The Veit Contracting Story w/ Kelly and Vaughn Veit – DT 326

Summary

Podcast Summary: Dirt Talk by BuildWitt Episode: The Veit Contracting Story w/ Kelly and Vaughn Veit – DT 326
Release Date: April 3, 2025
Host: BuildWitt
Guests: Kelly Veit and Grant Veit

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Introduction

In episode DT 326 of "Dirt Talk by BuildWitt," host Vaughn Veit sits down with Kelly Veit and Grant Veit to delve into the rich history, operational intricacies, and personal stories of Veit Contracting. The conversation offers listeners an insider's perspective on the company's evolution, challenges, and the enduring family legacy that drives its success.

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Company History and Growth

Kelly Veit provides a comprehensive overview of Veit Contracting's origins, tracing the company's roots back to his grandfather's endeavors as a truck farmer in the early 20th century. Transitioning through generations, Kelly recounts how his father expanded the business by acquiring dump trucks during the Depression era, laying the foundation for what would become a multifaceted contracting powerhouse.

• Quote: "We started out as truck farmers, raising vegetables and then pivoted to renting dump trucks to counties during the Great Depression." [03:16]

Kelly took over the company in 1975 at the age of 26, a transition that marked the beginning of significant organic growth. From a modest revenue of $363,000 in 1975, Veit Contracting has burgeoned to approach half a billion dollars in annual volume, now operating in 22 states.

• Quote: "Since taking over in '75, we've grown from 363K to nearly half a billion dollars in volume." [06:03]

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Personal Stories and Company Culture

The Veit family emphasizes a strong cultural foundation within the company. Kelly shares anecdotes from his youth, highlighting his early involvement in the business, from shoveling in sewers at 14 to managing scrap iron operations with his uncle.

• Quote: "I was making $100 a week at 14, which made me the richest kid in the neighborhood." [07:18]

The conversation also touches on the company's commitment to maintaining a respectful and inclusive work environment. Kelly recalls his determination to improve office spaces to foster better communication and employee well-being.

• Quote: "I convinced my dad to expand our office space because the original setup was too cramped and ineffective." [12:08]

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Technology and Innovation

Veit Contracting prides itself on staying ahead of technological advancements in the construction and demolition industries. Kelly discusses the adoption of robotics, GPS-enabled machinery, and drone technology to enhance efficiency and safety on job sites.

• Quote: "We utilize drones that fly at 380 miles an hour, completing topographical surveys in just eight minutes." [21:09]

The company also explores innovative solutions like plastic backhoe buckets that are designed for easy replacement, minimizing downtime and maintenance costs.

• Quote: "One of the things on the drawing board is a backhoe bucket out of plastic that you can simply replace when it's worn out." [38:17]

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Challenges and Lessons Learned

The Veit family candidly discusses significant challenges, including managing a massive landfill operation and addressing the opioid crisis prevalent in the construction industry. Kelly shares his personal battle with alcoholism, emphasizing the importance of mental health support within the company.

• Quote: "I'm alcohol. I've been sober since January, and it's been a crucial part of my journey." [61:08]

Grant Veit highlights the company's strategies for fostering an inclusive environment while maintaining the rugged, authentic culture that defines the construction industry.

• Quote: "We need to respect the pride of the industry while evolving to be more inclusive for everyone." [47:12]

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Legacy and Future Plans

Looking ahead, the Veit family outlines their vision for sustaining the company's legacy through the establishment of a foundation. This foundation aims to ensure that Veit Contracting continues to thrive and give back to the community long after the current leadership steps down.

• Quote: "Upon our passing, the enterprise will be owned by a foundation, ensuring its perpetuity and ongoing philanthropic efforts." [58:56]

The discussion also touches on strategic goals, such as achieving a 5% compounded annual growth rate by 2030, and the importance of empowering division leaders to drive their sectors autonomously.

• Quote: "Empowering our division leaders is key to our sustained growth and success." [57:07]

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Conclusion

Episode DT 326 offers a deep dive into Veit Contracting's storied past, present innovations, and future aspirations. Kelly and Grant Veit provide inspiring insights into balancing tradition with progress, the significance of family legacy in business, and the unwavering commitment to excellence that defines Veit Contracting. Listeners gain a profound understanding of the values and strategies that have propelled the company to its esteemed position in the Dirt World.

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Notable Quotes:

• "We do backhoes, everything. 100%." — Kelly Veit [04:06]
• "Every piece of paper goes to the office of Germany, hashtag four eyes on it." — Kelly Veit [54:48]
• "Never settle, dig deeper for excellence." — Grant Veit [46:34]
• "If you're 100 grand and we can get three times the mileage out... you ain't going to find out unless you try it." — Kelly Veit [15:10]

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This episode serves as both a testament to Veit Contracting's enduring legacy and a blueprint for future growth, embodying the principles of resilience, innovation, and family-driven success.

Transcript

[Vaughn]

For the first time ever, I am thrilled to say we have an official sponsor for the Dirt Talk podcast, and that's Ariat. I've worn Ariat boots on every job site I've visited over the years, traveling in them across five continents. More importantly, I have yet to find a single project where working folks, unlike me, are not wearing Ariat boots and workwear in every condition imaginable. And there's really good reason for that, and that's because it's phenomenal stuff. And the more I've learned about Ariat and the company, the more I've loved their brand. So with this, Ariat is offering any dirt talk listener 10% off their next Ariat order at ariat.com dirt talk that's 10% off boots, jeans, and [e-mail] dirt talk or at the link in this episode's description. With that, let's get to the show. As we get going here, can you explain the story of the ghost flames on everything?

[Kelly]

Well, I've always liked flames on hot rods, but on my car, they a little too wild for riding around for work. So I put the ghost flames. They're pretty subtle.

[Vaughn]

But why ghost flames?

[Kelly]

Hot rods always have flames on them. I always wanted my car to be a little bit different.

[Vaughn]

Yeah, but they're on everything.

[Kelly]

Well, yeah, we do it on trucks. Anybody the drivers that want them, we put them on. Really? Not everybody's into it. It's a car guy thing. You gotta be a car guy. Yeah.

[Vaughn]

Does your car have flames on it?

[Grant]

It did.

[Vaughn]

Oh, it did.

[Kelly]

It did. Yeah.

[Grant]

And then I switched. We had a burglar out on the property. So I'm like, I want a car that nobody recognizes. I just want to be undercover. So we sent the ghost flame vehicle down to Texas to be on that property. And it's a little bit different to have a flame vehicle in Texas than it is in Minnesota.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Grant]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, yeah. So then we shipped it back up here, and now we have two flame ones at the main house. Yeah. But no, I just drive a nondescript vehicle.

[Vaughn]

Really?

[Grant]

Except for the license plate.

[Vaughn]

Yeah, I haven't put flames on mine yet. But I'm thinking about it.

[Kelly]

It's just a cheap old Escalade.

[Grant]

Yeah, that's right. Just a cheap little Escalade.

[Kelly]

But part of the thing was, is she told me the story was that as a CEO, she didn't think she would dive in flames. She said something more formal.

[Vaughn]

Yeah. More professional, fair.

[Grant]

It was the first vehicle that he was willing to not put flames on. So tucking in the burglar.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Grant]

Really brought the theory home.

[Vaughn]

Did you grow up here?

[Kelly]

Yeah, it's down the road about 10 miles.

[Vaughn]

Okay. So you've been here your whole life?

[Kelly]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Vaughn]

Wow. Yeah. Where did the company start here by.

[Kelly]

No, it actually started in a little town, Hamill. My grandfather started. He's a truck farmer.

[Vaughn]

Okay.

[Kelly]

Then my dad moved it to Brooklyn park, and that's down the freeway here ways. And then in 80 or 79 or 80. I bought this land because our shop was so small. We couldn't get heavy equipment in. The doors. Yeah, we went. We had 12 foot doors and you couldn't get a 12 and a half foot D8 through there. So then we had 16 foot doors. Now we got 20 foot doors. We're building a new shop this year.

[Vaughn]

Okay.

[Kelly]

So it's going to have 20 foot doors on it here. Yeah.

[Vaughn]

Wow.

[Kelly]

We're adding on here.

[Vaughn]

Very nice.

[Kelly]

Yeah, but you know, we gotta be four and a half stories high so we get big cranes in because we rebuild a lot of machines.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

Yeah. I think 13 this year, wasn't it? I think so.

[Grant]

Have to ask Grant for sure.

[Kelly]

We can take a D6, you know, a new one. 660. Yeah, we totally do like a car frame off. Just assemble 100%. All new wiring, new hoses, overhaul the engines. Any modern upgrades, we do them for about 330.

[Vaughn]

Wow.

[Kelly]

So, you know, you're saving, you know, 3, 400,000 a year. We do backhoes, everything. 100%.

[Vaughn]

Scrapers.

[Kelly]

Yeah, just take them 100% apart.

[Vaughn]

The original business, it was trucking.

[Kelly]

I started out as truck farmer. You know what that is?

[Vaughn]

No.

[Kelly]

The farmers raise vegetables and take them to the farmer's market and sell them. And then in the 30s, the counties didn't have any money during the Depression.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

My grandpa started buying dump trucks and renting them to the county.

[Vaughn]

Okay.

[Kelly]

That's how it got started.

[Vaughn]

So they would. And they would rather rent to save money.

[Kelly]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Vaughn]

Okay.

[Kelly]

But they had mucker trucks in them days. You know what that is?

[Vaughn]

No.

[Kelly]

It's a conveyor that's got like a plow and they pull it with a team of horses or a tractor and it plows the dirt up onto an elevator and goes up and it's just like. Goes in steady. It's a truck.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

Well, they cut the cab off them so you can get underneath the elevator. And then the next truck, when the one's full, the one behind it drives in. So the guy Drives. The guy that's driving in is getting rocks and dirt on his head. And they got to go fast. And then they just. Then they go and dump. And then he had what were called jiffy dumps. They didn't have hydraulics. You pull a lever and this pivot point was up front so gravity would dump it. It dumped instantly.

[Vaughn]

Sure.

[Kelly]

And pull them down manually and go back and get in line.

[Vaughn]

Okay.

[Kelly]

That's how I did road work then, man. Yeah.

[Vaughn]

So then. And then your dad took over.

[Kelly]

Grandpa died in 39, and then my dad took over and then he got into excavating and stuff.

[Vaughn]

Okay.

[Kelly]

Bought his first cat in November of 41.

[Vaughn]

Wow.

[Kelly]

Yeah. We're still buying cat.

[Vaughn]

Yeah. Yeah. You're a big cat fan, huh?

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

Kind of crazy because I took over in 75 that year. We're doing 363,000 a year in volume.

[Vaughn]

In 75.

[Kelly]

75 now we're approaching a half a billion.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

So the. Yeah. How big was the company? Was taking over the company always your plan or did it just happen?

[Kelly]

What do you mean? To grow it? Yeah.

[Grant]

Well, taking it over from your father.

[Vaughn]

Yeah, from your dad.

[Grant]

From your dad. Taking it over from your dad. Was that always your plan?

[Kelly]

Yeah, well, he made me president when I was 26.

[Vaughn]

Wow.

[Kelly]

His plan that I was supposed to take over.

[Vaughn]

Okay.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

What was your first job at the company?

[Kelly]

Shoveling in a Sewer. Ditch labor. 14 years old.

[Vaughn]

Okay.

[Grant]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

$$.

[Vaughn]

Yeah. So you grew up around the business?

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

Full time, essentially.

[Kelly]

Bottom all the way up.

[Grant]

What did you do for your uncle before that time?

[Kelly]

Oh, my uncle was a scrappy. You know what they are, they buy and sell scrap iron.

[Vaughn]

Okay.

[Kelly]

And I work for him and it's like from 10, 11 to 14. And he gave me 10% of the profits for wages.

[Vaughn]

Wow.

[Kelly]

And I was making 100, $110 a.

[Vaughn]

Week, I was gonna say. And that's.

[Grant]

That's the richest kid in the neighborhood.

[Kelly]

When I was 14, my dad said, your Uncle Frank's in a spoil. You got to come to work for me. He's paying you too much money. I'm going to work for a dollar an hour. What did you.

[Vaughn]

What did you do with the money? What did you spend the money on?

[Kelly]

Oh, I.22 rifles. All kinds of stuff. You know, Marbles.

[Vaughn]

Yeah. Fun stuff.

[Kelly]

Yeah. Marbles, huh? Yeah. I actually didn't buy marbles. I won them gambling. We played. It's like gambling. We play marbles, bet marbles instead of money.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

I still got my original marble collection. There's 4,500 marbles in a jar.

[Vaughn]

Really?

[Kelly]

Yeah. Then we also have a marble mine at home, a marble mine back in, I think it was the 90s. We were excavating an old landfill from the 30s and 40s, and the state said we couldn't put it in our landfill unless we screened everything over three inches of it. We're running through a gravel screener out the landfill. You know, you got the piles.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

And I'd walk around, there's marbles laying on the bottom. I got pockets full. Pretty soon I got a bucket carrying them. And as that landfill filled up, we had to get rid of that 10,000 yard pile. So we screened it down to quarter inch screen and we hauled that home and we got, I don't know, it's about quarter acre, eight feet high. And I disk it and it rains and Kelly and I go out there and pick marbles.

[Grant]

Oh, it's very competitive.

[Kelly]

We've got about 10,000 marbles we found. See, in the old days, you didn't have garbage and you heated in the wintertime. You burnt everything. And I can remember my mother stepping on a marble and she said, if I step on another one, I won't throw them in the stove. And then so we find a lot of half melted. So it must have been a lot of mothers stepping on a marble.

[Grant]

And there's a story about you and your father. Were you playing cribbage?

[Kelly]

Yeah, I didn't have any money. I was about, I don't know how old, 14, 15? And he said, you got any money? I said, no. I said, I got marbles. Well, I'll play it for marbles. He took all my marbles away, won them all. And I was almost in tears. 3,000 marbles. And so he told me, he said, I'll give you your marbles back, but never gamble unless you can afford the lows. And I've been to Vegas probably a hundred times and I've never complained about losing. Never. I remember that I was just out to Reno for a week and I didn't lose, I didn't win. I broke even.

[Vaughn]

But yeah, that's fair, that's fair.

[Kelly]

If I lose, I don't care, you know, it's enjoyment.

[Vaughn]

Yeah. What was taking over the business like at 26?

[Kelly]

It. I had been running it for so many years. Basically I was running it from. I started bidding work when I was about 20. Taking slowly took over everything, though. I was 35 and I took it over and it was just nothing. It Just a matter of switching money around. We had a lot of real estate in the company. We split the company up. My dad took the real estate, and I ended up with the earthwork.

[Vaughn]

Okay.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

And what kind of jobs were you doing?

[Kelly]

Oh, little subdivisions, small demolition jobs. And the story was we couldn't get a license to wreck buildings in Minneapolis. And we did, like, houses and garages and stuff. So then I hired an attorney and I said, get me a license to wreck bigger buildings. So he went down there and he just applied for license. They gave it to us, and there was no. There was nothing special he had to do or anything. It was just Bolander was the biggest in them days, and they had the story out to keep you little guys. You couldn't get licensed. And I believed it. And then we started doing bigger buildings. Yeah.

[Vaughn]

Wrecking buildings.

[Kelly]

Yeah, wrecking five stories, 10 stories, you know, stuff like that. So we just kept growing, and now we're in, what, 22 states last year, babe.

[Grant]

Correct.

[Kelly]

Wow.

[Grant]

When you first took over. I'm gonna. I know some stories, so. Please.

[Vaughn]

That's. Yes.

[Grant]

When you first took over, what. What was the imprint of how your dad run things, Ran things? Like, there were things that you knew yourself you wanted to do different, which I think happens with every generation, generational families. There were some things, for example, buildings, office spaces, those kind of things where they really left an imprint on how you wanted the company to go.

[Kelly]

Like, our first office was a wooden office about this size in the corner of the shop. I had a meeting. I had to go out, and I had to tell the shop to quit hammering and stuff because you couldn't hear. And I swore I'd never have our people working like that. I finally convinced my dad to let me add on to the shop and put a big, like, about a. Well, I think it was a 24 by 32 office and private office and a working office and everything. And that's why I can remember those days. Four people in a little room like this, you know, and just no room. You couldn't even talk on the phone.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

I didn't want that for our people. And so that's why I go overboard on the offices.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

Well, I think.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

Pretty. Your offices are pretty recognizable nowadays.

[Kelly]

Yeah. Even our office, we just opened it, took over a Volvo dealership in Iowa and remodeled it so it looks like this.

[Vaughn]

Really?

[Kelly]

Yeah. And our. Our Milwaukee office. Have you ever been there? It almost duplicates this.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

Except we got a backhoe holding the Gap. Yeah, I saw that. Yeah.

[Vaughn]

Was that your idea to do that?

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Grant]

We call it vitamizing.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Grant]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

It is amazing though, just even the. I mean, everything around here, the detail with everything, it's, it's. There's not a square into this office that isn't vitamized. It really is everywhere.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Grant]

Well, really, it does kind of come from the story of the conditions that he was working in and then his vision for how he would take the company further.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Grant]

From what was important to his father, which is no less important important. You know, he was trying, probably trying to make sure that everything was very frugal for the success of the company. And. And so it's just interesting generationally, how people have different ideas.

[Vaughn]

Sure.

[Grant]

And then being able to actually fulfill those ideas. Because sometimes even though another family member takes over, for example, there's still the authority.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Grant]

Who brought it this far, who still hangs there. So people are afraid to actually implement their own ideas. And I think that's where family owned companies struggle is when they're not able to just truly let go and let the next generation move on. But.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

Did your dad get out of the way?

[Kelly]

Yeah, he just retired and gave you the excavation. I was young too. Kind of complained to my mother that no one listened to him or anything. He said, you know, I don't even have to be there. And she said, well, that's what you wanted and now you got it. But with me it's been different because Kelly just, I don't know, we talk a lot and everything and everything goes pretty good. Every once in a while I get my way or the highway and she don't like that. But yeah, like they thought I was nuts buying these fiber trucks. The leadership group.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

Well, we don't know. I mean, like I told you, if they're 100 grand and we can get three times the mileage out and we got $30,000 pickups, you know, who knows? But you ain't going to find out unless you try it. So we bought two and we got them here. And anybody that wants to just sign out and go get all the miles on as fast as we can get.

[Vaughn]

Really?

[Kelly]

Yeah. So this one here has been here for a week. That pickup's been sitting there.

[Grant]

Uh, yeah, no, I get notifications when they're moved, but I, I don't. I think it's. When you put it that way, I don't, I don't. Let me just say this. I don't think it's fair to say that people went nuts. I think that sometimes your ideas of investments.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Grant]

Are different than the leadership team that is trying to make sure that we continue to be successful.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Grant]

And have the profits necessary. So it's just difference. Right. But you've always been a visionary that can see 20, 30 years down the road, just like you do with the landfills. And actually when we just talked about it the other day, it comes down to I could not have taken the company at the time you did and brought it to the success of where it was when you asked me to take over. Just as you've said, Kelly, it's gotten too big. I probably couldn't even run it today. There's just too much going on. And so it is for family owned companies. It's having that recognition of you will always be the legendary leader that brought the company and had the foresight and the vision to bring it to where it was going to be in the 2000s, 2020. But you also had to know where your limits were when asking for the company to continue to grow. And with the changes just in technology, in the industry, with everything in HR and leadership, I mean, there's just so many changes that occur over that period of time.

[Vaughn]

Was the plan always to grow it big or did it just happen in a way?

[Kelly]

You get into different things, you know, and it just kind of evolves. We bought a company out Dakota that to get pipe fusion putting in long pipelines, water lines and stuff. Well, they had diving division. It was like a sports type diving. Well, we acquired that and they did a little commercial diving. So we started doing a lot of that now. And what did you do? Tim said we did a million and a half last year. In diving?

[Grant]

No, he was talking about a specific job.

[Kelly]

Oh.

[Grant]

In Chicago.

[Kelly]

Oh, okay.

[Vaughn]

Yeah, it's. It is amazing how I don't think I've been around another contractor that's as diverse as veit is the amount of stuff you all do.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

Is spectacular. Not just in number of states, but.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

Industrial cleaning over here, Large scale demolition over here, small scale demolition over here.

[Kelly]

Foundation.

[Vaughn]

It's. It's wild how much stuff is going on at this company.

[Kelly]

We have a lot of stuff, but. And some are profitable, some small groups, you know, they make a lot of money, but you need the big groups that don't make as much to keep everything flowing.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

You know, it takes a lot of money to keep, I call it grease, social grease to keep the thing greased up. Money.

[Grant]

But yeah, I think it's part of the brilliance of what Vaughn put together. The diversification, including the Waste group. I mean, you think of the Roloff division. And we've talked about trying to be competitive and increase the profits on Roloff, but really we could claim Rohloff as part of the marketing. I mean, because they're everywhere. Right. And so people see them all over. 94, 35. All over Minneapolis, Rochester, even Wisconsin.

[Kelly]

And you'd be surprised. My cousin's an architect. Sure. And he's in Minneapolis. How many dump trucks you have? He said they're all over the town. Well, they're dumpsters. There's not even trucks. So if he thinks that, how many people think, geez, that bite's got a lot of trucks.

[Vaughn]

Yeah, right. When did the landfill come?

[Kelly]

About 87. Yeah.

[Vaughn]

How'd you get that?

[Kelly]

A banker friend of mine repossessed an old gravel pit up in Ma.

[Vaughn]

Okay.

[Kelly]

And he said, I checked with the township and the county and the state and they'd give you a permit for a landfill. Why don't you buy it? So I bought it from really. And then started the permitting process.

[Vaughn]

I've heard you really like the landfill, though.

[Kelly]

Yeah, I like it.

[Vaughn]

Yeah. Well, what about it?

[Kelly]

Well, let's just give you an example. I was going to build a building this year, so I told the guys I need a thousand sheets of plywood and a thousand two by fours. Two months, had them all banded and stacked up to pull them out of the landfill. About $200,000 of lumber. People throw everything away. One man's treasure, you know.

[Vaughn]

Oh, so you pulled that out of the waste. Oh, really?

[Kelly]

Oh, we had a stack of 16 foot two by fours. There must have been 50 of them. Didn't have a nail in them. Brand new.

[Vaughn]

Wow.

[Kelly]

Yeah, just Stutz. It's.

[Grant]

It's kind of goes back to the beginning of what he said he was doing. From 10 to 14 years old. Is a scrappy.

[Vaughn]

It's like a treasure hunt. Yeah, it is.

[Kelly]

It is.

[Grant]

And plus he just loves watching the trucks roll in.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Grant]

And you know, it's another part of Earthwork. Really.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Grant]

Is watching everything, all the machines work together and.

[Kelly]

Yeah, it's.

[Grant]

He'll sit out there for hours.

[Vaughn]

Yeah, I've heard you'll just sit up.

[Kelly]

Really evolved, like the state requires. Run a topographical survey once a year. No one knows why, but we have to do so. We used to have mark herd, fly it. It was $2,000 and we got into robotics. We'd send a couple guys out and they could do it in three, four days.

[Vaughn]

Sure.

[Kelly]

Now we got a drone that flies 380 miles an hour. Eight minutes.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

Got towpok. Just amazing. And it's so accurate. You can see a car from a compact or a dozer.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

Just definition. And then I can look at. When they put on the screen, you want to look at east, west, north, south, top. You want to look at it from the bottom. See it all. It's there. Everything's in there. All the plans when we build it, you know, the liners and everything. It's all in the program.

[Vaughn]

What's your favorite thing you found in the landfill?

[Kelly]

Her.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

Really fortunate.

[Grant]

A hammer. We get my favorite hammer.

[Kelly]

We get along pretty good. No, it's a blessing to have a smart person, I'm sure. Yeah. And she. If you can't, Daddy, she'll baff you with bullshit.

[Grant]

But what. There had to be a time where you were like, oh, I'm just going to start a landfill.

[Kelly]

I mean, what. What created me about that?

[Grant]

Because, see, we had specialty contractor business.

[Kelly]

We had. It was. It wasn't called landfill in our shop. We dug out all the black dirt and sold it for topsoil. Then we fill it in with junk demolition. So we kind of had to feel. And then when that got filled in, it was. We. I was kind of spoiled. Had our own landfill all the time. So then I started dumping out here, and I got a permit to dump. Unknown to me, though, I got a permit by rule, which is only 15,000 yards. And after quite a few years, the state come out and said, we think you got more than 15,000 yards that landfill, 200,000. I didn't know. You didn't do anything about it. And the timing was, though, I just bought that other gravel pit out in Monticello, and I was in the permitting process, so we shut down here and went out there. So because you.

[Vaughn]

You were doing a lot of demolition, so you had a lot of debris you needed to take the landfill anyway.

[Kelly]

And concrete. Then we take it in here. We were the one of the first ones to start recycling. I see. And in fact, we spent one winter digging through the landfill, taking the concrete out and stockpile and crushed that and sold it. Give us more airspace back there. Yeah, yeah.

[Vaughn]

There's a. In Switzerland, they don't have landfills anymore. So they're mining their landfills. They're processing. They're taking all of the stuff out of these C and D landfills and processing all of it.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

And they're extracting like 85, 90% of what was put in these landfills 20 years ago. Because they only have so much airspace permitted. They can't. They will not get a new airspace, so. But most of it's recycled, which is crazy.

[Kelly]

Minnesota won't allow you to take this stuff out and recycle it. They claim it's hazardous waste and once it's in the ground, has to stay there.

[Vaughn]

Yeah, but it's all construction debris at Vono, right? Yeah.

[Kelly]

Not Von Co is industrial waste too.

[Vaughn]

Oh, industrial as well.

[Kelly]

We get, you know, deer carcasses, turkeys.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

Bad food and stuff.

[Vaughn]

Yeah, yeah.

[Kelly]

Then we do a lot of composting out there now too. And we're getting into composting food. Food waste.

[Vaughn]

Really?

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

And a fertilizer such.

[Kelly]

Yeah. Actually you can just the compost alone, you can sell it to farmers really high in a ph and you know they're paying 900 bucks a ton for fertilizer.

[Vaughn]

That's amazing.

[Kelly]

So what we do now, when we. We've got a 90 acre hay field as a landfill, we screen the compost and then there's reject stuff, little pieces of paper and sticks. We got a 50 yard manure spreader. We spread it on the hay fields. It's just full of ph and our hay just grows nuts.

[Vaughn]

Really.

[Kelly]

Yeah. But we've been selling everything we make. If we ever got too much, then we could sell it to farmers because we could just. There's farms all over the world.

[Grant]

I think MnDOT has purchased a lot of compost.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

Oh, yeah, yeah.

[Kelly]

Well, Ames had a job there hauling sea soil in and compost back. Must have been steak shop someplace.

[Vaughn]

No, when I went to your house a few years ago now, I think it was like 20, 21. And everything on the property is from somewhere else, it seems like. So this has been a lifelong pursuit of finding stuff and holding onto it. It's incredible.

[Kelly]

Well, when I was a kid, my buddies and I, we'd go to the town dump and get pop bottles and milk bottles. Milk bottles were nickel pop bottles of 2 cents. So we had those big baskets on our bike. We'd fill them up and go down the store and spend all the money on popsicles and stuff. But we'd make a lot of money doing that. And then I found a padlock that had the combinations with Alphabet little brass one. And I played with that and I finally found out the combination was Paris. And I lost it in a fire. I had one of the museums burnt down. Well, one was on eBay. They had a same kind of bicycle lock, but it was numbers. And so I play with it trying to come up with a combination. And my grandson, great grandson was out there and I'm explaining it to him. So he's fiddling with it nice. And is about 900 combinations? No, there's three. There's some power. And he says, and so we're going out, going out in the woods to look for deer stands. And we get my side by side. And he says, I opened it, Grandpa. He had the combination just that quick. 14 years old. And it blew my mind. So I had to write it on a piece of paper and I hung it on an old bicycle in a museum.

[Vaughn]

What's. What's the deal with the sculpture out here?

[Kelly]

That sea scroll?

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

The Minneapolis Public Library that was wrecked, remember, in the year Lee Koa restored Statue of Liberty because of the corrosion. He took all the copper off and put all new stainless steel framework in there.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

That was quite a few years ago. He had something to do with the government at that time. Kind of like Elon is now. Anyhow, they had Minneapolis Public Library, and it's the largest sculpture of that type in the world. Where they normally they hammer stuff over a wooden frame. A buck. This was formed, hammered the outside inside out and free formed. And it's supposedly supposed to be Hebrew letters on. Well, Frank Fradallone got the demolition job. He beat us. And I called him and I said, I want that statue. They agreed they're going to wreck it. And he said it was corroded inside, which is the red primer still on the inside. They just didn't want it. And it's worth like $150,000. So Frank even, he gave it to me. It's about $10,000 of the scrap iron. He even helped us load up and haul it out here. And I like scripture and stuff, so it's kind of neat.

[Vaughn]

It's really neat.

[Kelly]

Yeah. But my minister could speak Hebrew and he was going to try to interpret it and he never did. Now, the letters. There's about what, six letters on the front of it? Yeah.

[Grant]

I'd have to go look.

[Kelly]

It's supposed to represent the Dead Sea Scrolls.

[Vaughn]

Okay. I didn't even realize that it has letters on it.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

Wow.

[Kelly]

It's real. The legs are about half inch thick. Bronze. It's really, really well built. And we had to cut some holes in it to move it and weld them back in. But we looked inside and it's perfect. Like brand new inside. Built in 54. Some professor from the university made it. Wow.

[Grant]

Do you think that's what brought you your first Right. Like, true love of demolition is because you could go there, you could bid a job, and then, I mean, it's like the McAllister Field House, right?

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Grant]

And turning that into a horse stable out on the 500 acres.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Grant]

It seems it fits with the scrappy mentality of 10 to 14 years old recycling.

[Kelly]

Yeah. They don't even like to see me go on a demolition job because I say, oh, I want to save this.

[Vaughn]

You just want it all.

[Kelly]

Now, the guys are getting good, though. They'll snap a picture and say, you want me to save this? Yeah. Because they know certain things.

[Vaughn]

Well, it's. But it's like, you know, 500 acres, that's a lot of land. But it's like every corner of the property is something, right?

[Grant]

It is.

[Vaughn]

It's crazy.

[Kelly]

I get weird things, and I just stick them here and there in the woods, you know?

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

And someday, like, I got these. You know what the spears on the church in Russia look like? They're kind of swirly.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

I got two concrete ones. They came off a Lutheran Brotherhood demolition building. And I got one in the backyard, but I got one way out in the woods and tell people there's a lost city out there.

[Vaughn]

Has anything ever gotten away from you, like something you couldn't save that you wanted to save?

[Kelly]

Yeah. We wrecked a building in north Minneapolis. Had. Must have been 12 foot long as a Coca Cola distributing. Limestone block about 2ft high and a foot thick with the Coca Cola logo in there. And so I told the guy, save that for me. They went and mentioned it to the owner. The owner says, no, I want it because you're not from here area.

[Vaughn]

No.

[Kelly]

You ever hear the wildlife artist Les Cuba? Yeah. Well, he invented the Coca Cola logo.

[Vaughn]

Really?

[Kelly]

He drew it on Kentucky with the Coca Cola officials on a tablecloth, sketched it out, and that's what they use. So he would have fundraisers when he'd draw it upside down and backwards. And then you bid on. I've got two or three of them. Fundraisers. It's kind of a neat story.

[Vaughn]

Yeah. You've collected a lot of stuff, too. Like what? When did you buy your first gas pump?

[Kelly]

Oh, boy, I don't know. I click. So I got those metal motel chairs.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

First one I got 1969. I have 100 of them now. Yeah, I'm all over the place. Yeah.

[Vaughn]

You've got all kinds of stuff that you found all over it.

[Kelly]

Seems like street signs, all kinds of stuff.

[Vaughn]

And then cars. Cars, yeah.

[Grant]

Just happened to collect those.

[Kelly]

And surprisingly we have a lot of people tour museums and they donate, so. Stuff.

[Vaughn]

Okay.

[Kelly]

Like, a guy just gave us a German motor scooter and a 1993 Harley. That's, like, brand new. Yeah. So we detailed it up and got it lined up with our motorcycles.

[Vaughn]

Are you always looking for this stuff or does it find you or it finds me. Yeah.

[Kelly]

Gas pumps and stuff. You know, I've got 67 pumps sitting in a shed to restore yet.

[Vaughn]

Wow.

[Kelly]

We got probably 200 done.

[Vaughn]

And you restore them here?

[Kelly]

No, at home. At home, the boss made me get my personal stuff out.

[Vaughn]

Yeah, I see. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Kelly]

No more.

[Vaughn]

No more company paint job.

[Grant]

There happened to be 6. 65. There have to be 65 gas pumps waiting. Waiting to be refurbished in what's called the toy box.

[Kelly]

Yeah, yeah. But then they need. They need the space here because they've got to remodel the shop, and we're building a new one this spring, so they need that 3 or 4,000 square feet I was using for a toy box. They took all my stuff out of there, and they get it all full of supplies now. It'll probably stay there, even with the new shop.

[Grant]

Well, it makes it better.

[Kelly]

So you can, like, blankets. Blankets for the shears and stuff. You know, they shouldn't have to take up heated space. Sure. You can sit out there. Yeah, yeah.

[Vaughn]

So you have a shop back home where you do your restoration stuff?

[Kelly]

I got. We have a shop, but we just do small things, Restore.

[Vaughn]

Okay.

[Kelly]

Nothing big. I have a couple people that take them to them, restore them now. We used to have a full shop here, that body shop, but Grant figured it's cheaper to have farm that body work out. You know, we get through probably 10 deer hits a year on pickups and trucks and stuff, you know, and other accidents and stuff. So they're always fixing something.

[Grant]

Yeah, well, it's kind of. It's kind of the company evolves, right. And suddenly you're running out of space and you're running out of people to do the work. And so if you're pulling people off of work, that creates revenue or profit and having them do projects that are restorations for the foundation, it can affect.

[Vaughn]

At a certain point.

[Grant]

Well, you know, at some point, it can affect morale. It can affect, like, what are we doing? So it's empowering the people, people who run the shop. Like, do you need this here? No. You know, kind of helping them as well.

[Vaughn]

Why every. But everything else, like the equipment, the company stuff, it all looks really good.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

Why is that?

[Kelly]

The Paint shop here, though. Yeah.

[Vaughn]

So why does everything look so good? Especially with demolition, it's hard to keep stuff looking good.

[Kelly]

I started back in the 60s cleaning up machines that got all scratched up and repainting them. My dad thought it was a waste of money, but I thought the guys liked it. They looked like a fresh machine out there. You know, we'd do the repairs on it, then I'd clean them and paint them.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

And that just evolved into keeping them nice looking. And it makes a difference for marketing too. Really a big deal.

[Vaughn]

I think so, yeah.

[Kelly]

I mean, you go out and come on a job. Some of these contracts, you can't even see what color it is. As much oil and junk on them. We keep everything washed, pickups, machines, everything. Keep them clean.

[Vaughn]

At my house I have a little model Veit excavator with the red bucket on it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was like a Christmas gift one year and I picked one up somehow.

[Kelly]

And that was an idea. I just got to paint all the buckets and attachments red because we lose attachments on jobs. Forget they're there.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

Well, if they're painted red, we know it's ours. Sure. And in fact, one of the guys come by, a job was done like six months and there was red bucket in the weeds. They forgot to pick it up. We knew it was ours. So you send a boom truck over and grab it, you know, 10, 20,000 bucks for a bucket nowadays. Yeah, it's crazy.

[Vaughn]

Over the years, what are some memorable jobs?

[Kelly]

A lot of them.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

Demolition job. Memorial Stadium down to University. That was built in 1924. Took that down a Met stadium down there in Bloomington. It was a hockey arena, McGill building downtown. That was right in front of the old stadium now, but it's in the parking lot. And they had some big deal going on. So Coca Cola threw a bunch of money as we'd ramp up and get that thing done and turn it into a parking lot. They paid us a bunch of money so they could have their tents out there or some big deal. I don't know what it was. I'm not into sports. No. Yeah. I don't know. We've done a lot of jobs.

[Grant]

What about out by Von Co. The earthwork that was being done across the street from Vanko.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Grant]

Where you wanted to be out there because of all the machines going all at one time.

[Kelly]

Yeah. We had a million yards of dirt to move and we had a dozen of those tractor scrapers and compactors that now that you program where they should run no operator on them. And cat compactors, they just run back and forth. And if you come within 60ft of machine or a person, it stops and wait. See? Clear. But you can program it how much you want to lap, how many degrees slope is there, let it go on everything. And it just goes back and forth and all day long you're saving all that labor. Magic, you know.

[Vaughn]

Well, yeah, it's really repetitive. It's a job that people don't really want to do. Just back and forth a lot.

[Kelly]

Yeah. We got, I think Last count was 85 machines that run, you know, off the GPS stuff.

[Vaughn]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It seems like you all have done a really nice job, like you said, staying ahead of the curve.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

You have really nice stuff, which is very noticeable, especially somebody young like me. It's like that's a company I want to work for because they have nice things and they keep spending money on nicer, nicer stuff, which I think is.

[Grant]

Yeah, well, it's, it's about trying to retain talent.

[Kelly]

Yeah, yeah.

[Grant]

But I mean we have.

[Kelly]

It's.

[Grant]

You know, it used to be Vaughn, that was the one that was really trying to focus on being ahead. And then as the company develops and you hire all this talent, now it's the people.

[Vaughn]

Sure.

[Grant]

Right. Like Britain, Lawson or some of the others that are just building the relationships with Trimble or Caterpillar or Whomever. And we're able to test things before they even come to market. So that creates such a benefit to us to have those partnerships and some of the employees that are forward thinking.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

Cat has. We're one of six contractors that goes in every so often, brainstorms what you'd like to see.

[Vaughn]

Sure.

[Kelly]

And we get kind of heads up on what they got coming. One of the things on the drawing board is a backhoe bucket out of plastic that you don't have to rebuild. Just run till it's gone and throw it away and put a new one on. Yeah, there's a lot of stuff coming up.

[Vaughn]

Yeah, yeah, it's. It is amazing. This company's amazing because I hear about it everywhere. It's crazy. I'll be. And it's not. I mean it's Saudi Arabia, but I'll be. I'll be in Europe and I'll hear about Veit. No joke. But I mean it's. And it's a big company, but it's not like keywit, you know, you're not everywhere and you've been everywhere. Like it's still, it's still. You're operating a lot of places, but it's still very much like a local company. Like a very, like very Midwest. Yeah. Midwest company. But I'll be everywhere. People are like, what's, what's that? That. They always say it wrong. They always say vite. Like, what's that? Vite. I'm like, veit or vit? They're like, yes, that's the one. But it comes up probably more than any other contractor. Seriously. All my travels, Veit's the number one contractor comes up that people ask me about, which is crazy.

[Grant]

Great to hear.

[Vaughn]

But I think it's because of all that stuff. It's. Everything looks good. You all do so many crazy things. There's just so much going on. Like what? They have so much going on. What the heck's going on over there?

[Kelly]

But we try to give the client more than they paid for and we do just go the extra mile for them. Yeah.

[Grant]

Make the customer the hero.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

Yeah. Most work's private. It seems a lot of work. Or split.

[Kelly]

Some government work. Yeah, I don't know. It's split probably 50. 50, would you guess?

[Grant]

I wouldn't say 50. 50 depends on division too.

[Kelly]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Vaughn]

How do you. How do you spend your. What do you do these days?

[Kelly]

Me?

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

I spend about, oh, two days a week on a skitty.

[Vaughn]

Oh, really?

[Kelly]

Working on trails. I just ordered a tool that didn't even tell you about this. Goes on a skinny and it'll reach out. It's got an 18 foot carbide blade and extend out. I can turn it and I can trim overhanging branches on the trails.

[Vaughn]

Wow.

[Kelly]

Yeah. Just magic.

[Grant]

The whole 500 acres has become a job site.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

Okay.

[Grant]

Very nice. Each week he decides which job site he's going to be on. Is he making trails? You know, is he trimming?

[Kelly]

Well, a lot of the fields, you know, we have erosion problems. So we build these berms and pipe the water, catch the water and pipe it underground down the low spot.

[Vaughn]

Okay.

[Kelly]

We just finished putting in 1500ft of 12 inch HDP pipe. Wow. Our old dredging pipe, it's wore thin from sand. Well, it's good enough for me for water.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

So we refused it together and put out there and. And just build these big berms and then hold the water because we had 3 inch rain this summer. We had some spots that were 10ft wide and 5ft deep, washed down into low area into a wetland. So then we just. The deltas that they went out there, I smoothed them up. We picked up Another acre of cropland.

[Vaughn]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I forgot. Dredging is another thing you all do. It's just. It's a long list.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

Is that the skid steer? You have flames on your skid steer, don't you?

[Kelly]

Pardon?

[Vaughn]

You have flames on your skid steer. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Kelly]

Painted blue.

[Vaughn]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Kelly]

Catalak on it. Yeah.

[Vaughn]

Well, you bought a lot of machines over there.

[Kelly]

Well, I've got. Oh, yeah. How many million you spend on 20 million a year on equipment, don't you? Mostly cat. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Some trucks, yeah, yeah.

[Vaughn]

You had notes. What did you write down?

[Grant]

Lessons.

[Vaughn]

Lessons, yeah.

[Grant]

Lessons learned. I like to. Well, it's just you think about talking about the company or talking about the experienced. Just over the last three, four years. Lessons learned. Not just in my own journey, but for the company as a whole.

[Vaughn]

When did you get involved?

[Grant]

1996.

[Vaughn]

1996. Wow.

[Grant]

I was a dispatcher for Veit disposal systems in 1996, working out of the Vanko office. Yeah, no kidding.

[Vaughn]

Yeah. Wow.

[Grant]

And I wasn't the first hire. Well, I applied for the job and they gave it to someone else.

[Vaughn]

Okay. Yeah.

[Kelly]

And then they called back.

[Grant]

They called back to see if I was still interested. I said, yeah. So, yeah, that's where I started at veit.

[Vaughn]

Wow. Wow. Yeah. So you've been all over it then too?

[Grant]

I have, but I also was outside of it. I mean, I haven't been with Veid since 96. In fact, I think I'm just getting my 15 year ring.

[Vaughn]

Oh, nice.

[Grant]

But I worked. I mean, I worked on a variety of Vons companies, whether it was a distribution company for biodegradables and compostables. So I was in that space for a long time. Then I left and worked for a German company which had nothing to do with VEIT at all. Came back to VEID as a director. I don't know. Vaughn and I have always been intertwined in each other's lives some way, somehow throughout the journey for the last 33 years. You know, it was always fascinating. We love talking about business. My license plate says Secret Weapon. Just because he would use me. He would. He would use me. I can remember in the early 2000s, he brought me into a meeting that I really had nothing, no business being in. Got done with the meeting and then he asked me, so, what'd you think? And my takeaway from meetings is always different from his because I'm looking at people's reactions, kind of the unspoken words, and he's very focused on the Spoken.

[Vaughn]

Right.

[Grant]

And so there was a balance to us working together that he didn't necessarily see. So that's. He told someone at that time because he was questioned by an employee, like, what is she doing in this meeting? And he said, she's my secret weapon.

[Vaughn]

Women in general pick up on stuff that just goes right over men's heads, too.

[Grant]

Sometimes.

[Vaughn]

A lot of, like, there's even. I, like, I'll be watching movies with my. My girlfriend and she'll say, like, oh, that just changed. Like, they were. They. They look different seen. I'm like, how'd you even notice that? It's just like, it just. I'm like, I'm thinking big picture, but just. Just like right in there. Where.

[Grant]

Right.

[Vaughn]

Sometimes at work, you know, we have people. People like you that they just pick up on stuff that's not being said. And it's like, I would have totally missed. I had no idea. I was just. I was just in it.

[Grant]

But a lot of times it's helpful for employee relationships.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Grant]

Because if you're. If you're, you know, always in meetings with various people and you start to pick up like there's something going on, you don't know it in the meeting, you're not going to bring it out in the meeting, but it's worth a phone call because you can tell when something's percolating that someone chooses not to talk about.

[Vaughn]

Sure.

[Grant]

And it's usually pretty important.

[Vaughn]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Kelly]

But Tucker Carlson was saying the other night, he says, when you're meeting people, some people, you just know they're lying or giving you a line. And he says, you sense that. And he says, the first time I heard Tim Waltz talk, that's what I thought he said, this man's lying. And he went and proved it to the whole world.

[Vaughn]

I think I heard that. Exactly. I was chuckling while he was saying it. That's funny. Yeah.

[Kelly]

But I think that the election was good because next time here, I think Waltz is all done.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

I think Minnesota is going to go red.

[Vaughn]

Yeah. He's a Minnesota guy, huh?

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

Because we got all that mining up north there that could be. Could do it. And these Democrats keep washing it, squashing it.

[Vaughn]

Well, we were talking about New Range.

[Kelly]

It's crazy.

[Vaughn]

That New Range is a brownfield site. It was a mine.

[Grant]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

It's not. It's not. It's not this pristine land that they're going in and saying, let's. It's. It's already like they're going to clean it up as they mine it and that they still can't do that. It's just crazy. Going back to your lessons learned like what comes to mind first, what do you think? Lessons learned.

[Grant]

Well, I can start with never settle dig deeper.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Grant]

Because Vaughn and I were in the command center at the house when we came up with that.

[Kelly]

You did?

[Grant]

Well, I came up with the tagline and then you came up with because we never settle for average, we dig deeper for excellence.

[Vaughn]

Sure.

[Grant]

But the never settle dig deeper was just a culmination of both his life experiences and mine. And we tend. Can you move it? They'll just take a phone call from someone who's working off the fields.

[Vaughn]

I get it, I get it, I get it. Yeah. My girlfriend's father is a contractor.

[Grant]

Well that's no surprise.

[Vaughn]

Yeah. Well, yeah. And it's like they just. They're cut from a similar cloth these guys.

[Grant]

Sure. They Right.

[Vaughn]

Yeah. They're not all the same but like there are some similar traits which just flooded.

[Grant]

There are here's similar treats and there's can't quite just all of a sudden change who that industry is for the pride of that industry.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Grant]

To be more mindset of office. Right. It's very difficult to all of a sudden and I was explaining it with one of our VPs the other day is, is you know people. There's people who love Yellowstone.

[Vaughn]

Right.

[Grant]

The variety of reason. Well, you're not going to just all of a sudden change who Rick is.

[Vaughn]

Yeah, yeah, sure.

[Grant]

You know there, there's since my daughter's in that industry, I mean there people in the horse or cattle industry, they've been that way out in the fields for forever. They don't have time to worry about people's feelings because in any given moment someone could die. Dangerous. Right. And in some ways it can happen the same way out in the field in this industry. It's, you know there's a reaction and it could be a strong and what feels like a brutal reaction right at the beginning but people can get hurt and they can die.

[Vaughn]

Sure.

[Grant]

And the time to talk about it on bounds might be later.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Grant]

Now how do we change that industry? Because it's no different than if you have a child, child goes to such a hot stove. Are you calm? You know all don't do that. What do you react with some sort of force, verbal force anyway in order to save someone from getting hurt. Sure. Anyway, so it was just an interesting conversation I had the other day. Now no. No opinion is right or wrong but how do you allow 85% of the company to continue to be what they need to be to get jobs done in that industry while also evolving the way the world can evolve to be inclusive of everybody.

[Vaughn]

Yeah, yeah. And, and, and some of what the field does isn't necessarily wrong either. Like, I've, I've gotten trouble a lot for. From the.

[Kelly]

More corporate folks.

[Vaughn]

We're swearing. But it's like, hey, this is a key way to communicate our field. Like this. This is, this is. This is not just. This is a common language. This is important. You can't get rid of that. You can't sterilize that. You don't want to sterilize it. And I think that's like the only branch of the US Military right now not missing recruiting goals by a wide margin is the U.S. marines. Because they just lean into the message, like, this is not for everybody.

[Grant]

Right.

[Vaughn]

This is the shittiest job in the military or the grunts. But if it's for you, this is the place to be. People resonate with that. Like, oh, it's not perfect. It is dirty, it is miserable. But, like, that's what they want to be there. And there's this push to, like, I think, like, because the industry needs to recruit a bunch of people. There's some campaigns that are making it seem like it's something it's not. It's like that does everybody a disservice. That's not. We need to be doing. We need to be saying, this isn't for everybody, but for the people, it's. Or it's as good as it gets.

[Grant]

Correct.

[Vaughn]

Yeah, yeah.

[Grant]

No, I mean, I totally agree with that. It's just, I mean. Well, so not only I should probably be more cheerful. I don't know, but. But I appreciate both aspects of the industry.

[Vaughn]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Grant]

You know, there are things that happen in the office environment that. That cannot. We can't just take people from the field and, and expect that everybody understands the same goals. And I guess that's the way I see it.

[Vaughn]

Well, they, and they, and they're two different games too.

[Grant]

Like Parcel Amado.

[Vaughn]

Like, you're playing a lot of politics and these jobs, like, just to get these jobs. It's not, it's not easy.

[Kelly]

Well, culture is truly Republican and like the officers, liberals, and fields are concerned.

[Vaughn]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Grant]

It's that much different.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Grant]

It's really honoring the pride of an industry.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Grant]

That has the pride of building this country. Sure. And, and not stripping people of that very pride.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Grant]

That has created everything we'll Be built.

[Vaughn]

Yeah. I like my background's interesting because I grew up in Harbatch Valley, Arizona.

[Grant]

Yep.

[Vaughn]

Everybody very wealthy. All my friends, parents, wildly wealthy, billionaires, sports team owners, everything like that. My dad did well, but we were like the lesser off people in the grand scheme of things because we didn't have three houses on a plane. But, but my friends did and I enjoyed, I enjoyed it all to its fullest benefit. But then I, I 18 got into construction. So I grew up in like this very, you know, country club proper world. And then I, I started working with a bunch of Mexican guys telling each other go themselves.

[Grant]

Yep.

[Vaughn]

Like every five minutes out on my construction site in Arizona. I was like wait a minute, this is way cooler. I like this better. And, and, and once I, once I fell into it, it's like this is all I want now. And I'll some like I'll go back to Scottsdale this week for Thanksgiving. But I just, I don't like going back.

[Grant]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

It's like it just doesn't. This, this feels icky like it's like it does, it's, it's almost like made up life in some way.

[Grant]

Well, okay. So when I worked for a jewelry company, I was single mom raising my daughter and pleased to talk about it. But I would put on a business suit because I was going to meetings and, and she knew me as a different person and we called it my costume. You know, because you have to fill a certain part in order to fit into a certain world. Sure. And so none of the worlds are wrong, but everybody has their own organic self, which world they might fit into. And some people would not in any way, shape or form fit into the field environment.

[Kelly]

Right.

[Grant]

Or what you're talking about.

[Vaughn]

And you need both. You need to. You mean if people don't get paid out of the field, you got problems.

[Grant]

You need both and, and, and you do need a sense of, of respect. But some people, the way that they speak, their words are very different on what shows respect. Just like you're talking about with the group of people you worked with. Yeah, right. Because it wasn't that they were actually disliking each other.

[Vaughn]

No.

[Grant]

In their world and in some people's world, that's a sign of respect.

[Vaughn]

You know, if you weren't getting called names, they didn't like you trapped. Yeah.

[Grant]

And, and there is a party camaraderie that goes along with that. Just like you're talking about in the military. Military is not easy. There's a lot of industries that aren't Easy. And we have to continue to be able to respect that. Otherwise, why the people want to work. Sure. In that industry, they're losing the very camaraderie with any part of their team, because then you're just being inauthentic to yourself where people will know it.

[Vaughn]

You're working for the Germans as well. The Germans are very serious.

[Grant]

That's kind of what we talked about at the time. No, I learned discipline. Yeah, you learned discipline, and you learned very quickly that. That discipline comes harsh and unexpected at times. But, I mean, just a team of people that I miss to this day. Sure. And especially Dr. Edmond Dolphin was my biggest mentor, and I learned so much just about myself and life and. And business from him as well.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

You know.

[Kelly]

Yeah. Like one thing. Every piece of paper goes to the office of Germany, hashtag four eyes on it.

[Grant]

Yeah. That's where we learned for that. Well, I. Where I learned four eye concept.

[Vaughn]

Really?

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

I've never heard of that concept.

[Grant]

Well, it was just if we had a legal document, he was the managing director, but he always had other eyes put on it. So. Yeah. If it's an important piece of paper or even in our marketing, I mean, because there wasn't a big marketing department, we would all have our own input on it. You know, redline, student document, different ideas. So it was really a collaboration and collective thought process.

[Kelly]

But that trickles down to disapproving, invoice, sh. Big deal.

[Grant]

Well, and it became almost a game, because if the managing director misses a typo in a legal doc.

[Kelly]

Yes. It just.

[Grant]

It turns it into something fun instead of just daunting tasks that need to be done. Sure.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

It seems like over the past few years, the company has really grown as well.

[Grant]

Like.

[Vaughn]

Like over the past, what, five, 10 years?

[Grant]

No, three years.

[Vaughn]

Three years. Yeah. It feels like it's hit a new gear even. I don't know when we started working with y'all, like, maybe 2019. So it's been five years getting to know y'all, and even from when we started working with you to today, it seems like it's really hit another year.

[Grant]

It did. No, it absolutely did hit a new gear. We have some new leadership. We have positions that were never part of the company that. That we made sure to create because it was necessary for the success. Vaughn had given us a task to grow 5% compounded annual growth rate for to 2030. I put a call to the leadership team into the company of where I thought the company could be by 2028, and they said why wait till 2028? And they excelled. So that's. That is empowering people to do their jobs, getting the right people in the right positions and then empowering them and supporting them the best that you can with the equipment, the resources, everything else, and then helping solve issues along the way. But that is truly just appreciating and empowering people to do their jobs.

[Kelly]

Yeah. And we've done that. Kelly's done that without no acquisition. All organic.

[Vaughn]

That's what's interesting.

[Grant]

Kelly didn't do it.

[Vaughn]

Yeah, the people.

[Grant]

The people did it.

[Kelly]

Everybody did it.

[Grant]

Yeah, they did.

[Vaughn]

Yeah. But that's another unique thing is it hasn't been through acquisitions meant burgamic, which is wild. But it is quite interesting how you all. You got these different divisions and they all have a leader of the like industrial cleaning or demolition or civil. There's a bunch of different divisions and they all have leaders.

[Grant]

Well, you think about it. At one point, Juan was the expert.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Grant]

Of each division. But he acquired or, you know, through throughout history. And so everybody looked to him to be kind of the expert. And throughout time and throughout when he was building the company, then he started bringing experts. When it comes down to it, once you have those leaders in place, I mean some 25 years. Right. Or 10 plus years or, you know, you start to understand that you don't need CEO or leadership necessarily that understands every specific division. I don't need to do someone else's job and I don't need to recreate the wheel for Earthwork or demolition or, you know, any one of the foundations waste group. I need to support them. I need to know the vision of Bourne's legacy and the legacy of fight and then focus my time and attention on supporting them. And more of the macroeconomics instead of the microeconomics. Sure, yeah.

[Vaughn]

Now, you said Vaughn's legacy. What. What is your legacy?

[Kelly]

What, you know, one's on foundation.

[Vaughn]

Vaguely.

[Grant]

Paul.

[Kelly]

New one set up you got approved by federal government. It runs just like a regular company, but a good percentage of the products go to charity.

[Vaughn]

So the. The company essentially becomes a foundation.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Grant]

So there's a foundation which owns the museums. Right. So there's already a 501C3 that's been set up.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Grant]

And what eventually happens, the way it goes, if laws don't change and.

[Kelly]

Sure.

[Grant]

You know, everything changes. Right. So the idea, it's not necessarily a carbon copy of a Newman's oral Trust, but it's the same type of concept. And it's hard to predict when we will Die. So between Vaughn and I, the last one standing upon that person's death. The enterprise is then owned by a foundation, a 501 seeds. And so the board there that would be set up then works with the board of the enterprise and it allows the companies to go on in perpetuity. Right. Which is trying to make sure that, you know, it's a little bit difficult people look at, well, should I go to vite? You know, I don't know. What's one gonna do? Is he gonna sell it?

[Vaughn]

Yeah, yeah, sure. Yeah, exactly.

[Grant]

He's not. Kelly's not.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Grant]

This whole goal is to make sure to set everything up so that people who start 10 years from now, 20 years from now, that, you know, who knows, maybe in my life, 30 years from now, depends. Right. But at some point it goes into a foundation and that way the company still continues to go. There's, according to today's rules, there's a certain amount of profit percentage from the company that has to go through to the foundation, just as though if one still owned it. Right. You have a certain amount that goes to ownership from profits, let's say concept. And that's how the Newman's Own is set up with the salad dressings in grocery stores. The profits, certain percent of the profits from that company goes to is trust or foundational trust. And then there's. They specify where they want that money donated. It's a, it's a way to be philanthropic throughout the history of the company into the future.

[Vaughn]

I mean, you do that. That's pretty cool. That's incredible. Because I, I, I know that is like the question people like, yeah, what's like going to do? So I just said keep going. Yeah. That explains it. Why, why drug and alcohol?

[Kelly]

Pardon?

[Vaughn]

Why drug and alcohol?

[Kelly]

Because I'm alcohol.

[Vaughn]

Okay.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Grant]

But also it's because it affects this industry at such a high percentage. Yeah.

[Vaughn]

By a lot. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's 6:17.

[Grant]

The overdose for David was laborers over operators. Laborers are most at risk.

[Vaughn]

Yeah, yeah.

[Kelly]

They all struggle and you don't know how they're struggling, but they can get some help. No.

[Vaughn]

Yeah. I grew up around alcoholism, so I'm well acquainted with alcoholism. Well, I stopped stop drinking in January. That's been good.

[Kelly]

How long you're no, I'm third generation alcoholic. I've got chin thinner alcoholics fan kids.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

It don't, don't quit, you know.

[Vaughn]

Yeah, yeah. I'm, I'm, I'm very aware that growing up alcoholic worlds, it's like, yeah, I'm prone to it. And so that's why I've been extra careful.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

I don't want to fall into that. It's just a bad. It's a bad place.

[Kelly]

I quit drinking. It'll be 30 years if I make it that far, you know. But I was drinking a quart, quart and a half of gin. A close to being insane as she could be, you know. But when I quit in 95, thinking much query in the fog and really took off road that. Why did you quit 2-13-1995.

[Vaughn]

Why was that?

[Kelly]

Why I lived in Hazelden and for an assessment. And the 12 steps, they're off on a big billboard and the comparable steps of Blue Testament were on the board. Never have that just click. One day it went from a quarter and a half to zero.

[Grant]

Really?

[Kelly]

Yeah. Oh, it's just. It's a crazy disease.

[Vaughn]

Which is why I struggle a little bit with, with construction especially because it's. We talk safety, safety, safety, safe safety.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

And then just completely ignore the reality that is people dying by overdose. Yeah, overdose and suicide at the higher rate than any other industry in the United States. And I was like, why, if you showed parents those statistics, why would they want their kids in construction?

[Grant]

Sure.

[Kelly]

Well, it isn't just construction. I think it's just.

[Vaughn]

No, it's not all related. But opioid overdose and it's there. If you look at deaths on job sites, compared to how many construction workers died by overdose in a one year period, it's 17 times.

[Kelly]

Oh.

[Vaughn]

And I think it's. They've tracked. Traced it back specifically in construction because people are using their bodies a lot, you know, over a career or whatever it is that they get injured and they don't get a prescription. Prescription runs out. They're addicted. So whenever pills they're taken, they go get something else even from a friend of theirs, whatever it is, and that's lace. And then they're dead and bad. So how do you. How do you help people with that? So through ministry then?

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Grant]

There's a lot. Are you asking like how does the foundation exactly? Well, there's different organizations like for example Peace Academy here in Minnesota. They are a high school that ends up helping kids who are struggling with addiction so they can be in an environment where that isn't available.

[Kelly]

But you know, we'll go out there for a tour and look. You've ever been there? Yeah, I think Kieran and I are there.

[Grant]

It looked like street people.

[Kelly]

They dress real funny and everything, all the little kids and all. But they're all sober and then when they graduate ought to be teachers they teach there going on for 20 years. Yeah yeah.

[Grant]

And there's a lot of them are all. Yeah. There's another one that's in our Wisconsin that we donated to and so it's just. Or change the outcome with Khalid Ronnie she started batch her son passed away from addiction and so she's been just. She's a co kidder.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Grant]

Just a you know a mom that took the pain and decided that she had to do something different to try and help other people from experiencing that same pain. She still feels you know today. You know honoring her son's life. Right. So she goes a disclose supporting that. Supporting those type oats non profits themselves in order to assist their abilities because at one time she didn't have enough funding in order to keep going and now today it's. It's. She's doing very well and she. Betty Ford There was a wing that was built for mental health that was dedicated to Lauren's good friend Sutton who was in the program and had an enormous amount of people who would say gosh he helped me, he helped me. But he couldn't help himself then ended up taking his own life.

[Kelly]

Right.

[Grant]

So it's like those. There's people who can help everybody but in privately they're still struggling and can't get their cells burn Right. Any farms Right. Whether it's drugs, alcohol and never settle thing deeper still fits. Sure enough. Right. Because that's what people have to do sometimes on a daily basis.

[Vaughn]

Yep. Yeah. And it's a daily basis. It's a daily thing.

[Kelly]

It's.

[Vaughn]

You're sober one day at a time.

[Grant]

Okay. Yeah.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

I. I like on your. On your. I think it's your car too. Your says my boss carpenter.

[Grant]

Yeah.

[Vaughn]

Twitch.

[Kelly]

And then I remember what was mo. That guy that was here.

[Grant]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

Real strong Cathy guy.

[Grant]

Every time he'd say what the hell that mean on your car?

[Kelly]

And then I said you'll figure it out Bo.

[Grant]

And he was here for years. I bet you asked me 100 times.

[Kelly]

Didn't click with him.

[Vaughn]

What young people getting into this world. What advice do you give them? What do you tell them? In what in the construction.

[Kelly]

Either just do what you like to do. Well that's as simple as that. We hire good people then get to hell out of our way.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Kelly]

No best way.

[Grant]

Have a mentor. Think of where you want to be. Understand what that job description is. Sure. And then start mapping your life towards that goal. It sounds where you want to be at some point. But understand it takes time. Yeah, no thanks. Time for the education for. I mean Johnny, it's. It's totally like. I look at it as like an investment portfolio. Right. And every one of your days is part of your investment. All the others human being.

[Kelly]

Yeah.

[Grant]

And you're gonna put some of that time hopefully shorts family towards yourself, towards your job and towards outside hobbies. And you have to map out your weeks as to where are you putting your investments and what's your return on that and is that return actually helping your life as to where you want to go. This helping your family life, is it helping your personal life and then adjusting your investment portfolio as a you or me.

[Kelly]

The one thing I, I thought was most impressive, the analogy you gave me about the basketball player.

[Vaughn]

What was that?

[Grant]

Allowing other people to take the shot. So I don't play basketball at all. But one of the analogies was if you can stand at whatever line, free throw is always fun anyways. If you could stand and get a three point shot and you can do that consistently, don't always take the shot. Set someone else up who doesn't get that opportunity or who doesn't make the shot every time yet to be successful on making that shot. Because it's repetition and it's the ability of. You don't need to no longer be in the position that you're in to set people up for success who are reporting to you. Right. Make them continually successful. Because what you're doing is just building a stronger team around you and you're also building a succession plan. Because in order for people to move up in an organization or going different direction that they want to go, it's very mindful to make sure that sound that someone is right there ready to step into your spot.

[Vaughn]

But it's. It's interesting you're both talking about that too because it's like. I think especially what's happened over the past few years is very representative. Usually when like, like this business is. Was built around his personality and him.

[Grant]

Yep.

[Vaughn]

When you start to remove the guy, the gal, whoever it is, it causes problems because the whole business is built around a person. But it can, it can, it can, but it hasn't. I think the opposite has happened here. You all are just growing like gangbuster because. Because you did what you are saying you should do. Like you, you all did this exact same thing.

[Grant]

Well, it's, it's, it's. You're right. I mean he, he was, he was bite.

[Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Grant]

And. And people waited to hear from him as to the next direction, the next thing to do. They wanted to make sure whatever decision they were making wasn't going to anger him. I mean, it's, it's very much that way. And so once people are in a position to understand that, well, wait a minute, you're. You're the expert on Earthwork over myself. You tell me what you need. You take almost making each division leader like their own entrepreneur of how they can run their division and then finding out what they need for support, making sure that what I'm doing as a, as a person, as a CEO, is benefiting the bearing, integrity and value of this company and value of my position. But you also have to understand, I wasn't new here. I started in 96. I was around in the early 2000s. I've been around, biked for a long period of time. There were people who, what I call legacy employees newly. And I've always been the same person. I treat people the same way today as I did back in 96. Right. I mean, I'm not. It's another thing I say, no matter what title you have, don't ever feel that you arrived.

[Vaughn]

Sure.

[Grant]

Because you never will. And if you feel that you've arrived, you're actually diminishing the people that report to you. You have to keep going because it's actually greater responsibility than it is before you ever got to where you were.

[Vaughn]

Which goes back to never settle, dig.

[Grant]

Deeper and all those back to never settle, dig deeper. Well, I mean, and actually it came from, I mean, life experience. The reason that I said never settle, dig deeper and how it really to me encompassed not just the employees, but bought as team of being his. The way that he started the company and would have to talks about driving up and down 94, trying to hunt down customers, it would tears in his eyes because he didn't think he could make payroll. Right. And how he just kept pushing himself forward to do it. But also in personal experiences, I mean, it wasn't that long ago, maybe 2019, 2018, he went through the ice of a pond on back of our property on what I call this day ever. Right. And how much did it take for him, with all of his clothes, all of his gear on, to decide he needed to go back into the water in order to get on the other side of the. What's it called? The aerator. Yeah. So that he could try and propel himself up onto the ice.

[Vaughn]

Nice.

[Grant]

Right. Now that takes some never cell dig deeper. Right.

[Kelly]

Well, I was, I had to Ask that I made that was well I'm really up Kelly.

[Grant]

Thanks Shells. Yeah well as a full back in the last three jacket on oats and everything. Jeez. Are my own self in the horse accident that I had.

[Vaughn]

Oh yeah.

[Grant]

Two and a half years ago. Yeah yeah. And it's. It's like well don't ever I guess the feeling of I fall down. I don't really I've made mistakes but don't ever discount my ability to get back up and that's the power of that. The mindset of that is what I think is truly important and stands behind Never settle. Dig deeper it really all that we do. Yeah but I mean people do it every day. Sure. Right. I mean it's part of what I tell people is whether you're driving in traffic and you choose not to run into someone you've got your road range or sometimes it's just waking up in the morning and getting to a job. Second time people in their personal lives they're taking care of family members. You know that's difficult. Difficult. There are things that happen in everybody's daily life where they need to decide at that moment are you going to never settle and dig deeper or are you going to succumb to something easier which might be your own mindset of a pity party or you know whatever you want to call it and it's no you can do it. You know.

[Vaughn]

Well on that note a lot on yeah I'm glad we were able to do this. Yeah I really like now you'd be.

[Grant]

A better person for less than convert.

[Vaughn]

This is great. Well this. That's the best thing about this. I just get a learner in the city. It's a good deal. But yeah I appreciate you both sitting down and talking.

[Grant]

Yeah. And that was thanks for taking the time.

[Vaughn]

Oh yeah. I'm. I'm one of the biggest bike fans out there.

[Grant]

Yeah. We need to get you some more bike gear so you got a cat shirt on.

[Vaughn]

Well yeah. Yeah I went to C chat this morning so I figured I'd. Yeah but yeah I'll say should we change?

[Grant]

You're right a little.

[Vaughn]

I'll take my ear. Yeah yeah the great I have I.

[Kelly]

Have your hoodie with the never settle.

[Vaughn]

On it I wear it all the time. Super super comfy.

[Grant]

Good. Should cool at least. Inspiring.

[Vaughn]

Yeah yeah no this is fun. I appreciate you guys.

[Grant]

Pat. No thank you coming out and we're so proud of you for all your your success.

[Vaughn]

We're doing our best. Yeah yeah.