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In this conversation, Joey and Paul interview Dustin "Ox" Heiland, a quality manager at Concrete Supply Company. They discuss his journey from college to a leadership role in the concrete industry. The conversation explores the industry's evolution, the challenges of managing quality in concrete production, and the importance of sustainability in construction. They also highlight the impact of population growth on infrastructure in Charlotte and the need for innovative solutions to meet building demands while adhering to new regulations. Dustin shares insights on navigating project management and balancing sustainability goals and project schedules.
Creators & Guests
What is Add Ten Gallons Concrete Podcast?
Welcome to the Add 10 Gallons Concrete Podcast, where show hosts Paul Fendley and Joey Bell discuss everything related to the concrete industry. Join us as we explore topics ranging from concrete production and materials to construction, quality control, academia, equipment, manufacturing, industry shows, conventions, and other key issues pertinent to the concrete industry.
Alright. Welcome back to Concrete Works 2024. Excited to sit here with the man, the myth, the legend, Dustin Ochs Hyland. Thank you for being here, brother.
Speaker 2:Thanks for having me. I'm glad to be here.
Speaker 1:Does anybody call you Ox anymore?
Speaker 2:No. That, I think left me when I grade first left college and went to Washington DC.
Speaker 3:I still refer to him as Ox. He'll always be Ox. Like, it's it's still weird to me to hear people calling Dustin. It's like, like Ox, Smithful, Flounder, you know, all all of our old cronies from back in the AGR days. Like, the nickname's just just stuck.
Speaker 3:Like, I don't know anybody. Is anybody else? Yeah.
Speaker 2:I I mean, I still go. We were just out on a fishing trip with those guys, and, yeah, the nicknames are still alive and well for sure.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. That's awesome. So for those that don't know, Dustin and Joey and I, we all went to school together. We were in the same fraternity together, and that was almost 20 years ago now that we did all that.
Speaker 2:A different life. I've known Charlie Sours for since, the spring of 04. So, yeah, 20 years exactly.
Speaker 1:20 years. And it's it's interesting. I go back and I think about the Dustin Highland I knew in college. He was just this fun, like, guy who always was, like, down for a good time, and now I I'd have the Dustin Highland 20 years later who's freaking a big shot in concrete supply company, and and you you're the man. So what's what's that what's that change been like for you growing through this industry?
Speaker 2:Oh, man. Growing up is never easy or fun, but here we are. Like, you you do it, and the industry has been great to me. I know that for sure. It's, it's definitely helped mold me and make me more responsible and because there's a lot of responsibility with what we're doing in in ready mix concrete and construction in general.
Speaker 2:Just, you know, sometimes you don't wanna you don't think about it, but sometimes lives can be on the line if if your concrete isn't quality and you're not doing things by best practices.
Speaker 1:Well, we were just going over some of the ACI codes and, like, your knowledge of the different codes and the different things you're looking for and then your, way of critically thinking through some of these problems. I I was really impressed just just a minute ago. I was like, dang. This and I was thinking back to the aux I knew from college. It's just, like, the funniest guy in the world, and here you are freaking running the world, man.
Speaker 2:Well, yeah. I mean, you gotta know what you do. Right? You gotta be a you gotta be an expert in your, like, what is it that the old saying, master jack of all trades, but a master of 1 is how I I've I've always heard it. And so master that one thing and be the best at it that you can and you know it backwards and forwards in that way.
Speaker 1:What's your role right now at Concrete Supply? What are you just
Speaker 2:So, so my my title is quality manager, for and I'm in the Charlotte area for Concrete Supply, which is our larger market. We're doing about a 1000000 cubic yards a year in that market through a ton, out of about 20 concrete plants.
Speaker 1:Wow. 1000000 yards of Charlotte. Yeah. That's pretty good.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Yeah. Last year I mean, there's been a little bit slowdown this year. I elections kinda do that to any industry, but the the in the last few years, we built we were building maybe 3 or 4 high rises at a time. Wow.
Speaker 2:And now we're now we're kinda focused. You know, these industries go through phases. Now we're doing the infrastructure projects, water treatment plants a lot. A lot of smaller multifamily still. A lot of people still moving to Charlotte.
Speaker 2:I I mean, I personally moved there in 21, kinda as COVID was ending, and a lot of people had left New York City, New Jersey, and moved down the coast to to Charlotte. And so that explosion of people, it were you know, the city's still catching up and figuring all that out.
Speaker 1:There's so many places that have a shortage of single family housing. It's unbelievable.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Charlotte's definitely one of them. And then, well, Charlotte finally passed the like, a city city plan, the 20 40 city plan right after I got there, and it really refocused on changing some of those those those codes those building codes so that you could build, like, multifamily in a in a suburb that was traditionally single family houses only to help aid in that in that explosion of people so they could get more houses for people.
Speaker 1:It's interesting you say that. They just changed the code in my brother's, like, town. He lives in York, Pennsylvania, just central south central Pennsylvania. And, they just changed that there. The whole town was up in arms, actually.
Speaker 2:Because Yeah. Some people are certainly upset. They were like, I don't want a, you know, a townhome unit going up next to me. However, when you're when you're tight on space, it's not like Dallas, Texas where I lived for years, and there's all this infrastructure of in roads and tollways that can get people, you know, across the city efficiently. Charlotte is still very it's a very old city, and so it's hard to expand the roadways and the interstates efficiently and effectively.
Speaker 2:So it it almost becomes like an Austin where you get that congestion. Mhmm. And so people don't wanna live on the outskirts of town if they're working in the city. So it's hard to how do you how do you solve that?
Speaker 1:Well, that's interesting. You you came from Texas. What were you doing out there?
Speaker 2:So, originally, I was with, US Concrete, which has now been acquired by Vulcan recently. I believe that was a year or 2 ago now. I was there I I started out as just a you know, as anybody in the in the in the field testing mixes, tech testing trucks, learning the business, worked my way up to running our lab there in the in the Dallas area, doing the the gradations to mix mix designs in the lab. And then the Toyota 1 project came, and I get my company gave me an opportunity to become the 1st project management project manager at that company. Just they needed someone sales can't be on the job 247.
Speaker 2:They needed someone. It was a 150,000 yards. We did it in 12 months.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 2:So they needed someone out there that could liaison between sales and operations and quality control to work with take the customers to breakfast or lunch, bring, you know, bring the driver's biscuits like a sales guy would do, make sure the drivers are aren't spending an hour at the washout rack or the washout pits, getting back to the plant, make it sometimes they're running 2 pumps at a time, making sure they're going to the right pump, and then working with the the third party lab on-site to make sure they're they're taking and testing concrete and being able to fix mixes. So that way, our field techs could stay at the plants and make sure they're sending me good a good quality product.
Speaker 1:Man, talk about growing up on a job. Yeah. Man.
Speaker 2:I asked, they gave me the they gave me the position, and I'm like, so what's the position gonna do? And they're like, yeah. You're gonna come back and tell me. Well, thank you for the clarity, mister Bossman. I will I will go figure this out, I guess.
Speaker 1:That's awesome, dude. That's a good story. I like that.
Speaker 3:Was that, was that your first job out of the out of college?
Speaker 2:Where'd you
Speaker 3:go for that?
Speaker 2:So I I did start with US Concrete right out of college. However, I actually started in the DC area
Speaker 3:Oh, okay.
Speaker 2:With the, with the on-site division, ran by Mandy Shepherd and Roberta Talavera at the time and Steve Youngerman. And they were running, the DC City the DC City Center project with a sister company called Superior.
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:And so that was a really cool project. 7 tower cranes, large underground excavation, pouring, parking decks.
Speaker 1:Wow. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2:And and just kinda learn getting my feet wet, learning, you know, testing concrete mixes, get making sure stuff was right on-site, making some cylinders, making sure they get over to the la the sister lab to get broken and such. But I was only there for about 3 months, and then, excuse me, they couldn't get interns in Oklahoma for this Chisholm View wind farm project. So they're like, do you mind? I was like, no. I'll go out there.
Speaker 2:They'll work for a month out in the middle of no Hunter, Oklahoma, which is in between Enid, Oklahoma and Ponca City.
Speaker 1:Both You're still naming cities nobody's ever heard of.
Speaker 2:Exactly. Exactly. So I was out there for about a month, and then they're like, hey. You don't mind seem to be behind being on the road. We got a we got a levee pumping station project in New Orleans that we're finishing up, and the guy out there is really needing some help.
Speaker 2:So by by this point, I've learned how to kinda batch concrete, test concrete, just the basics. I've been doing it for, you know, 6 months at this point. And so I go out there, and I was out in New Orleans for another 6 or 7 months just batching concrete. That was a really interesting project because by that point, we we the the job site was actually down the intercoastal at and the main structure was done. They were just pouring, like, the large bollards and such.
Speaker 2:And so everything had to get loaded onto a barge and be barged downriver and placed. And so we'd have a couple big pours a week, and I was there until the plant shut down. And then, on-site didn't have enough work to keep me staffed, but they didn't wanna lose me, so they transferred me out to Dallas, Texas. Of course, I got to Dallas, and they immediately sent me back to Oklahoma to run a portable project for another 8 months.
Speaker 1:So Dude, life life on a portable site. It's rough. Oh,
Speaker 2:yeah. Oh, man. I mean, it's it's kinda nice because I tell people portable work can be some of the easiest work because you get you get your material set. You can't have this vast variation in material sets. You get you you get what's there.
Speaker 3:It's just for the project. It's just the material for the project. It's not like a regular ready mix plan. Right.
Speaker 1:Where I have
Speaker 2:to have I have, like, 5,000 mix designs for me to conquer my concrete pipes right now.
Speaker 1:But but when I'm on these sites, not always at crazy hours because you gotta you conquer your guys for whatever reason. You have to be out of the way of everyone else. They're, you know, set of people making way for us. You know, we gotta be out of their way. So we're pouring it, you know, midnight, 2 AM every time.
Speaker 1:But what was I I don't remember any portal settles ever on that the plant worked exactly how the plant is supposed to work, and there's nobody to call. Like, you climb up there and you start banging on it with a hammer. Mhmm.
Speaker 2:Yeah. I was lucky we had a sister company called Atlas Tuck at the time and just down the road. So they'd send me drivers every day, and then they had to get maintenance going staff. So
Speaker 1:You're bull you were blessed.
Speaker 2:That was bust. Say that. I mean, it did take a good 2 or 3 months before they you know, they set these portable plants up so quick.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:The guy setting it up sets it up in, like
Speaker 3:You can set one up in a week, probably.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Well, they set it up in 3 days and then wait for the maintenance guy to come back and, oh, like, your gates aren't weighing upright or your powders aren't. And then, oh, it's because I did they didn't tighten down that MAC valve or that Schrader valve that, like, you know, came loose in trans in transit because they're not checking every connection. So it takes a few months, but once you get your mixes you have 5 mix designs and you get them dialed in, you just know. And then you're only working with 1 customer, so it's just like, when you want a 4, you know, how how what what kind of rate are we doing okay?
Speaker 1:So
Speaker 2:you just hammer them or
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:Go slow. So it it gets easier over time, but about the time you you figure it out, you're, you know, you're you're wrapping up and you're going on to the next one.
Speaker 3:No. It balances out for sure. Because I remember, you know, the old job with all the airfield, paving and stuff that we were doing. When you were busy, like, you were busy. Like, you were doing those 14, 16, however long, you know, how however long hour days.
Speaker 3:But on the slow days, you're, like, stocking material. You're playing in a loader. You know, you're racking up sand all day or for a couple days, and then you're working on a plan. And, yeah, you it it balances out for sure.
Speaker 2:Yeah. I I certainly remember the end of that project. We're, like, we're getting down to doing, like, sidewalks and stuff, and so they need, like, 40 yards of sidewalk, like, 10 yards every 2 hours or something. Right? Yep.
Speaker 2:And so, like, it sent me 2 drivers. So I get in the batch house, load the 1st truck, the driver the other driver come in, we start watching a movie. I'd be like, oh, no. That the first driver get back. That driver go catch a load.
Speaker 2:He'd come in, watch movies with me. So you're just kinda like, well, that's the job. I I can't leave. I can't do any there's nothing else. Inventory's done.
Speaker 2:Paperwork's done.
Speaker 1:Yep. That's great.
Speaker 2:Wait for the guy to call for another load.
Speaker 3:That's right. Just sit there till till somebody tells you what to do.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Well, how's this concrete works been treating you? You've been having a good time with this show?
Speaker 2:Oh, this this show has been great. It's it's been one of the bigger shows, obviously, with COVID. It they started they started getting smaller, and it's taken a taking a little while to rebound. However, I mean, the expo hall has been great. Seems like there's a lot of people here.
Speaker 2:Another I just heard there's another record, with the number of drivers we had in the rodeo this year.
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:Record number of female drivers in the rodeo this year.
Speaker 3:That's cool.
Speaker 1:Record number of just participants is what I heard as well. They're walking the hall. It's been way busier than I thought I expected.
Speaker 2:There's gotta be, like, over a 1000 people.
Speaker 1:That's what they said. I think 1300 was number.
Speaker 2:Okay. Wow. Yeah. So that's been great. And then the breakout sessions are always super informative with everything that's constantly changing in the in the landscape of concrete.
Speaker 2:I was at a breakout session the other day. You don't you don't read these legislations that come out of congress. You hear inflation reduction act, and you're like, okay. Well, that's gonna be something to do with finances, but, really, there's $4,000,000,000 allocated to buy green programs for for state and federal agencies.
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:Well, concrete is one of those one of the best sustainable materials out there. So, a lot of that money is gonna go to benchmarking our the products and and figuring out ways to to to lower that that carbon load and how that money can get to the suppliers to to help help those benchmarking things.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yeah. I'm excited. We're we're actually gonna have Ben Grimsley on from Lithgow in a future. I've done a full length episode, and he's gonna go into what they're looking at for sustainability, which is interesting because part of that is a culture change, you know, with the construction world and the concrete world to say, like, we can be drivers of it.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. And it doesn't have to impact you as much as people like to say.
Speaker 2:No. And I I'm I'm blessed to be at a company that's one of the on the forefront of the sustainability thing. We just finished a project, with with Lithgow and Walter P. Moore, called The Pearl. It's a so Wake Forest, Atrium Learning Hospital there in downtown Charlotte and Walter P.
Speaker 2:Moore. Well, the specification that allowed us because they they challenged us to to lower GWP by 25 to 30%, and we were able to hit those targets with their specification using really high fly ash, 40% ash mixes in their footings, and shear walls were scheduled to allow for 56 day mixes. And then taking a hard look at what we need to get a high early mix that still hit 7,000 PSI that can kinda that can keep up with the schedule as best we can.
Speaker 1:It's all about the schedule.
Speaker 2:There was definitely conversations once they, you know once you go, well, I I need this carbon goal. Well and then the contractor goes, well, you want this schedule goal too, and those are opposing goals.
Speaker 1:So
Speaker 2:what's the best blend to get everybody to make everybody happy?
Speaker 1:When the would the owner was at the table with that discussion as well just to say yes or no?
Speaker 2:I was left out of those discussions because as a producer, I'm just like, here's what is possible. It's always like they say start of the possible. Like, this is the best we can do. This is the, you know, here's the best we can do on sustainability, and you get a 3 day break. Or we don't meet the goal, and you can get your 1 or 2 day breaks.
Speaker 2:So here's our best option, and then then and that's where, like, Ben Grimsley will come in and take it to take it to the to the engineer and the owners Gotcha. And sit down and value value engineer the product the best they can to to figure it out. Or maybe they can make up schedule at other places than the concrete. But that's that's why Ben has a, you know, a whole field. It's a whole it's a whole thing.
Speaker 1:Well, I mean, we look forward talking to him in the future, but we were happy to have you now. So thank you so much for coming on the add 10 gallons concrete podcast.
Speaker 2:Yeah. It's a pleasure to be here. I really enjoyed it.