How Payzant Home Hardware Built Atlantic Canada's Largest Independent Building Supply Fleet — and Why They Cap Commercial at 15%

0:00This episode is brought to you by our presenting sponsor Payzant Building Products. Payzant Building Products has been providing contractors and builders with the supplies necessary to complete their jobs since 1964. They've built a reputation of honest, helpful, and quality service serving the HRM for the last 58 years. Now with seven locations in Nova Scotia and one in New Brunswick. All right, welcome back to the Atlantic Construction Podcast. Very excited to have with us today our presenter sponsor Payzant Building Products, and we have Andrew Payzant, President, CEO, and owner.

0:38And Matthew, General Manager. So uncle and nephew with us today. And yeah, as I said, this is our first episode with one of our biggest supporters. Payzant is a presenter sponsor, so really honored to have you both with us today. Thanks, guys. Well, thanks for having us, glad to be here. Yeah. We usually start, you know, with our typical — to get a little bit of background on our guests' journeys in the industry. And obviously Payzant is a very familiar

1:10name to the folks around Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, here in Atlantic Canada, as a building supply store. So maybe Andrew, if you could start us off and just kind of give us a little bit of the history and the background of, you know, the family business and the humble beginnings and leading up to today and where things are at. Yeah, sure. So Dad started the business in 1964. Dad grew up on the farm.

1:39Down the Annapolis Valley, a small little village called Bishopville that nobody has heard of before. It's just out kind of in the outskirts of Hantsport, which most people — or a lot of people — know where Hantsport is. So Dad had moved to Lower Sackville from the Valley. So when he was — John, right? John. Yeah, so my dad's name is John. And he was working at a furniture store in Windsor, the Shan Sisters furniture store, and he met and married my mother, and my

2:20brother came along. So Dad was looking at things and thinking, oh man, you know, I'm thinking five dollars a week — you know, it was pretty hard. Just — here's what year is this? 19— That was 1951. Yeah, that my brother was born. So 1951. And Dad was looking at what he was making and thinking, okay, I now have a — a third mouth to feed, and oh, it's gonna be tough to feed, you know, this little baby. So he was working in this furniture

2:55store and the traveling salesman came along. And Dad happened to mention, you know, I'm looking for some work, things are pretty tight financially. So the traveling salesman mentioned to him, he said, well, you know, I know a guy I just came from in Lower Sackville by the name of Ted Blackburn, and he's got like a little shopping center down there. And he sold groceries and he had clothing and he had hardware and he had electronics, and he had kind of — he kind of claimed

3:29he had one of the first shopping centers in Nova Scotia — at Blackburn. So Dad said, well, I'll go down, because the salesman said he knew that he was looking for some help. So Dad decided, well, I'll go down and meet with him. And sure enough Ted hired him. So he moved to Sackville in 1952 and started working for Ted Blackburn Limited. And any of the older folks from Sackville would probably be familiar with Ted.

4:05So he worked there, and then at one point in the early '60s Ted decided that he wanted to kind of sell out his business. And he had a couple of children but they weren't interested in the business. So there were a couple of other managers in Ted Blackburn Limited. Dad was manager at that point of the building supply and hardware store part of Ted Blackburn. There's another gentleman who owned and managed the grocery store division.

4:42Another guy managed the soft goods — the clothing and so on. So Dad met with Ted and agreed that he would purchase just the building supply section. Another gentleman decided that he would take the grocery store division, and Ted just kind of closed down the rest. So Dad decided, okay, I'm gonna do this now. And I remember him telling me that he was trying to come up with the name for this building supply store. It had been Ted Blackburn — of course it was Ted

5:20Blackburn Shopping Center Limited. And Ted said to Dad, well, you don't have to come up with a crazy name — call it what it is, Building Products. You know, we put your name on it, you'll be proud of it, and that will give you extra incentive to make sure it works, because it's got your name on it. If it was, you know, Purple and Blue Building Supplies, who cares. But it was Payzant Building Products. So he did. So that's what he named it. And he operated there in

5:50the basement, basically, of the old shopping center location for a few years. And then — so that was 1964 — and then in 1969 he built the building where we are today for our head office location, further down the street at 250 Sackville Drive. Right. So my mom was not real happy when he bought the company, because at that point more children had come along, including me. I've got three brothers and a sister. So I came along in 1961. So at that

6:34point Dad had a two-story house with a few bedrooms and so on, but in order to buy the business he had no money to speak of. So he got a small loan from his father, and he then sold the house he was living in and moved into a small two-room place — a street away from where he was — near the Sackville location currently. Right. Correct. Yeah. So Mom was like, okay, well, where are we going to put all these kids? Like, you know, we — I had this

7:12halfway decent house where, you know, there's two kids in that bedroom and two in that one and one over here. And now we're in a two-room house that had a kitchen slash living room and one bedroom. So he said, oh, you know, I'll add on to it and so on. But that's how we got the financing. He had everything on the line when he started the business. Yeah, he had everything on the line. And then we basically — yeah, we kind of

7:40basically grew from there. It's always so interesting to hear the inception stories of, you know, such a well-known name now in the community. Right. And you've got — I think it's seven locations in Nova Scotia, one in New Brunswick, is that right? Yes. Just to hear how it started from the individual, like the entrepreneur, and maybe did it out of necessity. Yeah, but then also just how — yeah, just from that one idea, or that one inception idea, and maybe what he

8:10was going through at the time, and he had everything on the line, and then he looked at how things progressed. Yeah, it's really interesting to get those backstories. Yeah, thanks for sharing that. Yeah, no problem. Good thing you bought the hardware store, not the grocery side or the clothing. Imagine that. I don't know if Matthew would have made it in the grocery. No, I don't think so. I think I've got it — I don't think I would either. Having stuff that expires. Yeah, you know, like if

8:34I've got a two-by-four and it's sitting there and hasn't sold for a week or a month, it doesn't really matter. But if I had a tomato— What about yourself, Matthew? Tell us a little bit about how you ended up involved and a little bit about your journey to where you're today. Yeah, well, as Andrew mentioned, family business. So my dad is the middle child, I guess. So Andrew's older brother. And, you know, it was never kind of

9:08just assumed when you grow up that hey, you're going to work in the family business. In fact, it was much more encouragement — you know, do something, do anything else. Yeah, you know, just figure out what you want. Because obviously family business — sometimes the stories that you hear aren't great ones, right? And you just get people that get in there and either don't want to be there or shouldn't. So I pursued, after high school, my Bachelor of Commerce at Dalhousie. It's

9:37interesting that you were encouraged to — oh yeah, you know, to go your own journey. Because yeah, maybe that's not always the case. No, I think so. And I mean, it's nice, it's easy and convenient, but I think that's the concern. And as Andrew mentioned, my grandfather, you know, he started the business for what he could do for people and for his family. And always knew that the business was a means to provide, but it wasn't — you know, for the family, I'm sure he was

10:03thankful that his sons worked in it, but at the same time, yeah, it needed to be for the business. So I pursued my Bachelor of Commerce — and actually, I was here in Halifax — yeah, Saint Mary's or Dal. So I had some work terms, and I actually was working for a food service company. So prior to that — my partner — I'll take back what I said earlier, the food service business didn't last, though. It wasn't my calling. Because when I worked — just

10:32part-time job — it was Wilson's Gas, and I loved the gas station. I loved helping people and those busy days, just running over to the pumps and everything like that. I used to do that too. Yeah, yeah. It was really, really good. But when I got into my work after university, I was in an office — and no disrespect to marketing — but I was in a marketing department and I realized I don't love what I'm doing. And ironically I missed the gas station. You were front-facing, all the people. I was

10:59missing that customer interaction — that was the piece. So I thought, gee, you know, year and a half in, I've gained all this wisdom and experience, so I backpedaled into Andrew's office and said, listen, I've got a proposal for you. I can do wonderful things for the business. And then he hired me and put me on the order desk. So the rest is history. I don't think he listened to my proposal of all the wonderful things I could do. He's like, just get some experience, get to work.

11:28Yeah. So Andrew, you've been involved since '76, right? So you've got 46 years in. I do. Is that right? I do. 15. I think he counts it from day one, though. So 61 years. Okay. Wow. Pretty much born — pretty much right out of the womb. Yeah, yeah. So again, I was three when Dad bought the business. And yeah, I certainly did — although I started getting my first paycheck in 1976. I still have a copy of the first

12:01pay stub. I was getting $2.50 an hour, and I was so proud of that. I kept that and laminated it and set it aside. But yeah, I was 15 at the time and started out in the yard, and my first job the first few weeks was sweeping the gravel off the asphalt. That was my job. And back then we had a lot more gravel than asphalt, so it was a never-ending job keeping the parking

12:33lot swept up. So that was my beginning. And I spent — part-time, because obviously I was still in school — and I spent the first couple of winters on Saturdays. They weren't open Sundays back then. But on Saturdays I was out in the yard and I was serving customers, and once I turned 16 I was driving the truck and delivering to — for health and safety reasons we want to — talk about all the work experience in those early years? No.

13:10Because there was something — I've heard some of the different times, different times I've heard some of those delivery stories. Yeah. Better left unsaid. Yeah, yeah, we'll leave that for another kind of podcast. Yeah, for sure. For sure. Yeah. So, and then Dad only ever gave me one promotion in all the years that I was there. And one day he came to me in the summer and he said, I think it's time for you to move inside. You've been out in the air long enough. And

13:41I must have proven myself or something, so he said, you should move inside and start working on the customer service counter. And, you know, we didn't have much — actually, we didn't have any kind of training or anything in those days. It was just kind of you're thrown to the wolves and there you are, you're on the counter, start serving customers. So for me, that's great, because that's the way I learned the best anyway — I'd rather be immersed in

14:11it than read about it in a book. Just get immersed in it and go for it. So then in the early '80s I went to Mount Allison. And as Matthew said, you know, Dad — while it was a family business — he never put any pressure on any of us to work in the business. It's do what you want to do. And when I was graduating high school and was thinking about what I wanted to do, it wasn't this. I wasn't really sure what I wanted to

14:44do. So when I went to Mount Allison, the first year I actually just took a Bachelor of Arts program, because it's like, eh, not sure what I want to do. But prior to that I had taken a couple of economics courses and a business course, and it's like, oh, I actually kind of enjoy this. So I switched to the Commerce program. And then of course the summer months wasn't just July and August like it was in high school — it was May through August. And

15:14I discovered I really enjoyed this. So I decided — after university, I actually left university after three years. It's a four-year program, I left after three. Mainly to some degree there were two influences. One was I was taking courses and it's like, these courses don't make any sense. They were credits that were needed, and it's like, what they were teaching was not the business that I saw, that I had already been immersed in. It's like, I don't know what they're training us to

15:50be, but it's nothing to do with real business. Maybe if I went to work for IBM or somewhere the courses were applicable — it's much different today. But I just — it just didn't make any sense. Plus I had met my now-wife, so I had two incentives. Let's get out of New Brunswick, let's get this engagement going and so on. So I started working full time, and then over the years I just, you know, again worked up through all

16:30the different positions — from looking after the tool department, to the seasonal department, to cutting glass, to estimating and blueprint reading, and then management and so on. Just kind of every once in a while I'd give myself a new title and change my business cards. Yeah. And keep going from there. Yeah. I'll go back to the comment you made about, you know, after three years you kind of realized that university — that a lot of the courses weren't — yeah, you know. And

17:02I don't know if Matthew, if you have some thoughts on this. I did the business degree as well, as an undergrad. And you do learn a lot of good things when it comes to certain things like accounting and some knowledge of marketing and just basic administration skills and those kinds of things. But I don't know — it has changed for sure. I mean, lots of things have changed. But maybe it hasn't changed as much as — you know, you see a lot of —

17:28There's a right time to do it, or a right scenario where an MBA is valuable — someone coming from all kinds of different backgrounds and they're kind of collaborating and getting the business side of things if they haven't. But if you're — if you have a business in the family, or you know a business really well, I mean there's — yeah, I found that too to be my experience. Coming from a Millennial or Gen X — whatever you want to call it,

17:54I'm 36 — so I don't know if things have maybe changed, but then again, you know, there's nothing new under the sun. In a sense, if you know your business you can get some technical information which is helpful to plug into the way things are currently. Yeah. But that stuff is changing all the time. So I think whether it's Andrew or not — over the years at school — I can have my stories of how stressful university was or whatever. I

18:22of course got lots of sympathy from that guy. A hint of sarcasm. Yeah, a little bit. But I think that, as is often said, maybe university is going to teach you how to learn. And a lot of education — it's teaching good habits, learning how to work with people, teaching you how to learn. Yeah. But you know, that doesn't have a time limit, and depending on what you want to do, how much time you spend

18:47there might be different. But what you learn in school — I'll set technical skill aside because that's a different thing. Yeah, it's not always as relevant as how to learn and how to prepare yourself for your future. Yeah, I agree. And I bring it up mostly in regards to business itself. Like, if you're going to be an engineer, obviously you need the technical — that's right. But when it comes to business, you know, a lot of it is about people management and just kind of being

19:12immersed in it, like you said. There are some technical things you should know, but again, I think for business in particular, yeah, where it makes the most difference — like, why be learning about things that you're not going to use those tools for? Yeah. I think what I've always said is that the two biggest things that I learned in university — and really I learned them in the first year, it didn't have to take three years to get it through my

19:45head — but it was time management, which has a component of prioritization. So, you know, I was there, and I know a lot of people today — you extend the university, you take two credits at a time or whatever, in order to get their degree, it's like an eight-year process or something. But I was taking a full course load, and in order to complete in the four years, you know, I had to learn

20:19quickly how to decide which thing I'm gonna do. Because with five credits every term, you know, there'd be an accounting exam on this date, and there'd be a poetry report due on this date, and then there was a statistics project I had to do or whatever. And it's like, okay, well, there aren't enough hours in the day to do all of them, so which ones am I going to do? Which ones

20:50are the most important? So you learned those critical thinking skills. And I learned those critical thinking skills. So even though I probably have never used stats or calculus or anything like that since, the learning how to decide what was most important and planning my days and my weeks in advance so I could get it all done was very valuable. But after I got that, I remember one of the things that kind of put me over the edge was one of the courses I was taking — they decided

21:22that the professor and their textbook — it was about how lumber was sold in Nova Scotia — and everything single thing that they said was wrong. And I knew it was wrong. And it got me thinking, well, I wonder how much other stuff they're teaching me that's totally wrong. Yeah. Because they were talking about, oh, you get the logs — I think it was from like the 1920s or something — you float them down the river and you do this and you do that.

21:51And it's like, that's not the way it

21:55We have been involved a little bit with Saint Mary's, the School of Business, certain part of Saint Mary's. And I've looked through the curriculum — yeah, the curriculum and the course descriptions — a couple of times, because I was curious as to whether it had improved. Because there was one course I took — quantitative analysis for business decisions — it was just not relevant. It's like, this is garbage. And I will say, from what I could see from the course descriptions,

22:27they were teaching much more relevant content. Yeah. And even like the whole HR side of it, which can be a big part of business — that wasn't in the curriculum. Like, no, it wasn't in the curriculum. No. And just to clarify for our listeners — I mean, everybody has their opinions on the education system and not — you know, you're not going to please everybody — but we're not here to knock it. I'm not knocking it saying what I've said, nor are you. And

22:53what Matthew said is, you know, going through and completing a degree basically reinforces to you that yeah, I can do something for four years, I can manage my time. And it does teach you those intangible skills. And I think that's part of the systematic nature of how they're designed, so that a certain type of person is going to filter out from a BBA or an MBA — you know, a person that can decide to do that and then carry through and

23:19finish it. Yeah. It's a certain label — regardless of how specific or detailed or relevant the information is outside of that, right. But like you said, I mean, they're always trying to get outside business people or influencers or community members to help. You know, because a lot of the professors wouldn't agree with half the stuff they have to teach in the curriculum. They'd want to be teaching something different. And that's always the challenge — to make it relevant. That's where I think trades colleges get it much, much better.

23:49But you're looking for something very specific at NSCC, right? You want to be a welder? You're going to learn everything you need to know to come out in two years and be ready. And even in construction management or architectural technology — of course it's pretty relevant. I've hired some, and you know, it's pretty relevant. They learn a lot. They get the first year in the workforce as a big eye

24:17opener. In that regard. But the challenge of experience — like Andrew described — you know, the journey of the experience that you can gain over the years, and whether it's businesses moving faster or whatnot. But you know, how do you replicate that experience in a faster rate? And some of the education programs, again at NSCC and whatnot, are oriented around that sharing of information, sharing of experience, so that you can teach somebody, from day one, how to be ready and more

24:47equipped in three years instead of maybe what would normally have taken 10 years. And if you can get more experience — not just theoretical but real experience — because we need more people and we need them faster. Yeah, yeah. So yeah, and that's everybody's problem now, especially in our industry too, right? It's not just trades people that are short. On all these large commercial jobs and in the residential sector too, it's building supply stores being short-staffed in certain regards, and

25:20everybody's — it's just amped up. Yeah. Well, we see the impact in our position. Again, we're suppliers, so we're not necessarily hands-on making these projects go faster or sourcing out trades for a building. But we know the value of what we can do when we're on our game and when we offer the right service with the experience that the builders need — then we solve a lot of problems or we prevent a lot of problems, so that the job, on-site, is a lot easier. So it's important whether it's — you know, it's simply materials delivery, it's handling, it's ordering, it could be estimating services — whatever it is, we know that within our position we can help our customers be more efficient. But again, that doesn't just come off the shelf, so to speak. That experience needs to be taught. And again, you only have to talk to a local contractor — they'll tell you exactly how important this is.

25:49Oh yeah, yeah, it's pretty

26:21much essential. No, I'm already planning — okay, seven years from now when that person retires, what am I going to do? Like, because I need to know now. I'm making steps to try to work towards some of those changes, because that experience base that we've built up over 30 years — I want to try to replicate it in five years, you know, if it's at all possible. So if we were talking before, Andrew and Matthew, about the autonomy of

26:52the space that you're in as a building supplier — comparing the markets from central Canada to here — and how it's a very tight-knit community here, you know, even though — it's — I think we're all happy with how things are, how busy things are in our industry. But just the autonomy of where you fit and understanding your role to the contractor and the homeowner and the subcontractors and the trades that are

27:20building these homes, buying your products. And how do you — you know, like you mentioned earlier about working at a gas station to be front-facing, talking to people, understanding them. And there are so many moving parts. And with where Payzant has been able to get to locally — like you said, that doesn't just happen. You don't just build a name and all of a sudden you

27:52get to this level without understanding. Yeah. And a contractor who likes to deal with you guys, or who tries you for the first time and then they've been dealing with you for the last 10 years — I mean, there's a reason for that. So we would — a little bit about the business as a whole and where things are today. A few years ago — I don't — I guess COVID was a couple of years, so five years ago now. Yeah. We do exercises

28:17of course, and some of it was strategic planning or whatnot, and part of it they were discussing having a vision statement. And Andrew — because again, my grandfather probably didn't sit home and think of a vision statement for the business, it just evolves. Yeah. But when you tried to capture it, what ended up coming together was: we want to be the most desired supplier of home improvement products in our markets. And we talked a lot about it, because honestly and truly we obviously

28:45track our sales numbers and we track our performance and how are we doing year over year. We know how many stores we have, we know how many employees we have. But those are not the metrics that really drive us. It is: are we satisfying our customers? And when we say most desired, the measurement is, are we the place that people want to come to? And that is everybody — from an individual building a shed or doing a bathroom, fixing something, doing a little reno — you know, they're just in with

29:13their child, buying some hobby supplies to do a school project, to the guy that's building houses and painting and building apartment buildings. You know, the statement that we have and the vision — that's a lot of different customers. It is. But it really is. And of course business school will tell you, define your target market. Okay, well, our market is builders — it's people. Okay, well, narrow that down. Well, you know, human beings — human beings. Yeah. Right. So it really does drive our behaviors

29:44and again it works all across the board in all of our stores. We obviously have different teams that focus more specifically on different areas, which allows us to be successful in different market segments. But I think that vision statement truly permeates everywhere and it allows our people to be focused on the right thing. And it genuinely is the customer every single time. We've got some guys in our delivery — and I'm going to tell you, delivery logistics are not always easy, they're not always fun. And for me, being in the

30:20sales side of things, sometimes you're always at odds. But I can tell you the passion and enthusiasm that some of our delivery drivers have for doing their part of the job well. Yeah. Because they see the value of what they do. They're going to be able to deliver this material — I want to get it done right, I want to get it done quick, I want to get it done right for the customer. So again, that vision statement has permeated all areas and I think it

30:44helps drive success. Yeah. And they understand where they fit, right? They understand — if they say they're going to be there at 7 a.m. with a load of two-by-four or drywall or backsplash or whatever — the contractor's relying on them and they've got men standing by. And you don't say 7 a.m. — say early in the morning. Yeah, I never give the exact time. I'm not going to give you that telephone window between eight and four range, you know. But we'll try to say morning, early

31:10morning. Exactly. But no, you're right. Yeah. I think one thing that sets us apart — pretty much all of our major competition — we are a big business now, but we're still a small family business. So it's an interesting dynamic, isn't it? It is. And we have had to change over the years, because when we had one store and, you know, 35 employees — well, that's one thing. But when you have eight stores and 300 employees, you have to do things differently. So you

31:56don't want to lose your culture, you don't want to lose what makes you successful. But there are some elements that you have to put in place — some checks and balances — to ensure things are operating at the peak level. So I imagine, as the President and CEO for the last 20 years with the help of Matthew and the management, that's a big thing for you to manage while you're growing. You need the right systems, you need to have control over the right things, and to provide the same service

32:32and not double the revenue but decrease the service — keep the culture. Right? These are the things that management and the CEO are constantly — you have to see it before it happens. Those things aren't just going to happen themselves. A lot of calculated decisions. There's a lot of big-picture thinking that has to go into it, and keeping on top of — well, what is the next thing? What do we have to do in five years' time? Yeah. And knowing the local ownership, the local

33:07decision-making there in every store does set us apart. So we are able to — we're still small enough that we can make decisions quickly and act quickly. And that's been a big part of the reason for our success. We're not this — we're big, but we're not this big massive ship that takes forever to turn. And if something comes up — whether it's a customer issue, an employee issue, or perhaps an opportunity — we don't have to go

33:45through six levels of management to reach somebody in some office in some other province, or in some cases a country, with publicly traded companies like Kent and RONA and Home Depot. It isn't — that's the issue, right? It's so hard to talk to the right person where something can be answered and you can get some closure. Yeah. Because you don't even know who that person is. No, let alone can you talk to them — you're never going to meet them. So, Lower Sackville, Dartmouth,

34:14Sackville New Brunswick, Hantsport, Windsor, Porters Lake, Dartmouth — and Enfield. Yeah. Dartmouth is Burnside and Cole Harbour. Burnside and Cole — that's right. Yeah. So how many employees at each location? Right. It kind of varies — varies by store in a certain market. Right. You've got the Sackville location, obviously, which is the — yeah, Sackville is the big location right now. And it also operates as our head office, so all of the senior management are in that store. And I think

34:49we have roughly 120-something there. And then Enfield and Sackville New Brunswick and Cole Harbour are all about the same size, so they'd all have 25 to 35 — maybe 40 people there. Porters Lake is a little smaller. Our Burnside store probably has — I think 18. Our smallest store is in Hantsport, and it — oh, I think they've got eight. I remember — yeah, I remember last time I was in Hantsport, driving by there. I'll put a plug

35:33in there for the manager. Small but mighty. That's — oh boy, it's the little store that could. Like, when we first bought that store, I bought it more for nostalgia than anything else. It's like, if we can just break even there, I'll be happy. Because going back to our roots — Dad, you know, he grew up on the farm in Bishopville and the closest town or village was Hantsport. And I got to know my grandmother quite well because she lived

36:07to be 102. She was my — my Manila — she did. Now first of all, my grandfather died when I was two years old, so I never really knew my grandfather. But my grandmother — she would tell me stories. When Dad was young and Dad's brother were young, and they were a young family on the farm, they would basically try to just, you know, survive based on what they could grow and produce on the farm. And they had chickens — egg-laying

36:40chickens as well as some meat chickens — meat birds. And they used to gather eggs and then once a week they'd go into Hantsport and basically trade them in. She would take the eggs and get them to the little general store in Hantsport, and they'd get a little credit on their accounts — like a barter economy. So then when she needed flour or sugar, she could get that based on the credit for these eggs. And in the winter, sometimes it would be like — well, it might be

37:12a month or two before they could even get out of Bishopville, because the little dirt road wouldn't be plowed and so on. So when the store became available for sale and was kind of iffy — Hantsport was going through some hard times there, the Bank of Nova Scotia was pulling out and the Tim Hortons closed — it's like, oh, what's gonna happen to the little town? So it's like, oh, you know, there's still that connection there. And Dad still had

37:43— Dad just passed away a couple of years ago — and he still had all the original homestead land. Most of my brothers and I and my sister rebuilt cottages and stuff, and that's actually where I'm living now. For the last couple of years I've been living at my cottage, which is in Bishopville. So when we bought that store, it's like — just, you know, even just like — I

38:11mean, that's an interesting story. But even just the convenience — like if the contractor has a job up there and they're working on a roof up in Hantsport, yeah, you know where they're going to get their — if they run out of this or that or whatever. Yeah, we're building a home or whatever. Yeah. Right. And that's why that's been the exciting thing for that store. Because the gentleman who's managing it now had been working there before, and within a few months kind of got

38:38the understanding that hey, this is what Payzant is all about — we're all about being flexible and serving the customer. So for really no extra effort of ours, that store has grown a contractor business based on the fact that contractors know, I can walk in, I can say what I need and what I'm up against, and the store will respond — with inventory, you know. If you need us to start carrying this or that, or we've got to increase our levels, or what can we do here? Yeah.

39:08Everything short of, you know, buying a boom truck — because those take 14 months to get, I guess. Yeah. But we respond and react. So the stories over the last year of growth in that store have been based on the local connection. Somebody who says, I know the community, I know the people, I'm listening to the contractors when they walk in, and we respond in kind. With what inventory can we add? What services do you need? What people do you need? What resources can I tap into?

39:40Because again, we share our resources between all of our stores, so it's not just relying on that one store's expertise — you have the power and resources of the whole group. So it's been a really interesting experience over the last year. And we've owned the store since — was it three years? You've owned it four years. Four. Wow. But that last year — again, once COVID was passed and everything — you really see that growth. And it's all about listening and being responsive. Yeah. It makes me think, you know, like

40:12there are so many different facets to your business. Like, you have your contractors. And I can relate to a certain perspective, you know, from being a former contractor and dealing with certain suppliers, and just how big a deal it is to be able to call that person who's in charge of that region — your sales managers and so on — not just understand the business from my contractor's standpoint and the logistics and timelines and stuff, but actually know the materials. And I mean, that takes years to get

40:41experience. Right. And I'm thinking of one individual — I'll mention his name, we can cut it out if you want — but I know Ryan's family, who's involved with Atlantic Construction Podcast media — Knowles Grant. Yeah. At your store. And I just mention his name because I know — you know, a lot of people, you'll hear his name come up, and people know that he just knows his stuff. Right. And he knows the

41:08materials, he knows the logistics — so many different things. And for a contractor to have that — you know, he's got to have the trust level. And that's just one side of it. And then you have your whole wholesale end and your whole fleet that's working together to make things available. So a lot of different moving parts. But could you speak to how important it is to have those people in place — that people have that trust level

41:36and that experience level, and can come through for the contractors? Like, how big a part of your business is that? Yeah. Really. And I think most businesses are this way, whether they realize it or not. But it's all about having the right people. And on the contractor side of it, really, what it is — what they need and what they want — I think we do a reasonably good job of

42:10providing — is knowledgeable salespeople that make their job easier. So they want somebody that they can talk to, that they know knows what they're doing, they're not going to steer them down the wrong road. And they're going to say, you know, I need this product or I need this solution — I'm looking for this — and know that they can just leave it with them and move on with their next problem that they have to solve, knowing that this one is now looked after. They don't have to go back, they know that it

42:45they don't have to follow up again the next day, they don't have to question whether it's done right or whatever. They know that, okay, that's done, I can move on to my next thing now. And having people that are knowledgeable and understand the process and are able to do that — it really doesn't matter how much they have to do. Our guys — and gals, because we have some very, very capable ladies in the business as well — but our people, they might be scrambling in the background to get all

43:20the information they need and make sure it happens. But it's kind of like, you know, the duck on the water — we're just doing our thing, supplying the product. The contractor doesn't necessarily have to see the scrambling behind the scenes to get it done. Yeah, yeah. So I like, you know — like through COVID, so many of our contractors, the biggest question that they usually had was lead times: are you going to be able to supply me? Are you going to

43:49be able to supply us? And our response was always yes. And we always did. They didn't necessarily know the amount of work that was happening behind the scenes to make sure we could do that. And that's fine — they don't need to know that. All they need to know is that we were able to get them the products that they needed when they needed it, and it didn't hold their projects up. And that's all supported by good people.

44:24And I think that's the thing — I've heard elsewhere that I really like that person but they can't make things happen. In our company, you've got good people at the front line, and they make a commitment. And then there are good people next in line to make sure there's inventory to support it. And then it gets received, it gets shipped out. And to the point where somebody months earlier or years earlier decided, we need to order a new truck, or we need to make sure we're on the cutting edge — what

44:55is the business going to need next year to support the growth in the city? What are we going to need over the next five years to support the growth? So it's a whole system of good people that care that makes the whole thing work. Which is kind of exciting. Because sometimes good people are stunted by a bad structure, or their hands are tied — exact same systems in place. And we've seen that sometimes, whether it's growth in

45:23companies — they get bought out by a bigger company, and then it just stifles that independence, creativity, that autonomy. Yeah. And it's just not in our DNA to do that. So I think that's what's kind of unique — being able to maintain that strength for the individual and good people all the way through the organization. Yeah. That's a big deal for the employees too. They take a lot of pride in their job and their experience in doing it. Yeah. Not wanting to be hemmed in or

45:54boxed in, not able to deliver what they want to deliver. Oh yeah. Yeah. For sure. Yeah. You know, I kind of make it a point to not bring up the pandemic a lot in podcasts, because, yeah, it's something you could easily — and people are sick of hearing about it. But we haven't done a lot of suppliers on, and I'm wondering from a supplier point of view, as far as material pricing — was there any moves made as far as

46:18inventory and just replenishing things? And as things moved along — I'm sure you were riding the wave like everybody else in the industry. But were there circumstances where — you know, the price of lumber, for example, is a big one. Plywood and lumber — the price went up so much and down again. And I'm not fully — yeah. So like, was there any kind of moves made on the back end? Or, you know — I think, I guess — tell me if this is

46:48something that would happen on the back end — like, oh, I think you know, this number is going to climb like crazy, let's get enough in for the next year now. I know you're always thinking years ahead, so could you maybe just tell us a little bit about — so without giving away too much, Matthew has been a little bit traumatized. That was one of his chief responsibilities over the last number of years — the purchasing side of it. And I used to say

47:18to him every once in a while, you haven't experienced yet the peaks and valleys that we used to have. So lumber, plywood, OSB has always historically had peaks and valleys. What's the reason? The nature of the product itself — it's multiple tangled messes of variables. Because it's everything from the spruce budworm killing forests, to the price of fuel for trucks, to lumber mills burning down, to hurricanes in Florida. There's just so many

48:04elements that can potentially affect the price of lumber and OSB. It's nice to hear this from you, because you do hear people kind of speculate — well, this is why, and that's why. But it's nice to hear from someone — this is a big impact on your business and it's just a slew of so many different variables. Yeah. That sometimes don't, on the surface, even make sense that they had this effect. It's like that saying — nobody knows if a stock's

48:38going to go up or down or sideways. Right. Many, many conversations over the last couple of years where I even intentionally said, all right, I'm gonna park emotion and I want to talk logically. And I'd have a conversation — whether it's with a broker or other colleagues — and just say, okay, what do we think logically? And you come right back full circle to — don't know. If we had a crystal ball, yeah, we wouldn't be doing what we're doing. Yeah, if you could see the future. So logic doesn't solve it

49:11and emotion certainly doesn't help it. You know, and as you said, the factors — I think they only get more complex as the world gets smaller and information gets shared so much. The complexity of trying to figure out markets in Atlantic Canada — you know, we're proud of it, we love it, it's exciting. It doesn't — we don't drive the market. So what feels like a boom or maybe a bust or whatever here — that is the other part. It's not really

49:43driving the market — we're kind of responding to whatever happens elsewhere. And again, it happens fast now. So it happens daily. Like, the price changes daily. We don't change our prices daily, but if we went to buy a trailer load of OSB or a trailer load of two-by-four studs or two-by-six studs — when we priced it this morning, well, this afternoon the price is probably going to be different. It could be higher — wait until next week. Well, that

50:17happens many, many times. The reverse would happen too. And the reverse happens — that's part of your business. It's just part of the business. And yes, during the pandemic it reached kind of crazy levels for a period of time, then it dropped. So it went up very fast, it went down faster than anything I've seen before. So poor Matthew was — you know, we were selling lumber — certain sizes and types of lumber — for 15 to 20 percent under our cost.

50:55I'd say that the community ball fields behind our store in Sackville — my kids were in Little League Baseball. I remember a couple years ago sitting there in the ball field and I'm probably crying during a ball game, and people probably wondering what's this guy upset for. It was like — it's the game — losing money as the game goes on. Oh, what a feeling, though. Yeah. I mean, you'd literally see a truck go out and — yeah, yeah, it is costing you money. But to the

51:24point of strategy — we are intent on having the material. That's job number one. We've got to have it to sell it, we're not going to run out. Do we try to make the best decision we can within the market and within reasonable restraints? Yeah. So we can buy a little bit more, but with the lack of — you know, those are you're rolling the dice and gambling. So we try to partner with our customers, identify what their need is, so that job number one

51:52doesn't fail — we don't run out. Job number two is trying to be at the best and most competitive price that we can. So we're going to try to be there. And if we can try to buy a little extra because of the ebbs and flows of the market, you want to look at the long haul and say, okay, over 12 months, ideally we're not losing any money selling here. There are probably a couple of items that over the course of 12 months in the pandemic we lost

52:17money on, but that didn't — like I said, it did matter. It does matter. But we had to be there. So it's been an interesting experience. Yeah. And I think it's a nice perspective — I think for our listeners, it's just — even just that material in general, as far as lumber, but then you think about fixtures and plumbing and tiles and — well, there were some items. And there are a couple of items that I remember — I laughed — it's like people that say they

52:48have a baby and the baby's like 22 months old — I'm like, no, no, okay, you've got to start saying two years. Like, that baby's not 22 months old anymore. With lead times, they'd say, like, 58 weeks or — all right, you cannot say 192 days. Tell me it's one year, it's six months, right? Let's get on with it. Yeah. Some of these lead times — it was just ridiculous. But yeah, I could show a newsletter where a lead time was 187 days — a year and a half ago

53:16and now it's 17 days. So you had to adjust your planning for those lead-time changes. At some point it rocketed up to 187 days and you need to plan for that. And another time, if you don't pay attention, it's not 177 days anymore — it's 17. So now you can be more nimble, now you can be responsive. So you have to keep your eyes out there as to what's happening. Oh yeah. I mean, it sounds like just a constant monitoring of a lot of

53:45different — there are so many different products. I mean, we had to get very good at suggesting alternatives. So it used to be, you know, with garage doors — we'd have one main supplier and some inventory of this product, and this was kind of the garage door brand that we would promote. But because of the supply issues we had to get very good at — we had to widen our selection of product, and we had

54:17to suggest alternatives to customers. So they might come and say, well, I want a 9x7 garage door with this particular door light in it. And we'd say, okay, well, I can't get that one, but I can get this one over here, and the light looks a little bit different. Or I can't get a Wayne Dalton but I can get a Steelcraft, or one of these ones. So we had to get very good at that. And customers

54:44sometimes had to not take their first choice. But it's like, well, I can get that one, but it's six months away. Here's an alternate that you can get a lot faster. So we're trying to give our customers solutions and not just say, oh well, that's just the way it is, and it's this long lead time. We tried to find ways. And getting back to your first question — yes, if through our gut feel or looking at the market or whatever, we

55:17think that the price is going up next week or next month, we would bulk up our inventory. We weren't always right — sometimes it didn't go up. Or vice versa — sometimes we'd let it go down a little bit because, ah, it can't possibly stay at this level, it's going to go down next week. So let's not order this week, let's wait till next week. So that's a constant, weekly — yes, it's just a constant change. I lost my train of thought. Are you

55:52getting up for a certain reason, or no — just — I've got a great question here, just wait. I don't want to forget. All right. Just take a second here — just take your time. That moment has passed. This thought's okay. So we've got to distract it. Oh, I know what it was. There we go, see? I seriously do that. There's a moment — you try it, it does work. Yeah, you're right, you're right. I do that all the time. Overthink everything. So how much of — how much of your

56:25business revenue is, say, residential contractor-based or homeowner-based, and then commercial? And kind of what's the direction you're heading in the future? Is that something you're changing — the structure? Yeah, so that's a great question. So a lot of my fellow dealers — I meet with a lot of fellow Home Hardware dealers — and when I was on the board of the Atlantic Building Supply Dealers Association, you know, dealers of all different flavors

57:03— we'd have different get-togethers and so on. And most dealers kind of break their business up into retail and contractor — those are their two. We've always done it with six different customer types. So retail is pretty easy — it's just the guy that's getting some paint for his basement bedroom that he's building, or a few pieces of two-by-four to build a back deck or whatever.

57:37So there's retail. Then there's what we call small contractor. And small contractor for us — it has nothing to do really with their volume in dollars or the size of the purchase, but it's the type of contracting that they do. So that's primarily the renovation-type contractor — they're not really building new homes, but it's deck builders, renovation guys, shed builders, fence builders, all that kind of thing. Then we have what we call large contractors, and that's primarily the

58:13larger multiple new home builders that might be doing 30 homes a year, or 50 homes a year, or 100 homes a year, or 200 homes a year. And I mean, these residential contractors — these guys are serious contractors. They're doing more work than some of the commercial ones. Oh no question, absolutely. No question. Major. Yeah. Then we have our owner-builder. And our owner-builder is, you know, Mr. and Mrs. Smith — they've got a lot somewhere and they're kind of almost acting as their own

58:47general contractor. They've got a lot, you know, they're picking out their own plumbing and electrical, and they're hiring an electrician, and they're getting a guy to maybe frame it, and then they're looking after the roofing. So it's kind of the owner-builder — they come in with their set of plans, yeah, and want an estimate. You know, it's their dream home. Then a developer, and the commercial — kind of a similar thing. Right? Yeah. Right. Then we've got our installed sales, which is again consumers that want to buy the product

59:16but have us install it for them. And it can be anything from a kitchen to a bathroom to maybe a deck or something like that. And you're subbing out these installs to your contractors who are clients? That's right. Yeah. So we're speaking to our existing contractor base. Then we have the commercial contractor — and that's what we call the ICI, or Industrial Commercial Institutional side of the business. And that's the side of the business that we never used to do. We never really

59:49used to do any amount of commercial. Yeah. So when did that change? That changed about 20 years ago. You know, again, Dad — he was all about the residential, the retail customer, and the small contractor, and the contractor building homes, and the owner-builder. Because back then there was a whole lot more owner-builders than there are today. Like, today, even just with a lack of lots, a lot of guys can't — because they can't find a lot if they did want

60:24to build a house. So unless they're out in the country somewhere, if they want to buy a lot in one of the existing subdivisions, a lot of times there's just no lots available because the home builders tend to buy them up. So the owner-builder was a much bigger part of the business. But about 20 years ago we started focusing a little bit more on the commercial side of the business. And I think it was for two reasons. One is

60:57initially we were kind of pulled into it because some of our existing customers started getting involved in the bigger projects. And the other thing is, some of your existing customers maybe took on a couple jobs where they needed just crazy volumes. That's right. So they would leap, and we took it with them. And we took it with them. So we followed along. I always had a cap — originally it was just mental, but then I actually had it on paper

61:27where I said that I don't want that to be more than 15% of my overall business. Yeah. Because those six segments all add up to 100% of the business. But I didn't want the commercial part of the business to be more than 15%, and it's not — because it could have become just such a — the whole focus all of a sudden. Correct — it was the volume potential. You know, there's always the old expression, don't forget who brought you to the dance. Yeah. So the reason we had been

62:03successful is, you know, the local contractors that are building homes, and our retail customers — we didn't want to lose focus on that. So one of the reasons that we break it up into those six different customer classes and track it daily, weekly, monthly, is because each one of those types of customers requires a different level of service from us. And as Matthew said, if you go to business school they might say, well, pick who you know, who your

62:43customers are — don't try to be all things to all people. Well, in home improvement and building materials, we feel that we can be. And we track it very carefully. Because the commercial contractor and what he's looking for and what he needs from us in the way of service and material — that's totally different than what the large contractor wants, which can be totally different from what the small contractor wants. You know, a lot of times the small contractor — he's actually swinging a hammer, and

63:15you know — that's right. Whereas most of the large contractors — it's all crews. You can't build a hundred houses yourself with a hammer. So what they need from us — the type of services, the type of inventory, the speed of delivery, the type of trucks and so on — is very, very different. And with the commercial projects, the large apartment buildings — they can use up a lot of resources for a period of time, and then it just

63:47drops off. So you know, a contractor might build 50 houses a year. Or 50 houses this year, next year maybe it's 55, and then the year after that maybe it's 45. So the business is there and it goes up and down a little bit. But a lot of the developers, if they're building a 20-story, 150-unit building — that might take two years to build. But then when it's done, you might not do another building for two years. Yeah. Or by the time it gets to

64:16the material that we supply — so you know, you've got your trucks and your people and your resources in order to service that contractor. But then all of a sudden it's not there. And then all of a sudden two years later it's back again. So it's very, very hard to maintain a level of customer service to them without it negatively affecting your other customers. But then over the last 20 years a couple of things have happened. One is, as we've gotten larger — I think we

64:44have one of the largest, if not the largest, delivery fleets. We've got — for commercial, for total — yeah. So we've got over 60 trucks, 16 boom trucks. I've got two more on order, both of which are supposed to be here this year, both of which haven't come yet. But over the last 20 years — if you went to see CMHC and looked at the stats and said, okay, in Metro Halifax, how many of the housing starts were single-family

65:28— what was it 30 years ago and what is it today? So 30 years ago it was about 75 percent single-family homes. It's like 30 percent are single-family now. So the multiple unit, the larger buildings — these are becoming a much bigger part of housing. Yeah. The multi-unit residential — some people kind of classify as commercial, which technically it's not. But if it's a 100-unit building, technically it's not commercial — you know, commercial, you're looking at a shopping

66:09mall, a university campus, yeah, or a hospital or whatever. Yeah. But if you look at it — it's still the same volume of a project to supply for the contractor as it is for a lot of these commercial projects. Absolutely. Yeah. It might be wood-framed as opposed to structural steel. Right. But yeah, it's still — and even with structural steel — and that's the other thing I used to look at. You know, 20 or 25

66:36years ago, I'd say, well, all that building — it's all concrete and steel. You know, I don't sell concrete and I don't sell structural steel. But if you look at the buildings that we're supplying now in those multi-story buildings — we sell drywall, we sell insulation, we sell interior doors, we sell steel studs, we sell balcony railings, we sell flooring. So there is a lot of product that we do sell to those projects now. So we've got our delivery fleet, we've got our people,

67:12and so on. Now I've lifted the 15% cap, because we're comfortable that we've proven to ourselves that we can service that customer and serve them well and service them to a high degree of standard without it negatively affecting all of our other customers. We can still service them because of the size of our fleet and so on. Back when we had two boom trucks, it was very hard to be able to do that — because all of a sudden my two boom trucks are tied up for a month

67:44delivering drywall to this big building. It's interesting to hear about the operations and how many trucks are on the — you know, and that kind of stuff. And I'm assuming when it comes to residential and commercial, your big competitors are Kent and then a couple others. And if it's drywall then there's four or five drywall locations like Coastal and specialty dealers and whatnot. But if you know a lot of our audience and listeners are PMs and estimators for general contractors and developers,

68:13yeah, that are listening right now and haven't considered Payzant for railings and their lumber, and even commercial drywall — you know, a lot of guys are dealing with Coastal and Kent and whatnot. But they could be tuning in to this and hearing why not get a price from Payzant for that 100-unit that's going up

68:42somewhere in Nova Scotia. Yeah, for sure. That has been one of our focuses for the last couple of years — supplying that business. And we've got some very, very good, very knowledgeable people that are able to help these guys doing the larger projects. You know, with the commercial drywall — with the shaft liner and the glass rock and all

69:13the rest of it. Steel studs, etc. So yeah, we've been — in addition to customer service — I think over the years been very diligent at building good vendor relationships. And the Home Hardware brand is certainly phenomenal — a dealer-owned cooperative — and it's been excellent. But on the building supply side, it was always necessary to foster independent relationships. And that's something that I know Andrew's done personally and still does personally — is identify vendors for whom this market is strategic for them. And we want to

69:45deliver their product offering. And then for the customer, it allows us to bring a program or a competitive option that maybe has a desire to be in there. But also we can bring a wide range of product. And sometimes the specialty dealers are very, very good at one thing, yeah, but lacking in the breadth of assortment. And I think we're kind of a hybrid — where we strive to be as specialized as we can with our vendor relationships and

70:17partnerships — we'll try to understand the different products, the offerings, the new technologies — but also be able to offer a broad product mix. You know, right from the plywood that you might need when you're in the ground on the job, to the foam and the membranes and products like that — different kinds of insulation — and then all the way up through to the finishing product. So it is nice, because as a developer, as a PM, you can have a reliable contact. Let me call that

70:42guy or that gal, and I know that they have access to all of this stuff. It's not five different phone calls. So I think that's where the value proposition that we offer is — the strength of vendor relationships and the breadth of assortment. Yeah. And I think it seems like there might well be value too in a lot of these commercial projects that are happening — government-funded, general contractors involved. And these guys are always — they're always taking

71:11care of a certain portion of the rough carpentry themselves, a certain portion of different scopes, different overlapping scopes with their in-house labour. And if they're not ordering that stuff from Kent, well, you know, if Payzant's a good option — there's probably a lot of business there to be had, just from the GC's own in-house labour and carrying on on these larger — well, I know, but

71:39it's not the thing that in management you love to hear. But as I was — this morning on my way in — talking to somebody, and they said, what's up with those 30 sheets of plywood? I said, well, yeah, basically one of our guys is grabbing a pickup truck and taking 30 sheets of plywood and running it out to somebody. Because again, you get into these jobs — we love organized and planned, that's obviously what we strive for. But there's always the unexpected.

72:04There's always the stuff that you didn't plan for. And sure enough, those 30 sheets of plywood are going somewhere in downtown Halifax, because somebody on a Monday morning is realizing, shoot, we need this right away. Yeah. But if that guy's listening right now — he's probably thinking, crazy, absolutely. Right. You know, I still have the pickup truck with 30 sheets. Exactly. So that's the stuff that — you know, you'll always strive for planned and organized. But at the end of the day, when it comes down to it, we're going to be there.

72:30And again, we want everybody to plan, we'll work with you. But we're going to be there. Right. So yeah, there's always that stuff. And again, we try to plan for the unexpected and be ready. Yeah. So yeah, I mean — and we've had some of the biggest general contractors in Atlantic Canada on, and these guys are in charge of so many complex projects. But at the end of the day, you hear the comment

72:55a lot — nothing's ever going to be perfect, right? No. You want your standard and you have your optimum scenario, but you're always working around that. Whether it's 30 sheets of plywood on a Monday morning in downtown Halifax, or a hundred thousand other things. Yeah. It's — for our listeners, and I think for a business that's been around the way that Payzant has — from humble beginnings, family business, well-known name, trusted name — you reach the level

73:31you're at now. And you've made comments, Andrew, about — you're not the mom-and-pop shop anymore, you're a large operation. But you still maintain that culture. How important is it to understand who you are to the community? Because you are an option for people if they don't want to go to Kent. And you're always going to have those scenarios in business where there's the huge systematic

74:00corporate — who've developed all through the regions — and then you're in that sweet spot where it's like, you know, you're big enough to make a huge impact and influence, but yet it's still home-based, it's still local, it's still got that culture and that feel and the family name behind it. So speak a little bit about — yeah. It's — for us we find it a kind of a hard thing to do as far as

74:34blowing your own horn. Like, we have always tried to fly a little bit under the radar. We do our thing and we think we do it well. A gentleman — a supplier — told me even one time, not that long ago, he says, you know, you realize you can't do that anymore. Like, not that we couldn't try, but it's like, you're not flying under the radar anymore. People realize now how big you are, how

75:06your volume is. So it's a matter of — we tend to try to be fairly modest. You know, we're not any better than the next guy out there. But it's more understanding — well, on one hand, that has perhaps hindered us, in that we're not out there always blowing our own horn and saying, oh look at us, buy from us, we're big, we're bigger than the next guy and we're so great and look at us, aren't we wonderful.

75:34I remember one time talking to a contractor, and he says, oh well, I was meeting with a salesman for one of our competition and he told me you only have one boom truck. I'm like — at the time — oh no, we have eight boom trucks. But, oh, I didn't know you had eight. So it's a matter of — you know, our vision is to be the most desired, so we want to do

76:06everything such that customers want to shop with us. Sometimes if we've got an odd supplier that I almost hold my nose when I go and buy from them — but it's like, I don't have any choice — we want customers to want and enjoy doing business with us. But we are of a size now that we don't have to play second fiddle to Kent. And sometimes people think — although Kent are the big — well, if you look at it. So I remember Dad

76:37saying one time that short of maybe getting into business on day one, his best business decision was joining Home Hardware in 1971. And Home Hardware has been around since the '60s — since actually 1964, kind of ironically the same year that Dad started his business. Home Hardware started in Ontario. So Home Hardware now has close to 1,100 stores across the country — they're a multi, multi, multi-billion dollar a year operation. So when we purchase, we purchase through Home Hardware. So when we're

77:21buying plumbing, when we're buying electrical, we're buying roof shingles, we're buying drywall — we're using a Home Hardware purchase order number. So our volume gets added to the other 1,100 stores in the country. So if you look at the buying power that we have and the influence we have with suppliers, it's vastly, vastly greater than Kent. Kent has 50 stores in Atlantic Canada. I personally only have eight. But Home Hardware stores — there's 1,100 of them from coast to coast. And Home Hardware has a distribution centre in

78:01Debert, Nova Scotia. I don't know — it's a million square feet or something. It's got 60,000 different items. And you can go on the website and pick everything from a toaster oven to a wood stove to a bathtub — showers, massive — it's back in the business park in the trees there. It's hidden in the back — you'd never see it until you ran into it, but it's a big building to run into. So we get two trucks a week. So

78:34every three days basically we can get almost anything that that distribution centre has. So we have — now with that, along with our own fleet and so on — size-wise, we don't have to play second fiddle to anybody in Metro Halifax. Again, we have one of the largest delivery fleets and more boom trucks than the other guys and so on. It was interesting though — we were discussing the vision statement a bit ago, and it's like, how do you set a good goal? Well, a goal should be measurable. We want to be the most desired — it didn't have a metric that we could necessarily follow. But I know you were saying earlier we won the Industry Supporter of the Year from the Nova Scotia Home Builders Association. Yes, that's right. And

79:11you know, we kind of thought about that — like, well, who applied for that award? Nobody did. So it wasn't something that we had gone out and submitted an

79:43application for. So we got this call from Home Builders and they said, you've been selected the winner of the 2022 Industry Supporter of the Year. And who's making those votes? Yeah. Well, so that was the thing. I went to accept the award and I said, so I'd have to ask — how did we win this? She said, well, we put it out to the membership of the Home Builders Association and it was just a vote. Best affirmation — it wasn't multiple choice, it wasn't anything. It was like, hey, just

80:12pick — let us know who do you think. And our name came up more often than anyone else's. So it was humbling, it was fantastic. But afterwards I thought, there's the measurement — there's the result, I guess, of the vision of being the most desired. And that was what we needed, I guess, to prove. I think we must be on the right track, must be doing something right. Yeah. Yeah, especially — no, that's amazing. And then the MYHO award and the Sackville

80:38Business of the Year — were those awards recently? The last five years? Were those this year? The Sackville one — our podcast isn't airing yet, but they haven't even given us that award. They gave us the heads up, hey, by the way. But that was the community Sackville award. And then the MYHO award was for our store in Cole Harbour — it started up right at the beginning of COVID, trying to renovate the old RONA store in Cole Harbour and turn it into a Home Hardware. This was when RONA was — yeah.

81:07Exactly. So they closed it. And again, I give credit to Andrew with that moment, because you look back on business and you can think of key moments where you decide to take action. So yeah, we took ownership of that lease — playing chess. There are still stories of how somebody might have got in trouble, you know — geez, how did that location free up? And we were able to secure the lease. But we went to the landlords and they were able to get a

81:36deal. But anyways, turning that into a Home Hardware store during COVID — when normally you deal with store planners in Ontario and you'd have help come down and merchandising support and all of the graphics and whatnot — and we had none of that. So it wouldn't be as maybe turnkey as someone like me would think, who wouldn't be aware of all the things — well, who would normally help you? They engage with you and they partner with you. Right. But in this case they said, look,

82:02no one can travel, everything is delayed, everything is backed up — you're on your own. Kind of on your own. And so kudos to our team that really took that — you know, empty shell of a store — because when we got there the wires were pulled and everything was gone. So anyways, we turned it around. And that was the award — for a good first year. I think the community of Cole Harbour is fantastic. When the RONA closed, there was a lot of concern

82:33because we need a local hardware store, central location. And again, I like that some of our stores are the local hardware store. Yeah, you know, we have that aspect, we have our other aspect, we've got everything. But local hardware store — it's still in that DNA. And that's what Cole Harbour really is. We gotta mention the Fulfilment Centre — the new big news for you guys. Fulfilment Centre — yeah, can we tell our listeners about this, and what it means

83:03for operations, what it means for growth? Yeah. So one thing that I do — I take it upon myself in my role to always be looking to the future, always looking at where we need to be, what do we need to do today to be prepared to fulfil the needs five years, ten years down the road. And I do that several ways. I keep a very close eye on our industry outside of Atlantic Canada, because oftentimes

83:39trends in the industry, products in the industry, the way things are done — will be developed oftentimes stateside first, and then it will move to Canada. But usually in central Canada, maybe western Canada, before it reaches Atlantic Canada. So I keep pretty close watch on the industry so I can be prepared and be at the leading edge of what we need to do. So one of the things that I came to realize over the last few years is

84:21our existing facilities were getting more than maxed out. It's great to have very strong growth, which we have had over the last number of years, but it does create some logistical and operational issues and concerns. So in order to further our opportunities for the future, as well as to better handle the existing, I've been looking for some land — a piece of property. And we did locate a property that we bought last year in Fall River. It's about 18 acres of land.

85:12There's lots of space. And we are putting up initially a 60,000 square foot building, with — pretty close to the main highway. It's on Perrin Drive, which is just kind of right behind the DOT — the depot that they have there. And it's kind of the whole premise of that, right? I mean, it's there because it's fulfilling so many logistical needs for people. Right off the highway. Absolutely. So it's in a great location that

85:45is central to the existing market in Metro Halifax, but also very well situated for future development in Halifax, which is key. So it's a 60,000 square foot building, 18 acres of land, and we will be doing most of our primary customer fulfilment out of that facility. So all of our individual stores will still have trucks — from here to New Brunswick, to Windsor, to Hantsport, Cole Harbour, Porters Lake, et cetera — they'll all still have their own trucks that will do

86:33deliveries. But our primary fleet will all be centred in our Fall River Fulfilment Centre. And that provides us with one location that we can just be a lot more efficient with our trucking resources. We will be more efficient, we'll have more space, we'll be able to store more product inside. Because again, one of the things we learned with COVID is the importance of having depth of inventory. So I think we did an awesome job with what we had over the last couple of

87:09years. But it certainly would have been handy to have space to have a deeper inventory so we could be a little bit less hand-to-mouth, like we had been over the last couple of years. So centralizing your fleets and logistics at this new fulfilment centre and still having trucks at the locations — is it kind of like the commercial side, the large contractors — is that kind of the focus of the Fulfilment Centre? So the Fulfilment Centre will be for all customer types. The reason we will still

87:42have local trucks at the local stores is more the — oh, I've gotta have this right now, I forgot to order it. As Matthew was saying a little while ago — we'd love all our customers to — you know, forgot the milk. Yeah, right. And we'd like them to not forget the milk and eggs. However, life happens. And all of a sudden, oh, I need 10 more bundles of roof shingles, or I forgot to order my insulation yesterday and I really need it out there. So we don't

88:14want to be in the situation where, oh no, everything's at the Fulfilment Centre and all our trucks are there and we can't get it to you. So we will leave some vehicles, some trucks, at each of our sites so that we can do the local deliveries, the quick emergency deliveries. And in some cases — like with our New Brunswick store — we're not shipping products to contractors in New Brunswick from this fulfilment centre, so our New Brunswick store will remain mostly unchanged. But our other

88:47seven stores will all have the major project stuff delivered from there. If somebody's just building a deck or that type of thing, sure, that would remain at the local stores. Yeah. Yeah. So 60,000 square feet. I think success in business is probably about timing, for most of the big milestones. Right. Yeah, oh it is. Most of the years, Andrew would just — we'd go to him and say, well, I don't have space. And he'd say, let's go for a walk.

89:20And I think he learned this from his father. Go for a walk. And the famous three words that everybody in warehousing and management hated were — snug it up. Snug things up. There's enough space, you can find it — move this over here. But a couple years ago I think he started going, well, you might have a point. It might be as snug as a bug in a rug, as they say. We might need to make some more space. So yeah, I think the timing is right. We're

89:45excited about this new Fulfilment Centre — it's going to be wow. Excellent. And again, I think the growth in the city for the next few years — the next decade — is going to be significant. This positions us well. It's good news for a lot of people. We'll serve our customers better. Yeah, because our facilities would sometimes, in the last little while, have limited that and put a cap on it. And we're committed to doing everything well, so we might have had to say no to that. Well, this

90:12will allow us to say yes. I'm excited for it. Wow. Yeah. And in fairness to Matt — yes, I used those words. I learned them from my father, you know — just snug it up. I use them. But we were already leasing a 15,000 square foot building in Burnside for our window division. And that was a move — again, a couple of years ago — when some of the other local competition were kind of closing things down.

90:49And we made the strategic decision that, hey, we have an opportunity here to capture quite a bit more of the window and door business. But we will only underserve people based on our existing facility. So we went out, found a building, did a lease, and have been operating our window and door division out of that facility. So I knew that it was time. And it took us a while to find a

91:26property, because you don't find 18 acres in Metro Halifax quickly. Or at least not affordably. So it took a couple of years. But we're pleased with the location, we're super excited about getting it up and running and operating. And then you're — with the next eight to ten years speculated, you know, being what they are for our industry — you're certainly not going to be tied down with space once you have

91:56that all set up. When will it be operational? When is it — you know, for timelines? Yeah. So next year. Our target is next summer, hopefully early summer. There are some parts of it that we will probably make operational in stages, because the building itself may not be 100% complete when we're taking advantage of the yard space. Again, most of our lumber and OSB and products like that are all stored outside. Yes. So we don't

92:33have to wait for the building to be complete — it's not drywall. Yeah. So we may be making use of the yard space before summer out there as well. Because we're just positioning ourselves for future growth. You know, there are rumblings out there — things are slowing down a little bit, the interest rates, this and that, the economy. But my view is, there's too much underlying demand. Some of the craziness, some of the peak has come off,

93:13but the next 10 years are going to be very strong. You know, so this is — obviously it's a warehouse-type, climate-controlled fulfilment centre — a controlled environment as far as heat. For this it is. And we debated a little bit on how much of it is going to be heated. A lot of space — it's a lot of space to heat. Most of our warehouse buildings traditionally have not been heated, other than we had a small

93:42heated area for the drywall compounds and that type of thing. You can't keep drywall compound outside or in a non-heated warehouse. But we decided — we wanted to build in as much future-proofing as we could. Because as we go forward, we will certainly be looking at doing in-house parts of the business that maybe we haven't been doing before. We want to have a little bit more control over our destiny in some areas. So we decided, well, let's

94:16insulate it and heat the entire building. And that will give us a lot of flexibility for what we do down the road.

94:31Well, thanks — I want to thank you guys so much. Andrew and Matthew, for doing this podcast with us today. Any final thoughts, or anything we didn't touch on that you want to mention? Well, between the two of us we could talk for another six hours or so. We could. Yeah. Just looking at the time — yeah, there are places to be, things to do. But no, we appreciate being here. And I think my final

95:00thought is — you know, I love this industry. I love the people in it. I love the importance of it. We all have to live somewhere, right? We all live, and — I've always said, you know, we don't sell houses, we sell homes. We sell building products for homes. Yeah, yeah. So we're in a good industry. It's somewhat of a recession-proof industry, as we saw with COVID — when a lot of

95:32other industries — ours was not one that suffered. So I've been doing it my entire life and I enjoy the industry, and I appreciate the opportunity we've had to talk today. Yeah, yeah. And I likewise. And I want to say a special thanks to you, Andrew and Matthew, for showing some faith in our organization, and for the inception of our goal and mission statement with our business — the vision to shed light on the industry. Something

96:01that's so important to the culture as well as the economy. And it's just a very community-driven thing. And I think it's fantastic what you're doing — with the Atlantic Construction Podcast. And certainly for us, you know, we think about the industry at large. And when you were sharing the podcast idea — the inspiration for bringing people together — we certainly look forward to what's next. Because again, labour shortages, product challenges, job demand,

96:32changing technologies — all of those somewhat challenging things are exciting opportunities. And as a supplier, as a small part of this whole industry, we look forward to any way that we can participate, collaborate, and just help overall make this industry continue to thrive. So we appreciate this opportunity. Yeah. And again, this is our first episode with a presenter sponsor — our one and main presenter sponsor at that. So for showing faith in what we're doing, and for our listeners,

97:05you know, Payzant is a big reason why we're able to continue to do this and have this ongoing conversation with so many different players, shedding light on the industry in so many different regards. And hopefully we have an impact and just bring some positive growth to a lot of different people as we grow. So again, it's a special episode, lots of great stories, and awesome to hear all about Payzant. The future looks bright. Thanks again. Sure, thank

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