A ton of praise.
Jul. 16th, 2006 06:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
elfsThe never-ending project known as the western retaining wall does seem to be nearing yet another stage of completion. The drainage was inadequate behind it, so Omaha and I have been redigging the ditch and filling it in with new drainfill. We did buy some drainage stone from the local Dunn Lumber place, but Omaha remembered that there was a little stand-alone cement and stone place right around the corner from the Villa Sternberg.
When I think of small business owners and entrepeneurships, I think of your typical things: a photography outlet, a restaurant, a florist, a retailer of some kind who brings both passion and a speciality to a local market. I don't think of cement. But that's exactly what this place, called Burien Sand and Gravel, is: a small business, woman-owned. It occupies a small open triangle of land on which they've put a hut so small they're using a HoneyBucket for their outhouse, a couple of open bins 2.5 x 2.5 x 4 yards, a small cement tower no more than 20 feet high high, two almost toy-sized cement mixers and two equally subsized dump trucks, along with a mini load-lifter.
The woman who runs the place is equally small-sized. Apparently she started this business as a way of supplying herself with concrete for statues and artworks. The up-front investment was hefty, she said, but she's paying it off and has managed to double her delivery fleet, so she's doing well. She has the most important feature of all: location. She's the only mid-range cement supplier for miles in any direction, and she supplies it in a way that makes it affordable for mid-sized projects like a deck or shed foundation, or stone for a retaining wall, while still being capable of supplying a whole house foundation if necessary.
Omaha and I figured out after the fact that we should have bought a cubic yard and had it delivered; it would have been cheaper than buying it by the bag. That said, the bags were $4, less than the $7.50 at Dunn and much less than the $7.89 at Home Depot.
And the best part was, on my third run, I put seven bags in the car and tried to pay for it, but the register was down. The foreman said, "Eh. You'll probably be back for more. Just pay for it then."
I did go back for more, and I did pay for it, but he gave me a discount 'cause I keep bringing back the bags for recycling. He said most people don't bother; I said I didn't want more plastic cluttering up my work area. Still, I've moved a ton of drain fill rock this weekend, they've been both helpful and inexpensive, and it's good to have neighbors that cool.
When I think of small business owners and entrepeneurships, I think of your typical things: a photography outlet, a restaurant, a florist, a retailer of some kind who brings both passion and a speciality to a local market. I don't think of cement. But that's exactly what this place, called Burien Sand and Gravel, is: a small business, woman-owned. It occupies a small open triangle of land on which they've put a hut so small they're using a HoneyBucket for their outhouse, a couple of open bins 2.5 x 2.5 x 4 yards, a small cement tower no more than 20 feet high high, two almost toy-sized cement mixers and two equally subsized dump trucks, along with a mini load-lifter.
The woman who runs the place is equally small-sized. Apparently she started this business as a way of supplying herself with concrete for statues and artworks. The up-front investment was hefty, she said, but she's paying it off and has managed to double her delivery fleet, so she's doing well. She has the most important feature of all: location. She's the only mid-range cement supplier for miles in any direction, and she supplies it in a way that makes it affordable for mid-sized projects like a deck or shed foundation, or stone for a retaining wall, while still being capable of supplying a whole house foundation if necessary.
Omaha and I figured out after the fact that we should have bought a cubic yard and had it delivered; it would have been cheaper than buying it by the bag. That said, the bags were $4, less than the $7.50 at Dunn and much less than the $7.89 at Home Depot.
And the best part was, on my third run, I put seven bags in the car and tried to pay for it, but the register was down. The foreman said, "Eh. You'll probably be back for more. Just pay for it then."
I did go back for more, and I did pay for it, but he gave me a discount 'cause I keep bringing back the bags for recycling. He said most people don't bother; I said I didn't want more plastic cluttering up my work area. Still, I've moved a ton of drain fill rock this weekend, they've been both helpful and inexpensive, and it's good to have neighbors that cool.
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I'm sorry... this lept STRAIGHT into my head.
Date: 2006-07-17 01:43 am (UTC)Burien the competition.
Re: I'm sorry... this lept STRAIGHT into my head.
Date: 2006-07-17 02:31 am (UTC)Although, at this point, she really has no competition. There are cement manufacturers up in Seattle, and more down in Kent, but where she is there's no real competition for the niche she fills. Part of it has to be the technology: a cement tower and trucks that exist between the home mixer in his wheelbarrow and the full-scale contractor trucksful seems to be a recent invention. She just seems to have made good use of that technology.
no subject
Date: 2006-07-17 02:05 pm (UTC)