Why Good Contractors Cost More

Time. It is a limited resource and ultimately a good contractor’s most valuable asset. When you carve out and hold sacred the personal time needed for God, Family, Friends, Fellowship, Rest, Relaxation, and Recovery, the decisions you make on how you spend the time allocated to the “workday” become even more imperative.

Successful contractors are purposeful with how they spend their time, always cognizant that wasted time is something that can never be recovered.

Eliminating wasted time is one of the motivating factors that drive good contractors to improve themselves and their companies. Managing time becomes a differentiator that sets them apart from their competition. Contractors invest in developing systems and processes that pay dividends as their companies begin to run like well-oiled machines.

The best contractors devote themselves to improvement through industry education across all facets of the business -- from design and construction to sales and business.

Learn why good contractors cost more - Jason Brownlee

Jimi Smith Photography

They allocate resources to building a company that values relationships built; both internal with employees and sub-contractors and external with their customers and the communities in which they thrive. They desire to leave a mark -- to weather the storms and to stand the test of time.

In my role as a traveling design professional, I have had the opportunity to meet many of these visionary contractors at all stages of their journeys. Through our interactions, I have watched and learned from them as we have partnered on their designs. We have discussed their successes and struggles alike, and I have been inspired by the insights learned from them. I hope that sharing these will help others facing similar questions and challenges.

A unique aspect of my travels is the unique regional differences, biases, and issues that our partnered contractors face in their businesses.

Whether it is a product that is considered a necessity in Richmond, VA, but would never be considered in Charlotte, NC (which is only 5 hours away), or how a contractor in Port Charlotte, FL deals with labor issues differently than another in Denver, CO – each with their own success.

Sometimes the issues are climaterelated, and in other places biases appear more psychologically motivated. Each region seems to have its own set of specific conundrums to work through. But one truth that I have found to be universal when working with these quality-focused contractors from across the land is their frustration when their market competition actively works to label them to prospective clients as “too expensive” and uniformly undercuts their pricing – often to disastrous results.

The client relationship process takes time -- valuable work-day time that cannot be recaptured if something or someone takes it awry. It takes time to properly vet the prospect, work through a design process, and establish a solid relationship base where you feel comfortable moving forward into construction. It takes time to provide both rough framework estimates and detailed project bids, and then often to revise both the design and bid to best suit the needs of the client.

This allocated time is an investment on your part and should be reciprocated in kind on your client’s part as the purchase they are about to make as they add to the value of their home is, for the most part, the second largest they will make in their lives -- more so than luxury vehicles, lavish vacations, college tuitions, and children’s weddings. As such, this investment should be treated with the respect it is due by all parties.