APRIL 21, 2026 #012 M.SIMPSON/L/SALYER/R.OWENS (WRIGHT INDUSTRIAL GROUP-NORTH)

REPLY/COMMENT 

In this episode of Talkin' Grit, M.Simpson joins L.Salyer and R.Owens to spotlight Wright Industrial Group North. They delve into the work they do, their impact on the industry, and how they continue to support growth and innovation throughout the region. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

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SPEAKER_02 0:22

From the job site to the office, from lessons learned to stories worth telling, this is Talking Grit, brought to you by Wright Brothers. Here's your host, Jared Waldron.

SPEAKER_00 0:35

Hey, welcome back. It's Talking Grit. We are at uh Industrial Round Two. Uh we've got Robert Owens, known to all as Berto and Lucas Sawyer, back on the podcast and here with Mitchell. And let's just dive into this conversation and get it going and talk about Industrial North.

SPEAKER_04 0:53

Berto, appreciate you being here. Lucas, appreciate you being here.

SPEAKER_03 0:56

Appreciate you having us. Yeah, thanks for having us.

SPEAKER_04 0:59

So, Lucas, we talked last time, you know, how long you've been here. So, same question to Berto. Berto, how long you've been here at Wright Brothers now?

SPEAKER_05 1:06

I came in 18, 2018, when uh Wright Brothers purchased D. Miller construction.

SPEAKER_04 1:12

Yep. So Wright Brothers was in expansion mode. We had an opportunity. We we got acquainted with a great guy, Eddie Miller. Eddie was looking at retiring, and Eddie was trying to figure out what to do with his business at that point in time, right, Robert? Yeah, I believe he wanted it to survive him. Yep. Yep. And I think you've done that. You've done that. So so when did you start working with Eddie? And what all did Eddie do when you showed up to work there?

SPEAKER_05 1:39

So I started working for Eddie in 2014. I came to work for Eddie as a fleet mechanic. So Eddie had 32 pickup trucks, and he would wait until they had 100,000 or 150,000 to buy them, and then I would keep them running, forklifts, web machines, whatever it, whatever it was. So Eddie went out, he had a civil division, so they did civil work, commercial work, and then he had a mechanical division, pipe feeders, mill rights, all that stuff. So Eddie had a pretty good, I think he had a little over a hundred employees at that time. Yep. And I was just merely one of them at that moment.

SPEAKER_04 2:20

She was merely one of them. So in 2018, we were able to acquire Miller. We worked out a deal with Eddie and we bought bought out his business. And Eddie stayed on for a little over a year, right? He stayed on. He was trying to help with the transition, trying to keep us in with the existing clients, helping us get our feet on the ground. At that point in time, Robert, do you remember who who all the existing clients were? Where were we at? What were we doing up there?

SPEAKER_05 2:49

Yeah, Kimberly Clark, Evonick, Johns Manville, Dow Chemical, those are the big ones that Eddie had. JTEC, Von Or. Of course, he had some that I'd heard of in the past, Huber, and they called it switchgas back in the day when they were making fuel. Yep. Energy Solutions. We had them. Energy Solutions, yes, sir. Like I say, there's several of them. I'm sure I'm missing one or two.

SPEAKER_04 3:21

So I found it really interesting, you know, when we made the acquisition of Miller, this was Wright Brothers' first real foray into a service industry per se. You know, we were used to landing a contract, working the contract, beginning to end, closing it out, and then going on to the next job. This work right here, Berto, you guys really had clients. You guys were there day to day, right? Yep. And you were just servicing the clients' needs. And that was something that was very, very different than what we were used to at that point in time. And the other thing that was new for all of us here at Wright Brothers was this was our first real foray into mechanical work, right? So you guys, you had people scattered out at these plants. What was their day-to-day that they did at these plants?

SPEAKER_05 4:13

Well, we did a lot of everything. So some of them came in and they reported directly to the maintenance department. Basically, they just worked for the maintenance department as sort of like a temp service. So they would work for uh a week to years. And then we also had project work where they would quote and bid work and you know, like you say, you go in and complete it and walk away. But most of it was the continuous stuff where we went in and they said, Here we got this to do today, this is what y'all need to do. We would take care of that and then come back tomorrow and do this do something different, but basically in the same plants.

SPEAKER_04 4:52

Yeah, yeah. So with you being in the position that you were in at Miller, you know, you being the shop guy, you being the mechanic, you got to go to all these different locations, didn't you?

SPEAKER_05 5:03

Yes, sir. You all the all the men, I knew a lot of the the plants. I worked a lot of shutdown work, had a lot of contacts that way.

SPEAKER_04 5:11

Yeah, you got to be jack of all trades, right? Yep. Learn a lot. So then we had a leadership transition up there in in Loudoun in 2019, and you got to be the guy, right? Yeah, I made it there. You made it there. So what was your first thoughts when we approached you about being the manager? What was your thoughts on that? Man, I don't want to do this.

SPEAKER_05 5:40

Unlike every other blue-collar man in the world, you don't you don't want that desk job, right? It's uh it it took a minute for me to accept that I was headed there.

SPEAKER_04 5:50

So now that you've been at it for a minute, I mean, it's been several years at this point in time, how has that evolved? You know, you started out, you didn't want to have it. What was just the growth process of going from the guy that was running the shop, the blue-collar guy, transitioning into being the manager that you are today? What are the big steps that you see as you went down that road?

SPEAKER_05 6:15

Gaining trust from the people that you worked for. Yeah. So when you you worked for these guys, Keith Isbull, Tracy Harris, you know, I worked for them. And to transition into them working for me was a to gain their trust. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 6:33

So you worked side by side with these guys for years, right? Years. So that that was one big step. So what what what was that? Was that a communication piece? Was that them just getting comfortable with you?

SPEAKER_05 6:44

I think it's me getting more comfortable than them. You get more comfortable. Okay. Yeah, I think so. It was me learning the the in-depth of the trade, right? Is you go out and you work and you you put in this, they hand you this piece of pipe or whatever it may be, and you put it in. That's fairly simple. But the steps getting leading to that is what I had to learn. Like the bidding process of of how it all works.

SPEAKER_04 7:13

Yeah, yeah. So you had a learning curve there. So, you know, you started out with client relations, right? One of the big things you do today is going and talking to all these people. Was how how was that when you started walking through that door, trying to start working on all these communications with the clients and everything?

SPEAKER_05 7:32

It was like I say, it's all been a learning experience. Uh I I've always been pretty decent at talking to people. So it again, it was just the trust of them understanding that I knew what I would what I was doing. And the the people under me, I I can't say enough about the guys under me, right? Is uh you you don't really do this on your own by no means. Yeah, none of us do. Right. So everybody, everybody that's been with me through this process. I appreciate everything they've done. Yeah. I've learned a lot from those guys. And like I say, I I don't I don't want to take a lot of credit because those guys we've got uh Jeff Hambe, you know, he's been there. I've learned a lot from him over the last 12, 13 years. My son Aaron Owens has been with us since the beginning. And a lot of that is you the the client buys the team, right? They don't buy me, they don't buy one individual, they buy the team. And that's what's been key to us is we're all in this together.

SPEAKER_04 8:32

Yeah. So talking about being all in it together, you know, you mentioned the bidding process. You know, we didn't have a real formalized bidding process when we acquired Miller. You know, all of it was in between Eddie's two ears, right? Yep. It was all in his head. Eddie's super smart guy. He had it all figured out. And when we started down that road with the bidding process, I was there with you. I mean, that was an interesting deal, wasn't it? We had to figure out, hey, what what was Eddie thinking?

SPEAKER_05 9:06

Yeah. Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_04 9:08

What was Eddie thinking? And then, you know, Tiffany came in and Tiffany developed this spreadsheet, right?

SPEAKER_05 9:15

We still use it today, by the way. Still use it today. It's a key piece of it's a key tool for us.

SPEAKER_04 9:21

So shout out to Tiffany. So Tiffany developed this spreadsheet. You know, I would uh talk to Eddie, Berto, you'd talk to Eddie. We'd cobble something together, we'd look at it, it'd make sense, it wouldn't make sense. And then Tiffany really just got tired of all of us fumbling around. And she put something down and memorialized it to where, hey, this is how we're gonna bid the work, right? Yep. And I think that uh just looking at your business, I think that was a big move because that kind of really helped and set the standard about how you guys looked at everything and priced everything. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 9:56

And it puts everything in front of the estimator, right? It's now you see it, and when you can see it better, it's easier to deal with. And it's also easier to hand that information to Tiffany. So that when she needs to do her budgets or whatever she needs behind the scenes, now we hand her this spreadsheet and it she gets all the information she needs.

SPEAKER_03 10:19

Yeah, and it's uh what's interesting is, you know, just when when I came along and saw all this, you know, you look at it and and you go, wow, there's a there's a lot of ingenuity that this group has already put into trying to make this work. And and now we continue to collaborate. We've we've really improved in that area to where, you know, just a few months ago, Tiffany came up and talked with with Berto after a conversation between her and Berto came up to his team and said, Hey, I I know you're struggling with this part of this. What do you want to change about it? And we changed the spreadsheet to to fit them, you know, and so it works for them. We've we've modified it for Jason's group as needed, but that that has kind of been the core of it. We did just purchase an estimating software that we're working through on Trimble that'll help Jason and Palmer's group, but I think Birdo's group's gonna continue to use this.

SPEAKER_04 11:12

Yeah. So I mean it's pretty cool that you know the beginning of the business, you know, look, it was all Eddie, all his brain power, and then you guys took his knowledge, worked through it, figured it out, and then very quickly after you became the manager, you got you guys implemented you and Tiff implemented that bidding process, and it's still you're still carrying it forward today. Yep. So that's been a good deal. So one of the early struggles you had as a manager, one of the early struggles all of us had, right, was COVID. The dreaded COVID. COVID. So, you know, COVID, you and I have talked about this before, Berto, with you being a service industry, very different than other businesses inside of Wright Brothers, service industry really got hit by COVID, right?

SPEAKER_05 12:02

Yeah. You you weren't allowed inside, you had to take tests or you had to check your temperature or whatever. It was a struggle getting in the building. And a lot of a lot of the industry just simply shut the doors to outside help. So you couldn't you couldn't get in the plant to bid, you couldn't get in to do the work. If you wasn't there every day, then you just didn't get in. And a lot of that, so a lot of our continuous presence stuff pulled us through that. So we had work because they were there every day. They knew they wasn't sick, so they'd let them come back in the door. So Kimberly Clark and Johns Melville, Evonic, a few places like that, sustained us because we had people there every day and they would allow them to continue coming in, but you couldn't do new projects because nobody wanted the the sickness brought to them.

SPEAKER_04 12:53

Yeah. And you know, looking back on it now, it just appears to me, you know, that core group of clients that we had when we came through the door there, and then you had COVID happened, it's like the world really changed then because you've got a whole new host of clients at this point in time, right? Yes, sir. And it's kind of it's crazy to me about how much that one singular event in all of our lifetimes really changed the economy, changed the way we were doing business. And if there's any business at Wright Brothers that it really did too, it was you, right? So, you know, today, over this past year, you've picked up a whole bunch of new clients, right? Who are your clients today? How many new ones do you pick up last year?

SPEAKER_05 13:36

Oh, we picked up eleven new clients last year, which basically doubled our client list. That's crazy. We we're as far as SI Group in Newport, all the way down to you know, we Dollywood. We've we worked on some rides at Dollywood during their off season. You know, you we just can't name them all. You know, we got Jennera, which switched grass again, so they shifted. Interesting story there, they shifted from making fuel, now they make bowls and plates and stuff. So it's uh but it's still using the same material.

SPEAKER_03 14:12

So yeah, we we picked up with the return to Dow you talked about. Return to Dow. So group group called Bafessa that that works with alloys and zincs and stuff, right?

SPEAKER_05 14:24

Yeah, yeah. They're uh I I believe they're actually a recycler. I may be misspeaking there, but we've done some work there. Conveyor job was real good this past month or so. Like I said, I I'm sure I'm missing several, but yeah, it's been a good year, and I believe we've set up three new clients already this year, so it's it's continuing. That's pretty awesome. So how many people do you have up at Loudoun today, Birdo? Well, we've got between 35 and 40.

SPEAKER_04 14:52

I don't know the exact count. It it fluctuates. And then every time you got a shutdown, you know, it jumps up. Every time you got a civil job, it jumps up.

SPEAKER_05 15:00

Yeah, well we're we've been pretty steady for a while. So we've been steady at about 35 for a while. Yeah, but like I say, it's a lot less than what we had before COVID, but I think it's a lot, it's a lot more solid work, it's a lot better crew.

SPEAKER_04 15:16

So over your career, you know, you've done lots of different jobs, lots of different things, worked worked with a lot of different people. What what are the couple of jobs and situations that you're really proud of in your career and why?

SPEAKER_05 15:29

I believe the the conveyor at Kimberly Clark was was something to be proud of. That was one of our shining moments because you know, we come in and it's one of those where we all work together. So we excavated a pit inside the building, and Jessica came and did the the concrete walls for the pit. And we installed a conveyor system on an angle through two walls. And it was incredible. It it it was it was pretty good. Uh Tracy, Tracy bid bid that job and uh basically managed it. And that one had some struggles. The the client struggled with a few things during that. And the Louden plant's been there for how many years now? Uh so I believe it was built in '98.

SPEAKER_04 16:21

Yeah, so at this point in time, you know, they're piecing things together. It's been there for forever. It's a little bit here, it's a little bit there. Nobody has the original plans anymore. You have no idea what you're gonna do when you start this stuff.

SPEAKER_05 16:34

And a lot of that up there is drawn on a napkin. We're gonna we're gonna sit here and we're gonna run over here with this. And it it's uh hand waves and like I say, napkin drawings. It's it's pretty interesting work there. Premiant is uh interesting one that we've we've been building on for the last year or so.

SPEAKER_03 16:54

So premiant would be the former Tate and Lyle facility there. Former Staley's. Yeah, and if A.E. Staley. If you fun fact, you go all the way back in history. I'm pretty sure Steve has told me several times that they graded that site.

SPEAKER_04 17:09

Yeah, they graded that site, and then the rest of the story is they brought the scrapers from Mississippi, they rode them on the road from Mississippi all the way back to Loudoun County. And we need to get touched on asking that. I believe Touchdown missed the first week of his senior year while he was doing that. I've heard that story as well. So uh, you know, amazingly, Mark would rather be doing that than being in school. I'm stunned by that, right?

SPEAKER_05 17:35

It's crazy, right?

unknown 17:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 17:36

Yeah. So so premiant. So you're working at Premient now, you know, that's kind of a cool deal. That's one of those places that Wright Brothers has been and you're still there.

SPEAKER_05 17:45

Eddie was there.

SPEAKER_04 17:46

Eddie was there.

SPEAKER_05 17:47

It's just a revolving, you know, it's everything changes in this industry. It changes fast. You have to shift and move, and it's just one of them that has helped us through some of the changes, but it it's been a big one. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 18:02

It's and just to add kind of some context to this, so I I hope the listeners can understand that the majority of what what the industrial group does is really driven by private client relationships. We don't have a a large public bid component. So everything is built on these relationships. And some of these carried forward with Eddie, but Berto has done a fantastic job maintaining these. You know, I've challenged him over the last couple of years to get out of his comfort zone. He's going to Chamber of Commerce meetings, if you can imagine. Oh, wow. Sorry. Now he still wears the overalls, you know, because that's his calling card. Yeah, yeah. But but it it's it's incredible. And so a a lot of these type projects where you're where you're in this continuous maintenance, I I compare it oftentimes if the civil company is your Sam's Club or Costco, or you know, where you're buying everything in bulk and the pallets and you got a lot of it, we're we're the convenience store. We got to sell a lot of candy bars and six packs to to get this thing rolling right.

SPEAKER_04 19:08

Yeah, but it's about service, though.

SPEAKER_03 19:09

It absolutely is. And and it and it's and it's interesting because our jobs really what I guess I'm speaking to is our jobs are so short term. So you're continuously selling that service. You know, that that one job you did yesterday is gonna hopefully bring you the next job tomorrow and the one right after that. Same way for the for the civil companies, but it's it's so much of a quick turn. It's it can be very, very hectic. And then the other part that blew my mind, just I shook my head and scared me to death was like Berto said, so much of this stuff is done on a napkin, or uh, we're gonna walk it down. We're gonna go out there and look at it, and we're gonna say, Yeah, that's what we're gonna do. And, you know, I my first impressions, I thought, well, this is easy. Like you just take this pump out and set this in, and and it's not that hard. And then I went into the actual plant and I'm like, oh my goodness, like how are we gonna even get a lift in here? How are we no room? It's yeah, there's all these elements to navigate that are hard to really, you know, account for. And uh, but the fact that it was done without a lot of formal stamped engineering plans kind of scares you to death, you know. And we've worked on formalizing that to really push back to say get something, get something formal, and then we can bid this, you know, we can look at it. And and so some of it works in that way and some of it doesn't.

SPEAKER_04 20:33

Well, I mean, it's a pretty cool deal that you guys do. And you know, Berto, I remember back in the day when you're dragging me around through those plants, showing me stuff, and I just scratch my head every once in a while, like, how in the world are we doing this stuff? And it's it's really a testament to American ingenuity, right? It it absolutely is it really is because I mean you've got these plants that are doing amazing things, that are creating amazing products, build an America, right? Yeah, build an America, and you know, you guys are keeping it going. You guys are keeping the economy going for everybody and all these amazing things. And you guys are doing the service industry, you're kind of the unsung heroes, right? That nobody really pays attention to. Right. But somehow, someway you keep it going and everybody keeps getting their toilet paper, right? Yep. And uh it's it's just the reality of it.

SPEAKER_00 21:22

So yeah, what's cool is you know, you've you work for a company that, you know, you've been through the acquisition, turns into another one, you know, but still in the same area and location through the years, the all those relationships rolling into working as it became right industrial, and then stepping into leadership, you know, and you're bringing all of that wealth of experience and knowledge and like you said, relationships. That's so important. It's it's awesome to hear your story and and what you guys are doing and how it's it's expanding up there. That's Super cool. And like you're saying, Mitchell is keeping America going because we've got all these established plants, but somebody's got to do the work to keep the stuff, keep the stuff on and uh and keep it going. So that's amazing.

SPEAKER_03 22:11

Birdo's pretty humble, but I I will give him a ton of credit. He has taught me quite a bit since I have been here. I've learned a lot from him and Jason and Tony. But the the way that he's able to keep that group so tight-knit, I mean, Keith Isbel, Tracy Harris, all those guys, Ronald Thomas, you know, all of the foremen that have that have that have weathered the storm through just the past three years that I've been here as we changed things and tried to adapt and improve. Bert has done a really good job leading that group and and keeping them focused and and really expanding his leadership skills. And and Jacob Stillman. He was the welder Freddie Miller. He's so many good guys. And and what we saw through this is I keep going back to good people bring good people, right? But we were kind of viewed as more of a temp service, like you mentioned earlier. And now the clients see it as a valued team. They want that team. And for the business people out there, what that equates to is if you want to hire these people and you see the value, you'll pay more for it. Right. So it doesn't always become about the lowest price. It becomes about who can do the best job. And that's that's really the niche that industrial lives in is how do we promote ourselves to have the best value. By that same token, you know, we we really believe that if we are the best place to work, I know it's not all rainbows and unicorns every day, but if what we do as an organization and with Mitchell's leadership and the others, if we provide good benefits and, you know, services like like Jeff Spry, man, I can't talk enough about Jeff. He's such an incredible part of our team. And he is a differentiator for us. But you know, if we do that, then people will want to stay. Right. Um and people will will want to bring other people. And so we've seen some turnover, but our our average tenure length that we just looked at through some other things went from one year to three and a half in Birto's. That's awesome.

SPEAKER_04 24:18

Yeah. Pretty big. Well, I mean, culturally, you got it going on up there, Birto. You got a tight-knit group. Yeah. They've done well, very well. So, Birto, what are what are some closing thoughts you got on Wright Brothers and where you've been and the future?

SPEAKER_05 24:32

This has been a wonderful experience for me. I've told Lucas before, getting out of my comfort zone is tough, but it's been an enjoyable thing. And I I like I say I appreciate Wright Brothers coming in and and purchasing Eddie Miller and keeping that thing going because uh I'm looking for a place to retire like a lot of guys with gray beards, right? It's I want to be here till I quit. And I believe it's gonna happen.

SPEAKER_03 24:59

Yeah. I just sorry, got one more point to make if you don't mind. I didn't cut you off that.

SPEAKER_05 25:05

No, no, go ahead.

SPEAKER_03 25:06

I I do want to talk. We don't talk enough about this, but but the advancements they've made in safety in this group are unbelievable. Three years ago we had a different mentality and a culture of I've always done it this way or it'll be all right this time. And we had an injury where somebody knowingly stuck their hand in a shear past a guard that was designed for them to not do that, but they they modified the machine to do that and and it finally spit them. Wow. So to come from that to Berto, Birdo's group has gone 14 months now without a safety incident. Awesome. Without a recordable, that's pretty impressive. And they have committed to doing that. And that that would not be possible without Ben Summers, you know, on Jay and for as far as Jason Palmer's group, Jason Campbell, Clint, Clint Ballinger, all those guys, and and of course Michael Shirk and what he does overall has just been just been great. So uh but definitely want to highlight the safety before we close that out.

SPEAKER_05 26:11

So it's a lot going into a a client's when you go to the clients. That's one of the first things they ask you is your accident rate and that type of stuff. And it it's it's key. They don't want people getting hurt on their site because it affects them also. So that's that's part of making sure we can work in these places as being safe. Right. Yep.

SPEAKER_04 26:32

Yep. Well, Lucas Robert, thanks for coming on the podcast. Thanks for the conversation. Appreciate everything you guys are doing there. There's a lot that all of us here at Wright Brothers can learn from Birdo and how he is managing the service industry, how he's managing the clients, and how he's keeping them. How he's keeping them. Just working with the clients each and every day, guys. We all need to learn from that. We all need to take a sheet from Berto's book on that. So, with that, guys, thank you for being here.

SPEAKER_00 27:00

Thank you. Thank you so much for tuning in to Talking Grit this time around. Please send us some feedback. We want to hear from you. If you're enjoying these conversations, let us know. Hit us up at podcast at wbcci.com. Love to hear from you. Until then, the next episode, stay safe, be smart, and uh, we'll talk to you next time.

SPEAKER_02 27:21

That's gonna do it for this episode of Talking Grit. Thanks for listening, and thanks to everyone out there putting in the work day in and day out. If you liked what you heard, be sure to follow the show and share it with someone who knows the value of hard work. We'll catch you next time right here on Talking Grit.