Achieving excellence: Australian consultants bring the power of Buildertrend Down Under

Zach Wojtowicz:

What’s up, everybody? I’m Zach Wojtowicz.

Charley Burtwistle:

And I’m Charley Burtwistle.

Zach Wojtowicz:

It’s “The Building Code.”

Charley Burtwistle:

What an exciting day to be alive. It’s a beautiful Monday afternoon. Normally, Zach and I have to wait until Friday to hang out.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Little Monday vibe.

Charley Burtwistle:

Yeah, man, a little Monday vibe.

Zach Wojtowicz:

How was the Monday? Are you on a case of the Mondays or is it … What did you walk in with?

Charley Burtwistle:

I talked to someone earlier. Normally I start really happy in the morning, and generally the Monday kind of grinds me down.

Zach Wojtowicz:

More of a burnout guy.

Charley Burtwistle:

Yeah, completely opposite today. I started this morning in a really, really bad mood, and as my day has gone on, I’ve gotten happier and happier.

Zach Wojtowicz:

You knew you were going to be in the studio.

Charley Burtwistle:

That’s probably what it was.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Hit that crescendo.

Charley Burtwistle:

Yeah, it’s coming to a peak here. And not only am I here with my BT best bud, Zach, but we also get an opportunity to talk to some people experiencing Tuesday, which is always exciting. Zach, who do we got today?

Zach Wojtowicz:

Yeah, this is really an interesting one today. We’re having on consultants. You love consultants.

Charley Burtwistle:

Yeah.

Zach Wojtowicz:

But these aren’t just any consultants, Charley, these are consultants from down under.

Charley Burtwistle:

Down under.

Zach Wojtowicz:

That’s right. We got Scotty and Jordan from Aspire Projects. They are consultants. They work in the Australian market, specifically on Buildertrend.

Charley Burtwistle:

Yeah, which we love. We’re big fans of Buildertrend over here at the Buildertrend HQ. So, exciting to talk to people that have some experience, not just with Buildertrend as a software and as a solution, but also with the construction market and the consulting on top of that, too. So, it’s going to be a triple whammy for things that I love talking about today.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Well, let’s not delay any further. Let’s get them in here.

Hey, Jordan. Hey, Scotty. Welcome to “The Building Code.” It’s great to have you. How are you both doing today?

Scotty Braithwaite:

Yeah, real well. Real well. Thanks for having us on. It’s a pleasure to be here.

Jordan Bowles:

Yeah, doing real well, thanks.

Zach Wojtowicz:

We have not done a lot of Australian interviews. We had a couple from New Zealand. You may be, actually, our first in Australia proper, so congratulations.

Scotty Braithwaite:

Come on.

Jordan Bowles:

Starting right at the top then, hey?

Zach Wojtowicz:

That’s right. I don’t know if we want to stir up any New Zealand/Australian beef here on “The Building Code” too quickly, but it’s great to have you both on.

Scotty Braithwaite:

Hey, we’re pretty good friends. We’re only a ditch away. We’re very good friends.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Yeah, yeah. That’s right. Good. Well, you guys are obviously here today to talk a little bit about some exciting news that we’d love to get into a little bit. Before we go down that, why don’t you tell us a little bit about Aspire?

Scotty Braithwaite:

Cool. Yeah, so Aspire Projects is a Australian-based consulting group. We are dedicated to all things Buildertrend. So, currently we’re working with 54 builders in Australia on the platform, making their ecosystems perform really nicely with the things that they’re doing already on Buildertrend. We’re bringing their proficiency up. We’re bringing their efficiency up and getting them confident on the platform here, down under.

Charley Burtwistle:

Yeah, that’s super exciting to hear. Jordan, could you maybe tell us a little bit about how Aspire started, how long you guys have been in business, and how you got to be on “The Building Code” right here?

Jordan Bowles:

Yeah, for sure. We started around about two years ago now and saw a gap where builders didn’t really understand how to implement some of these systems and strategies into their businesses. They didn’t have processes for everything that they did, and we started by helping a couple of builders. And then from there, we really moved into doing a deep learning with builders to get that across the line.

So, yeah, we started loving what we do, helping builders get there and forming those systems, processes and strategies. So, yeah, been around for two years now, as Scotty said before, around about 53, 54 builders, something like that. And yeah, absolutely loving what we do. Scotty?

Scotty Braithwaite:

Yeah, it was a divine intervention, Jordy and I meeting and forming the company, and like Jordy said, there was a bit of a problem out there, which was the gap where we were seeing builders struggle on the platform or not milk it for all its goodness. And having been in that space … I’m a six-year Buildertrend user myself, and I was working with a resi builder, and I saw that, oh, a bit of a push uphill or a bit of a choose your own adventure on the platform, knew that the resources worked, knew that the platform was sort of bigger than the sum of its parts, I suppose, and wanted to pursue that opportunity. So, that’s how AP came about.

Zach Wojtowicz:

That’s awesome. I am super interested in that. So, you were users of Buildertrend? Did you guys work in the construction industry or what was your backgrounds?

Scotty Braithwaite:

Yeah. Yeah, that’s my background. So best part of a decade in construction on the ground, site supervision role. So, really in the trenches there for a long time. Moved through management, project management, monitoring jobs, big, small, everything in between.

And now, I suppose having that PM background allows us to deal with all types of different companies that we come into contact with now. So, project groups that are doing 130, 150 projects on the platform at any given time, right through to your boutique, bespoke $2.7 million custom residential architectural jobs who are only running one or three jobs on the platform on any given time. So, yeah, my background actually was with Jared. He was my original trainer, Jared Benak, back in the day.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Oh, JB getting a shout-out.

Scotty Braithwaite:

Come on. JB getting a shout-out. We knew we’d look after him, but he showed me everything I knew at the time. And we just built it from there.

Zach Wojtowicz:

How about you, Jordan?

Jordan Bowles:

Yeah, my background’s a little bit different to Scotty’s. So, I came from a background of university, or college as you guys call it, in psychology and business and then moving into some different operations management roles. So, I was with some larger corporate companies over here in Australia, really stress testing operations management with large teams, change management, leadership development and that sort of thing. So, a lot of commercial acumen work, assessing financial data, improving systems and processes for multiple businesses.

And then when I met Scotty, we started forming this idea, and when we realized what we could do in this market by helping businesses through Buildertrend, not only with the Buildertrend side of it, but by understanding what levers to pull inside their businesses when they need to do certain things, when they hit milestones, and when they’re not hitting milestones, setting KPIs with team, all of that sort of stuff. We came together and we saw that we could both give so much knowledge and pass on so much knowledge to builders. So from there, my construction industry knowledge grew, and I would say Scotty’s commercial and change management grew at the same time. And, yeah, we joined forces to help builders in the same way. So we’ve loved the synergy that we’ve had right from the start, and I think our clients have too, which has been awesome.

Charley Burtwistle:

Yeah, I think Zach and I have had about a hundred guests on here so far in the construction industry. And it’s funny, it’s always someone that grew up in construction has had to learn the business side of things, or someone that comes from a business operations background sees an opportunity and construction and learns that. So, you guys kind have both heads of the double-headed monster there, which is a really, really unique position to kind of go two for two.

So, I’m really interested to dive into what your service specifically offers. And I’m sure no two clients are the same, but can you kind walk us through typically high level, “Someone comes to us and they may be interested in our services and how we actually go about helping them.”

Scotty Braithwaite:

Just originally, actually, to tell the journey a bit, we would dip in and out of accounts and basically just try and do little bits here and there on a consulting role. That really progressed when we took a deep dive and stood back and went, “The builders aren’t getting as far as we would like to see them get.”

So, then our product and service changed into what we now call an implementation, and it’s a full service, six-week understanding with multiple components that addresses every facet of their BT interaction. So, starting with macro conversations about their team, who’s doing what, how they’re doing it, a full what you would call onsite implementation.

And most of this business for us is conducted via video. We have some in-service meets. We do fly to Sydney regularly. We’re based in the northern New South Wales area, just shy of Queensland there in Australia. And basically, that implementation, Jordan, maybe you can take it a bit further there, but basically is a six-week version of fully getting your head around Buildertrend and all of its moving parts.

Jordan Bowles:

What we want to understand with the builders is how each system and process works. And if things aren’t going to work for a builder or their team isn’t big enough for it, then maybe they’re not ready for it. But if their team is there, ready, willing, capable, able, we do train right to the nth degree. We get right in the details, so that they’re building these systems and processes not for the next year, but for the next five years or for the next decade.

But the different types of clients we see, it’s funny you ask. We meet all the builders where they’re at. We’ve seen small builders with really highly developed teams and larger builders with not a lot of systems and processes behind them because they have just really rapidly expanded or are along their growth journey. They haven’t put the time into solving each part of it. So, a wide range of builders when they come to us.

Charley Burtwistle:

And then are those typically … Jordan, maybe you could expand a bit more. Are they people that have typically bought Buildertrend and are kind of stuck in the implementation or are they net new clients that know they need something and don’t know where to start or who to go to?

Jordan Bowles:

Yeah, that’s one of our first questions. We ask, “Where in the Buildertrend journey are you?” And some builders might be hunting around for softwares. So, when they come to us, they pick our brains about what works, what doesn’t work, how it can support their business, if they would be the right fit, if it ties in with their estimating platform, how hard the transition is, all these sorts of things, how good the support is, how deep their understanding can be.

I would say we see more builders that are into the Buildertrend journey. So, in that first year or sometimes, I mean, Scotty, you could probably talk as well, we’ve got clients that are six, eight year users of Buildertrend. They’ve been going on Buildertrend since you used to pay for starts on BT way back in the day. And yeah, they’ve seen all the different software changes and upgrades, and they also love what we’ve got to offer as well because they might’ve tackled some of the easier to understand parts of it. And from there … I mean, you guys know. You’ve interviewed over a hundred. Do builders have time? Not generally. So, they haven’t done the full circle to go back and look at what they might’ve missed at the start.

Zach Wojtowicz:

That makes a ton of sense.

Jordan Bowles:

Yeah, absolutely.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Oh, go ahead, Scotty.

Scotty Braithwaite:

No, I was just going to build on that. I mean those intricate parts that are missed are normally the surface value, “Yep, I can pump out a daily log. It’s changed my world. I’m killing it,” through to, “Hang on a sec. We never connected this properly to Xero,” particularly in the Australian environment. Not as much QBO. We’ve got about 5% of our clients on QBO.

But Xero. How does it intimately connect? How does it talk? How does it perform? How does it work per supplier? All these types of things. Like Jordan said, who’s got time for that? So, this is why our company is excelling because the businesses that we work with are seeing great value in us coming and not only doing this, where we’re workshopping and saying, “Hey, did you know this is possible?” but coming around the back and full-on doing the implementation.

So, we’re scoped to actually come into their system and literally push the buttons with them and for them to get them across the line. I think that’s what our service offers that’s a little bit different to the average consulting. We will actually come alongside and be typing that out, pulling templates, connecting suppliers, all these types of nitty-gritty things that if you don’t get them across the line, you’d be wondering why you started in the first place. That’s what we’ve found.

Zach Wojtowicz:

That’s awesome. And I was poking at your website. Love the very scientific “suck,” “not suck,” x-axis. I’m going to steal that. And then it sounds like you even have a recurring model, too. You can have ongoing support even beyond the implementation?

Jordan Bowles:

Yeah. What we find is, again, after builders have gone through, that’s generally about six weeks that we see with them covering every facet of Buildertrend. What we find is sometimes builders don’t want to do all the parts of what we call project management. I mean, there’s parts, again, that they understand or that they have to have tight control over, but there’s lots of different parts of it where they can subcontract it out.

So, when they’re setting up projects, whether it be in schedules or if there’s parts of it like estimations, bringing estimations from external estimating softwares onto the platform, and then forming up bids and tenders, forming up purchase orders to send out to suppliers, things like that. When they need support with those things, we’re now a resource that builders can reach for who intimately understand Buildertrend, who intimately understand the Australian market, and who are trusted in this market as well. So, we’ve got builders that do reach back to us for that in time as well.

One of the cool things about that reoccurring offer that we do have as well is when builders get new team on, sometimes it’s hard to take the time out to train those site supervisors or chippies, we call them in Australia, not sure what it is in America.

Zach Wojtowicz:

It’s not as fun to say.

Jordan Bowles:

But yeah, to train them.

It’s the same, is it?

Zach Wojtowicz:

No, it’s not as fun to say.

Jordan Bowles:

Oh, it’s fun to say chippies, yeah.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Chippies is way cooler. I think that’s what we should go with. But it’s not that.

Jordan Bowles:

For sure. You should use it with some of your American podcast interviewees as well.

But yeah, we train those guys as well so that they’ve got a really good understanding of Buildertrend for their first day when they start on the site with the guys.

So, yeah, some good fun products that we’ve got with our builders.

Zach Wojtowicz:

That alone probably is worth the price, whatever it may be. I’ve actually did the service that you guys are doing through Buildertrend. I was an onsite consultant, so I traveled around, a little shorter engagement, not as long, but a lot of remedial, a lot of field crew folks training. And that is definitely one of the biggest stressors that our business owners struggle with is, “I don’t even feel comfortable with the software. How can I help the people out in the field be comfortable with the software?”

Scotty Braithwaite:

A hundred percent. And to riff on that, Zach, I mean, every ecosystem is different. I don’t know if we’ve said that yet, but the customization, any point where you make a trigger change, like in Australia, we have cost-plus contracts or fixed price contracts or AP … So, many different types of contracts. And then any number of those combinations will make that particular team react to the platform in a different way.

So, off the back of the onsite, you would’ve also seen that the customization is fully present. So. teaching BT to one group of individuals is so different to the next, and that’s why what Jordan was saying there with our Aspire Care product, which is a reoccurring product, it’s based on video training. The shots are taken inside of their system, so the language is familiar. And on top of that, we know their system intimately, which is different to like, “Hey, guys, we’re going to teach you a generic version of BT.” So, I think that’s where the guys are seeing value.

It takes a lot of attention to detail to get that quality assurance and not just pump the quantity. But yeah, that’s what it looks like in that rolling version. And like Jordan said, we’re project managers at heart, so we know how to interpret a contract, how to bring all the best strengths of Buildertrend to influencing the contract, how to handle PSs and PCs by using the change order function instead of actually … Or however else you would actually deal with it. I’m not sure how these days, because BT is so good at handling fixed price contracts in that manner. So, yeah, it’s just interesting to go on that customization as well.

Charley Burtwistle:

Yeah, I think it is interesting to think about the origins of Buildertrend and where we got to be today. A bootstrapped company, just three friends in their garage, really just building the product as new customers were coming in and asking for new things. So, inadvertently, we created a really, really robust product that can work for almost everyone.

But on the flip side of that is, it’s so customizable that it can be really, really tough for, exactly what you just talked about, a residential guy that has internal employees and their own design firm with them versus a roofer that just wants to go out and they need to have different schedule and things like that. So, having some of your area of expertise that knows how it applies and relates to each one of those specific customer types or builders, you can use it a million different ways, right? And so that’s where we struggle, especially Zach, on our customer success for …

Zach Wojtowicz:

Me, specifically.

Charley Burtwistle:

Yeah, this is Zach’s problem to have is how can you make it easy to onboard for all those different types of customers that may want to use it. And I think that we’ve found, and why we’re excited to partner with you guys, is a lot of times the best way to do that is just strap up in the saddle beside someone, give them six weeks, and we’ll show you exactly how to do it.

Zach Wojtowicz:

The Australian market is a big book of business for us. We have a lot of customers that the Australian team is great, they do amazing work, but they’ve had to learn …

Scotty Braithwaite:

And growing.

Zach Wojtowicz:

And growing. And they’ve had to learn your guys’ entire, not just like Buildertrend, not your culture, your construction processes are a lot more formal. The barrier to entry has a higher sophistication. There’s a whole level up. To be on that team even, you kind of have to be a little bit of a proven commodity internally at Buildertrend because it is so advanced, and they kind of get hammered with very nuanced questions. So, I am not surprised that in two years, you’re already up to 54 customers. You’re probably struggling to even address how much demand you’re getting. How big is your team? I’m curious.

Scotty Braithwaite:

Still less than five, Zach. So, lean and mean, mate. So, we operate with a few talent outsourcers as well, but basically you’re looking at the front of house. I mean, typically we try and control it by the two guys you’re looking at right now. And that’s the way we’re maintaining quality. We’re actually keeping those numbers specifically down. We’re taming the funnel so that everyone gets that same access to quality, and we’re not interested in taking 16 builders a week. We’re going to be keeping it lean and mean, and the flow seems to be quite stable and situated at the moment, which is helpful.

But we call it out if it’s coming into too much influx, particularly when we start hitting the bigger companies and they want more resources, et cetera. We’re just shaping accordingly. We’re no stranger to big teams. Jordan used to run a large team with 11 directs and 140 in the team, so we know how to scale. We’re just pulling the right levers. We like lean and mean, as well. It still has a really good space for quality.

So, that’s the answer to the team question. But watch this space. I mean, yeah, we’re growing, too.

Zach Wojtowicz:

That’s awesome. I really respect the discipline. It’s really easy to over promise and under deliver and to have the opposite mindset, long-term growth, long-term strategy focused on delivery first and acquisition second. So, that’s amazing. I am curious …

Scotty Braithwaite:

We tell guys we’re going to be around for a while. We’re not just a flash in the pan. We want to rack up a good decade. We’re here to stay. I think that’s a different mentality when you come in, and I won’t rat on the solar installation guys, but sometimes you can start a whole company, you just be doing 50 solar installations and then you’re out, lost on the next government bonus.

But that’s not our intention. We’re here to stay. We’ve built the base slowly. It didn’t happen overnight. Potentially, for our business to come to this fruition, it’s probably been 10 years in the making, different things that have happened in the market, different interactions that have happened to culminate to this position.

But yeah, sorry, Zach, you had another question.

Zach Wojtowicz:

No, that’s fantastic. Jordan, you unmuted yourself. Is there anything you want to add?

Jordan Bowles:

No, no. Scotty is pretty much covering it all there.

Zach Wojtowicz:

One question where I was going to kind of take it is what are the biggest challenges that a builder faces with Buildertrend in the Australian market? I’m curious.

Scotty Braithwaite:

Good one. Where do you want us to start?

Zach Wojtowicz:

Yeah, you could go down … That, it’s a whole other episode we’ll have to have you guys back. But number one thing that you’re solving with your consulting that you think that customers, that you want them to know that you’re there to help.

Scotty Braithwaite:

Sure. We didn’t discuss this offline, and we don’t really have a favorite. But one that comes up that is convoluted is the tax question.

GST is a big one, which has turned some clients off, and it’s one of the main reasons why they don’t connect their system financially to their accounting software. So we have regular conversations with accountants, bookkeepers, et cetera, that we have to do the cultural acceptance dance with, which is basically, “Hey, guys, there’s a new way of processing a bill. It starts in Buildertrend.”

If that business owner has decided that project management trumps your tax obligation at the start of the journey, but having intimate knowledge of the platform, we’re actually telling and educating builders that, “You know what? You can actually have both.” If you set your system up correctly, and you talk about what you want to finish on as opposed to just … When you get a Buildertrend account, it just sort of says, “Connect your cost codes.” And people go, “Yeah, why not?” And they royally cook it to be honest, because they don’t know how it’s supposed to interact with their financial software.

So, that would be the big ticket one for me. It’s one of the ones we talk about most. Jordan’s probably got another favorite.

Jordan Bowles:

No, no. I think along the same vein, I think one thing from being outside of the building industry coming into the building industry that I’ve noticed, one of the biggest differences is when you’re in a commercial environment, when you’re in operations management roles, it seems anywhere but the building industry, you can get live data on everything, all the touch points, all the financial data, at the drop of a hat. In a building industry, especially with Buildertrend and accounting softwares and that sort of thing, if builders are either one, spread across too many platforms or two, don’t have their platforms connected and coherent, they don’t actually have an understanding of what the influencers are to their projects. So, from my background, how can you possibly make decisions each week, each day with your team on the fly when you don’t have the right data coming in?

So, one of the most empowering things we do is towards the end of our implementations, we can solve those financial questions with the builders. Not for the builders because they need to have an intimate understanding of it so that they can hit the ground running on their next project, as I said, for the next five years, for the next 10 years. So, when things start on Buildertrend, and they understand the inputs and outputs of data and what levers to pull, when those things change, then they feel so much lighter at the end of it. I’m sure you guys get the same thing in the States as well.

Zach Wojtowicz:

We do. 100%. And it’s one of the most satisfying things to hit as a customer success person is you really, you convince them, but then you deliver on it, and you can just almost feel it in their entire soul. There’s this sense of relief that we’re going to be successful, we’re going to get through this turbulence.

Scotty Braithwaite:

You don’t know what you don’t know, Zach. And I mean, we have the pleasure now being connected like a multi account, and we see the back end of everything. And if we could just dump that knowledge on a builder to say, “Hey, look, it is possible.” Because if you’re living in a world where it’s been … I’ve got clients in mind that have been on the system five, six, seven, eight years, and they haven’t cracked it because they maybe didn’t know who to talk to outside. They got good training from BT direct support, but it didn’t influence their strategy, those types of things. And then we come in and say, “Can I just give you some screenshots of what this might look like moving forward?” And they go, “Oh, you can get there?”

Jordan Bowles:

Yeah.

Scotty Braithwaite:

Yeah. Well, let’s just break that down.

Jordan Bowles:

Sometimes you just need to see that it works. And I think at the start of our journey that was more challenging because we had less examples, but I mean 50 businesses now is nothing to sneeze at. Sorry. So, we’ve seen everything from volume, or project companies as we call them in Australia, all the way to custom residential to bathroom companies. You used the example of roofing companies that use Buildertrend for their project management aspects.

So, we’ve seen such a wide range of it all now. And I would say that we have an example for everything, which is really good. And they all work on Buildertrend. So, we’re seeing such a shift in Australia to move towards the premium software, which is Buildertrend. And we love seeing that shift from builders as well.

Zach Wojtowicz:

That’s amazing. Well, I think we should probably get the exciting news at this point in the podcast. We obviously had you guys on to talk about our relationship. Anything you want to share?

Jordan Bowles:

Yeah, for sure. Scotty’s background with Jared Benak years ago. Yeah, they developed that relationship over time, and we’ve been pursuing something with Buildertrend over the last two years of our business ever since the start. We knew that we would be able to interact with the Australian market quite well, and we’re excited to release the knowledge to everyone that we’ve now got a pilot agreement with Buildertrend.

So, we’re absolutely stoked to be partnered with Buildertrend moving forward in Australia. It’s such an exciting time for us and exciting time for Australians, as well, moving forward that they have a resource to draw on in us. And yeah, we can represent the face of BT in Australia, which is awesome.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Anything you want to add, Scotty?

Scotty Braithwaite:

No. It’s crazy that it’s finally eventuated. Big court moves slow. You would take that as a compliment and also a stick, but it feels like the right timing. I know many consultants have come and gone on Buildertrend, but this feels about right. It does feel like an organic journey to this point. Calling out JB again and saying, you know what, Dan and Eric, and there’s a few guys that have come to the party that have really seen the value of what we do, seen our attention to detail and gone, “We want to partner with that.”

And the same is in reverse because we really want to become the go-to for Aussie builders. We really feel like that’s going to be our call here for the next long while. And so the pilot solidifies that, and it really actually just gets us excited because it firms up a future for BT because the way we arrived on BT, we tell clients this all the time. We did a software analysis. We did your Procores and your NextSpheres and your Buildxacts and your … we did it all.

And we have an active observation of those platforms’ movement, but the juggernaut of Buildertrend, the 20 years’ experience, the maneuverability that’s coming to the fore now is unstoppable. And so, how can you not want to partner with that? We’re throwing the bias in now. We’re really getting behind it and going, “This is all we do.” We know Buildertrend intimately, and we want to share that with Aussie builders.

Jordan Bowles:

A hundred percent. And what we’re trying to do in the background there as well is to link Aussie Buildertrend users together. So, not only do we want to see individual businesses absolutely kill it on Buildertrend so that they can move their business forward. But one of the biggest missing links we see in Australian builders, and you might be able to talk about American builders as well, is that sometimes they don’t talk to each other, so they might feel isolated or in a silo.

So, bringing that community together, Scotty can talk about this as well. It’s our goal to see every Buildertrend user using Buildertrend to 85% proficiency and efficiency or more because we know that when they do that, they can excel their business all the way into the future. And then when they talk to each other about it, solve problems with other builders and that sort of thing, it creates a sense of community where they can ask these questions.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Now, that’s got me excited.

Charley Burtwistle:

Yeah, I was just thinking, too, I wish we would’ve brought in some champagne for that one. That would’ve been the perfect time to pop it right there. Unfortunately, 4:00 p.m. on a Monday, in the States at least, is probably not the acceptable time to be …

Scotty Braithwaite:

It’s better than 7:40 in the morning over here.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Oh, great point.

Scotty Braithwaite:

We haven’t had breakfast.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Well, mimosas on a Monday is a little more social accept …

Jordan Bowles:

Wouldn’t be the first time.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Yeah, that’s right. That’s right.

Charley Burtwistle:

No, but we obviously are super, super excited, too. I think everyone here recognizes the value and have been trying to figure out the right way to do it. Zach talks about the onsite consulting motion that we have where you go and spend a couple of days there, and we’re trying to develop the Buildertrend University. And we’re trying to figure it out in the States, and then you guys have already done it in Australia. And so, I think that the learnings and the motion and the synergies between the two is something that everyone here is super fired up about.

And I think also just having the opportunity to talk to you guys about what you’re seeing and what you’re hearing is invaluable feedback for us at Buildertrend, too, especially on our products and CS floors and things like that. It’s like, “Hey, these are the things that if you fixed would make life infinitely easier.” And hearing it streamlined through two people as opposed to a couple thousand that we work with, I think will be really, really valuable, too.

So yeah, we’re fired up. I’m fired up. Zach’s fired up. It’s going to be a beautiful partnership for sure.

Scotty Braithwaite:

So good. We’re not Buildertrend Uni just yet, guys, just to correct you there, Charley.

Charley Burtwistle:

Not yet.

Scotty Braithwaite:

That was …

Charley Burtwistle:

We just got to have a vision, right?

Scotty Braithwaite:

Hey, we might be coming. So, what’s this space? But yeah, no, it’s a pleasure. Yeah, for sure. We’re really excited. Yep. Dates and ready to go. We’ve got executed contracts and ready to go.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Fantastic. Well, guys, we are just at time, so we need to run, but we really appreciate your time today to talk about this exciting partnership and really your guys’ expertise on Buildertrend. I am blown away by the information you shared with us. And for our listeners out there, we will link to aspireprojects.co on our Australian market. We hope you’ll go and check out Scotty and Jordan. I think it’s going to be well worth the investment.

Scotty Braithwaite:

Thanks, guys.

Jordan Bowles:

Thanks guys. We can’t wait to be on here next time with you talking about all the builders that we’ve had since and the success stories out of those as well. Zach and Charley, thank you so much for your time this morning or this afternoon in your time.

Charley Burtwistle:

Yep, absolutely. Well, thank you, guys.

Zach Wojtowicz:

We just had Scotty and Jordan from Aspire Projects down in Australia. Off-air, we got a little invite to go down to Australia, so we’ll work that one. But Charley, as I always like to ask, what’d you think?

Charley Burtwistle:

I thought that that was a fantastic interview. I understand why our corp dev team was so excited to partner with them after talking with them. Two incredibly bright individuals that I think have the, you kind of hit on this a little bit, the right mindset about what they’re wanting to provide the customers. It’s not a land grab, not a money grab. They truly believe in what they’re offering, and the business that they have and so does Buildertrend, which is why we wanted to establish that kind of official partnership there.

So, I think it’s going to be really, really good for the Australian market. I think it’s going to be really, really good for Buildertrend. It seems like a home run, and I’m excited. They made a comment at the end there. I would love to have them back on six months, one year from now and talk about how it’s been going, the success stories and how they’re growing because I think it’s a really interesting business.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Yeah, it’s really exciting. It’s a step in a direction that Buildertrend hasn’t done a lot of to have kind of official partners that do coaching and teaching and best practices around our software, but they’re proven experts. They’ve leaned on them in customer success to be a strong partner and strong advocate for us. So, it was kind of fun to see this longstanding relationship blossom into something bigger. And ultimately, they’re going to know their Australian market probably a little bit better than we do, and so, we’re going to lean on their expertise.

We talked a lot about some awesome stuff in the interview around best practices in building. I got the sense of genuineness and truly kind of understanding the Buildertrend platform and seeing the potential of it. And so, you need people who are your evangelists, your warriors, that will go and not just be … Whenever we speak up about Buildertrend, of course, they’re like Charley, Zach, that’s who pays you. You are going to be advocating for Buildertrend. To have other people in our corner makes you really excited.

Charley Burtwistle:

Yeah. Well, jokes on you. I actually don’t get paid by Buildertrend.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Oh.

Charley Burtwistle:

Yeah, I’m just volunteering here.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Wow.

Charley Burtwistle:

I bet you didn’t know that, did you?

Zach Wojtowicz:

A bomb here. We got two huge announcements. Charley, just turns out he’s an easier problem to get rid of than I thought.

Charley Burtwistle:

Yeah, yeah. No.

Zach Wojtowicz:

No, we love you, Charley.

Charley Burtwistle:

Thank you. Thank you.

Zach Wojtowicz:

I’ll pull some strings, get you a little kickback.

Charley Burtwistle:

Yeah. A little gift card or something. No, just kidding. I get paid.

Yeah, great episode. Excited to go down to Australia. And how cool would that be if we joke about going on business and visiting our podcast guests and then the one we finally do is in Australia.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Yeah, we couldn’t even spare expense to Kansas City, but I’m sure they’ll put us down to the Gold Coast of Australia. That’s got to be affordable.

Charley Burtwistle:

Yeah. I can’t imagine why not?

Zach Wojtowicz:

Yeah.

Charley Burtwistle:

We’ll drive there if we need to.

Zach Wojtowicz:

Well, you’re a data scientist. I say you run that ROI. All right. We’re going long on the outro.

Thank you so much for joining us today on “The Building code.” We hope you loved it. Don’t forget to like, comment, subscribe, check us out where all podcasts are available.

Charley Burtwistle:

And we’ll see you next time.