PCG Connect

Intro: 00:02

Welcome to Inside Out, where we take a deep dive look at performance contracting services and product lines. We'll be talking to the movers and shakers of performance contracting, the folks who make the big deals and then bring those big deals to life. So, with that, let's get to it. Well, good morning.

Mel Renfrow: 00:23

We have another episode here of Inside Out, and that's where we, dive a little deeper into our different product lines.

Mel Renfrow: 00:29

And I'm really happy. I have 2 great people in the studio here today to talk about, Masthead rigging & crating. So first off, I will introduce mister George Hernandez. So you're the general manager of Masthead. Good morning, George.

George Hernandez: 00:44

Good morning. How are you, Mel?

Mel Renfrow: 00:46

I am awesome. Awesome. And then we also have, Ryan Kinsella, who is the vice president of what's the official title?

Ryan Kinsella: 00:56

VP Operations.

Mel Renfrow: 00:57

VP Operations, but you are in the central region and you oversee Phoenix. What all areas do you oversee? Which branches?

Ryan Kinsella: 01:04

So, Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, and then wherever Masthead's at.

Mel Renfrow: 01:08

Which is all over the place, right? We'll find out more about that here in a little bit. So, why don't we, I just want to learn a little bit more about each of you first. So Ryan, you have been here, what, since 2006?

Ryan Kinsella: 01:21

Yeah, about 18 years. So most of the time in Phoenix did, I guess what I would call traditional route out of college, started as APE and then went up to PE and PM and most of the time in Phoenix.

Mel Renfrow: 01:33

Okay. So where did you where'd you go to school?

Ryan Kinsella: 01:35

Purdue.

Mel Renfrow: 01:36

Purdue. We have quite a few people. Is there anybody that works here that you graduated with still or around?

Ryan Kinsella: 01:41

I don't think so. No.

Mel Renfrow: 01:42

So The Lone Survivor?

Ryan Kinsella: 01:44

Yep.

Mel Renfrow: 01:44

And so you right out of school where did you grow up?

Ryan Kinsella: 01:47

Grew up outside of Chicago about an an hour, little town called Minooka, Illinois. So 3,000 people. Small town. It's a little bit bigger now, but it was nice because we were about an an hour or so out of the city. So kinda had the small town living, but then could go up to Chicago anytime.

Mel Renfrow: 02:02

Yeah, that's perfect. And so then you landed in Phoenix, and that's that's where you've

Ryan Kinsella: 02:06

been. Yeah. Actually, PCI was there, I want to say junior or senior year of college. Maybe it was my super senior year. I can't remember.

Mel Renfrow: 02:13

Super senior. But

Ryan Kinsella: 02:16

I just saw a sign that said free pizza. So, that's what got me in. And and, that's how I found PCI.

Mel Renfrow: 02:21

Is that true?

Ryan Kinsella: 02:22

It is seriously true. Yeah. Free free pizza.

Mel Renfrow: 02:26

I love it. I that would have attracted me too in college. I was so poor. Free food. So how about you, George?

Mel Renfrow: 02:33

You you beat Ryan. So you've been here since, like, as I like to say, the 1900.

George Hernandez: 02:38

Pretty much. So started with Masthead back in 94. We were acquired by PCG in 99, so been with PCG ever since. I wasn't the quite traditional route like, Ryan was. I was the untraditional route.

George Hernandez: 02:51

I had went to a couple years at, TVI, which was a vocational school there in Albuquerque. I was going for project management at the time, Got out of school, finished my my prerequisites, and then I was supposed to transfer over to UNM. Didn't finish that. Ended up going with a buddy of mine to look for a job and ended up with Masthead.

Mel Renfrow: 03:11

Working what were you doing for them?

George Hernandez: 03:13

So I started at the very bottom of the totem pole. Pool. I was a laborer and slowly just made my way up through the ranks.

Mel Renfrow: 03:18

That's I love those stories. Absolutely. I I worked my way up too, so I I love those stories. And, I think it gives you a special insight, right, when you've done all the things and

George Hernandez: 03:29

Agreed.

Mel Renfrow: 03:29

Now you're overseeing everything.

George Hernandez: 03:31

Exactly.

Mel Renfrow: 03:32

So what was the acquisition like? Were you in the were you in the field when that happened?

George Hernandez: 03:36

So I was actually overseas when it happened. They had, Intel had hired me overseas at in Israel to, be a consultant for the reading company out there. So this the acquisition was happening the whole time I was out there, consulting the, the team out there. So, when I got back, they had basically filled me in on all the details. And at first, I was like, oh, no, you know, we're just gonna get swallowed by this big corporation and, you know, Mastodon's gonna just go

Mel Renfrow: 04:07

away. So speaking of, speaking of an acquisition, I lived through 1, you lived through 1. Any anything you wanna say to people? I mean, like, specifically, I know Metro just is going through 1 and, hey, these things live forever. So in the future, we might be talking to a future acquisition.

Mel Renfrow: 04:20

What what's your perspective on that? So what I wanted to say out, What what's your perspective on that?

George Hernandez: 04:26

So what I wanted to say out to all these, acquisitions that are coming up and the ones that are just recently that recently happened is that, you know, when Masten was first taken over, I was worried sick. I felt like I said earlier was, you know, I thought we're just gonna get, you know, swallowed up and, you know, forgotten about. What I wanna say to the the new ones is be patient. You're gonna have your speed bumps, but it's well worth the wait, you know, with the safety culture that that your company is gonna gain with, compensation for your for your employees, you know, it's just I I just can't speak highly enough about, you know, being acquired by PCG. It's it's been amazing.

Mel Renfrow: 05:06

Yeah. Hang in there. I know we went from the paperwork, like, quadrupled from we were just, you know, little mom and pop shop. And so, it is overwhelming at first, but it it hang in there.

George Hernandez: 05:18

Exactly.

Mel Renfrow: 05:18

Yeah. So you mentioned Albuquerque. Is that is that where you grew up?

George Hernandez: 05:21

I was born in Albuquerque, but I actually grew up in a small town, which was 2 hours west of Albuquerque in Gallup, in Mexico.

Mel Renfrow: 05:28

Okay. So let's big picture, explain exactly what, masthead rigging and crating is.

George Hernandez: 05:38

So on the rigging side, so try to put as layman as I can, a rigger is somebody who designs and installs the equipment to lift, roll, move, our customer's material or equipment. So anything that the customer doesn't feel that he can move safely, they call upon us.

Mel Renfrow: 06:00

Yeah.

Ryan Kinsella: 06:00

I think I have a a maybe a a quick story that can help people understand this a little bit more. I actually had a a home that I was remodeling, and it it had this old refrigerator in it. And it was a huge subzero, you know, floor to ceiling. Well, it broke, so I called subzero. They came out and said, well, I have good news and bad news.

Ryan Kinsella: 06:22

Good news is I figured out what's wrong with it. Bad news is this refrigerator's stolen, so it's no

Mel Renfrow: 06:27

longer under warranty. What? So

Ryan Kinsella: 06:30

so I said, okay. Well, if it's gonna cost this much to fix it, just go ahead and take it. I don't want it anymore. So, he called his install team and said, hey, just go ahead and remove this refrigerator. That team looked at it.

Ryan Kinsella: 06:43

And keep in mind, all this team does is move big Sub Zero fridges all day, every day.

George Hernandez: 06:48

Well, it

Ryan Kinsella: 06:48

was so jammed

George Hernandez: 06:49

in there.

Ryan Kinsella: 06:49

They said, sorry. You're out of luck. We can't get this thing out. So I called another appliance company, that same thing. That's all they do is move appliances in and out.

Ryan Kinsella: 06:59

They said, sorry, buddy. You're out you're out of luck. So I thought, you know what? I'm gonna call Masthead. So after dah dah.

Ryan Kinsella: 07:05

After work one day, they came by, took one look at it, said, yeah, we we'll get it and pull the special equipment out of the truck, moved it out to the alley. It was gone within 10 minutes.

Mel Renfrow: 07:15

I love it. That that's a perfect story for what they do. And what type of so what does crating do then?

George Hernandez: 07:21

So the crating is, it was a separate part of Mastodon. So that actually started after, we had been doing the rigging. So it started probably 3 or 4 years. Intel came up to us and said, you know, a lot of our equipment that we have, we wanna ship it to other sites or overseas. And so we need a crating division.

George Hernandez: 07:39

So our, our owners at the time, they said, okay, well, that's something that we can do. So they they opened up a fabrication shop where they built these wooden crates so that we can send out all the equipment that we're moving out of Intel and ship them to other sites.

Mel Renfrow: 07:52

Yeah. You have quite a big space there where you're building all those things right there in Phoenix.

George Hernandez: 07:56

Correct. We actually have 2 sites. So in New Mexico, we're doing the same thing. So we have Mexico and Phoenix that are both building that are fabricating the crates.

Mel Renfrow: 08:02

Oh, wow. About how many square feet do you have there?

George Hernandez: 08:05

Between the two, it's probably around 20,000. Yeah.

Mel Renfrow: 08:09

Okay. Something else that makes, obviously, you have to go to wherever you're moving, the equipment is on the rigging side. So you mentioned earlier you were in Israel. So I think something that's a little bit different about this product line is, you travel quite a bit even internationally, it sounds like.

George Hernandez: 08:28

We do. So, prior to getting bought out by PCG, I was I almost traveled probably half of the states in, the US, and then we went to to Ireland and to Israel. So it's still quite a bit of traveling and still do.

Mel Renfrow: 08:44

Yeah. Now currently, are we still doing work, internationally right now? I know we have, Aard Mac, our our partner. Do we still do work over there? It's just mainly domestic now.

George Hernandez: 08:54

Mainly domestic now.

Mel Renfrow: 08:55

Okay. So what are some of the, just to give people an idea, like some of the major, you mentioned Intel already, but what are some of the types of projects, that you most frequently work on?

George Hernandez: 09:07

So our biggest product line is, definitely the semiconductor business. So we move a lot of their equipment. So that's Intel, that's TSMC, That's a lot of the smaller ones aimed at. Nikon has a facility as well. We also look at the data center.

George Hernandez: 09:23

So we're we're big with the data centers. They're big generators that they they have we move them in as well as the, low voltage generators that they have. So we're mixed in with the data center. And then on top of that, we also do pharmaceutical. We've done, x rays for Toshiba and Philips, a little one offs.

George Hernandez: 09:42

We've done, ancient Egyptian artifacts, for museums.

Ryan Kinsella: 09:46

So Oh, really?

George Hernandez: 09:46

Yeah. So

Ryan Kinsella: 09:47

And I think the the data center scope is pretty important, you know, if today's idea is to get the message out of what what does Masthead do. I think there's several times where PCI individuals are out on a job site. You know, everybody knows how many data centers are out there right now nationally. And we have all these individuals walking around in pre bid walks, you know, seeing what scope we can pick up, working with our customer. And I don't I think they're walking right by these big generator pads, not understanding that there's these giant pieces of equipment that have to get moved in and maybe don't understand that that's that's what we do.

Ryan Kinsella: 10:20

Exactly.

Mel Renfrow: 10:21

So is is your work typically, in and out? Or do you or do you stick around? I mean, how do how does that I'm just thinking of how do you schedule something like this and man load and all of that type of stuff?

George Hernandez: 10:33

So with Intel in in New Mexico, we've been out there since 85. So we plant the roots. We stay there. You know, the semiconductor world is always updating their equipment. So

Mel Renfrow: 10:43

They're always moving it around.

George Hernandez: 10:45

Exactly. Exactly. So so we stay there as long as we can. A lot of the data center work, it's one offs by we're there probably 3 or 4 months, and then wait till the next project starts. These data centers have typically been growing throughout, you know, the upcoming months.

George Hernandez: 11:02

So we've we're there for 3 months, leave for a month or 2, and then we're back out there for another 3 months. So

Ryan Kinsella: 11:07

And I think you even have some some day trips here and there too. Right? You still get these one off calls. Hey. We really need this piece of equipment moved and set on a truck, and it's a one day deal, and they're they're they're gone.

George Hernandez: 11:18

In and out.

Mel Renfrow: 11:19

I need a sub zero refrigerator pried up. Exactly. Exactly. So what makes us so special? Because, I mean, I'm sure there's a lot of people out there that can move, you know, big equipment, but I imagine this isn't just any old equipment.

Mel Renfrow: 11:33

There's, a lot of moving parts and pieces and calibration. Equipment. Yeah. So is that is that our niche here?

George Hernandez: 11:41

It definitely is. So with our expertise that's a specialized, trade that we have. So it's not somewhere where we can just go pick Tom, Dick, or Harry off the street and say, hey, you know, we need to move this equipment. It's somebody that we have to do a lot of training with being that, the type of equipment that are that we're moving is very delicate, very sensitive. I mean, it's sensitive to vibration.

George Hernandez: 12:03

It's sensitive to heat, and the cost of it is, you know, in the 100 of 1,000,000.

Ryan Kinsella: 12:09

Yeah. They've moved equipment that costs over a $100,000,000 before. I mean, think about that.

Mel Renfrow: 12:13

You know, that's What?

Ryan Kinsella: 12:14

Yeah. That's something you don't wanna drop. Exactly.

Mel Renfrow: 12:16

What what kind of equipment is that? I mean, is that in, like, semiconductor? Or

George Hernandez: 12:21

Yeah. It is. So they have they have what they call is a the man the manufacturer's a Nikon, but it's, it's basically a humongous camera. And Oh, wow. Intel has, you know, 40 or 50 of them inside their facility.

George Hernandez: 12:34

So

Mel Renfrow: 12:34

wow. So I imagine our insurance and bonding on this has to be

Ryan Kinsella: 12:38

a little different. Yeah. And framing drywall.

Mel Renfrow: 12:40

Yeah. Because, I mean, there's no, oops, I dropped it, and, I mean, everything would be out of whack. So you let's go a little bit deeper when you're talking about you can't just hire anybody. What kind of training do the workers require?

George Hernandez: 12:52

So it's an in-depth training. So we we we weed them out from the very beginning. We, find out the people that are actually wanting to to be there. There's not a school that, you know, we can just pull them from like we do with, the drywall or, you know, the other side of our our businesses. So, you know, it's, 1 on 1 with our 4 minutes, 1 on 1 with our lead men, with our superintendents, and slowly, they make up their make the steps to, becoming a a certified rigor.

Mel Renfrow: 13:21

Okay. So and then how often is there ongoing certification there

George Hernandez: 13:24

with that? There is. It's actually, nationally accredited.

Mel Renfrow: 13:27

Okay. Talk to me about crew size and about how many, people do you run on on average, would you say?

George Hernandez: 13:34

So currently, we have a headcount of about 300 to 350 depending on the day. A typical crew size is anywhere from 4 to 12 people.

Mel Renfrow: 13:46

Are you hiring everybody out of Phoenix or we'll get into joint ventures in a minute. So I'm sure, you know, you're hiring people, but, so, like, when when you have somebody that works for you, are they automatically on, the masthead branch, or do we have people that are rigors that are like, DC?

George Hernandez: 14:05

No. No. So they're all, on Masthead branch.

Mel Renfrow: 14:08

Okay. And so you have people that are literally all over the United States that are essentially calling their time into Correct. Phoenix.

George Hernandez: 14:16

Correct.

Ryan Kinsella: 14:17

And I think right now that just rough numbers, if there's a 100 at Intel, a 100 at TSMC, a 100 at Intel in New Mexico. You got 50 or so that are, you know, moving around to different locations. One thing I wanted to touch on is is how important some of these mega campuses are. Intel, a 100 people. TSMC, a 100 people.

Ryan Kinsella: 14:39

Well, think about what's upcoming. You have a job in Columbus. Hey, maybe that could be a foundation for another 100 people that George mentioned had been there since 1985. So, now we have a Samsung job coming up. Hey, maybe we can plant our seed there.

Ryan Kinsella: 14:54

You know, the Boise, Idaho, there's another mega project coming up there. Let's plant a seed there. So I think there's potential for masthead to grow unbelievably over the next few years as long as we can get our foot in the door. It could be 20, 30 years worth worth of work. Agreed.

Mel Renfrow: 15:09

Yeah. That's I I love this company how we look. So we also used to do printing presses, right, and and all of that equipment. And, I don't know how many people out there still get a newspaper delivered to their door every morning. Nobody.

Ryan Kinsella: 15:23

That's a a great point to make sure your business is diversified. You you can compare the 2 businesses between Masthead and PCI. Before PCI, acquired them, they got into business to move print printing presses. Right? Luckily, they decided to diversify at some point and said, well, there's this intel down the road.

Ryan Kinsella: 15:40

Maybe we should start moving that equipment. And, you know, obviously, there's not really any more printing presses going in buildings anymore. Sort of like us, right? We had the insulation business and, hey, there's a need for drywall, there's a need for cleaning. Look at what IMP has grown into over the last few

Mel Renfrow: 15:55

years. Yeah. It's just mind boggling. And and then just to think about where it could go, which I'll touch on in a minute, but I wanna I wanna talk about how does this interplay with bundling, you know, bundling services and, you know, Intel, obviously, we have a lot of different, product lines that are there. When when did you first I know you do quite a bit of that joint venture type of work, but when did that come into play, really?

George Hernandez: 16:20

So I think the first time it came into play was, we did work over in Portland, Oregon with that branch, and we, actually provided all the crate. They were doing a big deinstall of 1 of the Intel facilities.

Mel Renfrow: 16:31

What's that? What's a deinstall?

George Hernandez: 16:32

So they were moving out all of the equipment, and they wanted to install

Ryan Kinsella: 16:34

their saying demo. They like to say deinstall.

Mel Renfrow: 16:37

Oh, you're so hip and cool.

George Hernandez: 16:42

So PCI had hired us to go out there and build fabricate all the crates for them and then create up all the equipment that, they were moving out for to Intel.

Mel Renfrow: 16:49

What year was that around with that?

George Hernandez: 16:50

That was probably, oh, 13 or 14, I believe. 2013, 14. Mhmm. And then right after that, we actually did a joint venture over in Ag GlobalFoundries with the PC PCI group out there. We were, helped them do the rigging for the for GlobalFoundries.

Mel Renfrow: 17:08

Yeah. So at the time, I think it was DC, and then that grew so big, turned into the Albany branch. Right?

George Hernandez: 17:13

Exactly.

Ryan Kinsella: 17:13

Out

Mel Renfrow: 17:14

there. So what would you say? What percentage of your work is joint venture where you're working with other, other PCI branches or PAS or whomever?

George Hernandez: 17:24

Over the last couple of years, it's probably, oh, would you say about maybe 30, 40%

Ryan Kinsella: 17:29

of it? Maybe, yeah, 20, 30% is what I would say. It it does vary because at times, they've helped us out with TSMC, for example. Right? I I can't remember how many guys you had on that at one point, but it was heavily JV business at that point.

Ryan Kinsella: 17:45

And then it tapered off, and, you know, so it does vary quite a bit.

Mel Renfrow: 17:48

Where is that project, by the way? I have I've TSMC. I heard I've heard it all the time. It's Phoenix. Phoenix.

Ryan Kinsella: 17:53

I got Northside.

Mel Renfrow: 17:54

Okay. Thank you for solving that mystery. If it bothered me enough, you know, I do have a computer where I could have looked it

George Hernandez: 18:00

up, but,

Mel Renfrow: 18:03

what kind of margin does it bring in? So, obviously, all of our our product lines have varying, you know, percentages. So would you say it's like on the low end, middle, or or the higher end of I I'm gonna take a guess it's on the higher because it's a special it's a specialized

Ryan Kinsella: 18:18

soft serve. I think the easy answer is there's a reason why we wanna promote this business. It's because it does very well.

Mel Renfrow: 18:23

Well, please keep doing more and more of it.

George Hernandez: 18:26

But if Jordan's listening, that's totally opposite.

Mel Renfrow: 18:28

Oh, okay. Yeah. Jordan Jordan Briscoe, their controller. Yeah. September rolls around.

Mel Renfrow: 18:34

I have no idea where all this money came from. We made it in the last month. So are there any special projects that you're currently on that you'd like to tell people about or anything that you're pursuing that, you know, you're excited about?

George Hernandez: 18:46

So I think there's a few. So we're just, starting off with the Intel project there in Arizona, which is, Fab 52, and there's it's it's a new beast. I mean, the equipment's a lot bigger than what it was before. So, you know, we've been doing a lot of planning. We're in the planning stages of of that project.

George Hernandez: 19:04

Another one that's coming up real soon is Brian had mentioned it was Samsung. So, you know, they're running a little bit behind schedule. We're supposed to start this last year. It looks like it's gonna be starting September, October of this year. So we're in the final stages on that one as well, which it's a whole new market, and so we're looking forward to to getting out there.

Ryan Kinsella: 19:22

That's the one that I'm I'm most excited about right now again because this could be potential for years of work.

Mel Renfrow: 19:28

At the Samsung one? Exactly. That that's in the Austin,

Ryan Kinsella: 19:29

Texas area. So, again, that's in the Austin, Texas area. So again, that's opportunity for almost like a whole satellite business out there for for years to come.

Mel Renfrow: 20:34

So obviously, when you're trying to grow, you know what I mean? You wanna establish those relationships early on. So how do you approach something like that, like Samsung, where you're like, okay, we're trying to get our foot in the door here. Obviously, we always wanna go above and beyond with customer service, but I imagine there's a specific strategy.

George Hernandez: 20:53

There was. So they actually contacted me probably oh, it's probably about 2 almost maybe 3 years ago Yeah. Now. Yeah. And they were just ask inquiring about Masthead.

George Hernandez: 21:03

There were some ex Intel employees that actually went over to Samsung, so they're the ones that, popped up our name. As we went along, we just, made trips out to to, Austin, the Austin area. I had, Ryan and Bruce join me for one trip where, you know, we were just basically putting it online on all the product lines that we can offer Yeah. Samsung. And so they were really pleased with everything and, you know, it just, started we started clicking and here we are now that we have a contract in hand.

George Hernandez: 21:30

So

Ryan Kinsella: 21:31

The the good thing about us and our company, I think, I'm sure this will be another good example years down the road, is really all we need is an opportunity. And then once we show how we do our work, how responsive we are, how safe we are, we're gonna be just fine compared to our competition.

George Hernandez: 21:46

Kinda speaks

Mel Renfrow: 21:47

you know, just watch us. We don't have to tell you. Just watch what we do. Yeah.

Ryan Kinsella: 21:50

And we're starting to see that now in Denver. And I'm sure some of the other new businesses is just once we get in the door, show our customers what we can do. We're off and running.

Mel Renfrow: 21:58

So do you ever run into, you know, one of the reasons for 1 PCG was people didn't realize, even because like McCarthy, who had been doing work for, they didn't even realize everything that we did. And that's where we still have PCI in the name. So masthead is complete is that a special challenge? Do you feel like when you're talking to customers that they're like, oh, you're you guys are, brothers?

George Hernandez: 22:24

Mhmm. It has been. So, prior the old management of Masthead, they were they like keeping us in the shadow where, you know, we weren't out there, and so not a lot of branches knew about Masthead. So as of, you know, probably the last, you know, 5, 10 years, you know, we've really expanded on that and tried to get our name out there. So it's it's it's becoming a part of the PCG and and our customers and PCEI's customers are both starting to realize that we can offer this product line as well.

George Hernandez: 22:51

So I think Ryan was a big, part of that, getting our name out there. So definitely appreciate it.

Ryan Kinsella: 22:56

Even just internally, I think, I like to to claim we were part of the 1 PCG movement before it was a slogan. Yeah. We, we we moved in together, and I don't know what year that was, 2018 or something like that. And

Mel Renfrow: 23:09

The branches moved in. Yeah.

Ryan Kinsella: 23:11

Merged in the same building, and then, you know, you you think about before that, there's a lot of people in Phoenix who didn't even know Phoenix internally, who didn't know what Masthead did. But now we're in the same building. We're collaborating a little bit more, working together more. Now, we just need to do that more on a national level. Exactly.

Mel Renfrow: 23:28

Are there any specific markets that you're interested in targeting? Here's here's where it maybe they're listening. So where would you like to grow into?

George Hernandez: 23:39

So there's a few. So, talking to Ryan, you know, the, battery plants that are that are popping up everywhere, you know, we definitely wanted to get a part of that. We think we can definitely offer a lot with that being that, we did some of the work over at Tesla. We installed all their battery racks for them, along with that, the IMPs, work that we're doing, cross the nation, is that, you know, the panels that they're lifting up is actually a rigor that's doing it. So, you know, we definitely could add on to the our expertise there.

Ryan Kinsella: 24:09

And I and I think when it comes to those big job sites, right, that's where where Mastodon operates well is large job sites, logistics of a large job site, how to get material in and out, how to get efficient with moving material, technical lifts, anything that has to do with these panels, unusual panels, unusual equipment, that's where they would come into play.

Mel Renfrow: 24:30

How does the estimating on it work? I mean, because, you know, usually you get a set of plans and, you know, you square footage and all that type of stuff. But so how does it work for you?

George Hernandez: 24:40

So that's the hard part with with Masthead is and that's something that we've been trying to figure out the right way to go about it. So typically, it's been all tribal knowledge. So, you know, the my estimators and PMs I currently have have been with Masthead for the last 20 plus years. So we know it just by moving the equipment on the number of hours, the number of, you know,

Mel Renfrow: 25:03

how many pieces of equipment

George Hernandez: 25:05

exactly. So it's not an easy small little box they could fit everything into. So we've been trying to pass that trouble knowledge to our younger PEs and hopefully that they'll catch on as well. So a lot of it is out there walking the jobs, you know, learning what the pieces of equipment are, how heavy they are, how big they are, what, you know, our our equipment that we have, their capacities, and what we can do.

Ryan Kinsella: 25:28

And there is a lot of it that's that's t and m because it it it is pretty much impossible to to bid, to put a lump sum to Like a hard Or if we had to, we would we would bid it worst case, and then the number would be astronomical. Because there's so many pieces of the equipment. You don't know exactly how it's going to show up, when it's going to show up, when we're going to have the dock time, will we have a crane, will we not have a crane. There's there's so many factors that a lot of customers do just put us on a T and M rate and then we we turn it or or unit rates in some cases.

Mel Renfrow: 25:56

Yeah. So, it's time and material. So essentially, we keep track of how much, labor we have in material and then the agreed upon markup and it's a lot of paperwork that the field guys have to get signed and all of that good stuff.

George Hernandez: 26:09

Exactly.

Mel Renfrow: 26:10

Well, that makes sense. What about the future? So, you know, we've talked a little bit about AI. And do you see anything in your area that maybe could be replaced, like, with robotics or anything like that? Or do you feel like it's specialized enough?

Mel Renfrow: 26:25

Or do you just see any trends, I guess, in the market is my question.

George Hernandez: 26:29

So there there's a new equipment that's coming up. We just recent well, I shouldn't say recently, but about 4 or 5 years ago, we got our 1st remote controlled, forklift.

Ryan Kinsella: 26:38

Oh.

George Hernandez: 26:38

So, I mean, basically, you know, it it's more productive. It's a lot safer because the, the person that's controlling it is actually can have his eyes on the piece while he's, moving the forks in. We've been looking at, new dollies that are robotic that, you know, in the past that we've been having, you know, adding people to the to move this equipment because it was so heavy. We're now with the robotic ones, you know, now you need 2 or 3 people steering it, and that's about it. So we're we're looking at all these different, robotic equipment that's coming out.

George Hernandez: 27:09

So

Mel Renfrow: 27:10

Where do you find it? I mean, do they have trade shows for that type of thing? Or are you on eBay? I mean, what They Craigslist. Yeah.

George Hernandez: 27:18

They do. A lot of our vendors are constantly coming over to our site and demos doing demos for us. So What

Mel Renfrow: 27:24

do you want people to know, I guess, about is there any myths out there or anything that you wanna bust? Anything you've heard about masthead that is you'd like to kinda redirect the conversation there?

Ryan Kinsella: 27:34

I don't know if there's any myths that I can think of, but I think just getting a better understanding for our people out there to to know what masthead does. Because, again, I I think there's so many situations where we're just walking right by an opportunity for masthead, and we don't even know that because you don't know exactly what they do. So the more we understand it I went through it personally where I didn't have a great understanding, and now every job site I'm walking on, I'm looking at stuff going, oh, there's there's an opportunity for Masthead. I'll look at that. That's something Masthead could do.

Ryan Kinsella: 28:04

And I think if we all did that as a group, the the opportunity would would be enormous for for this business.

Mel Renfrow: 28:11

What are some of them?

Ryan Kinsella: 28:12

Walking into a call it a university and just seeing a giant piece of artwork or statue getting moved into a a job we're doing or a casino, I remember this giant piece of equipment moving in. And there's even, not so much equipment, but just unorganized stuff happening on a job site with our logistics of lay down yards and how to get stuff in and out of a building even if it is typical stuff that we see every day. But because we're on these mega projects, maybe it's the first time we're on one of these mega projects whereas, like I said, that's all these guys do. Like, that's kind of their world, where I think we have a ton of opportunity.

Mel Renfrow: 28:50

Anything with scaffolding?

Ryan Kinsella: 28:51

Definitely when it comes to maybe some of the platforms, getting those in and out, large pieces of scaffolding, yeah, that would be right up their alley.

George Hernandez: 28:59

And then the crate the crate as well. So, you know, we've been working with Metro Glass lately on building a a specialized crate for them so that they can move their pad their glass panels, you know, from Denver over to Oregon. So the crating is another big one that, you know, definitely wanna get out there. I think, Indy hit me up a few weeks ago too that they need some specialized crates. So

Mel Renfrow: 29:20

They're very cool. Well, I'm sure, like, with the, Metro Glass that then they can ship further and all of that type of expand their business as

Ryan Kinsella: 29:27

well. Exactly.

Mel Renfrow: 29:29

So let's talk about safety just for a second. Are there any different implications or anything like that that you are specifically aware of when it comes to your line of work?

George Hernandez: 29:39

So as far as of the traditional PCI companies, our line of work is a lot more dangerous because our environment's constantly changing. We're working out outside. We're working, you know, in congested areas. We're working, you know, with this heavy delicate equipment and it changes daily, you know, so the path that we have to get from a to b, just because it's a construction site, I mean, may change over the hour. So that alone makes it a lot more dangerous.

George Hernandez: 30:11

And then if if the equipment that if it's not planned right then we can definitely hurt somebody really bad. I mean, there were there used to be a an old joke, prior to PCG buying us out is that you could tell the number of years a rigor had by the number of fingers he had. So

Ryan Kinsella: 30:28

Yeah. You know, not the case anymore.

George Hernandez: 30:29

Not the

Ryan Kinsella: 30:29

case anymore.

Mel Renfrow: 30:30

Not the case anymore.

Ryan Kinsella: 30:31

No. It it is pretty technical, I'll say, from a safety standpoint. One example, I was watching a tool get moved in in New Mexico and, very top heavy, first of all. Right? So so that that means any kind of shifting or movement that that it's a possibility it tips over.

Ryan Kinsella: 30:47

Well, then, you know, they get an uncrated anyone who doesn't know anything about this tool would just go ahead and plop it in in the elevator. Had to go up to the to the fab level. Well, they knew exactly where you could lift it. The only way you could do it was to work with the elevator company. Elevator had to come in, open up the doors, then actually lift that elevator up 6 inches so it could slide in perfectly.

Ryan Kinsella: 31:09

You know, if if someone that wasn't specialized in this in this type of knowledge, that would have been a disaster, where those guys looked at the tag, knew exactly what type of tool it was, how to lift it, where you can't touch it. It's top top heavy, so you can't shift anything as you move it in. Did it flawlessly. But from a safety standpoint, I mean, that's extremely dangerous.

Mel Renfrow: 31:28

Sounds like a lot of physics are in play

George Hernandez: 31:31

Oh, yeah.

Mel Renfrow: 31:31

For this. Yeah. So that's, I think, you know, a lot of people in the branches know when it comes to insurance or if you have a owner controlled insurance program, how they have different modifier and multiplier based on the type of work you're performing. So

George Hernandez: 31:46

Exactly.

Mel Renfrow: 31:47

I'm assuming yours is a little bit higher than, say, drywall

George Hernandez: 31:49

or Oh, you actually there's a separate insurance that we have to carry. It's a rigging insurance that's required. So

Mel Renfrow: 31:55

Okay. And that's also why, technically, masthead, we have set up in as a different company like PAS because there's specific, you know Requirements. Requirements and rules that apply over there. How is your safety? Did you guys ever win a KMS?

George Hernandez: 32:09

We have. We've won it, 2023? Yeah. Just last year.

Mel Renfrow: 32:13

Congratulations. Yeah. So which which what level was it?

George Hernandez: 32:16

The 2nd tier, wasn't it?

Ryan Kinsella: 32:18

I think so.

Mel Renfrow: 32:18

2nd tier KMS award winners. That's how I should have introduced you at the very beginning. Well, congratulations because it's it's, it sounds like it's, you know, an extra hurdle that you have to pass.

Ryan Kinsella: 32:30

So

George Hernandez: 32:30

Absolutely. Actually, last year, we were awarded a the 1,000,000 man hours without a recordable award as well from national the National Safety Council.

Ryan Kinsella: 32:39

So that's

Mel Renfrow: 32:40

Well, so we're we're doing something right.

George Hernandez: 32:42

Absolutely. I just received the email probably the day before yesterday that we received the 2024 Highwire, safety awards as well.

Mel Renfrow: 32:50

So What's that?

George Hernandez: 32:51

High Highwire? Highwire.

Mel Renfrow: 32:53

Highwire? Oh, okay. Who who, who awards that?

George Hernandez: 32:56

That, I will find out. I just got the email. So You did? Yeah.

Mel Renfrow: 32:59

Yeah. That's really cool.

Ryan Kinsella: 33:00

Yeah.

Mel Renfrow: 33:01

You you took notes. Is there anything else there, George, that you wanna make sure you

George Hernandez: 33:06

there's a few things I want to bring up, and basically, it's just shout out. So one is I want to definitely give a shout out to to my family. You know, I've done a lot of traveling over the last, you know, 30 plus years. So with all the traveling, it's been, you know, a little bit hard on them. So I appreciate, you know, them standing by me.

George Hernandez: 33:24

The other part is my Mastap family. You know, without them, I can't have been as successful as I am. You know, I have a lot of people that I've worked with, you know, 20 plus years, and it's definitely a really good run. And then the last shout out I want to do is, we have a workshop coming up in September there in Phoenix that, you know, any branch managers that would like to know more about what Masthead does, they're more than welcome to attend.

Mel Renfrow: 33:48

Yeah. And we can put information on there, whenever we whenever we post this of how people can find out a little bit more about it. Basically, we're doing these product line summits excuse me, product line summits where people, you know, everything you wanted to know about fill in the blank, rigging, you were afraid to ask. So you can come in in and learn more about it and some of the opportunities you talked about, Ryan, where we can be, keep putting our rigging glasses on when we're going to looking at work. Well, I wanna thank both of you very much, for coming for coming in.

Mel Renfrow: 34:20

Normally, we try to snag people when they're in here for other events, but you both flew in specifically for this. So I wanna thank you and spending more time away from your family and all of that good stuff. We really appreciate it.

Ryan Kinsella: 34:31

Thank you, pal. Well, thank you. We've been talking for years about how George has a great face for radio.

George Hernandez: 34:35

So we'll be looking forward to it.

Mel Renfrow: 34:39

Well, his voice isn't too shabby on radio either. Well, thanks, guys. It was great having you here.

George Hernandez: 34:44

Thank you.

Ryan Kinsella: 34:45

Thank you.