manytimes I had to go rent an air
compressor and go blow graveloff a roof.
Norman Eicher (53:57):
I see.
Sam (53:58):
Yeah, and then we got doing metal roofs.
Anyway, that's a wholedifferent story.
That industry.
I have a bunch of friends thatare in it, but the majority of
the ones that I know stay prettyfocused on just the roofing
side of it.
They're not into all the restof it, so much.
That's wild that you actuallydid that.
Norman Eicher (54:20):
Yeah, we were certified with Conklin.
We had done some pretty majorjobs there.
Again, if you get into that,you're putting yourself out
there because, guess what, forthe next 10 years, 12 years,
whatever, if there is a leak,guess who they call you.
They're going to call you Ifit's three hours away, four
(54:44):
hours away, six hours awaywhatever.
Sam (54:46):
You'll fix it.
Norman Eicher (54:48):
You're going to go fix it.
It was a learning curve.
Did I enjoy it?
Yeah, would I be good again?
Probably not.
Sam (55:01):
Probably not Like me hooking up double whites.
Nope, no more, let the youngguys do it.
So then ended up in Tennessee.
Norman Eicher (55:12):
From there Yep Ended up moved down here in fall
of 2006.
I got you Cool, Been down hereever since.
Very good Got married there, orwere you married in?
Sam (55:25):
Illinois.
Norman Eicher (55:27):
Married in Illinois, okay, my wife's family
there's two of them still inIllinois and her father, and
then the rest are in Missouri,Kentucky, kind of scattered
around.
Sam (55:39):
I got you, sam.
Norman Eicher (55:41):
You're going to have to get down here and see me
sometime.
Oh, yeah, I was planning on it.
The boys have been begging togo golfing again, so oh no, they
want to go hunting and fishingtoo.
Sam (55:53):
Huh, fish it out of the pond.
Norman Eicher (55:59):
Well, no, they probably won't do that.
That'd be probably me more thanI hear you.
Sam (56:05):
No, we're gonna make that happen.
Just, man, my back's got me solike I was supposed to go to
Oklahoma to the barbecue outthere, wasn't able to go to that
.
I've had two other tripsplanned that I've had to cancel.
It's a struggle to ride for twohours to get up to North
Carolina to get our sheds done.
But yeah, the plan is to goback up there tomorrow.
(56:25):
I'm going to try to get oursheds done.
But the other plan is to goback up there tomorrow.
I'm going to try to get aboutsix of them out tomorrow.
We'll see how it goes.
But yeah, it's just I'm doingbetter.
As long as I don't drive everyday, it's much better and I'm on
some better stuff that I thinkis starting to help too.
(56:45):
So we're getting there slowly,but surely Glad to hear that
help too.
So we're getting there slowly,but should be glad to hear that.
What would you, um, what wouldyou put out to everybody out
there, like, where do you see us, where do you see the, the
market going?
Of course you're in Tennessee,you're like me.
You're in an area where it'sjust seems like it's never going
to slow down.
We're in huge growth areas.
(57:06):
But what?
What do you say out there tothe people in the shed industry?
Norman Eicher (57:10):
I guess in the last year I've been watching um
through covid there seem to be alot of guys getting into the
shed industry and I think we'regoing to see some consolidation
among some of those um and Ithink we're going to see some it
slowed down.
So that's just personal feeling, kind of my gut feeling of
watching In my area.
(57:33):
I think we're going to be solidbut I think there's going to be
some areas, especially in thenortheast, maybe more in the
Florida area and stuff, that Ithink we're going to see some
pretty major slowdowns.
That's just I'm just talkingoff my hip here.
Some pretty major slowdowns.
I'm just talking off my hiphere.
I don't have the numbers, butthat's just my gut feeling from
watching where I'm at.
(57:55):
My recommendation is don'tskimp on how you're building
your sheds, because quality willlong outlast quantity.
Sam (58:09):
Yep.
I agree Anything out like.
You're so diversified it's alittle hard to nail this down.
Plus, you run on.
There's something we didn'ttalk about, but I'm thinking of
how diversified you are and whatyou're doing.
But you've you've got in-housetrucking that you use also.
I guess you're still doing that.
Norman Eicher (58:32):
Yeah, we do all our own trucking.
Sam (58:37):
That basically the shed hauling picture part of it,
which is mostly where a lot ofmy listeners come from.
Is you feel pretty comfortablewith the way you're set up doing
that?
Um?
Trucking seems to be prettysteady right now I do.
Norman Eicher (58:55):
Um, I'm, my drivers are busy.
I I've been happy with you know, I've not had a struggle
finding someone Most times.
One of my drivers has been withme for almost 10 years at this
point, and then the rest of mineI pretty much can promote from
(59:22):
within the company.
We'll bring them in, run,they'll haul, lumber, they'll
haul whatever else we need, andthen if we have an opening,
there's usually one of themthat'll jump at getting paid.
We pay based off of performance, based on deliveries, and so
the opportunity to make someextra money doing a good job.
(59:43):
I've been very, very happy withthat Cool.
I've been very, very happy withthat cool.
Yep, so yeah, it's for us.
The, the haul inside just makessense.
Sam (59:57):
Yeah you have dealers.
Like you got guys out therelike not all your lots are
corporate lots, so you have thedealer side of it.
You're grinning like a Cheshirecat over there, do you still
have?
Dealers, or did you get rid of?
All of them.
Norman Eicher (01:00:17):
No, we have dealers.
Sam (01:00:22):
I'm just thinking out loud here that I'm comparing you a
little bit to Westwood Mike andArlen.
They do all their own haulingin-house, but then they have all
their own sales lots too.
They don't have dealers.
You've still got that.
Norman Eicher (01:00:39):
Apparently we have a mix.
Some days I think our owndealers do better and then some
days my independents do better.
So it's just the dealer side ofthings can get very interesting
, because as soon as they hit amonth where they're not selling,
(01:01:00):
it's automatically everybodyelse's fault, Absolutely, it's
just.
Can I say it's like babysittingsome days it is yep, I've heard
that before.
Sam (01:01:17):
It's an adult daycare.
Yeah, yep, I've said that aboutthe haulers too.
So I guess I mean there's daysI need babysitting, I guess.
Norman Eicher (01:01:25):
So it fits all of us sometimes.
Yeah, and for us, having ourown haulers has been a really
good thing.
I would have a hard time seeingcontracting my hauling out.
It simply keeps thecommunication so much cleaner,
tighter.
Sam (01:01:45):
Yeah, I'm very happy with that yep, and the other thing
you've got going for you isyou're you're actually a little
bit of a grease nut, anyway,like you probably more than a
little bit yeah, so you, youactually still enjoy, it's not,
it's not like it's a burden tohave to actually own trucks to
(01:02:08):
have them work.
Norman Eicher (01:02:09):
I love it.
That makes a big difference.
We do all our own maintenancein-house.
We just get done rebuilding.
We rebuild our own engines.
Sam (01:02:21):
You totally rebuilt the one truck, not just the engines and
stuff.
Norman Eicher (01:02:25):
You do it all we do.
You need to come see my 84, Sam.
Sam (01:02:32):
Yeah, I know I need to get it done.
I know Last time I was therethere was a hood in the paint
booth and a cab.
I think, yeah, I've got to getup there.
Norman Eicher (01:02:42):
I've got an 84 C10 that I'm rather happy with
how it turned out.
Sam (01:02:49):
That's awesome just for the record, the road runs both ways
, you know.
Norman Eicher (01:02:55):
I know, but you know, I've got to keep, I've got
to keep the office work done sothat everything else keeps
going oh no, no, I know yourpeople good enough to know
better than that.
I was.
I was really hoping that I couldget out a little bit more this
year than what I have some otheryears.
Last year was really rough onme.
It just seemed like westruggled all year to get the
(01:03:18):
right people in the right places, adding the lumber side,
growing the metal side as muchas we have.
It's been a growth thing.
This week I'm having my firstEOS meeting.
We're going to do a full scaleimplementation of EOS system.
(01:03:39):
I'm hoping that it'll make abig difference on operational
side.
I got you Cool.
Sam (01:03:52):
Very good, anything else you want to throw in there
before we close this out?
I?
don't think so.
Cool, well, I thank you so much.
It seems like well, I do.
I appreciate everybody thatcomes on here lately.
It seems like it's hard to getpeople to come on because, um
well, I'm my schedule is sowhacked right now.
(01:04:13):
Shannon's like, come on, yougoing to get some more guys in
yet, or you know where we're atnow.
Just put it out there.
Anybody that wants to come onwould love to have you on, would
love to sit down and chat withyou.
It's not that hard to do.
Anybody can do this.
Um so, but yeah, I know itsounds repetitive, but I
appreciate you coming on talkingwith us, um, anything like.
(01:04:34):
So people want to get a hold ofyou.
How did they get a hold of you?
Norman Eicher (01:04:38):
um.
Call the office here atmountain view, ask to speak to
me, I'm, they can transfer youto me yep, yep.
Sam (01:04:45):
Mountain view company I saw it says now when I looked you
up on technical.
Norman Eicher (01:04:50):
Technical name is mountain view construction llc,
um.
I believe we're listed ongoogle as mountain view co yeah,
right there.
Sam (01:04:56):
yeah, mountain view.
Co is what it shows on there,right off the side of the big
road in belvedere, big town ofbelvedere, where we had the big
old shedbash Good place 2019shedbash.
Yep.
So anyway, thank you guys forjoining us today.
Always appreciate having youalong for the ride.
(01:05:17):
Uh-oh, what are you looking forback there?
Norman Eicher (01:05:20):
March the 2nd 2019.
March the 2nd 2019.
Sam (01:05:24):
Yeah, you got a plaque back there somewhere.
Norman Eicher (01:05:26):
Yeah, that's what I was looking for, yep.
Sam (01:05:28):
So, yep, yeah, you got a plaque back there somewhere.
Yeah, that's what I was lookingfor.
So, yep, thank all you guys forbeing on today.
Make sure you always catch upon the newsletter.
You can catch us on YouTube,Spotify, iTunes, all the places.
We even have a call-in numberwhere you can just call in and
listen to it by the phone.
Thank you guys once again forbeing on today.
This is Sam Basseter.
(01:05:48):
We'll catch you next time.
All right, guys.
Welcome back to another episodeof the Shed Geek podcast.
Friday fun days with SamBasseter I'm your host, Sam
Byler and guys, I'm so excitedabout being here today.
Man, I got to get back to doingsome of these live.
I'm depending on these zoomcalls all the time and it's it's
not near as good as when I canshow up in person, and we were
(00:31):
going to do this one in personand things just don't always
work out.
Now I'm kind of under a travelban till I get my back figured
out a little better.
So anyway, I am here with NormanEicher from Mountain View,
Belvedere, Tennessee, back allthe way to where we had the
first big bash.
(00:51):
We had the Montana one, but thefirst big Tennessee bash.
We were over there at thecommunity center and then we did
all the activities over atMountain View.
And then we did all theactivities over at Mountain View
and Norman was kind enough toreach out to us way back in the
early stages of planning saying,hey, anything we have over here
you're welcome to use.
(01:12):
Man, you guys were fantastichosts.
How are you today?
Norman Eicher (01:17):
I'm doing fine.
Thank you, Sam, for the introthere.
Uh, yep, my, my background was.
I remember Sam coming in here.
This curly-haired guy walks inand I'm like, who is this?
And we kind of hit off and beenfriends ever since.
Sam (01:31):
Absolutely.
Some days I wonder how the bashwould have gone if we'd have
been as good of friends as weare now.
If we did back then, we'd haveprobably gotten some trouble
back then.
Norman Eicher (01:43):
We'd have probably gotten a lot of trouble
.
Sam (01:45):
Yep, so you guys didn't start out originally as shed
builders did you.
Norman Eicher (01:52):
No, we did not.
We started out as aconstruction company and then
bought a property on a dividedhighway, had someone here here
decided we wanted to sell somesheds.
My partner and I at that pointwere both had a background in
sheds.
I had worked for my unclebuilding sheds from a very young
(02:14):
age, and then my partner'sfather had a kind of shed
company in Illinois that he soldsome sheds at, and I had worked
for them there as well.
So we were both very familiarwith selling sheds, and so we
actually found a supplier and westarted selling some.
At that point the supplier onlymade treated sheds, so we were
(02:37):
into the metal.
Metal siding, metal roofing iswhat we promoted.
So we started playing aroundtoying, building a couple metal
sheds, building everythingvertical, nothing horizontal, um
, the typical way you would seeit, put on a pole barn or
whatever, and the company's justgrowing from there.
(03:01):
We would have opened doors herein 2009.
And then in 2014, we would haveadded a trust plant.
And yeah, we've just kind ofbeen adding on ever since.
I think there's some more inthe plans, oh no, some more I
(03:22):
don't know how far that?
oh yeah, no, we need another,another.
I've got scheduled to buildanother 80 by 400, so wow you
guys.
Sam (03:33):
So talk about the metal side a little bit.
You guys do all your own metalstuff we do.
Norman Eicher (03:38):
We put a roll former in of our own in 20, 20,
2021, and that's continuallybeen growing as well.
In 2021, we would have addedabout 30,000 square feet here,
and in 2022, we added another20,000, and I'm looking to build
(04:05):
another 32,000, so, okay, how'syour?
Sam (04:11):
so I think the last time I was there maybe, I don't know
one of the last times I wasthere you had started playing
around with not bending trim butrolling trim.
Are you still?
Is that a secret, or are wetalking about that, or?
Norman Eicher (04:25):
no, that's going.
Are you still doing it?
Oh yeah, we still.
We still do a lot of all ournormal trims are pretty much
rolled.
It's just so much quicker.
Um, just give you an idea.
Yeah, a piece of j channel, ifyou do it on the break, is going
to take you probably around 30seconds or so between 20 and 30
(04:48):
seconds to make a piece of jchannel, and the other day two
of my guys ran in 1200 pieces ofj channel in just under five
hours.
Oh wow, and it's very easy.
There's nothing to it.
Sam (05:03):
A lot less stressful, a lot less action, involvement.
Norman Eicher (05:08):
It's just so much quicker.
Nice, that works out to a PCJchannel about every 15 seconds
and you could never maintainthat doing that on a break.
The key being maintain yeah yeahyou can probably do one or two
(05:30):
pieces and then you're going tobe done and not do a maintained.
It's just not going to happen.
Yeah, yep.
So so we, we ran, we rolledfour metal and two different
profiles in a 36-inch widescrew-down panel, and then, of
course, we do board and we dostanding seam, and we have.
(05:52):
Last spring my two bigpurchases were a brand-new
automated saw for the trussplant and a double-bend
VarioBend.
So I have a double folder fromvario bend.
It folds both ways fullyautomatic with the fingers.
It's really, really sped up ourtrim side wow, probably this
(06:16):
year, my big pushes.
I'm going to have to add onagain and then do a slit line
with nesting function and, youknow, automated functions on it
to get my speed back up to whereit needs to be.
Sam (06:33):
So what is and I don't know , this probably might not even
be important to you, but for aguy like me sitting and watching
is do you do more trusses?
Do you do more metal?
Do you do more sheds?
Do you do more metal?
Do you do more sheds?
Do you not care?
Norman Eicher (06:46):
you just roll them all wherever they go dollar
wise, we're doing more in shedsdollar wise, you do more sheds
yeah, dollar wise, we do more insheds and the metal side is
going to be almost even withthat this year.
Sam (07:04):
Okay.
Norman Eicher (07:05):
But then I've added lumber.
We're a full-scale lumberyardas well, and that's been a
struggle.
We're in the south, a verytight-knit, close community and
everybody knows everybody.
Yeah, and any new kid on theblock, he's looked on with
utmost suspicion.
I get it.
(07:28):
He's got nefarious, uh, he'sgot nefarious ideas.
Um, you know, even if I do thesame as what my local lumberyard
is, um, it's not good enough.
So, yeah, it's a learning curveand it's it's building to
putting the right people in theright place.
And, yeah, on glick, uh, togive you feedback, to help you
(07:53):
make you better.
Sam (07:53):
So, oh yeah, absolutely so does.
Uh, on your trust side, do youhave I can't remember if we
talked about this or not do youactually build pole barns or do
you just supply all thematerials for pole barns?
Norman Eicher (08:09):
We currently have two of our own crews building
pole barns, and then we'll stillsub some out.
Sam (08:13):
Okay, yeah.
So that's where the lumberbetween that and sheds.
That's where your lumber demandcame from, anyway.
Norman Eicher (08:20):
Yeah, so we were stocking most of the stuff you
needed at a lumber yard anyway,so it just made sense to add
some more and then try to try tomove some of it.
Yeah, and that and that keepsgrowing.
It's that's.
That's been a very interestingpiece.
Yep, it's a lot harder to getinto than I anticipated.
Sam (08:44):
Yeah, yeah, that's interesting.
Locally here we have Yoder'sBuilding Supply which has been
around.
They're obviously not a new kidon the block but compared to
Lowe's Home Depot 84 Lumber someof those guys they would be
(09:04):
considered that.
But locally here they kickthose guys tails um.
Yoder's probably supplies morecontractors than five or six
lows locally put together.
Yeah but, so my local loads.
Norman Eicher (09:20):
yeah, my local lows in home Home Depot are a
joke.
They don't do anything.
But I've got a local lumberyardjust down the road.
There's two decent lumberyardswithin 15, 20 miles.
Yeah, the one I've always had avery good relationship with.
(09:41):
The other one has been paranoidof me ever since I started here
.
Sam (09:45):
So uh, uh, yeah.
Well, I'll tell you the samething.
We tell shed companies, youknow, when another shed company
moves in, I'm like if, if youbelieve in your product, you
worried about anybody else?
If?
You believe in your service.
Uh, you know, product orservice.
Pick which one you want to beand build on that.
(10:06):
I've preached this for years.
Everybody knows this about meCompetition is good.
Competition is good for me,it's good for you, it's good for
everybody else.
Norman Eicher (10:17):
That's what I find.
I've got two shed companieslocal.
I go to church with one thatbuilds for one of them.
The other one I know well.
We back and forth.
We built his.
He added on three times in thelast 15 years and we've done all
three additions to his shops.
Yeah, yep, we've had a goodrelationship with them.
(10:39):
I try to you know what withthem.
I'll even go as far as they'llcall me and go hey, we ran out
of hinges, do you have any?
I'm like, yeah, just here's abox, just replace it.
That's how we've always workedand I appreciate that.
That means a lot to me.
Sam (10:56):
Oh, absolutely.
Yeah, I agree that's.
That's important.
So so it sounds like one of thethings I always try to figure
out is where are you headed next?
What are you doing next?
Sounds like your metal'spicking up.
You're headed back harder onthat.
So do you have?
Do you like supply stores withmetal, or are you strictly
(11:17):
selling to public?
Where's your metal go?
Norman Eicher (11:21):
combination.
Uh, we got in with some chickenhouse guys.
We're supplying some chickenhouses and we just became a
Lowe's vendor about two monthsago, so we're starting to sell
some to Lowe's and that's aweird market.
That, right, there is a weirdmarket.
I mean, they have brand loyaltylike I've not seen anything
(11:42):
like we'll do lumber packagesfor them.
That I'm just like how Icouldn't sell to a contractor
locally for what I'm chargingthem and they don't care.
I don't, I don't know, is it?
I don't have an answer for that.
(12:02):
I guess I'm not in that longenough, but I'm not.
I shouldn't.
Maybe.
Maybe that's a secret.
I shouldn't have an answer forthat, I guess I'm not in that
long enough, but I'm not.
I shouldn't.
Maybe that's a secret Ishouldn't have passed on, but
that one there has been reallygood for us.
Sam (12:12):
That's interesting, yeah, yeah.
Well, I know you know the samething here locally I don't.
20 years ago, 25 years ago,Lowe's started outsourcing
trusses, you know.
So our Lowe's around here, oureconomy is so dadgum crazy which
(12:32):
I know it is there too, and youyou've got Huntsville pushing
up from the bottom there too.
But like they startedoutsourcing trusses and packages
and some stuff like that, justbecause they weren't able to
handle it all in-house.
I remember walking into theSeneca Lowe's and there's an
overhauled truss hanging upthere and it says overhauled
truss on it.
They're like yeah, if you gettrusses, it'll be delivered from
(12:54):
overhauled truss.
I know they do that kind ofstuff.
Norman Eicher (13:02):
Lowe's does not have their own plants, they're
just simply like a Walmart ofbuildings, moving Yep.
I don't quite understand someof the loyalty that they
generate.
But then, on the other hand, Iguess if you have a Lowe's
(13:23):
account, they sell it to you ata certain price and then you get
a discount which your invoicestill shows If you're doing cost
plus.
I guess I understand some ofthe games that contractors like
to play.
Hey Sam, here's my invoice for$2,000.
And Lowe's says well, I'm acontractor, I'm going to give
(13:44):
you five percent or eightpercent off of that invoice.
So it puts an extra percentageback in the contractor's pocket
by doing some of the things theydo.
Sam (13:54):
Well, I, I mean, yeah, I've , I've had a pro account with
Lowes for, oh my word, longbefore I moved to South Carolina
.
So for 25, 27, 28 years thatI've had a pro account through
them and, yeah, I get.
You know you, you get the, youget the discount on your
(14:14):
packages, so to speak.
You get special sometimes.
Now they have it to where if I,if, even if I don't use my pro
card account, like to pay for it, they have my credit cards
registered on there to where Iclick I collect rewards and then
I use rewards cards to pay forit.
(14:35):
So I'm getting three to fivepercent off of their side and
I'm getting three to fivepercent off my credit card side
and then I'm getting fivepercent off my packages.
It'll it.
It adds up to where at least ittakes some of the stress off of
some of the purchase you haveto make outside of your business
.
Norman Eicher (14:54):
Stuff you're doing, it does it adds up and
and that's that's one thing II'm seeing play out in the
contractor world that I that's agame I've never played.
I'm a gc in Tennessee andAlabama and you know I've always
bought my stuff in quantity,wholesale, whatever, and I've
never played the game of okay,I'm going to build it, cost plus
(15:15):
.
I go to the lumber yard and getan invoice and knowing that my
invoice is going to be 5% less,yep, if I pay it on time it's
going to be 5% less than this.
So I'm building the house for20% above cost.
So technically I can gainanother 5% of that.
(15:39):
So I understand why guys aredoing it.
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Tomorrow I have a fullyfinished 18 by 40 cabin.
That's going to require two tothree mils to get it delivered
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With all the rain we've hadlately, it's going to be a mess,
but it needs a bigger mule.
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(16:26):
Ah, that's right.
You're talking about the onethey had up at Michigan at the
Shed Show, that monster meal man.
That thing was awesome.
That's right, it's the oneyou've seen at all the Shed
Holler barbecues.
Man, yeah, there's nothing likea little diesel donkey to make
my day go so much better.
Sam (16:46):
What up Are you still in the window business?
Norman Eicher (16:52):
Yeah, still I am, I need some windows.
Sam (16:58):
I don't need a semi-load of them and I know that's what you
like.
That's basically what you'redoing, right.
You're not selling basic.
I mean, you're like sellingwindows out by the semi-loan.
Norman Eicher (17:08):
No, no, we're a retail location.
We deal with a ton ofcontractors.
Sam (17:14):
So have you thought the reason I brought that most
people.
You might be wondering why inthe world is he bringing up
windows when we're talking witha shed conversation?
Have you ever thought aboutpushing it on the shed side?
I have not.
Do you want to sell windows toshed manufacturers?
Norman Eicher (17:33):
No, I guess I've just never really thought about
it.
I have enough to take care of.
That's going to be an idea Ineed to pursue at some point,
probably, but probably not today, because I've got.
Sam (17:47):
I've got other things I need to take care of, so yeah,
so you don't want everybodyblowing up your phone right now.
They want to get winded fromyou.
Norman Eicher (17:57):
I'd be happy to do that.
It just it'd be hard, dependingon where you're at, to get them
to you efficiently and costeffective yeah so that now
you're mimicking exactly whatyou told me about buying metal
from you.
Sam (18:12):
Remember, I pushed you hard to get metal down here for us
and you, you're pretty, you'repretty logistically savvy to the
fact that you've got animaginary line out there that
you stop at or all of a sudden,it just doesn't become cost
effective.
Norman Eicher (18:28):
It doesn't become cost effective to ship a
finished product that far.
Your volume has to be so highto make that make sense and I'm
going to share a little bit whyI see that happen.
(18:48):
I was purchasing out ofSouthern Indiana for years and
because I didn't like thequality and what I could get
locally Yep.
Like the quality in what Icould get locally Yep.
The extra I was paying in priceand the aggravation and
frustration of making thathappen made me probably a lot
(19:09):
more aware of at some point.
Logistically it doesn't becomepractical because you're going
to pay more in shipping thanthan your items are worth.
Sam (19:19):
Yeah.
Norman Eicher (19:20):
If you, if you and you have to run that ratio
and make that make sense.
And that's kind of the same waywith shed companies.
If you, if you start, if youstart hauling a finished product
300 miles, it's hard to makethat make sense.
It's hard to make that makesense when you can haul a raw
(19:43):
product and have someone buildit 20 miles from there.
And then you have, then thenyou, you just set up another hub
and you keep going.
Sam (19:53):
Yeah.
Norman Eicher (19:54):
Simply because you know sheds is an oversized
community, trusts is anotherthing.
That's.
It looks a little difficult,but for me I kind of run
everything on a case basis.
If you're talking $30,000 worthof product, there's enough
overhead there to swing some ofyour logistic cost.
(20:16):
But if you're talking somethingdown running at like a 5 of
five or six percent margin,there's not enough.
There's no money in it by thetime you pay shipping.
Sam (20:25):
Yeah, that makes sense.
Norman Eicher (20:27):
It's not just as easy as shipping it with UPS.
Sam (20:30):
Yeah, but it is amazing to me how many times I see sheds
getting shipped four, five, six,seven states away.
Pennsylvania is still famousfor doing it.
Norman Eicher (20:42):
I can't make that make sense logistically.
Sam (20:44):
Yeah.
Unless they're.
So the argument that I've heardalready.
Now some of the stuff that Isee shipped out of Pennsylvania
to Texas, to Arizona, toColorado, to California, is back
to what you're talking about.
You're talking $100,000 to$120,000 loads and up, and then,
(21:05):
like you said, there's a littlemore pie in there to split up,
but it's still.
So often I'll see a load ofsheds, you know, Pennsylvania
truck, a load of sheds goinginto Florida, Pennsylvania truck
, a load of sheds going intoFlorida, Pennsylvania truck,
load of sheds going, you know,past me here somewhere, and it's
just, it's mind boggling to me.
(21:26):
And those guys aren't crazy,they've been doing it a long
time.
Then they still figure out.
Now, some of those truckers,they will they back.
Like Omar transport, he'llbackhaul, he's got his trailers
built to where they can hauljust about anything on a
backhaul.
As to where I'm more of the guy, I'm not even going to spend
(21:46):
time to try to find something.
Bring back.
I'm going to go back and get mynext one and go again.
You know, I don't.
I don't want to fool with that,which would be the same way if
you're delivering metal, youwant to do your four or five
drops and go back home.
Norman Eicher (21:59):
Yeah Well, so I'm going to give you a little
scenario I don't think we'veever talked about.
I had a company fromPennsylvania reach out to me
about some sheds going on to agovernment project down here.
They held a government contract.
I built them to their specs.
I think we did close to 20sheds.
Sam (22:20):
Yep.
Norman Eicher (22:21):
Went down to an arsenal in Alabama.
So in those specific scenariosthey have their contractors that
they want to use or have to useor something like that.
So I totally understand atthose points.
Yes, at those points.
(22:43):
Yeah, yes, he made, he made ashe made more than I did by
having that contract and justgetting me to do it locally.
Yeah, bank on that, on thatproject.
But I, if he wouldn't have usedme, I would have had no way of
getting the contract, becausethose contacts and those
contracts take a long time tobuild and maintain.
Sam (23:02):
Oh, yeah, yep, I locally.
Norman Eicher (23:04):
I do a lot for the government simply because I
carry the proper insurances andall of that stuff and there's a
lot of people that don't.
I guess I just got a job theother day that somebody else was
cheaper but they didn't havethe proper stuff and so we ended
up with with the project simplybecause there was nobody else
that could do it.
Yeah, yeah, but that takes alot of desk work sitting here
(23:29):
behind in a desk chair gettingthose, getting everything
crossed, every dot, everythinghas to be dotted, everything has
to be done right.
You have to have the rightaccounts, you have the right
paperwork on file, you have tohave the right insurance, you
have to have I mean, there'sjust the listing.
For those type of projects.
The money is lucrative.
Sam (23:49):
There's a lot of back-end work that goes on to get it yeah
, I was gonna say I've talked tosome of those guys that have
those contracts and some daysthey're even like was the back,
all the back work that we did?
Was it even worth doing it?
And they're like, yeah, if youcan keep them, if you can keep
them and keep going at it, butit does it takes.
It takes a.
I mean that's, that's four orfive years ago.
(24:12):
Yeah, hold on.
Seven years ago, 2018.
Seven years ago, I did aproject for Michelin and it was
the same way.
It was so many hoops and stuffthat you had to jump through to
get ready to do this.
You know, I mean, it wasn'teven that big a project.
It was big for my woodworkingshop at the time.
But after a while you're like,can we just get the project done
(24:35):
?
I mean, you know and's, butthen once you were done, you
know, when they needed somethingelse done, it was done.
You were, it was a breeze.
Yeah it was a breeze.
Norman Eicher (24:45):
So but and here's what I'm seeing a lot, a lot of
the smaller guys don't have theoffice staff or the personnel
to handle the paperwork thatneeds to go be done on those
projects and so, yeah, that'sgoing to see someone very large
get it.
And you know, on those things,you know, on a 17, 17 shed
(25:08):
bundle you're talking, he heprobably made 80, 90 000 on top
of what he paid me.
Basically, he priced him comingout of Pennsylvania, priced him
delivery coming out ofPennsylvania, bought him from me
for the same price.
He could have got him out ofPennsylvania in pocket of the
(25:29):
delivery fees.
He did very well, I don'tbegrudge that because I know
what goes on to make thesethings happen.
Yeah, it's really really hard,could?
Sam (25:42):
we ever go down a rabbit hole on that?
Why is it so hard to understand?
That's not a word, that's notwhat I'm looking for.
Why is it so hard to be okaywith somebody making money off
of you making money?
Where did we get off on that?
(26:03):
You know what I'm saying andlisten, I'm going to preach
straight at shed haulers for aminute right here.
They want to always cry aboutthe fact that the big man is
making so much money, you know.
And why aren't they making more?
When they're making money,they're doing good.
You follow what I'm saying.
Norman Eicher (26:24):
Oh, I follow what I'm saying.
I'm going to come at it fromthe other perspective, so I'm
going to play.
I'm the big man, you know whopays the insurance.
Sam (26:36):
Yeah.
Norman Eicher (26:37):
Who pays when that shed blows apart on the
road and somebody gets killed?
Sam (26:44):
I'm I'm glad you brought that up, because we can't get
some of the big men to pay forthose they're like.
It's on your trailer, it's yourproblem um, so I'm gonna share
that I.
Norman Eicher (26:55):
If something like that happens, I feel I'm in the
boat as much as anybody else.
That's why you're one of thegood guys.
I don't know about that, Sam,but then it comes down to if
there's something wrong with theshed who pays for it?
Even five years down the road,if that thing starts leaking,
who sends somebody to fix it andtake care of it and make sure
(27:19):
the customer is taken care of?
And I'll just share.
Sometimes there's heartburn inwhat I'm doing because it seems
every time I turn around there'srisk.
I'm putting myself out there.
I'm taking all the risk.
Yes, I'm, I'm taking all therisk.
(27:40):
Yes, I'm making money, but atthe end of the day I'm also
putting myself out there andtaking a ton of risk.
Um, you know, if I purchasedthat a hundred thousand dollars
worth of material and the bottomfalls out, um, you know, the
anticipated 25% tariffs don'thit and the, instead of material
going up, it goes down.
Who takes that hit?
(28:01):
You know you have a lot ofmoney in play that it feels like
at the end of the day there'ssometimes not a lot of rewards
for the back-end effort that youput in.
Sam (28:18):
Yeah, yeah.
Norman Eicher (28:19):
Who makes the sure.
You know it's like I'm payingoffice staff to you know,
process the order.
Make sure it's done.
Make sure taxes get paid.
Make sure my dealers get paid.
Make sure that you know if wehave lots that everybody gets
paid.
Make sure that there's enoughmoney in the bank to pay the
haulers.
It's just you.
Sam (28:42):
You know, yeah, there's money coming in, but it a lot of
times it tends to go out justas quick, and most times, if I
can get them to listen longenough, it's like, look, you do
the same thing.
You don't know where your fuelcost is going to be.
You don't know where this isgoing to be, you don't know
where that's going to be.
It's the same way.
You're not going.
You don't want to haul forcheap, you know.
So it's um it.
It works both directions.
The thing that frustrates me iswhen, when they find out, or
(29:08):
when somebody and I'm saying itgoes either direction on this,
when they find out that youmight have made extra money on
it, or whatever they're like.
Oh blah, blah, blah, blah.
You don't want to run off aboutthat.
It or whatever they're like ohwater, blah, blah, blah.
You'll never want to run offabout that.
And I'm like, since when?
If, if I tell you that I'm ahall sheds for you and you're
going to pay me five grand aweek, why do I care?
(29:28):
If you make five grand a weekor 500 grand a week, what
difference does it make, doesn't?
None so?
So that's why, yeah, that's whyI feel like too often we kind
of forget the part that we allneed each other.
And if he makes good this time,I'll make some somewhere else
(29:49):
sometime.
At the end of the day, we're allstill moving forward am I too
harsh to say?
Norman Eicher (29:59):
that's a little bit an Amish mentality, Amish
Mennonite mentality that I can'tstand.
That if another Amish orMennonite makes a dollar on me,
I see that.
I see that a lot.
Somehow we think we're entitled.
You know we're not.
We're not entitled to anythingin life.
No, there's nothing that I amowed.
(30:21):
We're not entitled to anythingin life.
No, there's nothing that I amowed.
Sam doesn't owe me anything.
I've tried to go out of my wayto help him but he doesn't owe
me anything, just who I am.
If Sam puts a deal together andI tell him I'll sell him that
shed for $9,000 and Sam can sellit for $18,000, guess what?
(30:43):
That's not my.
I agreed to sell it to Sam for$9,000.
I don't really care what Sammakes off of it's not why is
that why?
Does that.
Why should I let that bother me?
Sam (30:54):
I don't know, man, I don't have the answer and I guess I'm
asking that, trying to makepeople think like why?
Should.
Norman Eicher (31:02):
I let that bother me.
Sam (31:04):
Yeah.
Norman Eicher (31:05):
You know, Sam's got costs, he's got to live too.
So if I'm not doing something,if I'm not making Sam money and
he's buying product from me,then I need to go.
I need to figure out what I'mdoing wrong, because if Sam
can't make money on it, thenit's no use for him to do it.
There's no reason for him to doit.
Sam (31:23):
Yes, this is true, and then if we don't have each other,
we're not getting our jobfinished.
Norman Eicher (31:30):
Yeah, and that's kind of the way I view employer
employee relations.
Oh, absolutely Same thing.
If my employee isn't making memoney, I can't afford to pay his
taxes.
I can't afford to pay hishealth care, I can't afford to
give him a bonus at the end ofthe year.
I can't afford to have a deskfor him to sit in.
(31:53):
If he's not making me money,I'm paying for the space for him
to be here, and if he's notmaking me money, then why is he
here?
Sam (32:03):
Yeah, because pretty soon neither one of y'all are going
to be there.
Yes, yep, good point.
Norman Eicher (32:11):
So I think we need to get it through our head
that if we're not making theother person money, there's
something wrong in what we'redoing.
Yeah, yeah that's, that's fairsorry I went off on a rant there
, but that's just no, no, no, no, no.
I just yeah, I agree, I I have.
That's bothered me likesomething crazy.
(32:32):
I see these and particularlyI'm still beachy Amish and and I
see that in that culture theyjust if another man makes a
dollar on him.
It's just terrible.
I can't see that why.
Sam (32:52):
But we're okay going to Lowe's and letting Lowe's make a
dollar off of us.
Norman Eicher (32:56):
Yeah, we're totally fine with that.
Sam (32:59):
You know what I'm saying.
Yeah, Shannon's going to belike man.
I don't know where these twogot off on this.
Why am I not in on thisconversation?
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Sam (34:54):
So we you know I don't think I ever heard the term race
to the bottom until I got toknow Shannon Latham, and he's
constantly harping on the andDave Miller.
Dave Miller, when I firststarted, you know, working with
him on the rent to own side umfact, Shannon might have stole
it from Dave, to be honest withyou, because Dave is, you know
(35:15):
he's he's always been of theopinion that you know we need to
quit this race to the bottom.
You know rent to't companies doit, manufacturers do it, shed
lots up and down the same road,you know it's.
It's like uh and home depot andLowe's don't do it.
You know they might run aspecial on something to get you
(35:35):
in the door to see everythingelse.
You know I remember back in theday, man, this all the way back
in the early 90s, when you knowsometimes they would run a
special on studs or they wouldrun a special on studs or they
would run a special on plywoodor something.
You know where you could.
You could get it dirt cheap butwhen you were in there you
bought everything else youneeded to and you know it's it's
(35:59):
.
I've noticed we're gettingtight again a little bit.
And on on the shed sales, theprofessionals shed sales
professionals page, I've seen itcreeping up again where some
dealers are starting to fussabout other dealers' prices and
stuff.
It's so hard for me not just toshake my head at them and be
(36:19):
like, come on, guys, but it getsinto you that man.
He's selling that 10x 16 for400 bucks less than I am, and
it's like it's not the same shit.
Norman Eicher (36:32):
My question is go look at the sheds.
Sam (36:36):
And.
I would tell my guy to go Tellthe customer.
Go look at it, You'll see whatthe difference is.
Norman Eicher (36:41):
You'll see what the difference is, but I
guarantee you over 50% of yourcustomers will buy based on your
personality and your way ofapproaching them, versus what
your price are.
If your price is within 15%,they will.
What's 15%?
Sam (37:02):
Nothing to them If you walk out there.
Norman Eicher (37:04):
I have a salesman here that I will put up against
anybody I've ever run upagainst.
Older gentleman People love him.
Comes out with his cowboy hatand his cowboy, his starch jeans
, you know, stand up bythemselves.
Yeah, well-dressed, well-spokenPeople love him.
Yeah, spoken people love him.
(37:32):
Yeah, we sell more shedsbecause of him than you ever.
It's just his personality.
So if you come across as you'resome bum, you don't care what
you look like.
You're here to sell them thecheapest thing that that you can
put slap together and get tothem versus I care about you.
Here's what we're doingdifferent.
Here's how we're different.
We try to take care of you.
(37:54):
We try to build somethingdifferent.
This is why we do what we do.
If you're within the ballpark,people will buy.
Sam (38:04):
I agree, yep, and I still know those.
I've still got them.
There are some really goodonline salespeople out there.
I've seen some of their numbers.
I know what they can do and notat all knocking on what they do
because they're good at it, notat all knocking what they do
(38:24):
because they're good at it.
But there are four or fivepeople that I know in the
southeast that sell just as muchdollar wise that do very little
online.
Norman Eicher (38:40):
It's all based on their personality based on
their product knowledge andbased on they sell themselves
before they ever sell theirproduct.
And it still works it.
It works, it just does, and youdon't have to be a car salesman
uh no, to make it happen.
Sam (38:57):
No, I'm even starting to see some of that shift in car
sales if you like car?
Magic, changing some of that.
Norman Eicher (39:03):
You walk out there and you're confident in
yourself.
You're well-spoken, you knowwhat.
You know, your product.
I promise you you will sellsheds.
Sam (39:14):
Yep.
Norman Eicher (39:15):
But the flip side of that is stay in your office
and let your people just wanderaround the lot, not go out and
talk to them and then come whineto me.
You can't sell sheds, it justwon't sell.
Sam (39:30):
And that is not a hypothetical situation either.
It happens.
Norman Eicher (39:35):
Look, I've been doing this for over 20 years.
I know how to sell sheds.
Sam (39:48):
I was here by myself on a Saturday, one Saturday Sam, from
9 o'clock to 2 o'clock, I soldsix sheds.
Yep, it happens.
Let's get back to what you'redoing with sheds.
You said that originally youstarted out with wood sheds.
Norman Eicher (40:00):
We were selling you were selling somebody else's
Correct.
So we were.
I was a little interestingthere Through a family friend.
They brought us some sheds.
They didn't want to, but hetalked them into bringing us
some sheds.
(40:21):
They set us up three or foursheds and we were like it's
really hard to sell sheds withtwo or three sheds, ended up
borrowing some money and buyingwholesale for a couple of years,
and then, and during that timeis when we started building
metal sheds and and then at somepoint they said they would no
(40:43):
longer, they don't want to dealwith us anymore, so we started
building our own wood sheds.
Sam (40:49):
I was going to say you build wood sheds.
Now what point did you?
Yeah, so do you know what's theratio these days?
We sell.
Norman Eicher (40:59):
We sell a little better than 50% in metal.
Sam (41:03):
Okay, so metal still does a little bit more.
Norman Eicher (41:05):
oh yeah, we're doing a wood green, a lot of
wood grain stuff now yes, that'sright, you are doing wood grain
some pretty stuff yeah you knowthe wood.
You never have to paint it, Sam.
It's so much better than wood.
Yeah, you're much better.
Still looks like wood.
You know you can have wood look, but it's so much better.
Sam (41:26):
I'm with you, still doing your double wides and stuff.
Norman Eicher (41:31):
Oh yeah, we're still doing.
I heard that one of the biggernames in the shed industry is
starting to do double wides now.
Sam (41:42):
Oh, you heard something I haven't heard yet, but I've been
stuck in the hills of NorthCarolina for seven months.
Norman Eicher (41:50):
I heard old Hickory's doing double wides now
.
Sam (41:52):
Oh nice.
So way back in the day I usedto get double wides from a
company called Robin.
Robin is a 50-year-old shedcompany from down in South
Georgia.
Robin is a 50-year-old shedcompany from down in South
Georgia and I used to buy shedsfrom them because I could get
double-wide garages from themand they actually would build a
(42:15):
30-foot.
How do I explain this?
So you could get a 12-by-30building and the roof ran the 30
, the 30 foot way side gable, soto speak.
Yep, and when you did that, youcould go as long as you wanted
to go with a 30 wide building,12 foot at a time, and keep
(42:37):
slapping them things together,one right after the other one.
I did one one time where Idon't remember, I think it was
seven or eight of them.
I did one one time where Idon't remember I think it was
seven or eight of them and wealmost had a 30 by 100 foot
building Set with still has thefloors blocked them up and
everything bolted trussestogether.
Norman Eicher (42:58):
Hmm, but that roof slope must have been like
what.
Sam (43:03):
A lot, probably Maybe one and a half, and that was back
when it was that metal that whenwe put like when we connected
them together you would bend itover at the top and run it down
the other side it was.
Norman Eicher (43:16):
it was like I don't know if it was aluminum.
Sam (43:19):
Yeah, it was like it was like almost a corrugated pattern
.
But no, you would just slap thesheet up, go up at the top and,
very carefully, just fold itdown and send it down the other
side and that's how you put themall together.
I still think yeah, because themiddle sections wouldn't have
(43:43):
no gables, they'd just be open,and you would double truss, bolt
that truss together, bolt thefloor together and slap that
piece of plywood in the floor.
Norman Eicher (43:52):
How many do you?
Sam (43:53):
want.
No, I don't want to do thatanymore.
Norman Eicher (43:57):
I'll get you as many as you want.
Sam (43:59):
I bet you will too.
Norman Eicher (44:04):
No, I'm serious.
If that's what you want, Sam,I'll be happy to do it for you
nope, nope, nope, nope.
Sam (44:10):
I think I'm done with those days.
I think that probably made meold before my time.
And that, listen, we weren'tsetting those on slabs either,
we were blocking them.
So you'd start on the groundand you go out 50 feet and
you're, you know, there.
You know, tell them where youwere off the ground.
Norman Eicher (44:28):
Yeah, yeah, and you know customers always right.
Just started the job thismorning on the construction side
that the customer said he shottransit on four inches off in a
30 by 30.
I think he measured he gotmessed up between four inches
and four foot because it's fourfoot off.
Sam (44:49):
No way, yeah and 30 feet, we've been there.
Norman Eicher (44:55):
It's pretty level .
Pretty level Four inches off,four inches off.
Sam (45:00):
Well, now you know.
So the bad thing about atransit is, if it's not a
self-leveling one, you don'tknow what you're getting.
Yeah, yeah, I never.
I just bought me a new transit,probably two months ago, and
(45:22):
these are like when I wasresearching them or whatever all
these new transits you get itjust close and the things
self-level themselves.
You know, back in the day whenI started, we were looking
through the rifle scopes, youhad to have that thing set for
different, like you would spinit all the way around, spin it
over here and spin it there andadjust it, because there was no
(45:42):
self-leveling involved.
You had to be, right.
Norman Eicher (45:45):
Yep, my dad had one of those for years, that's
what.
I did.
I got into construction.
It's, pop it on, hit the button, walk away from it.
By the time you get to whereyou want to go, it's running and
you're good to go.
Sam (46:01):
Yep, I'm sitting there and I'm like man I don't know if I
trust this thing or not Justbecause I don't understand it.
Norman Eicher (46:12):
Yes, sir, Yep.
No, you were asking about wherewe started from.
Typically for me, at least someof this stuff is so.
I've done it all my life.
So if I see an opportunity, Itry to capitalize on it, jump
into it and yeah yeah, great, mycompany's grown beyond the days
(46:37):
where it was just me.
It's been an interestingjourney.
Sam (46:43):
Yeah, it's hard to let, and I know you're enough, like me,
that it's hard to let some ofthat stuff go and let somebody
else take care of it.
Norman Eicher (46:52):
Yeah, but I've learned, if I don't, I'll go
crazy.
Sam (46:55):
Yeah you will in a hurry, yep.
Norman Eicher (46:57):
There's and there's people that are better
qualified to do some of thosethings.
I'm better.
I do better at being theinnovator, the creator.
I'm the one that comes with theideas.
I can do a lot of theimplementation, but when it
comes down to being here makingmy people do the job, I want to
get the result I want to.
Somebody else can do it so muchbetter than I can.
Sam (47:19):
Yeah.
Norman Eicher (47:20):
It's not my gift.
Yeah, I'm trying to do betterabout that.
Sam (47:30):
Let's go back even further.
Nobody's originally from thatarea.
Norman Eicher (47:37):
No, I was born and raised in southern Ontario,
a little town called ElmerOntario.
Yeah, I heard of pathwaypublishing.
I grew up just quarter milesouth pathway wagler printed.
Printed all the family lifeyoung companion blackboard
bullet all the books my mom wasuh.
(48:02):
So I grew up my uncle there.
He told me he built his firstshed in 75.
And he still got it.
But I would have.
My sister would have workedthere for 12 years and I used to
go back there after school wasover and work for another three
(48:24):
hours after school buildingrafters.
I would have probably been 12,13.
This is interesting.
I know I'm pretty young yet,but at that time when I started,
they paid me $2 an hour tobuild their rafters for them.
Sam (48:40):
Too bad, you can't find that guy now.
Norman Eicher (48:48):
A lot of things have happened since then.
Sam (48:51):
When did you leave Canada?
Norman Eicher (48:53):
I left in 2003.
January of 2003.
Been out on my own ever since.
Sam (49:05):
Went to Tennessee from there, or did you stop somewhere
?
Norman Eicher (49:08):
along the way.
I spent four years in Illinois.
Sam (49:14):
That's right.
You said you had an uncle thatwas over there.
Norman Eicher (49:17):
Yeah, I had an uncle over there in Illinois.
He was buying and selling sheds, delivering sheds, buying and
selling sheds, delivering sheds.
So from 2003 to fall of 2006,.
So almost four years I wouldhave spent there.
He built gazebos, sold sheds,built Paul Barnes.
(49:39):
We did Conklin roofing sprayfoam for some of those years as
well.
So we've been involved in someof that as well.
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Sam (51:32):
I had my Conklin spray foam years too, back in the early
90s.
Karen's my wife's uncle waswell I know.
For years he had plaques on thewall.
This is before all the bigshots showed up, but he was the
Eli Yoder.
Eli Yoder I didn't know if shewas kin to like the Utsi boys.
(51:53):
No, I'm actually kin to theUtsi boys, but we're n ot going
to tell anybody that.
But that was before they evergot into it.
So but yeah, him and Marvin,Yoder, Yoder and uh, oh my, I
hope he's not, he doesn't listenbecause he'd be like, come on,
man, you don't remember my name.
Oh, I can't think of the otherone, but they ran Yoder's.
(52:15):
There was a couple Yoder's thatran big time out of Montezuma
area, Macon Columbus, down intoValdosta, down into into they
got up into Atlanta a little bitand man there for four or five
years.
They were big.
I mean it was crazy Really.
(52:35):
Yeah, eli's still, him and hisson still run a full-time foam
conkling coating business.
Marvin's actually buildingsheds for Premier in Montezuma.
Now he wants to get back tofarming a little more again.
(52:56):
It was a big deal.
I don't know.
They started about 87, 88 iswhen they first started getting
into it and yeah they.
Eli's a little more relaxed nowthat he's older than he used to
(53:18):
be, but man, he used to selllike crazy.
It was crazy.
Norman Eicher (53:23):
I see, and so I never was personally signed up
with Conklin, it was justthrough my uncle, and what?
We had done there.
A lot of people have madereally good money at it.
It's a multi-level marketingthing that I don't care much for
.
Sam (53:40):
Eli never did that part of it either.
None of those guys really did.
Ronald Yoder he's still big inMontezuma area with a coating
business.
Oh man, yeah, there's manytimes I had to go rent an air
compressor and go blow graveloff a roof.
Norman Eicher (53:57):
I see.
Sam (53:58):
Yeah, and then we got doing metal roofs.
Anyway, that's a wholedifferent story.
That industry.
I have a bunch of friends thatare in it, but the majority of
the ones that I know stay prettyfocused on just the roofing
side of it.
They're not into all the restof it, so much.
That's wild that you actuallydid that.
Norman Eicher (54:20):
Yeah, we were certified with Conklin.
We had done some pretty majorjobs there.
Again, if you get into that,you're putting yourself out
there because, guess what, forthe next 10 years, 12 years,
whatever, if there is a leak,guess who they call you.
They're going to call you Ifit's three hours away, four
(54:44):
hours away, six hours awaywhatever.
Sam (54:46):
You'll fix it.
Norman Eicher (54:48):
You're going to go fix it.
It was a learning curve.
Did I enjoy it?
Yeah, would I be good again?
Probably not.
Sam (55:01):
Probably not Like me hooking up double whites.
Nope, no more, let the youngguys do it.
So then ended up in Tennessee.
Norman Eicher (55:12):
From there Yep Ended up moved down here in fall
of 2006.
I got you Cool, Been down hereever since.
Very good Got married there, orwere you married in?
Sam (55:25):
Illinois.
Norman Eicher (55:27):
Married in Illinois, okay, my wife's family
there's two of them still inIllinois and her father, and
then the rest are in Missouri,Kentucky, kind of scattered
around.
Sam (55:39):
I got you, sam.
Norman Eicher (55:41):
You're going to have to get down here and see me
sometime.
Oh, yeah, I was planning on it.
The boys have been begging togo golfing again, so oh no, they
want to go hunting and fishingtoo.
Sam (55:53):
Huh, fish it out of the pond.
Norman Eicher (55:59):
Well, no, they probably won't do that.
That'd be probably me more thanI hear you.
Sam (56:05):
No, we're gonna make that happen.
Just, man, my back's got me solike I was supposed to go to
Oklahoma to the barbecue outthere, wasn't able to go to that
.
I've had two other tripsplanned that I've had to cancel.
It's a struggle to ride for twohours to get up to North
Carolina to get our sheds done.
But yeah, the plan is to goback up there tomorrow.
(56:25):
I'm going to try to get oursheds done.
But the other plan is to goback up there tomorrow.
I'm going to try to get aboutsix of them out tomorrow.
We'll see how it goes.
But yeah, it's just I'm doingbetter.
As long as I don't drive everyday, it's much better and I'm on
some better stuff that I thinkis starting to help too.
(56:45):
So we're getting there slowly,but surely Glad to hear that
help too.
So we're getting there slowly,but should be glad to hear that.
What would you, um, what wouldyou put out to everybody out
there, like, where do you see us, where do you see the, the
market going?
Of course you're in Tennessee,you're like me.
You're in an area where it'sjust seems like it's never going
to slow down.
We're in huge growth areas.
(57:06):
But what?
What do you say out there tothe people in the shed industry?
Norman Eicher (57:10):
I guess in the last year I've been watching um
through covid there seem to be alot of guys getting into the
shed industry and I think we'regoing to see some consolidation
among some of those um and Ithink we're going to see some it
slowed down.
So that's just personal feeling, kind of my gut feeling of
watching In my area.
(57:33):
I think we're going to be solidbut I think there's going to be
some areas, especially in thenortheast, maybe more in the
Florida area and stuff, that Ithink we're going to see some
pretty major slowdowns.
That's just I'm just talkingoff my hip here.
Some pretty major slowdowns.
I'm just talking off my hiphere.
I don't have the numbers, butthat's just my gut feeling from
watching where I'm at.
(57:55):
My recommendation is don'tskimp on how you're building
your sheds, because quality willlong outlast quantity.
Sam (58:09):
Yep.
I agree Anything out like.
You're so diversified it's alittle hard to nail this down.
Plus, you run on.
There's something we didn'ttalk about, but I'm thinking of
how diversified you are and whatyou're doing.
But you've you've got in-housetrucking that you use also.
I guess you're still doing that.
Norman Eicher (58:32):
Yeah, we do all our own trucking.
Sam (58:37):
That basically the shed hauling picture part of it,
which is mostly where a lot ofmy listeners come from.
Is you feel pretty comfortablewith the way you're set up doing
that?
Um?
Trucking seems to be prettysteady right now I do.
Norman Eicher (58:55):
Um, I'm, my drivers are busy.
I I've been happy with you know, I've not had a struggle
finding someone Most times.
One of my drivers has been withme for almost 10 years at this
point, and then the rest of mineI pretty much can promote from
(59:22):
within the company.
We'll bring them in, run,they'll haul, lumber, they'll
haul whatever else we need, andthen if we have an opening,
there's usually one of themthat'll jump at getting paid.
We pay based off of performance, based on deliveries, and so
the opportunity to make someextra money doing a good job.
(59:43):
I've been very, very happy withthat Cool.
I've been very, very happy withthat cool.
Yep, so yeah, it's for us.
The, the haul inside just makessense.
Sam (59:57):
Yeah you have dealers.
Like you got guys out therelike not all your lots are
corporate lots, so you have thedealer side of it.
You're grinning like a Cheshirecat over there, do you still
have?
Dealers, or did you get rid of?
All of them.
Norman Eicher (01:00:17):
No, we have dealers.
Sam (01:00:22):
I'm just thinking out loud here that I'm comparing you a
little bit to Westwood Mike andArlen.
They do all their own haulingin-house, but then they have all
their own sales lots too.
They don't have dealers.
You've still got that.
Norman Eicher (01:00:39):
Apparently we have a mix.
Some days I think our owndealers do better and then some
days my independents do better.
So it's just the dealer side ofthings can get very interesting
, because as soon as they hit amonth where they're not selling,
(01:01:00):
it's automatically everybodyelse's fault, Absolutely, it's
just.
Can I say it's like babysittingsome days it is yep, I've heard
that before.
Sam (01:01:17):
It's an adult daycare.
Yeah, yep, I've said that aboutthe haulers too.
So I guess I mean there's daysI need babysitting, I guess.
Norman Eicher (01:01:25):
So it fits all of us sometimes.
Yeah, and for us, having ourown haulers has been a really
good thing.
I would have a hard time seeingcontracting my hauling out.
It simply keeps thecommunication so much cleaner,
tighter.
Sam (01:01:45):
Yeah, I'm very happy with that yep, and the other thing
you've got going for you isyou're you're actually a little
bit of a grease nut, anyway,like you probably more than a
little bit yeah, so you, youactually still enjoy, it's not,
it's not like it's a burden tohave to actually own trucks to
(01:02:08):
have them work.
Norman Eicher (01:02:09):
I love it.
That makes a big difference.
We do all our own maintenancein-house.
We just get done rebuilding.
We rebuild our own engines.
Sam (01:02:21):
You totally rebuilt the one truck, not just the engines and
stuff.
Norman Eicher (01:02:25):
You do it all we do.
You need to come see my 84, Sam.
Sam (01:02:32):
Yeah, I know I need to get it done.
I know Last time I was therethere was a hood in the paint
booth and a cab.
I think, yeah, I've got to getup there.
Norman Eicher (01:02:42):
I've got an 84 C10 that I'm rather happy with
how it turned out.
Sam (01:02:49):
That's awesome just for the record, the road runs both ways
, you know.
Norman Eicher (01:02:55):
I know, but you know, I've got to keep, I've got
to keep the office work done sothat everything else keeps
going oh no, no, I know yourpeople good enough to know
better than that.
I was.
I was really hoping that I couldget out a little bit more this
year than what I have some otheryears.
Last year was really rough onme.
It just seemed like westruggled all year to get the
(01:03:18):
right people in the right places, adding the lumber side,
growing the metal side as muchas we have.
It's been a growth thing.
This week I'm having my firstEOS meeting.
We're going to do a full scaleimplementation of EOS system.
(01:03:39):
I'm hoping that it'll make abig difference on operational
side.
I got you Cool.
Sam (01:03:52):
Very good, anything else you want to throw in there
before we close this out?
I?
don't think so.
Cool, well, I thank you so much.
It seems like well, I do.
I appreciate everybody thatcomes on here lately.
It seems like it's hard to getpeople to come on because, um
well, I'm my schedule is sowhacked right now.
(01:04:13):
Shannon's like, come on, yougoing to get some more guys in
yet, or you know where we're atnow.
Just put it out there.
Anybody that wants to come onwould love to have you on, would
love to sit down and chat withyou.
It's not that hard to do.
Anybody can do this.
Um so, but yeah, I know itsounds repetitive, but I
appreciate you coming on talkingwith us, um, anything like.
(01:04:34):
So people want to get a hold ofyou.
How did they get a hold of you?
Norman Eicher (01:04:38):
um.
Call the office here atmountain view, ask to speak to
me, I'm, they can transfer youto me yep, yep.
Sam (01:04:45):
Mountain view company I saw it says now when I looked you
up on technical.
Norman Eicher (01:04:50):
Technical name is mountain view construction llc,
um.
I believe we're listed ongoogle as mountain view co yeah,
right there.
Sam (01:04:56):
yeah, mountain view.
Co is what it shows on there,right off the side of the big
road in belvedere, big town ofbelvedere, where we had the big
old shedbash Good place 2019shedbash.
Yep.
So anyway, thank you guys forjoining us today.
Always appreciate having youalong for the ride.
(01:05:17):
Uh-oh, what are you looking forback there?
Norman Eicher (01:05:20):
March the 2nd 2019.
March the 2nd 2019.
Sam (01:05:24):
Yeah, you got a plaque back there somewhere.
Norman Eicher (01:05:26):
Yeah, that's what I was looking for, yep.
Sam (01:05:28):
So, yep, yeah, you got a plaque back there somewhere.
Yeah, that's what I was lookingfor.
So, yep, thank all you guys forbeing on today.
Make sure you always catch upon the newsletter.
You can catch us on YouTube,Spotify, iTunes, all the places.
We even have a call-in numberwhere you can just call in and
listen to it by the phone.
Thank you guys once again forbeing on today.
This is Sam Basseter.
(01:05:48):
We'll catch you next time.
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