Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign.
[00:00:09] Speaker B: Welcome to the Clear Impact Podcast, brought to you by Mitre Brands University. Thanks for joining us today. My name is Sheri Conner and I am your host.
[00:00:19] Speaker A: Whether they're just looking at a product, trying to make a decision, whether they bought it, you know, whether they're in the middle of a service issue, we're going to be there and we're going to take care of them. And I think that's the biggest sell point. There's a trust factor factor there, or at least there should be. And if there's not, that's my job as a sales leader, to instill that trust.
[00:00:39] Speaker B: Good morning. We are here on the Clear Impact Podcast, and today I am chatting on the phone with Andy Brill. Welcome to the podcast.
[00:00:47] Speaker A: Thank you, Sheri. Good to be here.
[00:00:48] Speaker B: Yeah, thanks for making time. And so before we talk about multifamily projects and MI windows and doors and all of that, tell us a little bit about you, like your background, your experience, and then your current areas of responsibility and territory.
[00:01:04] Speaker A: So I'm going on my 25th year. I believe that'll be next month. I started off back in, I believe it was 2001. I have an engineering degree and at the time, Mi Home Products, I was looking for to fill that role. So I started off in the test lab running simulations, doing thermals. I was in charge of the structural thermal testing, sound testing, got involved with a beautiful Florida product approval project, and then moved into sales. So I was a replacement rep, moved my way up to a regional manager back during COVID And MI invested a lot of money during COVID in our capacity and our plants, and we never really focused on the multifamily division. So I think with my background in sales and technical. Technical data, they decided to create the position for multifamily. And that's what I've been doing here for the last three years.
[00:01:58] Speaker B: Wow, that is such a leap. Like, that's a very unusual story. You don't hear that very often.
[00:02:03] Speaker A: Not too many engineers are going to go into sales, but Stan Sullivan actually back in the day gave me my first opportunity, so I still appreciate that guy.
[00:02:10] Speaker B: Oh, that's awesome. And so what is your territory?
[00:02:13] Speaker A: Basically, it's Texas up to the Dakotas and everything east, it's a multifamily project, so I deal with the customers and also the reps from the M side.
[00:02:23] Speaker B: Okay, and where are you based?
[00:02:25] Speaker A: I'm based out of corporate. I live in Mechanicsburg, right across the river from Harrisburg.
[00:02:29] Speaker B: Okay, so you're in pa. Nice. So do you Tackle Florida also then
[00:02:33] Speaker A: yes, we get into Florida. A lot of the MI products are with their design pressures and whatnot. If you draw a line through Orlando, that line in north is where the MI product is. With the PGT acquisition, we've been pushing a lot more stuff their way because it's made for Florida.
[00:02:49] Speaker B: Right. Florida product approvals and Miami Dade noas and all of that fun stuff. I'm very familiar with all of that. So not for the faint of heart and with your background, I'm sure that's quite helpful.
[00:03:00] Speaker A: It's not as scary.
[00:03:01] Speaker B: Yeah, not for the average person. So before we dive into the details of MI and all of that, can you just give me a quick definition of multifamily?
[00:03:13] Speaker A: So yeah, a lot of people intermingle, they'll say commercial. You know, I really try and stay away from that word. You know, we're more of the way I Bumi is a light commercial window. So our wheelhouse is stuff that we really excel at. In your three or four story garden type apartments, condos, that type of deal. Yeah, we can go higher floors. We don't do high rises or anything like that. But you get a lot more obstacles the higher up you go and a lot of it's service related. So for us, multifamily is typically a project of 300 units or more. And like I said, they're going to be about three stories garden style apartments or condos. We also do a lot of other things like military housing. There's a lot of other things that kind of slot into that, but for the most part you're looking at three stories.
[00:03:57] Speaker B: Okay, is it new construction or refurbishing, remodeling or a mix?
[00:04:03] Speaker A: It's a mix. I would say 80, 20. Most of it is new construction, but we do a lot of rehabs. You know, we have a rep down in the Maryland area, does a lot of, you know, tear outs. The funny part was, or the cool part was one of the projects he recently did were our windows that were being replaced from 30 years ago. So that just goes to show the life cycle of the product and then the fact that, you know, they wanted us back in there, they wanted our product back in there. So that was a good example of a rehab job.
[00:04:31] Speaker B: That's awesome.
[00:04:32] Speaker A: But yeah, we get into both of those. But it's just leaning a lot more to new construction.
[00:04:37] Speaker B: Yeah, that makes sense. Well, especially as cost of housing and cost of building keeps going up, people have to be able to afford the roof over their heads and multifamily is a great way to be able to do that. So here's a question. Who are your customers? Like primarily? Who are you talking to? Are you talking to property managers? Are you talking to architects? Like, who's your person that you're talking with?
[00:04:58] Speaker A: The easy answer to that is everybody.
Okay, so there's so many different ways to approach this. You know, if you want what I'll call the low hanging fruit, yes, we'll do a job site visit. You know, we'll find out where the next project is. You know, there you're dealing with a general contractor. We also go after the architects, owners and developers. That's more of a long range vision because you're trying to get spec on a project that might not happen for three or four years. And then we're also, like I said, dealing with our customers and our reps because even though we might not know about a project, our customer might have a relationship with somebody and next thing you know, it's, hey, can you poke these windows? So pretty much from, from ownership all the way down to the guys installing the window, everybody that's touching that product is technically our customer and we need to be in front of them, invisible at some point in time during the process.
[00:05:50] Speaker B: Okay, that makes sense.
And so what is the process like from start to finish? How do they engage with you and your team and with MI from the beginning until the end? What is the normal process?
[00:06:05] Speaker A: So if we're, if, you know, if we're, I'm going to say skipping a couple steps here about getting spec and whatnot. Once the project's going and we're in a bid cycle, our customers, our distributors will work with the architect, owner, gc. They'll do a takeoff, put that into our software, and then they submit that to us. They might have notes on codes or applications or they might have some technical questions. So that quote will come into our department. We flip the quote and we apply discounted pricing to it. We look at a lot of different things, quantities, project duration, when it's going to start, where the project is. And then we'll put a quote or presentation together. We'll send that back to the customer. They'll get in that bidding cycle. Once the project's awarded, then they'll start placing pos and then it becomes more of a, an internal manufacturing and field service handoff, I guess, versus sales. But we're also developing through our service department kind of they're going to show up on the job sites with the water testing, do like a break. It Fix it. So we're really trying to that whole process of when the project's awarded to when it's over, we still want to be heavily involved in every aspect of it.
[00:07:14] Speaker B: We are sharing our expertise around all topics and relating to the window and door industry. Whether you are a customer selling our products or a homeowner doing research, the Clear Impact podcast provides helpful content that makes an impact. Subscribe today wherever you listen to podcasts.
That's awesome. And I'm sure that's helpful for whoever the GC is because you know, they're dealing with multiple vendors across multiple fronts when they're doing a project like this, especially a new construction project.
And so they want to be able to rely on a vendor that knows what they're doing and can really handle it from start to finish.
[00:07:51] Speaker A: Yes, that's correct.
[00:07:52] Speaker B: And so what would you say? I know this is probably an impossible question because you do have a pretty robust line between the V2000, V3000, you know, single hungs, double hungs, all the horizontal rollers and weave encasement awnings. What would you say are probably the most common or maybe even your recommendation as far as products for multifamily projects?
[00:08:14] Speaker A: So that's actually a great question and an easy one to answer. It truly depends on where the project is. You know, what you're going to put in Florida is going to vary versus some other parts of the country. But our single hung window, we have V2000, 3500 that just because of the way the product is built, we call it componentized. What I mean by that is if you break the sill or you break pretty much anything on that window, regardless outside of the mainframe, you can fix the product and you get into these multi family jobs and you know, there's a lot of different people touching those windows and some of them aren't the most skilled guys out there and stuff gets damaged and our product is very, very easy to take care of. So the 3500 single hung would be my first recommendation. And then the other popular items are 910 patio door, once again, that's easy to service, and our basement window. And when I said about where you're building, you know, you go out west and there's certain areas where they prefer say a horizontal slider versus single hungs, you know, it's just kind of the area and what's kind of expected. You get into the Northeast, you know, the Boston area, they don't know what a single hung is. It's everything up There is double hung, but like I said, for the most part, for what we're bidding, it's our 3500 single hung, 910 patio door. And then we can also get into the slider or case product. But there's not a lot of fancy stuff going into multifamily, right?
[00:09:38] Speaker B: Yeah, it's almost like a not quite builder grade, but maybe a step up.
[00:09:42] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean the biggest options you'll get and it's not because of they wanted them, it was code required. But you know, you might be looking at some window control devices, some automatic locks, things like that. You also get in a more expensive glass if there's sound requirements. But in terms of finishes, grid patterns, that's a lot of that stuff will be vel. A lot of times guys will get a quote, a white quote and a black quote and it just comes down to the owner say, all right, am I willing to pay this much more money for a color? And a lot of times it comes back, it ends up being a white window. So.
[00:10:14] Speaker B: Right. Well, I mean it just depends on the kinds of projects that you're working on. Right. If it's a more high end unit or high end division, subdivision or apartment complex or condo association, they might want to elevate the look. And so it's nice that you have all those options.
[00:10:30] Speaker A: Yes, we just. Actually I was at a project last week down in Philadelphia and they're going to be high end luxury rentals and the union are black casements with transoms. Absolutely beautiful looking building. But they told me flat out when I got there that these are luxury apartments and they're going to be paying good money and basically they're telling me everything needed to be perfect. So it was interesting call, but it was also kind of neat to see some pretty black windows with some nice sight lines going into a building right outside of Philadelphia.
[00:10:57] Speaker B: Oh, nice. Yeah, that's the way to go. But it's nice that you have a portfolio that allows you to hit all of those needs across the multi different markets and applications that you're serving.
[00:11:08] Speaker A: Yes, we have the right tools. Sometimes it's just getting people to use them.
[00:11:12] Speaker B: Right. So without sounding like a complete blatant commercial, why would you say MI is the best window and door partner for your customers?
[00:11:21] Speaker A: I alluded to it a little earlier. I really feel that we have our DMA principles. You know, working for Emma is easy because when I say easy, it's not like every day is easy. But you know, when management lies out these DNA principles and stuff, and they're broad, but it's easy to get into a situation and go back to those and then not feel bad about the decision or, you know, maybe a problem you had to deal with that carries over to the customer. Whether they're just looking at a product, trying to make a decision, whether they bought it, you know, whether they're in the middle of a service issue. We're going to be there, and we're going to take care of it. And I think that's the biggest sell for. There's a trust factor there, or at least there should be. And if there's not, that's my job as a sales leader, to instill that trust. But, you know, we're not perfect. Nobody's perfect. But it's how you handle the things and move forward and take care of people. And I think that's the biggest sales point that I would. I would bring up.
[00:12:17] Speaker B: Yeah, that's awesome. I was half expecting something, like, around quality or delivery or timing or something like that, but I think you went right to the root of it, which is who we are as an organization and how we operate. And so, speaking of the Mitre DNA, I've been asking people this question on the podcast lately. What is your favorite DNA point that
[00:12:39] Speaker A: actually is more difficult question than the other one you thought was difficult?
[00:12:43] Speaker B: You can have more than one.
[00:12:44] Speaker A: Okay. No, there's a bunch that really kind of get me. I don't want to say every day, but I would say comfortable being uncomfortable, especially with a lot of the projects we get into. I got to take my blinders off and look around the corner and make sure that we're doing the right thing. And that also goes into, I don't have the DNA right in front of me.
[00:13:04] Speaker B: Sherry, the worst decision is making no decision at all.
[00:13:06] Speaker A: Yes. Thank you. You know, and I made poor decisions. And once again, jumping into another DNA aspect there, I'm going to learn from them. You know, we constantly have losses through the multifamily department where we didn't get a job or we might not have gotten spec'd. And I'm not going to dwell on why or the minute details, but I'm going to learn from them. So moving forward, we don't encounter that again.
[00:13:28] Speaker B: Right.
[00:13:28] Speaker A: So there's like, I think I hit about three of them there, but they're three of the more popular ones for me, at least.
[00:13:33] Speaker B: Yeah. So we celebrate the wins and learn from the losses, or we are comfortable being uncomfortable.
And we believe the worst decision is making no decision at All. Yes, those are solid choices. I like them all.
[00:13:46] Speaker A: It makes your day to day activities a little easier. Like I said. I don't know if I said it correctly, but we have difficult decisions we have to make every day. And those DNA points put you at ease when you make your decision and run with it.
[00:13:58] Speaker B: Right? Well, I think the thing that I love the most about the DNA is that it's empowering.
So you kind of lose all of the micromanagement tendencies that come about when you don't have something like that because you're never really sure what the right next step is and you're always having to check in and is this the right thing? Is that the right thing? Here we kind of have a compass to help us. Right. So we can decide for ourselves. If it lines up with this and I'm using my best judgment, then I can move forward and be successful and or learn if I'm not. Right. So I love that, Andy. I think we covered everything.
[00:14:35] Speaker A: If I can throw one more thing in there.
And I can't believe I missed my favorite DNA. And once again, I don't have them in front of me, Sherry. But to paraphrase it, we focus on our opportunities and not the obstacles. And I believe there's something in there that the obstacles are what we created. And I can't tell you how many times I use that during a day, just whether it's with internal team members or customers or, you know, I don't look at it as a negative thing, but, you know, it's an obstacle if we put it there. Let's get it out of the way.
[00:15:04] Speaker B: Yeah. We focus on opportunities, not obstacles, because the only barriers that exist are the ones we choose to create.
[00:15:11] Speaker A: I was pretty close.
[00:15:12] Speaker B: Yeah, that's very close. That's pretty good for off the top of your head. That's amazing. Well, Andy, it's been a pleasure talking with you today. Thank you so much for giving me your time and your expertise along this line and wishing you the most success and I hope you have an amazing day.
[00:15:27] Speaker A: Thank you, Cher. You do the same.
[00:15:28] Speaker B: All right, thanks.
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