Timeless Business and Building Strategies

Finding Your Lane: How Three Partners Built a Construction Empire with Adam Ferrara

• Tony Johnson

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What does it really take to build a successful construction business rooted in integrity? Adam Ferrara, founder of Ferrara Buist Contractors, reveals the surprising path that led him from residential construction to commercial contracting and development during one of the worst economic downturns in recent history.

Starting his first company in 2007 as the housing market collapsed might seem like terrible timing, but Adam saw opportunity in crisis. "Some people crashed and burned, and through those ashes, new people cropped up," he explains, detailing how he initially focused on home additions and renovations by simply asking banks where they were still lending money. This entrepreneurial instinct would later serve him well when he partnered with engineering expert David Buist to launch Ferrara Buist Contractors.

The conversation explores how Adam's "visionary" personality complements his partner's technical expertise, creating what he calls "a three-legged stool" of complementary skills that drives their business forward. This partnership approach extends to their innovative "Design Assist Build" model, which gives clients more freedom than traditional design-build contracts by allowing them to maintain ownership of architectural drawings.

Adam doesn't shy away from discussing his faith-based approach to business, explaining how Christian principles guide company decisions: "It's not about perfection, but about putting our heads on our pillows at night knowing we've done the right thing." This philosophy manifests in how they handle project challenges, focusing on solutions rather than issuing change orders - a refreshing stance in an industry often plagued by adversarial relationships.

Perhaps most compelling is the story behind their development arm, Vulcan Property Group, which aims to build 100 buildings over a decade. They've already completed 35 projects, creating a virtuous cycle where construction feeds development and vice versa. Whether you're in construction, considering a business partnership, or simply appreciate hearing from entrepreneurs who prioritize integrity over easy profits, this conversation delivers practical wisdom worth implementing.

www.ferrara-buist.com


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Tony Johnson:

Thanks for joining Timeless Business and Building Strategies today. This is Tony Johnson here. I've got Adam Ferreira with me. Adam, how are you doing today, sir?

Adam Ferrara:

I'm doing well, tony, thank you.

Tony Johnson:

Yes, sir, and Adam is a partner and owner of Fiera and Boost Contractors. I probably mangled that name. So, adam, you could probably restate your company's name and we'll get into it.

Adam Ferrara:

Let's give it a shot. So Ferreira Boost Contractors. It's definitely a mouthful, but eventually it just kind of sinks in. Definitely a mouthful, but eventually it just kind of sinks in.

Tony Johnson:

Yeah, it's cool. It sounds like a sports car kind of setup.

Adam Ferrara:

I was one letter away from being very, very wealthy.

Tony Johnson:

That's right. You were close, you were right on the cusp. Yeah, so you guys are in Charleston and Fort Mill, south Carolina. You're a commercial general contractor and you also have a development arm. So, adam, thank you so much for joining us today. Could you give us a little background?

Adam Ferrara:

of how you got into the business, how long you've been in the business? Yeah for sure. So I was a graduate of the College of Charleston in 2000 and a very good friend of mine who went to the Citadel turned me on to a job with John Whelan Homes. They're a very successful home builder out of Atlanta and that was my first rodeo here in Charleston. And then, right after September 11, 2001, a lot of people remember that day I moved to Charlotte, north Carolina, to transfer with John Whelan Homes they had a successful division up there and went to a neighborhood south of Charlotte and was very successful there and built my first home there as well, was very successful there and built my first home there as well my first personal residence at the age of 25.

Adam Ferrara:

And then, I guess, I was noticed by one of John Whelan's competitors, toll Brothers, out of Horsham, pennsylvania, and I took a quick promotion to a project manager with Toll Brothers at a neighborhood that was just down the street there in Charlotte and continued on with them for about two and a half years until the end of 2007, where, as we all know, there was a tremendous amount of market turbulence. Some people crashed and burned and through those ashes, new people tended to crop up. So that was where I was able to start my own company at that point in time. I just named it after my wife. Her name is Becky, it's called Beck Design Group and we were just doing additions and renovations at that time and it was very much so wildly successful because it was a bedroom community of Charlotte, which is a huge banking city, as most people know. We just were effectively following the money. I went to some local branches and just simply said, hey, where are you lending money? And then we started targeting those types of projects.

Adam Ferrara:

So fast forward a few years. And then I continued on with the home building side. Some new home building was cropping up and, as 2010, 11 was moving along and people were ready to get back to work. And I twisted my business partner's arm, david Bust, who was working for his family's commercial construction company in Florida, to move up to Fort Mill and give it a chance and grow his family and grow mine. And that's how we got started at Ferrer Abuse. Thank goodness to our wives, who grew up together in Anderson, south Carolina, who introduced us.

Tony Johnson:

So that was kind of how it all came together. Fantastic. So you and David started your company what year?

Adam Ferrara:

It was the summer of 2009. It was when we filed and we were off to the races. We were literally sharing one desk and one key man office in Fort Mill, South Carolina. I had one, one laptop on one side and he had one on the other. And you know, just just like every small business starts from humble beginnings, that was our kickoff.

Tony Johnson:

I love it. So you know you. Obviously you know we don't know each other. Your story aligns significantly with my story, so you know it's very cool to hear I don't hear a lot of people. You know starting that's exactly. Well, I started my company in 2007, but you know you started your first company then and so you know amazing things happen in that crash the massive crash and people did come out of the ashes and business started up. So when you guys started in 2009, uh and you partnered up. So it sounds like the primarily what you were doing prior to getting david involved is was all residential remodels and looking at some new home construction. Uh, with that bringing him from the commercial side up. Did you have any commercial experience before he joined you?

Adam Ferrara:

Other than doing a couple of small office outfits, I would say from a complexity standpoint, I had little to no commercial experience to speak of.

Tony Johnson:

And so, with with him coming in, which one of you is the visionary and which one is more the operator type of person.

Adam Ferrara:

Yep, I'm the visionary. I am I'll touch on this later, but it's learned in strategic coach with Dan Sullivan I'm. I'm the entrepreneur that happens to be a general contractor. I hold the licensure for the company and I have. I'm the entrepreneur that happens to be a general contractor. I hold the licensure for the company and I have. I'm the connector of people.

Tony Johnson:

I am the kind of the hey guys we can do it.

Adam Ferrara:

I'm the cheerleader, the coach, and try to build the biggest table possible is my focus. And David is an engineer, a graduate of Clemson and civil engineering. He is a nuts and bolts guy. I can't promise you he doesn't have one brown and one brown sock on and one black sock on, but he knows how to read a set of drawings and he's very, very good at helping people realize that their plans can be built. And I'm more of the cheerleader for the, the cheerleader for those business owners to help them understand that. Uh, hey, let us do, let us do the heavy lifting of the building so we can get you guys to work, to do what you're good at.

Tony Johnson:

I love that. Yeah, well, that that's fantastic. So you guys did both of you do strategic coach, or just you. I did strategic coach.

Tony Johnson:

Um yep coach or just you? I did strategic coach, yep, so that's fantastic. So you know a lot of what we like to talk about here is the business right and understanding how people that are getting in the business can be successful. And so obviously you know groups like strategic coach, gobundance there's tons of other ones that you can get involved with. It's a peer group and that's a coaching group. And Strategic Coach is the longest-running one, with Dan Sullivan and Ben Hardy's wrote a bunch of books, so that is great. So do you ascribe a lot to reading into Colby Print? You know CliftonStrengths. Do you analyze you guys? Do you guys work with that? So, as you've built up your company, do you utilize those or any other for analyzing potential team members?

Adam Ferrara:

So what we are using Colby, I would say that it's been a little bit of starts and fits and spurts, because when we started in Fort Mill in 2009 and 10, I expanded our brand back down to Charleston, where I'm from, which is why we opened this branch to target some of the potential North Florida markets and the lower part of the South Carolina what most people commonly refer to as the low country, and we opened this office in the summer of 17 and quickly penetrated the market because it's certainly still somewhat of a good old boy system and I'm a seventh generation Charlestonian and grew up here and had plenty of connections, so I quickly jumped into the market to take some market share. But then COVID comes right. So we're continuing to build through COVID. It is much slower and we did not lay anybody off in COVID. We kept going strong, but I would say that really created some quicksand moments, right. We were kind of stumbling through it and pushing and working through it and it just almost felt like it postponed some of the inevitable, which was how to really grow this team the right way.

Adam Ferrara:

So I went from our first team of people and and recognized how this team needed to operate here and, and now we have an excellent team in place that have been in place for anywhere from uh, we have some junior guys here that have been in place for anywhere from. We have some junior guys here that have been here six months to folks that have been here for four years at this point post-COVID, and so we haven't been able to really fully implement it across the board. But as we are hiring on new folks, we are doing that to evaluate our team and the way that I can try to build that team in a way that allows me to continue to explore my entrepreneurial strengths and team building strengths and to really put the right people in place to operate. The day-to-day has been crucial, and that's something that I don't want to overlook today is the strength of our team.

Tony Johnson:

So, being the visionary side, you're the future forward thinking piece in your team. So, as you are looking forward and planning for your company's growth, are you looking to expand to other markets, grow market share? What is your vision and goal for your company?

Adam Ferrara:

Well, as we know, it's organic, right, it's not we're going to do this and then do this and do this. It sort of develops as the market continues to work through presidential cycles, as we work through the money cycle. As we know, it tends to be tougher one administration versus the other. So we've decided as a group David Buess and I partnered with another gentleman who had experience in the middle market lending sector and was lending money all across the country with a large financing group to help with much larger developments and that we'll call it the $20 million to $100 million scale range, and we were able to create a separate company called Vulcan Property Group, where our goal is to build 100 buildings over.

Adam Ferrara:

Originally it was five years and then COVID kind of slowed it down a little bit, so we backed, called Vulcan Property Group, where our goal is to build 100 buildings over. Originally it was five years and then COVID kind of slowed it down a little bit, so we backed that up to 10 years and we are on that path. We have successfully built over 35 buildings out of that 100 so far and our goal is to long, long term, hold those and be the landlord for those buildings, and that's really been great for ferrera abuse, because ferrera abuse is a tool in that toolbox to to build those buildings and avoid some of the pitfalls of change orders and being nervous about how to control cost, as most developers are nervous about that. So we really help comfort not only our developers that hire us to build for them at FB, but we are having our lenders be very comfortable with the fact that we are controlling costs on the development side as well, so that that that goes hand in hand yeah, absolutely, absolutely.

Tony Johnson:

Now are you guys taking private investors. Are you allowing in private investors or is everything just through your partnership group and private equity and lenders?

Adam Ferrara:

So it's interesting you ask that question. So the project size is going to drive that. So if we have a project that's in that million to three million range, we're going to just handle that in-house. Let's say it's a two building development it's what some people will call in the industry an unanchored retail. Or let's say it's a couple of a small little medical complex with two or three buildings. That might be a total of I don't know 15,000 square feet. We'll do that in-house. We might bring in some friends and family money, but that's more of an offer than an ask, which is nice because it doesn't put pressure on our family and friends.

Adam Ferrara:

And then the other projects. We delivered about $50 million worth of new projects in 24. That were larger centers. I'm actually living in one right now as a tenant which is nice. It's a five-building establishment here at Point Hope, the old Guggenheim property in Clements Ferry Road, and we have a medical office building. We have three other retail buildings where we have great tenants like Dunkin' Donuts, firehouse Subs, domino's, some doc offices and somehow Ferrer Abuse squeezed out an office for itself. So we're kind of the the redhead stepchild of this retail center, but it's this is a very important corridor to our market, which is why we're here.

Tony Johnson:

That's fantastic, yeah. So having the ability to build your own it substantiates a lot, so to speak, to what you were saying. When you're able to be the builder and develop the property, not only does it make the bank feel a little more comfortable, because they understand that you're able to control those costs and overruns a lot better, but it also saves from your perspective because there's a built in. So it's actually a lot of times it's less money to have to bring up front. So the deal actually makes a lot more sense when you're underwriting it and you guys are not only then being able to own, operate and build up that portfolio, but you're also giving your company work right. So you're keeping your, you're making sure you're you know you can verify for your employees. We have something. Whether we land this competitive bid or not, we've got these backup plans right. So you have definitely thought that through.

Tony Johnson:

That is fantastic. So I love how you guys have put all that together and I like the idea of the. You've set the standard of the hundred buildings, but you didn't. A lot of people would specify it as maybe a square foot under management they're gonna get, but to just kind of throw out, yeah, this amount of buildings. I like that idea. So, and you guys say that you are on path for that, that you've done 35 out of the 100. This is all great. Your additional partner that you've brought in how did you guys, when that came together, where does he fit in? And how does he fit in on that mix? Typically a little bit more difficult with three instead of two.

Adam Ferrara:

For sure, for sure. So the way we have, each of us kind of have our own lane, our own sandbox. So I'm here in Charleston and I am a member of Vulcan Property Group, as well as Ferrer Abuse and David and Scott operate out of the Fort Mill office, because that's where their residences are and kids are in school and whatnot. So we're we're all in our late 40s, so we all stop kids in school so that we're all doing life together on the same timeline. That's part one. Part two is you know, I don't want this to kind of go without saying you know, we're all godly men, right? We, we are Christians and we, we feel like that. You know, we want to operate our business as such. You know, we want to operate our business as such. It's not about perfection, right, but it's about how to.

Adam Ferrara:

How, to just know we can put our heads on our pillow at night that we've done the right thing that day. It may not be the right thing for the business, but it's the right thing for the project and the client. And that's huge because we will have to cut, take a cut sometimes on ourselves because we just missed something right. We have to make it right, whether it's on the development side let's say it's signage or whether it's on the construction side. We missed a pipe somewhere. Whatever it is, we make that problem go away. We don't just create some, you know, like instant moment of where we need to issue a change order. So that's part two, but really part three is um Scott and I met um uh through our church in Fort Mill.

Adam Ferrara:

His wife, actually uh, was part uh associate pastor and baptized my children, which is really cool and um and, like I mentioned before, our wives, on the for our abuse side, our wives grew up together and went to college together, so there's some really, you know, trust is big. But we don't have to wonder and trust, right. We don't wonder, like what the angle is when sometimes partners have that like what's their ulterior motives? We don't ever worry about that because our wives will set us straight immediately and we're back in line. So those are all key, key things. But Scott's a money guy, right. So he's a Wake Forest guy. You know degree in real estate finance, he worked for the FDIC, worked for Merrill and he worked for some middle market lenders both stateside and abroad. So he really has a unique perspective on what makes a deal go right, what gets banks excited. Because he knows how to speak that lingo. So he brings that expertise. I bring still the dream division like oh, we can do this.

Adam Ferrara:

This would be great. Here's how we set it up, and David brings the okay. Here's how we're going to get the plans done. So it's a really cool three-legged stool, I guess, if you want to call? It that.

Tony Johnson:

I love to hear that. That's awesome. Yeah, so that is great. You sound like you have a great team and it sounds like you guys all align, bringing a great value and complimenting one another. So let's talk a little bit about your business operations with the construction company, right? So do you when you guys are doing work, so you're doing 30% of your 70% you're doing for clients. So when you're doing that, do you guys predominantly do design, build, design, assist. What are you guys most successful at as a contractor?

Adam Ferrara:

So you know, we certainly love the jobs that are negotiated, okay, client says, hey, we're using you, um, there's nobody else and we're going to manage the design process. We want to bring you in at small, you know, at, at value engineering moments, um to to try to, you know, for the lay person, opportunities to uh, have the same activity take place. It's the same result but maybe it saves money, right? So that's that approach. But where I learned about and I can't take credit for it, but where I learned the term design assist build was an architect buddy of mine here in Charleston who we've done a lot of projects with, and it stuck in my mind for probably a year before I was comfortable enough to kind of put it onto our website and point it in. The design assist build is unique in that the client signs a letter of intent with us. They pay us a very, very small fee to help corral the civil engineer, the landscape architect, the MEP, structural and architect all of those design professionals are paid directly by the client, right? And so, for a matter of safety, liability is big in our industry, right? So the client and the architect own those drawings. We don't own those drawings, right? We're going to build what's on the drawings. But we have a part in saying, hey, you know, put this in that recipe, put that in that recipe. But the design assist portion is that we're part of the communication with the architect, just like design build.

Adam Ferrara:

However, every lender wants an owner to at least get two prices for a project and every negotiated GC says, oh my gosh, you're going to go put that on the street to get a price because you need a second price. It's going to confuse our subcontractors. They're going to now wonder if we have the project. So every story I told them about having that project is now maybe seems not so true. So now I have egg on my face.

Adam Ferrara:

In this case, our client knows they can go get a price at any moment because if they fall out of love with me during the design build process and I've seen that happen on more than a dozen occasions they're stuck with me because I own the drawings and that's not fair to them because it's their business, it's their money, it's their land. Why would I make them beholden to me? So I feel like if I give them that freedom, right, it's, it's that you know, you love it, let it go, and if it comes back, it's yours. If it doesn't, it never was. So that's my approach to it and I really feel like that's the best way to do it. There's some risk, but I also think the reward is so much better because you know they're saying yes to you.

Tony Johnson:

They're not just feeling obligated. Right and now, do you run in every time when you're doing a design, assist where you, where the owner is getting a second price so I've had three owners get a second price.

Adam Ferrara:

Inevitably, if they do, I don't ask them who gave them the price. I do ask them to send me a schedule of values that maybe has some blinds on it, so that we can do a leveling of the bid. I'll give you a great example An ice cream shop we're building right now. They got a bid. The bid was about 30 grand less than ours and I said I'm scratching my head and I'm thinking there's no way that this is possible.

Adam Ferrara:

I literally live next door to the site and there's no way this guy's that much less expensive than us because we're cutting it pretty thin, because we're right next door and we're. And lo and behold, there were about 10 items that added up to about 60 000 that were just not thought about on either his part or maybe they were shown. As you know, um alternates or owner supplied, yeah, and you know, and? But but joe consumer doesn't know how to level set a bid and we do so. Um, it's cool because it keeps our pencil sharp and honest, but it also gives them the comfort that they've really paid us to do something of value to them.

Tony Johnson:

We've got to bring value to the project yeah, I mean, I think, I think that that that is fantastic. Yeah, and in more times than not, you know when you're going and assisting on a design like that, you're you're making sure everything is covered. So the the risk that you run into, just like what you're speaking of, is when they bring in that second party. That second party is leaving things off and so you know that's where it comes in. You know, you know a construction management company potentially right, you don't like those, but it's the reality is you have to have.

Tony Johnson:

It's the risk that an owner runs into to speak to you that they don't have the knowledge and expertise to understand is that when you're going through that iteration, that process, and you're doing a design assist, you're making sure everything is covered. Then you bring in someone from a competitive bid standpoint and they just want to do the bare minimum on the drawings and might have a backside change order plan. So they're doing a low number and so, you know, doing a disservice to your client. So it's sometimes difficult to be able to show them the bid leveling. It's sometimes where the owners and where I run into this and I'd love to get your insight where the owner doesn't allow or doesn't state that they say everything just looks right and you really have to have a strong relationship built for that owner to you know. Allow you to do that. You know how have you, how have you handled that to make sure you overcome that hurdle?

Adam Ferrara:

So because we've, we've you know, professionally speaking we've we've been in bed with this owner for a year now, right Through all the entitlements, through the permitting, and I haven't gone into that portion of it when we help them find land, and sometimes we help with finance acquisition that's the advantage of being a developer we can really give them the comfort. Not only do we know we can do it for you, but we can show you. We've done it for us on dozens of occasions. So it's that's almost like a oh, it's not really a big deal and it's not so overwhelming. And when you can bring them through your project in real life, that's part one. But part two is when they almost look at you like you're crazy when you say, hey, we would encourage you to get another bid. I want them to get another bid every time because I want my estimating department and my pre-construction team to see like, oh, I could get this done for that price, if that in fact is an accurate price. But so, but the other the other portion is too we have a really unique checklist for our development, of our projects. That is is something only a developer that's very seasoned would know how to put together. We open up the coffers on all of our goodies that we use to do development.

Adam Ferrara:

With all of our clients that want to do development especially the first time clients that are doctors that love to occupy 51 percent of their building because they want to rent out the balance of it and the bank loves it because they're a doctor and they're under occupied we can really help them navigate that process. And I've had clients where I've said, hey, let me see your business plan, can you get financing for this? And I ask that, with all due respect, let us help you with that. So we do a lot of business coaching without really advertising that. We do business coaching and you know, I know we're doing it well, or well enough, because our trade partners are coming to me asking for help to develop their own spaces, which is really really flattering basis, which is really really flattering.

Adam Ferrara:

And the last part is you know the simple questions like hey, did that contractor look at the landlord work letter? If it's a first generation space, oh, I didn't send that to them. Well, how do they know what the landlord's promising you versus what you need to put in, versus what the other GC needs to put on this quote what you need to put in versus what the other GC needs to put on his quote. And that very thing happened to one of our other clients building a pizza shop in Somerville, south Carolina. The landlord missed about $20,000 worth of work. Another GC would have just put it in his price right, because they walked a space that's not there. Well, I went to the owner and said, hey, this landlord owes you this work. It's not in your drawings. We need to reconcile that. And it was like a head scratching moment like, oh my gosh, you just saved me $20,000. So I just love those like little wins and that gets me super excited. Um, to do what we do that's, that's amazing, you know.

Tony Johnson:

It speaks um kind of volumes to who you are as a person.

Tony Johnson:

So that you know to go back to speaking of yourself earlier godly men, uh, you and your partners, so that that is true and it's, it's refreshing to hear something like that. You know, being in this industry, coming upon 20 years, you know I don't run into a lot of people that are in this industry that have and hold that honesty side. It's. You're a lot of people that are in this industry that have and hold that honesty side. It's a lot of times fighting to try and be honest with clients, because there's a lot of deception, unfortunately in our industry and fighting that when you're trying to be that honest contractor is a difficult balance beam you have to walk in order to be successful because you, with every new client, have to validate, you know and justify that up forward and being honest and, you know, building that trust when you have a lot of times in a competitive environment, a lot of things that you have to overcome and explain to a client. So you really have to work hard to be able to do that.

Adam Ferrara:

Yeah, I think. I think focusing on you know when we're and I'll tell a client hey, let's fast forward, and you're done. You know you're feeling excited. Your doors are open. You're nervous. You know you want you to be successful financially. The last thing you need to be thinking about is oh my gosh, I've got a daycare opening up August 15th. We don't have our CEO yet. Or I forgot to coordinate with DHEC. You know we understand that we also own several daycares as developers too, so I guess there's a lot of I don't want to use the word cheat codes, because we've earned it.

Adam Ferrara:

Right, we took the knocks on the head but the ability to get them to focus on how they're going to feel once the doors are open, letting us solve the problem and delivering a great product, and then all the behind the scenes scuttle that takes place between contractors and architects. We really, really, really take that same approach with our owners to defend our design teams, because if you take an let's just say it's a hard bid situation, you're bidding against 10 other GCs right, it's highly competitive, such as public work and you've got let's say it's, you know a school district or something that's building a $30 million school. You're going to have very, very low bids and you're going to have massive change orders. Right, it's that old, you know, the picture of a dinghy is the contract and the picture of the yacht is the change order. Old, you know, the picture of a dinghy is the contract and the picture of the yacht the change order. But we make sure, because 90% of our work is either design, assist, build or negotiated, or it's for our own development company we really make sure that our civil engineers and our architects really understand and appreciate that we are going to and our architects really understand and appreciate that we are going to. We have a little bit of construction contingency and design contingency in our numbers, right, a couple of percent. But then the balance of it is how are we communicating the issue and are we bringing three solutions to that problem, not just pointing a finger in a copy? All email oh, your architect's window is five feet off on the exterior versus the interior and it's, you know, in the way of a door that has to do with your life safety of getting in and out of this building.

Adam Ferrara:

Right, I mean something that could create a massive cost change order. We don't. It's not that we're hiding it from the customer. It's just that, hey, let's assess what the risk is, how do we solve that risk and what's the absolute best case scenario? First, then we call the architect or the civil and we then say, hey, this is what we see, here's how we think we can fix it. What's your opinion about the best way to approach this? And that also speaks volumes, because that's how we're going to get referrals from architects. They're not going to refer jobs to contractors that run them through the mud, unless they're just the cheapest contractor, and they always get work because the developer wants what they perceive as inexpensive. But eventually you get what you pay for.

Tony Johnson:

Absolutely yeah. So if somebody's trying to hold on to a building, which is speak to you, if you're going to be occupying 51% of a building a lot of times, you would really need to pause if you want to go with that lowest bid, because you're going to be dealing with that building for years to come. So the initial costs in the long term is going to be a big problem for you. All right, so just real quick. I know you've mentioned it again, so could you, for the listeners, just explain when you're saying you design assist or negotiated? Can you explain? Now we've discussed your design assist. Can you explain negotiated? For the listener?

Adam Ferrara:

Absolutely so. I'll give you a great example. We are working with a corporate daycare brand out of the Midwest right now on a project in the Carolinas. And they are they've selected a site, they have a construction manager in-house. They've selected a site, they have a construction manager in-house right, that's his job to do all of those pre-development exercises. You've got to have your soil studies, potentially a phase one to environmental traffic studies, whatever that municipality or highest authority of jurisdiction requires. Beyond that, they can ask us hey, we're not in market, can you recommend a civil or an architect? And we will, we'll recommend two of each and then or they may not ask for that at all they may say, hey, we've already got our architect because it's a brand, right, and they're just repeating that brand with our codes. And we've got our civil. We're going to have a design kickoff meeting. And what that design kickoff meeting includes?

Adam Ferrara:

Us in the design from A right alpha to omega, a to Z, and we are advertising opportunities to keep dollars under control, whether it's you know wall types, you know truss heights, wood, truss, metal those are sometimes commonly referred to as a 2B building or a 5B building, and then we will give them guidance on hey, I know this municipality likes X in their drawings or Y, because we've experienced it. So we're just providing, not like a tour. I would classify this. We're a. We're like a very experienced tour guide on the design assist bill. We're more of a abbreviated tour guide on the negotiated Right. We're giving them the high points but we're not. We're. We've been brought along to that party. We're not running as a host.

Tony Johnson:

Yes. So now when we're talking so in other words, you know, just to clarify it real so when he's doing the design assist, he is bringing the recommended architecture, pulling all those relationships and still steering and guiding the ship in the design assist, in the negotiated, he is present and there, but not really the captain of the ship. He's a side piece on the ship. He's there because they want his input along the way, kind of as a consultant type of feel. That would be kind of how I would try and describe it. Now, when we talk before right, when we're doing the design assist and you guys are doing those right, you're getting an LOI, you're doing that. So how are you protecting yourself for negotiated work?

Adam Ferrara:

Sure. So when you say protecting ourselves with the design assist build, you know in theory it's we're trusting that the owner is going to hire us because they've seen the goodwill, they've seen the time. There is a tiny kicker where the client, if we do charge them a small fee for that design assist bill process, we actually do honor it and give them a price reduction. So let's say they give us a deposit of $15,000 to manage the entire design process and get permitting which could take anywhere from 12 to 18 months here in the low country process, and get permitting which could take anywhere from 12 to 18 months here in the low country, a while, or add another six months for SBA financing. Then yeah, so I would say from a contractual standpoint there is no guarantee, but what our contract does promise is they give us last look.

Tony Johnson:

Yeah, Right. So you know, and the reason that I wanted to bring that up is because you know and we were about the same thing, right, and the reality is you know you're doing this as a service to help the client. This is not. You are not making money. If you broke this down to hours spent into these projects, you're making pennies on your time.

Tony Johnson:

You're doing all of this work and putting in all the effort to help that client under the assumption that you're getting the job, because you're really not trying. You're just trying to put something. So you're trying to state, hey, um, you know with, because in time in time, a lot of people that are newer to contracting would do all that for free and then get bypassed and lose it. So you're just trying to give a little bit of a nudge to say you know, uh, you know, just, you know, at least pay me for what I'm doing. But you know that is not really what that's there for. It's just kind of like cause, realistically, you're almost this whole year, year and a half that you're putting in is almost for free. It's just kind of something to tie yourself to it really.

Adam Ferrara:

It's a lost leader, for sure. But let me tell you what it does. Tell me, if a client is not willing to pay me $10,000 or $15,000 to basically quarterback the entire process for them so that they can manage and run their business, they're telling me that they don't believe in their business enough to invest in it, because they're going to be shocked when they see the prices from commercial architects to design unique one-off projects. Those range in between $30,000 to $200,000. And the civil engineering is also very similar in between $20,000 to $100,000, depending on the site size and complexity and the municipality.

Adam Ferrara:

If they don't want to invest in themselves and I'm relatively blunt with them in a very, very professional way I say, hey, you know, because some people have said why am I paying you that? Well, I'm giving it back to you when we go to start your project and I promise you that Well, I'm giving it back to you when we go to start your project and I promise you I am. It is a line item in there and we don't inflate the numbers to just offset it. It's honest truth, it's just the integrity that we work with and I'll say, hey, it's important for these designers and your lender and your investors, potentially, or your partners and your employees, to see that you're willing to invest in your business and if now is not the right time, we want to be here for you when it is. But I've had clients that didn't want to do it and their projects still haven't happened yet.

Tony Johnson:

Well, yeah, that's typically it.

Tony Johnson:

So it's a call sign for me that if they're not going to do it then it's not probably a real project you, it's probably not the best client for you, because if they don't see value in you just from this standpoint, then how much value are they really putting on you during the project? That might be the type of client that's going to try and override you, try and go on and that you're going to have issues with later within the construction process. So it could be a leading indicator that this isn't the right relationship and beware. So just something to put out there. One last thing before we finish up Adam and I've really enjoyed our conversation Could you tell me, you know, with the evolution of technology right now in the industry it's there's a lot happening. So I know, just with my company, ai, we're trying to just keep up with it. Right, there are so many things happening. How are you guys handling all the technology changes with AI and worrying about robotics and labor capacity? How are you guys trying to think of that moving forward?

Adam Ferrara:

So because we're not really in a production area environment such as a merchant builder is building the same model in a neighborhood you know a hundred times over, but we are building unique, one-off buildings. I would say on the labor side, with respect to the real construction, we haven't really implemented anything new. In that respect I would say we're implementing more oversight with our cameraing systems and how those are integrated within our software, like Red Team is one of the softwares we use. We did move from Procore. It just was not the best fit for us. Red Team was designed by a GC so we used them and we are using on the what I would say that early on stages right, the diligence period, the site studying oh my gosh, I cannot tell you how many times I'm using my phone to pull up you know land glide to pull up land information. Know land glide to pull up land information, using, you know Mosher to measure. You know site topo. Even though we don't have much down here topography, we have a lot up in Charlotte.

Adam Ferrara:

We're using AI you know, test fit to help forecast what a site could look like, because maybe the civil engineer doesn't have time to draw us a concept plan for a site, whereas I remember when I first started on the residential side, I was hand drawing some of these small additions that we were doing, because it was within the footprint of the home, maybe we were adding a second story to a garage or something.

Adam Ferrara:

So, between our project management software, the way that we're communicating interpersonally within our teams, our short and long-term video cameraing systems Blue Ox is another great one that does some like you can see your project compressed into like 30 seconds from start to finish, which is really cool. Um, and certainly we're going, we're staying with the uh, the um, the uh back to our normal stable efforts with like obviously we we use drone technology to to to see what's going on with our sites, uh, in progress on a monthly basis. We work with a company that does that for us. So so I would say that you know we're investing a solid percent and a half to 2% of our total volume in that type of technology as a matter of our gross sales, and hopefully that answered your question.

Tony Johnson:

That was a fantastic answer. So there was a lot of great tidbits in there on some of the new products that you mentioned. And to go back to what also you mentioned, I was just on a call earlier today regarding Procore. So that's a challenging software because it's an industry standard, I would say software for project management. It's got a lot of complaints from a GC side. So when you say, yeah, Red Team was created by a GC, Procore is one of those companies that does not look out for the client. It's more of a gotcha bait and switch company.

Adam Ferrara:

It's a pay for play platform and as it has gotten bigger, it's gotten more expensive. You would think, as it's gotten bigger and more subscribers, that they could maybe have all better offerings to the you know, your I don't know what the term is your original users. But yeah, it can't be. The barrier to entry cannot be so painful financially and the simple fact that the deal killer for me with Procore and we told them this about 38 times in a three-year period was we could not run our scheduling through Procore. You have to schedule outside of Procore and then dump into Procore. Well, quite frankly, we could just have our own Google Docs and do the same thing, and it's not. You know, it was awesome for pictures, it was awesome for RFIs and and whatnot and submittals, but it's just not that good for the lay superintendent yeah, absolutely yeah.

Tony Johnson:

And so what he's saying is one of the big disadvantages of Procore is they have a basically a third party or it's kind of a Procore drive that you take your Microsoft project scheduling software and you can't update. You have to go through a drive and go in and update. You can't just go within this very expensive software and adjust your schedule. You have to go into the secondary program outside, go through basically a port and almost integrate it in. It's the craziest thing I've ever seen in my life for a software that costs such an arm and a leg, like three times what every other one costs it's.

Adam Ferrara:

Yeah, you know you've got your other ones that are great for residential use, but you know we found that the the switch to red team you know switching is always painful, right and.

Adam Ferrara:

but I will tell you that you know, when you go back um, to remembering what it used to be like, versus how you then operate, then you're like, oh my gosh, this is so much better, um it. You don't want to keep going back to the same old thing, the um, uh. It's probably not PC to say that kind of the beaten wife syndrome. You just keep coming back to it and you just feel terror. You just feel like, oh, I'm just used to it, so I'll just keep coming back to it. It should not do that in any business. If you feel in your gut that something's not running the way, it should research, chat, gpt, it, whatever you figure it out, um and and, uh, and, yeah, you know, don't, don't ever just stay status quo, um, because every business really should be organic. Uh, in most cases, even the, even the large franchises, should still be able to think autonomously, to function in some capacity.

Tony Johnson:

Absolutely yeah, and so, uh, you know, just to reiterate what he was saying, red team is who they're using, which is a very good alternative platform. Autodesk is another one that is more expansive than Red Team and offers more alignment with Procore. I mean, they are a bigger company and they actually offer even more things than Procore. So other alternatives to look at in the market. So, yeah, to that point I'll leave it alone, but you know, I would wish that that software would kind of more engage, because you don't hear a lot of positive information in the marketplace.

Adam Ferrara:

Tony, I can promise you David Buse, my partner, who will listen to this podcast at some point, is going to be so excited that you and I are fighting for the little guy.

Adam Ferrara:

He is a yeah, it was just not good. So it's, but we're really happy with the change and but I don't know how much more time we have left. I just want to be very cognizant and give a shout out to the total team. Right? So my wife is our HR manager. She has a master's in accounting from Clemson and she manages all of our HR personnel, onboarding and whatnot, so she's part of this as a family. David's wife manages our social media and controls the outward presence of what we're presenting to the public and our team as a whole.

Adam Ferrara:

We have a staff of 28 strong internally within our both offices and we could not do what we do without our team, and that you know.

Adam Ferrara:

A lot of business owners will say that and I believe they mean it, but I can assure you my limit of reading capacity is 40 pages, which is the length of our contracts, and because you know, every entrepreneurial owner like me that's the ideas guy is ADD and I'm sure you've picked up on it. But I have to have very, very detailed people and God has blessed me with a beautiful wife, three great kids, and we have money people. We have non-risk takers, we have more non-risk takers, and then we have finance guys and we just have this awesome team of construction professionals, from PMs to superintendents we call them construction managers because we want them to really own their projects and our office staff, Julie and Alana. So we just are very blessed to have the team we have and could not do it without them, and I'm grateful that they allow me to have the flexibility to take a Wednesday. I take every Wednesday as a what's your teacher coach? Call it A free day.

Tony Johnson:

Free day. My free day is not Focus, focus suffering free day.

Adam Ferrara:

That's my free day to go out and explore new projects to help grow these businesses and see what else is out there. Man.

Tony Johnson:

Hey, well, yeah, I love that that's and explore new projects to help grow these businesses and see what else is out there. Man, hey, well, yeah, I love that. That's fantastic and I appreciate you taking the time to talk about your team. Now, if someone wants to find you guys on social media, what social media platform are you the most active on and what would be the handle we're looking for?

Adam Ferrara:

active on and what would be the handle we're looking for? Yeah, so so our uh Facebook um for our abuse contractors. Let's see, uh, I have people that know all these things Um we'll, we'll find you on there.

Tony Johnson:

Yeah, for our contractors on uh.

Adam Ferrara:

Facebook. Facebook is is where you guys are the most active, but we're active on Facebook, uh uh, two times a week, but we're active on Facebook two times a week minimum. And LinkedIn. We're very active on LinkedIn, whether it's through our successes in our projects, philanthropic efforts with with our various municipalities and counties. So both are for air abuse contractors on that.

Tony Johnson:

I love it. A lot of similarities in the ways we do business, so it's been an absolute pleasure having you on today, adam. Thanks so much. Hopefully maybe we can get you on another time later down the road. It's been fantastic and I appreciate your time and we'll put all the links to your social media in the chat and we'll put all the links to your social media in the chat, and thanks again for joining us.

Adam Ferrara:

Sir, I do want to give a quick shout out to Charlotte Berger and her team at CBPR, who helped arrange this. So thank you to them and thank you to you and your platform. I've enjoyed listening to your podcast on some of the cost seg stuff and some of the other GC related things, and I've actually forwarded your podcast to all of my team through our company to listen to to, to grow their their knowledge base. So thank you so much for all you do.

Tony Johnson:

Awesome. Thanks again. Appreciate it, adam. All right, have a great day you too, sir.