COMPETITIVE Intelligence By Carla Waldemar
Chain (of custody) reaction
he light bulb moment occurred when Mike Friedman ran out of space. Mike had launched a homerepair business in Portland, Me., in 2005, which, as he reports, “grewgrew-grew. We’d started out in a basement, then moved to a larger space, then bought a building, but even that wasn’t big enough, with us doing so many little jobs. We had $1 million in sales and 200 handymen. We needed wood storage—everything from plywood to drywall—because we
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had to drive 35 miles for, say, a 2x4. We also had a huge garage filled with refuse we’d hauled out. So we needed a bigger place to keep more wood on hand and to sort the trash. “We found a convenience store in Cape Elizabeth,” a town of 9,300 15 minutes away. “Prices were cheaper out there: It made sense,” he explains. His partners—his sister and two carpenter buddies—agreed. Then came the epiphany that birthed Lumbery last November.
LUMBERY PARTNERS (left to right) Ryan Holland, Alex Bettigole, Jennifer Friedland-Stora, and Mike Friedland launched the business for economic and environmental reasons—there had been no single place to buy lumber or Sheetrock within 30 miles.
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n Building Products Digest n March 2021
“We’re not the only ones who have to drive for wood. Besides, the quality of wood and the service level at the boxes was terrible. We needed quality wood and a place to store it that was convenient. Plus, most lumberyards around here are closed weekends, just when the do-it-yourselfers need them. Besides, the bigger outfits wouldn’t deliver to the smaller stores.” Conclusion: “We gotta sell wood!” At first, they envisioned a hybrid outfit: home repairs and wood sales. But covid nixed that. Homeowners became reluctant to let a handyman into their home, and those fellows were equally hesitant to enter them. “So… we paused. We let all our employees go off on their own with our blessing, supplying references and contacts. Then the four of us had to learn everything from computer programs to how to find dealers and reps for hardware.” The four partners quickly finetuned the original epiphany (“Sell wood!”) with another—and more ground-breaking—one: Sell Maine lumber. “We’re living in a state that’s 90% trees, but the little mills here get bypassed by the giant distributors. There’s no connect between the sawmill and the consumer: Zero!” So, modeling their practices on those of the revered Patagonia clothing firm, they decided to make their credo the chain of custody. “We’re asking ‘Where was the tree located? Is the forest sustainable? What does the mill do with its waste? How did the lumber get to our store?’ By buying Maine wood, we’re lessening the environmental impact plus helping out a small town. And people are more and more eager to ‘buy local.’ Ads promote ‘Get to know your farmer.’ But who’s asking, Building-Products.com
