Thank you for More than Your Business: A Letter from Charlie Crippen

“I have learned everything I know through trial and error. With an emphasis on the error.”

Chuck, an extremely successful GC we worked for, told me many years ago, “I have learned everything I know through trial and error. With an emphasis on the error.” I was probably 30, had been running the company for a few years, making every rookie mistake conceivable and inventing some new ones. Freedom to fail is a big deal when you’re learning. Hearing that from someone at his level meant more to me than I imagine he intended it to. Chuck would always carve out a little time for me to discuss business and helped me figure things out. He was open with his early disasters and the path he took to get his company through them. He is a humble and brilliant business man and team builder. I still draw on his advice from those early conversations.

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“We absolutely love everything you and your team have ever built for us, but we have one problem. Has anyone ever told you that y’all are slobs?”

Bill and his wife Nancy called me and asked me to stop by for a glass of tea one afternoon. We had done multiple projects for them, their daughter and their extended family by this time. I stopped by and sat at the table with Bill. Nancy brought us some tea and joined us. After exchanging niceties Bill got to the reason for the meeting. 

“Charlie, we absolutely love everything you and your team have ever built for us, but we have one problem. Has anyone ever told you that y’all are slobs?” 

“No sir!” I exclaimed.

“Well, they are thinking it.” He responded. 

At that time, 80% of our jobs were in new construction and the rest were remodel projects.  We were hyper-vigilant about food and drink debris, but construction debris, in our eyes, was a good sign of progress. Our protocol was a big clean up on the last day. It never occurred to me to clean daily, nor had I even noticed construction debris during the span of the project.

Thanks to Bill and his southern, sweet tea ambush, we started looking at our job sites through the eyes of our homeowners and implemented daily clean up standards.

The tides turned. Before, everyone remained silent about our scrap wood, demo piles, and random debris in their yard. Now, everyone commented on the cleanliness of the job site. We immediately started getting positive feedback on every project. Customers expressed their gratitude for the care of their property, thanks to my tea date with Bill. He passed several years ago. I still think of him every time a customer comments on our crew's cleanliness. 

Thank you Bill!

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 “Charlie, I think we can build this together, don’t you?”

We have worked for Ray for about 15 years. A few years into the relationship, his usual cabinet guy, who was an amazing craftsman, got backed up and couldn’t deliver a very high-end master vanity that Ray wanted built. Ray called me and said, “Charlie, I think we can build this together, don’t you?” Of course I did, but we had yet to build anything as refined as the proposed plans. We were going to have to prove our work in real time. We succeeded and have built hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of very high-end cabinet and furniture pieces for Ray since. We still work for him today. He trusted us with something out of our depth and challenged our skills and we got better. This is a constant in our story. 

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"We didn’t have a track record, we just had John’s trust."

That first builder, John, (who I talked about in my last newsletter) turned us loose in a million-dollar house to run the trim. I had worked at that level as an employee for another company, but never for myself. We didn’t have a track record, we just had John’s trust. We trimmed every house he built for the next seven years until 2008 when the housing market crashed.  

"Our team met the challenge and rose to the occasion yet again."

A couple years ago a client trusted us to build two dream master closets. One styled after a Coco Channel showroom (hers) and the other, inspired after Tom Ford (his).  Every person who sees those closets are stunned! Grey cut us loose on our first six-digit deck build several years ago. Our team met the challenge and rose to the occasion yet again and now those builds are standard practice.

Every contract begins as an exchange of trust and we have been blessed to be trusted above and beyond our proven track record, which allows us to learn, grow, get better and establish a new level to exceed. 

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"Every time, on every job we are enriched by being guests in your homes."

I can fill several more pages with stories of clients who have shaped our business. It’s not simply an exchange of goods and services that my team and I appreciate. It is the exchange of all the things that come from working at your home for a few weeks or a few months. Sometimes a question from a client leads us to a new solution. Or an extension of trust lets us step out into new creative territory.

In the same way, a critique positively impacts our procedures. Other times, a story or a piece of advice applies to, not only the business, but to life in general. Every time, on every job we are enriched by being guests in your homes. The occasional tray of treats or drinks left out, or a simple “thank you” for the fellas never goes unnoticed. We all feel the excitement when your project hits milestones and starts to look like you envisioned. We are grateful for the laughs exchanged, getting to know your families, hearing your stories, and most of all, earning your trust. 

Thank you for much more than your business!