stay the same. “We’ve long been known as a supplier for residential contractors. From an operational standpoint, custom home builders are the most sustainable customers for us. These are the people who value quality service in high-end products. Increasingly, it is niche products that have the greatest reach for customers. We’re obviously showing up on a lot of web searches now all over and we’re seeing that we make the most sense in terms of price point for many people. These are the kinds of customers that make us what we are.” “Since 2008, we’ve seen an 80 percent increase in sales.” “We’re not exclusive to any particular kind of customer. We get people who come in who’ve grown up under their dad’s tool belt and people who are new to home building. The range of customers obviously means very different workloads on our end, but we take everything in stride. The housing market and supply industry has really benefit- ed from the influx of immigrant communities in the Lower Mainland and this brings with it a lot of perspectives and opportunities for us,” Chris added. “Some of the homes our customers are building along the waterfront are just incredible. The more unique a project is, the more technical difficulties it presents. Waterfront projects are a great example of this, particularly in Belcarra. Renovations and new construction on cliff faces is amazing to watch. The underpinning and putting foundations on rock faces and building upward from there is an incredible thing – impressive. The crane work alone is a sight to see. The dispatcher usually calls me when something unique is about to take place and I love to get footage or a photo- graph of it all. It’s awesome what these machines and what our drivers are capable of – it’s pretty neat.” But it is not always so hands-on at POCO Building Supplies. Chris explained that their list of online regulars is growing by the day. “We’re happy to do business through email alone and, quite frankly, it’s worked well for us over the years. I can recall several major projects like deck packages being sold to customers who we never see or speak to – it’s basically just quoted and shipped. These are customers who typi- cally access online resources and know exactly what they need. It’s that kind of flexibility that doing business in the Lower Mainland gives you. If a customer wants a quote on something you don’t have on-hand, you can usually get it in your hands within 24 hours. It doesn’t matter who the vendor is, we’ll get it. The Big-box stores just aren’t set up this way. Special orders come with so much processing for them that it becomes inconvenient and often unnecessarily expensive for the customer. People love to take advantage of how fast we can get a special order in their hands – they appreciate the value there.” For Chris, the opportunities include getting out to job sites in places like beautiful, seaside Belcarra.
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NOVEMBER 2018 • SPOTLIGHT ON BUSINESS MAGAZINE
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