Today we’d like to introduce you to Richard Laurine.
Hi Richard, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I grew up around construction my entire childhood as my grandfather was a local home builder. I never saw myself following down that same path though. I was working a job throughout high school and college and a frequent customer of mine offered me a job installing cabinetry and trim for his company. One problem, I had no clue what I was doing, I couldn’t even read a tape measure.
He flat out told me he wasn’t hiring me for what I knew, but rather my work ethic he had observed over the years when frequenting the business I worked at, and how I could learn along the way but he couldn’t teach the work ethic. Fast forward, he mentored me for years, always telling me he knew I’d go leaps and bounds beyond what he was capable of. I finished with a bachelor’s degree in business and a master’s degree in Information Technology.
At this time, IT was exploding and I decided to hop over into that world and try my hand at that. I made it a year and quickly realized I wanted to not only work with my hands but be my boss. My wife and I had just got married and if it weren’t for her support and persistence in pushing me to venture out on my own, I can’t say that I would have committed to blindly taking the jump. I started a small garage at our townhouse in Frederick MD building wooden dog gates/crates, Wooden Maryland Flags, and Farmhouse tables.
Within 6 months, I couldn’t keep up with Demand. My father had just retired and began helping 1-2 days a week. Within 3 months, he was helping me full-time. After a year, we got our first warehouse. We quickly outgrew that within a year and then made our move to Urbana MD. I still remember the anxiety I had signed our first real formal lease. What if I failed? What if I couldn’t afford the rent for one month? Within 6 months, we were so busy, we added a second unit to our lease, followed by a third unit 6 months after that.
What started as small furniture led me straight to full-on General Contracting. Kitchen and Bath Renovations, Basement Finishing, Tile, Painting, Drywall, Millwork, and Custom Cabinetry. What I set out to do as a one-man operation 5 years prior had turned into a multi-million dollar business right in front of my eyes. Business School taught me some pretty important things, but there is nothing that can prepare you for the dive you must make when it’s truly sink or swim to make it on your own. There are a few important keys to success as well:
You must take care of those who take care of the business and make it run. I can’t stress this enough, your employees, subcontractors, contractors, etc, pay them on time, pay them well, respect them, treat them fairly, and truly care. I spend more time with these guys than I do with my own family sometimes. We work late nights, early mornings, weekends, and occasionally holidays. I look at every one of our guys as family, not employees.
Secondly, be patient, success will come. It is happening right in front of your eyes, you just can’t see all the small things adding up until one day you look back and finally see the fruits of your labor and realize it has been happening this entire time.
Lastly, no one is coming to save you. Work your ass off, stop making excuses. If you work harder than everyone around you and surround yourself with successful people, good things will happen. Always go outside your comfort zone, that is how you improve, grow, and get better.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall, and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Not at all. Fear of the unknown is tough when you jump out on your own and start a business. The quicker you realize no one is coming to save you, you realize the true task of what’s needed to grow and be successful.
Work your ass off, stop making excuses. If you work harder than everyone around you and surround yourself with successful people, good things will happen. Always go outside your comfort zone, that is how you improve, grow, and get better
The biggest struggles were scaling especially in higher-end remodeling and finishes. We do a lot of one-off custom millwork/cabinetry/renovations with unique finishes and designs so you need to find qualified folks who are capable of doing the work properly. You can’t just hire someone off the street and expect them to be good.
We’ve certainly brought on guys and groomed them from the ground up, but in the early stages of growing, that isn’t an option as it takes years to get good with some of the higher-end finish work.
Cash flow is always tough especially as you grow and scale up with a large team. I have always made it a point to pay every subcontractor promptly and ensure all employees are paid before I take any payment myself. It is very common in this industry for trades to not be paid and that’s how you lose good people.
Work-life balance by far has been the toughest struggle. My wife is a true warrior. She has supported me since day one and without her, I can’t say if I would have made it this far. Folks don’t understand how many hats you have to wear when starting a business and just how grueling it is. I recall one December about 3 years in when we started to explode in growth, working 20-hour days from the Monday after Thanksgiving through Christmas Eve.
The days all blurred, I was doing whatever it took to keep up and I remember just being so happy to have the work and see the growth in the business. That was when I realized we were going to make it past the dreaded 3 years in which most businesses fail. I have 2 daughters 4 and 2 and over the past 6 months, I’ve been hit with reality on how much I’ve sacrificed and missed over their short lives. I think most business owners can relate to the feeling of business life creeping into family life and overtaking it, at least in the early years.
In the past 2 months, I’ve taken a step back and restructured the way our business is run and operated to get back that family life, separate from the business, that my family and I deserve.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about Weathered Wood Worx?
Service General Contractor specializing in Basements, Kitchens, Bathrooms, Custom Cabinetry, Millwork, Tile, and Custom Bars. We are known for our Custom Built In’s (Mudrooms, Built In’s, Bars).
What sets us apart is we self-perform 95% of our work. We own our own electrical company and have a master electrician on staff. Most companies have an owner and simply sub everything out. We have a rather large team that works together day in and day and is used to one another and the specific processes and how one another works.
We have mastered the ability to perform higher quality finishes at a faster pace than normal simply due to cutting out having to wait for a bunch of different subs to come in and bid on different facets of projects. I can line up projects to kick off and run seamlessly, start to finish while maintaining a higher level of quality than most provide.
The biggest thing to know is most folks don’t realize we do as much as we do. Some think by the name Weathered Wood Worx, we simply do woodworking. While that was our main focus at one time, we do an entire range of full-on design/build services and self-perform almost all of it.
How can people work with you, collaborate with you, or support you?
We are very active on social media (Facebook and Insta). Any interaction on those platforms, sharing our content, tagging us in posts looking for recommendations for contractors.
If you email sales@weatheredwoodworx.com, we set up an initial virtual consult to briefly speak about the project, your desires, design, budget, etc, and prepare a proposal based on the space and design. Then, if it fits your budget and you wish to proceed, we set up an onsite appointment to finalize the actual layout/design of the overall project and make material selections.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.weatheredwoodworx.com
- Instagram: @Weatheredwoodworx
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/weatheredwoodworx
