Masonry Magazine February 2006 Page. 14
Contractor
# Masonry: What do you feel is the biggest misconception about the masonry industry?
Kinateder: I think the biggest misconception - and there are a lot of them - is that, as far as materials, we're expensive compared to other materials. That, to me, is a real misconception because they're not taking into consideration the lifecycle cost; all they're looking at is the front end.
# Masonry: What would you do to change that misconception?
Kinateder: We have to educate the people that are buying our products and show them that lifecycle costing. The International Masonry Institute has come up with a program for doing that and they're in the process of rolling that out right now. If we can get the purchaser and the end-user to understand that block partition walls might cost you more on the front-end than drywall, but when you look at your maintenance and the rest of your lifecycle costs, block partition walls really aren't more expensive. I'm just using that as an example, but there are a lot of other things that go right down the line with that.
# Masonry: What are your three biggest concerns in keeping your company successful?
Kinateder: Having an adequate workforce would be one. Probably my top concern is that general contractors and construction managers are too focused on price over quality. When they're bid shopping or bringing in contractors who aren't qualified to bid on some kinds of jobs - the work somebody's priced on - they'll sacrifice quality. The other thing would be government regulations. What I've seen in the last 30 years that I've been involved in this business-how much more regulated we are - it really makes it tough to do business. And I'm not just talking about OSHA; I'm talking about all the other regulations right on down the line.
# Masonry: Where do you think the masonry industry is going to be 10 years from now?
Kinateder: I think that it's going to be healthy, because promotionally, we're doing more stuff now than we ever have and we're getting associations to work better together. The mason contractor's, IMI, ICE-we're all starting to pull in the same direction. We haven't been conflicting with each other. When we work together as a whole, rather than being fragmented, I think the industry's going to benefit from that.
# Masonry: What do you think will be the masonry industry's biggest competitor in 10 years?
Kinateder: I would think that panelization is going to be our biggest competitor, and there are two ways to look at that. What we're trying to do when you talk about growing and expansion, is looking at just all pre-cast panels. If that's going to be the wave of the future, then we're going to try to get in on it and do some of the installation. It still could be some of our work. It's not going to be traditional masonry work where you have a guy out on a wall, laying the brick individually. We should be installing the pre-cast panel. I think we need to look at installing other materials.
# Masonry: What do you feel are the most critical issues you'll face with future government regulations?
Kinateder: Succession planning is a big issue. OSHA, naturally, is a big issue.
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