They Can Do It!

They Can DO IT! As America celebrates the 70th anniversary of the “Rosie the Riveter” image, 5 womenowned businesses discuss their work in various niches of the construction industry

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American Builders Quarterly

Growing in an Old Boy’s Network Mary Marble of Marble Mechanical Service on taking over her father's company, taking advantage of federal aid, and taking on a male-dominated industry Interview by Anita R. Paul

Universities, hospitals, and government facilities throughout Detroit, Michigan, have benefitted from the work of Marble Mechanical Service, LLC. Providing design, installation, and operation of HVAC systems, the company has thrived under the leadership of its president, Mary Marble, and it is poised to leverage its expertise into new frontiers of combustion, heating, and air-conditioning. In this interview, Marble explains how her vision and strategic planning will help ensure a solid future of innovation and professionalism for the company.

How did you get your start at Marble Mechanical Service?

At a Glance Location Birmingham, MI Founded 1960 Employees 10 Specialties Design, installation, and operation of HVAC systems, process piping, and refrigeration equipment

Mary Marble: My dad started the business in 1960 as a manufacturing company. He represented a line of industrial burners, then got into contracting and installation. In the first 10 years, he did the heating and processing side. Later, customers requested [air-conditioning]. I grew up in the company, working here in the summers. In 2005, dad retired, and I made an asset purchase of the company that was finalized in 2006.

What is your strategy for growth over the next five years?

MM: We look for work in our niche—retrofitting. In essence, we take out old boilers and chillers and install new ones. Jobs that are less than $1 million are a good size for us to handle today, but I’m seeking more federal government work. The federal WomenOwned Small Business program requires five

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percent of dollars on a given project to go to women-owned small businesses. I qualify as an economically disadvantaged womenowned small business. Through this progam, we could go national. However, bonding is a hindrance for my size [of ] business. With this program, I can partner with larger companies.

Describe a few recent projects Marble has completed. How do they exemplify your work?

MM: For the Flint Federal Building, we used multiple high-efficiency hot-water boilers to replace the old heating system. New pumping systems were installed for more efficient operation of the building. The project was completed at a cost of $350,000 in February 2011. Another recent project was the Walled Lake High School project, which involved the installation of a solar-panel heating system for the main swimming pool.

At a total project cost of $200,000, we also

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“I can attract more attention to their cause because of the position I’m in.”

Mary Marble, President

installed a new boiler to supplement the solar system. New pumping systems for both the solar system and boiler system were installed with new heat exchangers.

What partnerships or collaborations have been beneficial to you over the years?

MM: We have worked with Performance Engineering Group going on 20 years now.

Alan Deal has helped us with the design of heating systems and also has recommended our company to owners. Over the years, we have installed over 200 [pieces] of their equipment [including boilers, domestic hot-water heaters and storage tanks, snow melt/radiant systems, and pool heaters].

They have been very easy to work with and have always given us great service.

Make your buildings energy efficient!

We focus on providing reliable, cost effective solutions to your energy needs.

• Basic or Custom Hot Water and Heating Applications • Engineering Support and Service • Extensive Product Availability including Parts • 24 Hour Support 734-266-5300 • Single Source Responsibility • Environmental Impact and Energy Savings • Support for Tax Credits, Rebates and Incentives • Equipment Transition Plans Congratulations to everyone at Marble Mechanical Service for their due recognition and outstanding work. It is a privilege to partner with such an impressive team of professionals.

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MM: Financially, it’s been really challenging.

The federal government gave banks all this money, but now I can’t get a loan to save my life. Secondly, it’s been challenging to grow the business at a comfortable level. I’ve been networking, meeting new people, establishing relationships. I’ve been very fortunate that my associates who came with me from my father’s company are all seasoned. As I’ve had to add people, I’ve been fortunate to find people I can trust and who have experience.

What challenges do you face as a woman in a traditionally male-dominated industry?

MM: I’ve grown up in this industry, so it’s not like I just came into it. Ninety percent of the time I’m well received and respected.

I respect my counterparts, too. But it is an old boy’s network. I speak my mind, but I’ve always respected the “guy” thing. I’m always professional, so in spite of it, I’ve succeeded.

I’m starting to see more women in this industry. I support the National Association of Women in Construction and attend the meetings, but when I network, I have to get to the decision makers. Fortunately, I have been able to bring information to the table and help support my association in what they do. I can attract more attention to their cause because of the position I’m in.

How do you measure success for yourself on a personal level?

MM: I want my customers to be satisfied— that’s number one. I want a quality installation. I want to see my team all striving for the same thing. I want to turn over a project and know that I’ve done a good job and that it will operate the way it’s supposed to operate. We may not be the cheapest game in town, but when we get done with it, you know it works.

32995 Industrial Road | Livonia, Michigan 48150 Phone: 734.266.5300 | Fax: 734.266.5310 www.performanceengineering.com

Cite two hurdles you have overcome while building the business.

ABQ A Rheem® Company

American Builders Quarterly

Conducting a Full Underground Sweep of a Property with Robin Burke of X-RAY Locating Services, Inc. Several years ago, Robin Burke, who had recently been discharged from the US Navy, was working as a boiler operator for the state of Virginia. It wasn’t, as she puts it, the most exciting profession.

But she did have plenty of time to read the newspaper every day, from cover to cover, and that’s where she spied a help-wanted ad for utility locators. The next day, she applied for the job, and she’s remained in the field ever since. “I walked in, and [the manager] hired me because he liked how women worked,” Burke says with a laugh. “He said the men tended to be sloppy and the women drew straight, even lines and placed the flags neatly.” She stayed with that first business until 2008, when she realized that instead of working 24/7 and crawling into holes for someone else for less pay, she could be doing it for herself. She started her own utility-locating firm, X-RAY Locating Services, Inc., and today the company finds buried utilities to help contractors of all kinds before they go digging holes. Take a look at the full process the firm uses to conduct underground sweeps. —Cristina Adams

1. Calculate the Contractor’s Needs

On any given day, the X-Ray Locating Services team can be working with a technician who’s putting cable TV in an apartment building, an electrical contractor who wants to set three poles, a plumbing contractor who wants to establish a water line, or an environmental contractor who wants to check the health of a site where a gas station once stood. In these and other situations, X-RAY Locating Services receives a set of project plans and what the client believes may already be located on the site. “We come in before contractors do directional drilling and prelocate all of the utilities in their path,” Burke says. “The reality is that we can work for anybody, from a homeowner to ExxonMobil. Eventually, everybody needs our service.”

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4. Mark Any Anomalies

After the ground-penetrating radar machine, which resembles a lawnmower, has done its work, X-Ray Locating Services marks any anomalies it may have detected. “All you can do is call them anomalies because you can’t tell what it actually is,” Burke says. “If it’s a tank, you can tell. But otherwise we can tell it’s a line of some kind, just not what kind of line.”

2. Set up Shop

X-Ray Locating Services arrives at the site with both conventional locating equipment and ground-penetrating radar. This gear allows the company to detect and confirm what underground lines or obstructions may or may not be present.

These are marked according to a national color code, the company putting up flags and painting the ground to clearly designate where each one is.

3. Double Check the Results

Once Burke and her team have completed the conventional locating process, they bring in the ground-penetrating radar and run it in a grid pattern across the property—first north to south, then east to west, and finally corner to corner. It is gauged to whatever depth the client has requested, which, according to Burke, is usually from 5 to 15 feet. She adds that water lines usually run five feet down, so that’s a reliable starting point.

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American Builders Quarterly

“We come in before contractors do directional drilling and prelocate all of the utilities in their path.

The reality is that we can work for anybody, from a homeowner to ExxonMobil.

Eventually everybody needs our service.”

Robin Burke, Founder

“We See Through Dirt” Damage Free Excavation!

It's a scary world underground. We offer almost 40 years of combined locating experience. Our trucks are equipped with the latest and most up to date technologies. Our field crews are committed to the highest standards of customer service, safety, and accuracy.

5. Process the Results

After the detecting, marking, and recording are complete, the project team then has to compile all the information it has gathered into a report, or “onto paper,” as Burke puts it. Once this happens, the report is handed over to the contractor in charge of the project.

We pride ourselves on high quality, a fast response & excellent service.

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6. Stand By for the Contractor

In theory, X-Ray Locating Services’s role in a project is finished once the paper report is submitted. Subsequently, the contractor comes in with site-clearing equipment and puts it to work. If some of the unknown anomalies prove to be serious obstacles to safe execution of the project, the contractor may consider moving it to another part of the property to avoid any problems. ABQ

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• Locating copper & fiber cable as well as water, gas, sewer and electric lines • Inspection services • Potholing for all utilities • Sonde services (up to 20 feet deep) • Splicing of copper & fiber cable • Ground Penetrating Radar • Construction of aerial & underground fiber and copper cable • Probing services • Core drilling • Our network of experienced partners enables us to provide a full rage of fiber and utility services!

7306 Carvel Circle • Houston, Texas 77072 P 713-922-7621 • F 281-575-0891 • burkerobin@sbcglobal.net

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Photo: Dulce Levitz

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the specialists

Safety Gear of One’s Own

The Specialists

Terri Piasecki of CharmandHammer.com on her line of female construction gear that keeps women from using poorly fitted, unsafe work wear Interview by Russ Klettke

At a Glance Location Apex, NC Founded 2003 Employees 4 Specialty Online retail of safety apparel for women

The story of how CharmAndHammer.com came to be one of the main distributors of safety apparel for women in construction and other “physical” professions can easily get lost in the site’s product visuals: pink tool belts, periwinkle and purple work gloves, sea-green overalls, and the coolest tortoise-shell-framed safety glasses ever seen. The company, founded in 2003, is a premier online retailer that has prevented women from having to make do with men’s clothing—in an industry dominated by a decidedly male aesthetic. The fundamental value of CharmAndHammer. com, however, goes beyond fashion: safety wear designed for women is safer. Piasecki spoke with American Builders Quarterly to explain why.

Where did you get the idea for your company?

Terri Piasecki: I grew up the daughter of a union electrical contractor and worked in my father’s business on the administrative side doing bookkeeping and job costing. Note that women weren’t acceptable on jobsites at the time, in the 1980s. After that I worked for an environmental organization for 10 years, where I climbed the corporate ladder and became their safety manager. I knew there was safety wear designed for women out there, but no retailer was stocking them.

I also had men in small and big sizes. In each case it was hard to find the right sizes without doing a Google search. Since nothing was found all in one place, it struck me I should start an online distributorship.

On the surface, online retailing looks easy. You develop a concept, you hire a designer to put together a spiffy website, you fill orders and make money on the markup. Is that how it worked?

TP: Because Internet retailing is so new, I learned a lot by trial and error. The cost of

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website design is astronomical, and I found you don’t just put it in the lap of designers.

You have to figure out how to create some parts yourself. And I had to learn a lot about SEO—search engine optimization, an online marketing tactic—and about click-through rates and how sites are laid out. I had to order most goods by the case [even though construction firms with one or two female employees are unlikely to order a 100-count case of pink safety glasses]. And I selffinanced everything, reinvesting revenues back into inventory. It helps to get to know your shippers, particularly now that we have customers in Europe.

What makes you the qualified person to do this?

TP: First and foremost, this is about safety.

If a woman is forced to wear a man’s bomber jacket or safety vest, the loose fabric can get caught in machinery. This is something I had to be concerned about as a safety manager.

Also, I think women are more comfortable getting advice on fitting and function from another woman.

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the specialists

When you began to build this e-business, did you mostly have supporters or naysayers?

TP: My husband was supportive. Some people in the industry told me how this had been attempted before but failed because women make up only one to two percent of the industry workforce. But that was before Internet-based retailing. One manufacturer’s rep tried to convince me to sell a broader line of goods, but after the first year of sales success, he came around. Now, new vendors seek me out and request that I carry their new women’s gear.

Your mission goes beyond simple retailing, addressing the broader issues of safety wear for a workforce of diverse sizes. How do you approach these problems?

TP: I’m passionate about helping women and men in large and small sizes. This comes from my safety background. I listen to their concerns and needs for solutions—then communicate that back to manufacturers.

They need to know that women are sensitive to fit and appearance.

What do you see in the future for your business?

Is it about more women getting jobs in the trades?

TP: We are already finding different customers, [including] dental hygienists, artists, jewelry makers, and teachers who need leather aprons and safety glasses. So we have become the designated distributor of women’s gear for companies like Turner Construction [Company] and smaller local contactors. We also have an eBay store and are now working towards a mobile e-commerce function. The benchmarks keep moving.

We also supply online safety courses through CharmAndHammer.com. These are highly interactive courses that are OSHAcompliant and accepted. I participate [in] and speak at events for women in the trades, including those sponsored by the National Association of Women in Construction.

Particularly where unions are prevalent— throughout California and in Seattle, Portland, and Chicago—there tend to be more women in the trades. ABQ

A Message from the NAWIC The National Association of Women in Construction (NAWIC) endeavors to enhance the success of women in the construction industry. Founded by 16 Fort Worth women in 1953, NAWIC has evolved into a national organization with an expanding membership and 153 chapters. The original members formed NAWIC to serve as a support network for women working in the male-dominated construction industry. NAWIC also provides its members with leadership training, education, mentoring and much more. NAWIC, alone and partnering with the NAWIC Education Foundation, also offers educational programs for students, scholarships, and continuing education. For more information, visit the website at www.nawic.org.

A Message from Rosies Workwear Rosies Workwear offers women a stylish alternative to traditional men’s workwear. All Rosies products are made of lightweight, durable fabric with removable kneepads. They’re tough but comfortable and, as they are designed to fit a women’s body, offer the safety necessary when working in “hard” industries. Serving women since 2002.

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n e m o w s e rv e s s e i s o R th i w s e i r t s u d n i e h t in , y t e f a s r o f clothing fashion. d n a t r o f com San Luis Obispo CA 93405 www.rosiesworkwear.com info@rosiesworkwear.com 805-541-2443 American Builders Quarterly

the specialists

Interiors Joan & Associates

By Kelli Lawrence

1. Elkhorn River Valley Custom 2. Big Sandy Lake Project 3. The Linden Estates 4. Linden Wood Renovation

One of the most established interior design firms in Nebraska, Interiors Joan and Associates knows its clients have come to expect a certain level of service.

But the firm has been fortunate to spend nearly 50 years honing its customercare practices, and it now has it down to a science. “We start very early on,” co-owner Nancy Pesavento says, “from the concept of our clients; to developing the plans, specifying and supplying the materials; right down to the accessories, artwork, and furnishings.”

Because of this, the firm’s staff—which includes 14 different ASID-affiliated designers (13 of them women) spread between offices in both Omaha and Lincoln—has seen ample return business and strong client loyalty.

“Many of our clients we worked with when they got their first home at age 25,” co-owner Diane Gernstein says.

“And now those same clients are on their third home!” Here, four of the firm’s designers reflect on recent showpieces.

1 Elkhorn River Valley Custom Elkhorn River Valley, NE Designed by: Nancy Pesavento (top) and Lisa Cooper Started: August 2008 Completed: February 2011 Size: 10,112 square feet Building Type: Private residence

Natural stone and walnut finishes contribute to this contemporary home, built in the Elkhorn River Valley near three ponds. Nebraska railway stations inspired the architectural design, which project designer Pesavento describes as “characteristic [of ] the Nebraska landscape—a very

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natural feel,” as per the client’s request.

The designers strove to incorporate fine indoor living with a natural outdoor environment for the client, a young family seeking sophistication and room to entertain. “The home has gorgeous outdoor living spaces: a pool, screened in porches, and patios,” Pesavento says. “It was really furnished and designed to live as well externally as internally, which I think they very much enjoy, as they are outdoor people.”

The custom home, which has collected a couple of design

awards—including the BALA Room of the Year Award for its kitchen and the ASID Chapter Project Award in the Residential Over 3,500 Square Feet category—since its completion, is unique of its own accord. And Pesavento believes the heart of the home’s one-of-a-kind feel stems from the level of trust the designers were able to establish with the client, which gave them the freedom to be creative.

“When you get a client that has the trust and allows you to do those kinds of things, we as designers create our best designs,” Pesavento says.

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Photos: Jeffrey Bebee; Tom Kessler

2 Big Sandy Lake Project Ashland, NE Designed by: Ellen Turnage Started: 2009 Completed: August 2010 Size: 8,200 square feet Building Type: Private residence

Aspen, Colorado, was in the mind of this home’s owner, who sought out Interiors Joan and Associates for the design of a weekend residence that would ride the fine line between rugged sophistication and casual comfort. And his vision wasn’t fleeting; he went to the firm with a magazine photo of an Aspen retreat in hand.

“The photo became a guide for the project’s design concept, as the logs, stones, front portico, balcony, and lighting are all things you would see if you drove through Aspen,” project designer

Ellen Turnage says. “To create the realistic ambiance, the builder brought in three semi-loads of logs from Oregon and two semi-loads of Colorado moss stone.”

As for the rest of the house—which boasts a wine room, a theater, an entertainment loft, three private bedroom suites, a bunkhouse for the homeowner’s teenage son, and a lookout tower—it is fitted with hand-scraped, five-inch alder-plank flooring, which runs throughout the home’s common

living spaces. The Aspen motif is further accentuated with a palette of earth tones (sumac red, bark, spruce, and black), leather and mohair for the furnishings,

and an eight-foot-wide, antlerfilled chandelier hanging in the great room—“a perfect scale and fit for the room’s grand 37-foot ceilings.” Turnage says.

Photos: Tom Kessler

the specialists

3 The Linden Estates Omaha, NE Designed by: Diane Gernstein Started: 2010 Completed: July 2011 Size: 6,000 square feet Building Type: Private residence

When it comes to aesthetically softening a room’s look, bigger doesn’t necessarily mean better.

According to project designer Diane Gernstein, the rooms within the contemporary-

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themed Linden Estates were so spacious and grand that making them cozy and inviting proved to be quite a challenge. But, with careful selection of area rugs, artwork, and light fixtures,

Gernstein found the right textures and colors to convey the warmth the homeowners sought.

As with so many of Interiors Joan and Associates’s clientele, the owners of the Linden Estates had an idea about how to get where they wanted to go with their home’s interior design, but they had neither the time nor the resources to make it happen on their own. “They have a lot more exposure [to design concepts],” designer Nancy Pesavento says.

“But they don’t have the

professional training to accomplish making their project really spectacular.”

That, of course, is where designers such as Gernstein step in, doing more detail work for a design project than most would ever give them credit for. “You take on a heavy load because things are very technical, very costly, and you have to make big decisions for your clients,” Pesavento says. “We’re always trying to reach for that next level with them.”

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the specialists

4 Linden Wood Renovation Omaha, NE Designed by: Beth Settles Started: 2011 Completed: 2011 Size: 437 square feet

When a kitchen needs to serve multiple purposes for a family and fails to serve any of them, a renovation is critical. Such was

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the case with the Linden Wood home, which was in dire need of a larger kitchen that would better accommodate daily living while

American Builders Quarterly

Photos: Tom Kessler

Building Type: Private residence

Visit your local Ferguson Bath, Kitchen and Lighting Gallery to find everything you need to remodel your kitchen, bath, or entire home—and the trained consultants to help with any taste or budget. With showrooms from coast to coast, come see why Ferguson is recommended by professional contractors and designers everywhere. also serving as the perfect space for entertaining.

“My involvement in the space planning and specifying of materials and finishes for this project was extensive,” project designer Beth Settles says. In addition to a large island, which provides both seating and cooking space, the new and greatly improved Linden Wood kitchen features chrome hardware and light fixtures (contrasting a color palette Settles describes as “monochromatic tans, chocolate, and gold—accented with a pop of sapphire blue”), glass tile with a metallic sparkle, birch cabinets with a dark custom stain, contrasting colors of granite, and a hickory-wood floor.

“And spice racks were cleverly hidden in the cabinets that define the cook top area,” Settles adds, noting also that an induction cooktop, recessed into the countertop, provides a flush transition between the two surfaces.

“Every detail of this project was planned with meticulous care,” Settles says, “to create a finished space that would achieve the purpose and encompass the look that my client envisioned.”

ABQ

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Omaha:

6780 South 118th Street

(402) 331-0662

FERGUSON.COM ©2011 Ferguson Enterprises, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Mailing Address P.O. Box 80798 | Austin, Texas 78708 Physical address 16809 Radholme Ct. | Round Rock, Texas 78664 Phone (512) 252-8920 | Fax (512) 252-8923 | www.texasroofing.com april/may/june 2012

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the specialists

Austin Lumber Company Laura Willhoite Culin knows a lot about Austin Lumber Company, Inc., founded by her great-grandfather, William Willhoite.

As a female entrepreneur in construction, Culin (opposite page, top) did not inherit this business; she bought it from her father and had to rebuild it after a series of trying events. The company’s story begins in the Great Depression and carries all the way to the current Great Recession. There have been fires, floods, cement shortages, and modern-day improvements in the succession from father to son to grandson to—something that might surprise William Willhoite—a great-granddaughter with winning business acumen. Culin has made Austin Lumber a 21st-century supplier, offering custom-millwork capabilities and environmentally friendly products such as green housewraps, e-board (a gypsum drywall alternative), recycled cotton insulation, and FSC-certified lumber products. Here’s a look at how the firm has come so far. —Russ Klettke

1929 Austin Lumber founded Shortly after the stock market crash of 1929, William Willhoite starts what becomes a set of three building industry-related companies, which are ultimately divvied up among his sons. These businesses are just part of how the Willhoite family initially uses its land in the eastern part of Austin, Texas. There are cattle and sheep and a sustenance garden on the property as well. “They were so broke they didn’t know it,” Culin jokes.

1941 A second generation takes the reins William Willhoite dies the day Pearl Harbor is attacked, effectively leaving the business to his son Bernie Willhoite. As the war effort grows, many building materials are rationed, but using business savvy and capitalizing on its close proximity to a railroad track, Austin Lumber becomes the sole source of cement in Austin.

1965—1995 Culin learns the ropes Culin’s father, Don, purchases the lumberyard from Bernie, his father, in 1965. As a child, Culin begins to learn company operations. She studies retail buying, business math, and marketing in Dallas and Austin and then goes to work for the company in 1985. She is given full management responsibilities in 1989 and takes ownership by purchasing the firm from her father in 1995.

She founds the East Austin Business Owners Association that same year.

1945—1964 Divide and conquer Bernie and his brothers split the businesses among themselves during the war: one brother becomes an architect, another goes into metal supplies, and Bernie and another brother keep the commercial-building-supply companies. After the war, Bernie also builds 700-square-foot houses for employees of the slaughterhouse industry nearby. The homes sell for $2,850, and Bernie helps finance them by holding property deeds as the lender to the homeowners.

Family members get little rest while running the business. Their weekends include retrieving lumber in East Texas or chain link fencing in Houston, and children in the Willhoite clan help unload inventory in the mornings before going to school.

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American Builders Quarterly

the specialists

2005 Fire and legal battles Culin is unable to insure her buildings because of the age of the structures and the neighborhood in which they are located. On January 1, 2005, neighborhood children playing with firecrackers start a fire that burns five of the seven buildings to the ground, a loss that includes a mill, a truck, a forklift, and all inventory. Culin has to spend an additional $60,000 on a frivolous lawsuit defense related to the fire, which she eventually wins, and she battles a computer hacker who tries to steal the company name—all this while facing the daunting choice of rebuilding or closing down the company. “I did not want to be the one who quit the family business,” Culin says of her perseverance. “My daddy was tough on me, and he taught me to survive.”

“I did not want to be the one who quit the family business.

My daddy was tough on me, and he taught me to survive.”

Laura Willhoite Culin, Owner & Operator

2006—Present

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2006—Present Reinvention and recession Post-fire, Culin decides to take the company in a green direction. She self-finances, rebuilding a retail hardware store, an office, and two enclosed warehouses—all of them made of fire-resistant metal and concrete—and she expands to offer a decidedly green line of products.

Working in Austin, which is famous as a progressive area of the Lone Star State, Culin is already familiar with a green sensibility. “When I wasn’t sure if my business would survive, I taught courses on green products at Austin Community College and was certified to teach on FSC lumber,” she says. “I decided it would be our point of differentiation to offer eco-friendly products.”

The company now supplies businesses such as Texas Roofing, a major local contractor that leans on Culin’s green expertise for projects such as several buildings at Texas A&M University (left). Those new structures open in August 2008, just one month before the financial meltdown that year. Culin acknowledges it has since been a challenge. But, she says, “I’m still here.

I love what I do.” ABQ

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