Faces of the Industry: Casey Carey

Vice President of Mfg • Builders Warehouse Manufacturing • Aurora, Colorado

How’d you get into this industry?

In 1981, when Pizza Hut was rolling out their incredible idea to serve a personal pan pizza in 5 minutes from time of ordering, I was making 300 personal pan pizzas at $3.25 per hour. Later that day my brother called me and said I could make wall panels and floor deck sections for $5.50 per hour. I said, “Where do I sign?” Then I asked him, “What the heck is a wall panel and floor deck section?” I continued to work several summers during my college days building roof trusses, floor trusses, wall panels, and prefab floor sections. Fast forward, this industry has taken me across the United Stated in many different positions working for many wonderful companies.

What’s your favorite part about being in this industry? What could you do without?

People are my favorite part of this industry. Like the women in the photo who make the business run, along with many others. Whether it is customers, vendors, competitors, or fellow associates, I have enjoyed the interaction with the people in our industry. I have had the privilege to mentor a few people and watch them grow and contribute to our industry. There is no better satisfaction than that. 

What could I do without in this industry? This year, a large portion of our business is multi-family housing with long term contracts, so we surely could do without the uncertainty surrounding steel costs and tariffs and the volatility of lumber costs as the spike in raw material prices have created an inability to maintain reasonable truss margins and overall business profitability concerns. With the demand that we have had, and the framing labor shortage that exists, this market should be our version of business heaven. However, sadly, this year has felt like the component industry’s version of waterboarding.

What’s your company/market focused on right now?

Builders’ main focus has been strategic growth in our region. We are about market segment balance to make sure we are not vulnerable to cost changes. There has been tremendous growth over the last few years for the company, and multi-family housing has been a significant part of our business. With insight from market analysts and industry professionals, we anticipate the multi-family market to decline as we head toward the early 2020s and believe our single-family presence has to be enhanced in order to maintain our growth initiatives. 

We continue to stress product segmentation and acquisition. Our product segmentation includes manufactured deck sections, insulating exterior wall panels, door manufacturing, and countertops. Some of the other long-term initiates we believe are important to grow Builders and our industry include maintaining and enhancing our BIM capabilities, ensuring the company has a clear career path program, and a strong focus on developing our employee orientation and training programs to help attract and retain employees. We also focus on selling and educating our customers on cycle time reduction and the ability to build more houses with fewer people that ultimately reduces costs and increase their throughput and lower their construction cycle time.  

What’s your SBCA chapter focused on?

There currently is no Colorado chapter within SBCA, but I have been having some conversations about getting one started, and am looking to assist in the development of a Colorado chapter of SBCA. I have worked with SBCA staff for a long time and I am looking forward to working with Trish Kutz, SBCA chapter support staff, on getting a Colorado chapter re-energized.

What challenges do you see for the industry in the future, and what should SBCA be working on now to meet those challenges?

I will jump on the labor bandwagon, more specifically leadership development. This is all while we develop orientation, training and a career path program to meet our direct labor needs. Leadership development is critical for long term success in any organization. We continue to ask, “Are we developing the leaders of the future and are we searching for those who value the core values, ethics, and integrity upon which our company was founded?” I will be looking into incorporating the Professional Leadership Training that SBCA has developed over the years into our leadership development process.

When you’re not thinking about trusses, what keeps you busy?

I travel extensively for work during the week so I tend to slow down on the weekends. I read a lot and have taken classes in counselling, studying psychology and theology, that helps me understand why my son would rather text me than talk on the phone. I spent many years traveling to third world countries on medical missions, which has taken a back seat since moving to Denver, so I have a hunger to get back involved in mission work. I love to travel with friends and family to various cities across the country and look forward to spending my time off with my son (Spencer) and his wife (Nicole) for the holidays. You can also find me in front of the television screaming, “Go!...Pack!...Go!” as well as “On Wisconsin!”