Hello, everyone, and welcome to this episode of stamping the envelope. I'm your host Tyler Kern. Thanks so much for joining us here for this episode today. Now today, we're chatting with Randy Watt senior vice president and general manager of AGI Architectural branding to learn more about the importance of rain screens to both building owners and general contractors Randy, welcome to the podcast. Thanks for joining me. Thank you, Tyler, for having you for having us. It's our pleasure to address this Symphony envelope audience today. Well, I'm thrilled to have you on, Randy. And just to to get things kicked off and to get things moving, I'd love to hear a little bit more about your background in the industry. Your experience and now your role at AGI. Thank you, Tyler. Well, I've I've been in the industry pretty much all my life. I guess I would have to say that I was born in the industry tree. My dad was in it before me, and I guess as a young man, I wanted to follow my dad. I was so appreciative and enamored by what he did. In this industry. And so I've only worked with two firms over my entire working career. And so fortunate to be with AGI. I tell you the the integrity of this organization, it just makes me proud to be a part of it. And I am fortunate enough to be a senior vice president, general manager of a division called Architectural branding for AGI. Been here a number of years, and Elizabeth feel very blessed to be associated with this organization. So give us a little bit more background maybe for people who aren't familiar with AGI. Give us some background on on what you do, the products you provide, and the industries that you serve Well, AGI has been in business for over fifty years, and its mainstay is signage and identity products and way finding products for the Fortune five hundred in in America. And, you know, one of the biggest in in this industry leader. And One of the things that we decided many years back is our customers were urging us to get into a separate line of products that we weren't really supporting at that time, and that was exterior imaging as it comes to building storefronts and architectural elements and facial per se. And we knew that if we were gonna do that, we wanted to launch with a product that we were proud of. You know, one of the things that carries forward in the AGI organization is that anything we do, we're gonna do it well. So throughout our products and services, that motto sticks with us. So towards this subject today, we started developing a product line designed around architectural branding of the exterior of some of our main customers in the automotive industry, banking, restaurant, you name it. If they're in a Fortune five hundred, we probably have served them at some time or another. And some of our automotive customers who we play a big role with were the ones that urged us to get into this market line. And it has been very, very rewarding for us. We knew that we had to develop some products that were built with great integrity. The last thing we wanted to do with our customers was put an inferior product on the market. We have relationships that go back decades and we couldn't embarrass our cell embarrass ourselves with a product that didn't represent us well. So we put a lot of effort in design and engineering a product that we're very proud of. It's our pressure equalized range screen, which we're here to talk about today. It's one of many of our lines of products. We we actually work with many materials and substrates to create the architectural elements and facades for our customers, but the product we're speaking about today is a pressure equalized rain screen system developed around the ACM industry. Absolutely. So as we dive in and and talk a little bit more about the the pressure equalized rain screens. I would love to hear just your perspective, Randy, on what helps this product stand out from maybe the rest of your competition? Tell us tell us about this product and what makes it so unique and special. Well, Tyler, most of our audience will know. ACM has been predominant and the architecture over the last few decades. It's used in in the automotive industry at I won't say exclusively, but predominantly today, and many of the big box stores, retailers, restaurants, and other industries that we serve. So ACM is is a product and and it's it's a great product and the fact that it has long useful life, paint finishes, many colors, and, you know, it kinda gets away from the old bricks and mortar and glass that, you know, much of the industry was limited to before ACM got into the marketplace. But it's more our development is not so much around the ACM, but the system or the products that allows the ACM to be installed on the building. We had to develop a system that was able to withstand high wind pressures small and large missile penetration or deflect that penetration. We had to screen off moisture from the building's envelope. And so we put together a a large team of engineers and designers to develop such a system. We had a great knowledge of the products that were already on the market, and we wanted to make sure that we had one of the better products on the market So we spent a lot of time making sure that we had one that would serve us well for many, many decades. And in that process, we also decided that we wanted to have our products tested by some independent labs so that we weren't just working off of ego thinking that our products were good, but that we had products that the rest of the industry would acknowledge as being superior products. And so in working with those labs, we had to go through all the standard testing that was required, especially around coastal America. So all of the standard AMA five zero eight, five zero nine, ASTMs, two eighty three, three thirty, three thirty one, getting into testing architectural standards of tier one, tier two, tier three, and other test standards. So designing around those and putting it into the labs, it was my intent to build a product that would exceed the North American standards or requirements. As a matter of fact, I remember telling the lab I want you to take our product to failure. I want you to put as much pressure it takes as it takes on our product to make it fail. And after taking the product to a high level, they came back to me and said, mister Watts, we We don't feel like we can take this product to failure because it would be catastrophic to our lab and possibly a personnel. So they took it above what was required in North America and stop the testing. So we know that we have a product that will serve North America well from anywhere down to Key West Florida, anywhere around the coastal rim, realm, all throughout Central North America, Canada, the Southwest, the southeast, we just we have a product that we have a lot of confidence in. That's really incredible to hear about. You know? And and I wanna go back to what you were saying earlier about, you know, developing these products because of as the request of of clients that you had had for decades, right? People were asking for a product like this. So did you feel like to a certain extent that AGI's reputation kind of on the line, and that's why you put so much time, effort, and money into testing these products as as strenuously as you could. That's right. Being in the identity and the architectural arena of Tyler, we just could not afford to put a product out there and have it fail. So we just had to put all the front end work and effort in to know that we had great assurance that this product was gonna be one that would have great useful life. As a matter of fact, we have never had a structural failure associated with weather or or any other element, no no warranty claims. We have some of the most favorable warranties in the industry. We offer a five year bumper to bumper warranty on material and labor. We also offer a twenty year pass through warranty that's provided through the ACM suppliers that we work with. So a warranty that I don't think has surpassed by anyone else out there. And quite frankly, we can offer that warranty not because we're adding costs to cover, but because of our confidence in our product. When we designed this product, not only did we design, we went back and value engineered it as well because we wanted a product that was very durable and long lasting, but yet not a product that we had engineered a lot of surplus costs in. We knew that we had to be economically in the market. We'll probably never be the lowest cost product out there because there's a lot of product that have not been tested, and will not stand up to what we have put our product through. And we don't try and sell against those guys, we try and sell to customers that appreciate quality products. So, Randy, you've done a great job really outlining the importance of this product and and and the reasons why it exists, but talk to me specifically, just about the importance that this product holds for general contractors and building owners specifically throughout the life cycle of this product. Thank you for the opportunity to answer that, Tyler. It's very important for us, for our customers, both the contractor and the end user to have a quality experience with AGI. We we have a full complement of services starting with our architectural services, our engineers, our designers, our manufacturing staff in our plant. And then, of course, our project managers overseeing the product being installed in the field and then signed off by the customer. We don't take anything for granted. Many of our competitors will simply manufacture this product in the field. We we don't feel comfortable with that. We want a product that as we said, you know, tested and proven and manufactured in a facility that that we know that no corners have been cut in any way. And again, I mentioned project management, but all of our job sites have project management and attention in the field. We're overseeing the installation and all the details there on the facility. So it's very important for us to make sure that the GC has confidence in us that he's getting a product that he doesn't have to worry about. And that the end user or end user knows that you gain a product that will have long lasting durable life. Yeah. We wanted to make sure that we mitigate any risk that a general contractor would have with Mole, milled you, a misinstalled product, or or any risk that may affect his warranty with the end user. But we're also making sure that we don't have an issue. You know, we're we're we deal with a lot of volume, and we don't wanna be going back and addressing problem issues that are behind us. So and we have not had that problem because of our attention to detail. We actually work with many of our GCs repetitively over and over and over in, and we feel like that's because of their confidence in us. And as I said, you know, we have relationships with most of these end end users. We've worked with them, you know, for many years in the automotive, the banking, and the retail environments. And we know that we have to maintain their confidence in us that their brand standards are being guarded by us. Well, and one of the things I find particularly interesting and and quite frankly amazing about this is that obviously weather and the the different conditions and factors that you're gonna find in parts of the country are are varied and different, right? Like you mentioned, Key West is gonna have different, you know, weather problems and the, you know, and concerns than Seattle or Boston. You know, all these other places, that to me is particularly fascinating just that the product is effective everywhere no matter what the the different conditions might be. Well, that's right, Tyler. Kind of the standard for all systems is Florida, Dade County, Florida that's some of the most extreme testing in North America. And we knew that if we designed around their criteria, we'd have a system that would surpass anywhere else in in the US. Our system is rated, like I say, anywhere in North America down below key west and beyond, Not only in the pressure and rain screen, small and large missile testing, but also we test it for expansion and contraction. Get into the southeast, Southwest, where you have high temperatures, you get into the north, where you have very cold temperatures. You have to have a system that will deal with the expansion and contraction that occurs, you know, daily and, you know, over decades fatiguing and and tearing systems apart. So there's there's a lot to to be considered when you design one of these systems. And we didn't wanna just have one of these systems that was built on-site with you know, a few angles and various extruded materials and some ACM attached to a building, we wanted to have a system that was engineered and designed to perform well. Guttering off all of that rain, moisture, and wind pressures Also expanding and contracting as required all across America. Absolutely. Now, everything we've talked about obviously is aimed at the goal of delivering excellence for your customers on a on a routine basis. And given the the durability, the reliability of your products as you've you've out here during this conversation. It sounds like you do that on an incredibly consistent basis. Talk me through the the process for meeting with customers early on in the process lay out the various steps that lead to that success. How important is that step in this entire process and just kind of speak to the value that that provides? Yeah. Well, Tyler, it's kinda twofold for us. We have brand standard sensitivity for many of our customers We work with General Motors, Ford, Lexus Mercedes Benz, Hyundai. You name it in the automotive world. We work with many of the banks, many of the merging banks today. And so we have relationship with them and a responsibility to honor their brand standards. But for the most part, we're taking those brand standards and applying in one contract at a time to our g c base. So we work in contract through g c's, and we wanna offer them a product that not only for the end user respects their brand standards, but for the g c, gives him a great quality product to offer to the end user as well. And we will do whatever we have to do to make sure there's been a good experience for both the g c and the end user. In utilizing our products and services. Absolutely. Now, when it comes to to GCs, what types of questions do you often get from them what are some maybe frequently asked questions that you get that maybe you could answer here for us to maybe calm some of the nerves or the questions that you get from general contractors? Yeah. Well, depending on if it's a renovation or a ground up new bill, they're always interested in the time cycle. How long it takes us to take a product from contract to installation and and sign offs. So we have a very fine process it would go through, and we lay that out step by step for the GC audience, letting them know that we have a professional team of project managers and directors that will take their project seamlessly through the process. We meet with them early in the contract and make sure we're on the same page with the time phase of their building schedule, and monitor it all the way through, making sure that we are never the cause for the miss of a grand opening or an interruption of a a building phase. Now what about from the perspective of of building owners? Do do they have questions for you often Obviously, they they interact quite a bit with with general contractors, but but what concerns do building owners often have? And what do they wanna know? The building owners are are typically you know, more concerned about the the durable, useful life of the product. You know? How was the was the required maintenance? How long will it last? What can I expecting ten, twenty, thirty years from this product? And like I said before, I think we have an unmatched warranty out there, five year bumper to bumper materials and labor. We offer a twenty year Finnish warranty on the ACM itself, meaning that the colors are gonna be fresh and vibrant for decades. So that's what they're mostly interested in. My facility gonna stay looking this good. For years to come. Absolutely. So Randy, you've done a fantastic job of explaining everything about this this this product, everything from the development to the testing, to the durability, to, you know, any questions that general contractors have about utilizing it. So what final thoughts and conclusions do you want to leave our audience with here today? Is there anything that you wanna make sure that they understand either that we haven't talked about yet or that you'd like to reiterate to people before we sign off today? Well, obviously, as I said early, I'm very proud of being associated and a member of AGI. I hope that the audience will check us out on a g I dot net. And see all the offerings and surfaces we we have out there from brand identity to architectural elements, interior, exterior, We have a division that is focused on lighting and maintenance, just many, many opportunities in in working with and we work closely together the various divisions to support one another as we know about customers' needs and recommendations. You heard Randy. For more, go to a g I dot net. You can read more information there, get in touch with them, and and ask any questions that you have maybe even following this podcast. So make sure to go to a g I dot net for more information. Well, excellent stuff, Randy Watts, Senior Vice President and general manager for a g I architectural Randy, thank you so much for joining us here on stamping the envelope. Tyler, thank you for having us. It's such a pleasure to be able to address this off the audience. And we know that there'll be future podcasts with other lines of product and other subject matter. But thank you so much for having us. Well, it's been a pleasure having a a member of the AGI team on the podcast with us here today. We appreciate it very much. For more on AGI, Make sure to go visit agi dot net. And stay tuned for upcoming episodes of stamping the envelope where we talk to a variety of people like Randy mentioned across this world and across industry. So make sure to stay tuned for upcoming episodes with more expertise and thought leadership coming very soon on stamping the envelope. You can subscribe on stamping the envelope dot com or on Apple Podcast or Spotify to stay up to date with the latest episodes. And stay tuned. We'll be back soon with new episodes of the show, but for this one for Randy Watts, my guest, I've been your host, Tyler Kern. For joining us.
