Nate Emerson runs Armadillo Excavation in Chattanooga, TN. Nate grew up on a 100-acre farm in Giles County, about an hour south of Nashville. After 2 years of college studying construction management, Nate knew that it wasn’t for him, and made a hard pivot to working in the music industry, selling merchandise, and doing stagehand work. After some office work experience, Nate found himself staring out the window into the Chattanooga mountains and realized that was where he needed to be. So he started chatting with local contractors and before he knew it, he was digging a basement on the side of a mountain. The rest, as they say, is history.

This week on Dirt Talk, host Aaron Witt and Nate Emerson of Armadillo Excavation discuss the primal instinct to want to get out in the dirt, learning the hard lesson that building a business is mostly just making it up as you go, and doing hard things for your own mental wellness.

Follow along with Nate’s story on IG at @armadilloexcavationllc.

—

DirtWorld.com

Let’s build a BETTER DIRT WORLD

Without the Dirt World, we wouldn’t have the food, clean water, electricity, roads, or shelter required for survival. Demand for the industry is growing, yet over 40% of our workforce will retire by 2031. We must add hundreds of thousands of people every year only to keep up...

So let’s fix that.

What if society viewed our profession as noble? What if parents were proud when their kids declared they wanted to be in the Dirt World? What if a workforce shortage was no longer a worry?

Now is the time for us all to work together to build a movement. We need to tell our industry's story, further care for and train our existing workforce, and create clear pathways for people to join and succeed in the Dirt World. It's all possible, but only together, and time is of the essence. Help us secure the future of the Dirt World.

Listen to Dirt Talk:

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2GK5UWkulNJ6tNFXvWngMt?si=2332acb8e2954301

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/dirt-talk-by-buildwitt/id1494235724

Google Podcasts: https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuYnV6enNwcm91dC5jb20vNzc5NjAz

Stay Dirty!