How Wallace Sheet Metal Tripled Without Adding a Location

David Crow:0:00
What's made in? What's made in

Carl Holden:0:11
Welcome to What's Made in the USA, the podcast that celebrates the people, companies, and ideas behind American manufacturing. I'm your host, Carl Holden, and on each episode, we meet the entrepreneurs, engineers, and skilled professionals who are building real products right here in the United States. Today, I'm pleased to have David Crow of Wallace Sheet Metal, headquartered in Gainesville, Georgia. Let's get started. Welcome, Dave.

David Crow:0:35
Thank you so much, Carl. I greatly appreciate you having me. I'm very honored and feel privileged just to be a part. And so thank you so much.

Carl Holden:0:43
I'd like to jump right in. David, could you give us a top level overview of what y'all make at Wallace Sheet Metal? Yep.

David Crow:0:51
Wallace Sheet Metal is a hundred and twenty-five-year-old company. So we've been around for quite some time. And we are considered what is a very well-rounded fabrication shop. So we do everything from water jet to laser jet to press break, weld, spot weld, assemble, and pretty much anything in the realm of fabricating parts. That's what we do.

And we've been doing it for quite some time.

Carl Holden:1:21
Yeah, hundred and twenty five years is nothing to sneeze at. I mean, I see on your site that you started in eighteen ninety seven. There ain't a whole lot of companies in the United States that could put a eighteen on the the year that they started on. So that's pretty awesome.

David Crow:1:35
Yeah, thank you. There's a lot of rich history here. Since eighteen ninety-seven, Wallace is only on the fourth owner of the company. And all hundred and twenty-five plus years have been right here in Gainesville, Georgia.

Carl Holden:1:50
That's awesome. That's great. Tell us a little bit about your role and what led to your journey here at our Wallace Sheetmount.

David Crow:1:57
Yeah. So my background is a quality engineer. And so I spent the first fifteen years of my career with companies that you would know, such as Caterpillar, Siemens, ZF, larger companies, and was working my way through the ranks as a quality engineer and became a quality manager.

And roughly 17 years ago, I ventured out into the world of sales, where I began by selling primarily metrology equipment, anything in to do with checking parts, calipers, micrometers, et cetera. And from that, after about five years, I gravitated more toward tool sales.

Drills, taps, in mills, anything that goes in a CNC machine. And that was what I really enjoyed because I understood a CNC machining. I understood tool, wear life, et cetera. But I tell you what happened, Carl, is when COVID came around in 2020, it really devastated a lot of our outside sales guys. Basically, we could not go into a facility.

For over a year. And then when we could start going back in, some of the individuals that we needed to see, now they were working remote. So anyway, it it was an unfortunate time for many reasons in our country. But Wallace Sheet Metal was an account of mine and a very loyal account from which the owner of the company and I had become friends.

He had inquired if I would come on board here to help him get to the next level. Wallace had been at the same level for about six or seven years. And he had asked, Will you come and help me? And so after the stint with COVID, about a year and a half of that, I agreed. And so I came on board as the vice president of sales and business development. My assignment.

David Crow:4:09
was to bring more work into Wallace. And at that time I had been on the road for twelve years and I had a lot of contacts. I knew a lot of people. And so I began really pushing hard to help Wallace Sheet Metal get to the next level. That's been five, a little north of five years ago now. And it's been an incredible journey over the last five years. You're

Carl Holden:4:37
kind of like a regional business in that you're making things for like the Atlanta Georgia Metro or do you are you making stuff for people across the US? Where where is that business?

David Crow:4:47
Nationwide. We have we have customers from California to Texas to Kentucky and North. We're nationwide.

Carl Holden:4:56
Okay, awesome. That's great. Now with Wallace, d this is the main office that you're at there in Gainesville. Do you have multiple locations that you guys do or is all that national work happening here in in Gainesville? We

David Crow:5:08
We have one facility here in Gainesville and we do not have satellite facilities.

Carl Holden:5:14
What we've learned as we do this podcast is that of course we make things, but we're making jobs, we're making careers for people. How many people work at Wallace Sheetmeter?

David Crow:5:26
Currently today we employ thirty five people here at Wallachet.

Carl Holden:5:30
Awesome. And those are people that are operating, obviously making the stuff. He's got sales team. Like what what amount of the people are actually like building stuff? Out of

David Crow:5:40
The thirty-five people that are employed here, twenty-six of those in individuals are on the shop floor, leaving another nine of us here in the office.

Carl Holden:5:53
Awesome. Well you're you got a lot of people making a lot of stuff, it sounds. What do you do as a company to help engagement? Because a a lot of the big problem isn't just making things in the US. It's keeping a quality staff of people, both like that believe in your vision and and want to have a career. What do y'all feel you do to kind of gather and keep that talent? So

David Crow:6:15
That is a really good question, Carl. Right. That's the day that we're living in. And here in Gainesville, it is very much an industry hotbed. As you may or may not know, Gainesville, Georgia is the poultry capital of the world. And so Yeah.

Carl Holden:6:34
Heard that, yeah.

David Crow:6:36
So you've got Kubota here that employs no less than twenty five hundred people. ZRF is here. I mean, the list just goes on and on and on. So there's a lot of opportunity for, you know, the skill sets that we require here. I've been in the workforce for thirty five years and I've had some great companies that I've worked with and some companies that were bit less desirable. And so what I did over the last 30 years is I just put my focus on what companies did I work for that I really enjoyed working there. And why did I enjoy it? And so we just incorporated those practices here. A whole lot of that revolves around teamwork. We believe the acronym of team, together everyone achieves more. And you know People d want to be treated fairly, not just in pay. Obviously, you know, usually the first question is, well, what does the job pay? But beyond that, people want to be appreciated. They want to be celebrated and not just tolerated. You know, people want to know that they are a part. And now what's really been cool here for the last five years is no matter what role you play here, you're winning. Our company has triple.

In the last five years. So there is a lot of excitement in the when I first came here, there were 17 employees. We have doubled in size, number of employees, but we have tripled in the amount of business. So there's a lot of excitement in the air here. You know, there's been no less than three million dollars spent, CapEx money on equipment in the last four years. So To answer your question in short, I would say treat people as you want to be treated. And that's kind of the motto. That's what we try to do. Every person here from employee number one down to employee number 35, it's made known that, hey, you are appreciated.

Carl Holden:8:45
That's great. You have success because you're you're putting money and time into most valuable asset, which are the humans, the people that are making this a career that pay their bills from from what you do. And so we are really glad to hear that you're doing that. And it's sad that that has to be a competitive advantage. And that's why people will stay with you because you treat them right. That should be a standard thing with companies. And And they wonder why they have turnover. They wonder why they can't keep anybody. We've got jerk bosses and a toxic work environment and unsafe working conditions. Of course, we're gonna struggle to make things in the US if that's the kind of precedent that companies want to set. Yeah. Yeah. So tell me a little bit about who you sell to and what a typical transaction, what does a customer look like for you in your industry? Okay.

David Crow:9:38
Okay, so there was a significant change when I was asked to come here and help this company break through the lid. If you a lot of leadership, you know what the law of the lid is. Well, Wallace Metal had a lid on it that they have been at for six, seven, eight years. Sir, when I was asked to come here and help this company break through that lid, I immediately said, now look, I can do that, but there's gonna be significant change.

So if you're not willing to embrace the change, then we probably shouldn't do this. But the owner was very, very adamant that he wanted that change and he wanted to go to the next place. I said, okay. So for example, because of the rich history of Wallace Sheet Metal, every person in North Georgia that had a little trailer port or, you know, something from the kitchen or the track.

Or whatnot. They knew to come to Wallace Sheet Metal because we could fabricate just about anything, but I knew that wasn't a good business plan. And so we had to change that. I wanted to go whale hunting, if you will. I was looking for high volume, big numbers of parts, big production, and I wanted those accounts that we could grow with as we went along. So I first had to. come up with a very soft way of when these people that had been coming in our front door for the last twenty years and they had something scribbled out on a piece of cardboard that they needed. And then I've got an engineer spending two hours, you know, worth of work for a three hundred dollar part. I had to let them down easy because they were good people and they, you know, pleasant to come in and speak with and they depended on Wallace.

So I found another shop that's in our area that is what I would consider a friendly competitor, a people that I've known for twenty plus years. And they enjoy work like that. They they embrace that kind of opportunity. So I set it up with them and said, Hey, I'm gonna be sending a lot of people your way now because the structure of our business is headed in another direction.

David Crow:12:04
So the people that came in that we were friends with for 20 years that were used to getting their parts made here, they didn't like that we couldn't make it for them anymore, but they were okay and understood it, especially when I said, Hey, I can't do this for you, but I've got somebody that can, and they're only 10 minutes away. Once I got that settled, I started by design wanting to build.

A very diverse portfolio. In other words, I wanted companies in the agricultural market, tractor parts, implements, things of that sort. I wanted retail, flashing around coolers or checkout counters or whatnot. I wanted to be in that market. And then I looked for commercial equipment of all sorts of different arrays and ideas. So by design, we began to build A market, a portfolio for us that when one market dips a little bit, we really don't feel it because the rest of the markets are thriving. And so you'll see a lot of fluctuation, but it doesn't affect us that much because we've got such a diverse portfolio. So the parts we do here, they range all over from A to

Carl Holden:13:25
Gotcha. Yeah. We have a client here in Huntsville that does a lot of CNC machining. And I I'm looking at your site and I'm seeing similar equipment as I've seen in their shop. And and it looks like you've made an investment in That diversity of of tools so that when someone does come with you on a specific type of need, you're able to take care of that. And that sounds like he wanted to move away from being what's the local equivalent of the local blacksmith of hey, I need you to compound something out and move towards, hey, we want to talk to larger companies that have a wider portfolio of work that needs done. Cause that's going to take you to the growth that you had as a vision.

For Wallace and also sustainably allows you to grow and allows you to keep said people we talked about gainfully employed. Correct, sure. Awesome. Well, do you plan on adding, like looking at the equipment and the the stuff that you have, do you plan on adding to more? Is it currently pursue this path of growth? Like, are y'all wanting to move into different industries or you've now felt that you've gotten your footing?

David Crow:14:36
So we want to remain within the portfolio that we have, the diverse different industries. We're gonna stay in those markets, but we want to continue to grow. Like we s we have on board, we have on the agenda for more CapEx in 2027. And you know, because one of these pieces of equipment now, this isn't, you know, twenty, thirty thousand dollars. When you purchase some of this fab equipment, this is, you know.

Hundred and fifty two and five hundred. You know, this is this is big boys equipment. And that was one of the things it's funny that you say that. You know, we do machining here. We have three CNC machines, but I do not go to market as a machine shop. I do not look for that work. I'm not after that work. I have a machining department so that one of my fab customers has a part.

There needs a tap toll or a radius cut or some sort of little bit of machining, I can do that in-house versus being held captive to the local machine shop that I'm depending to do that for me. So with that being said, we want to stay right down Main Street of fabrication. We want to

Carl Holden:15:55
Metal fabrication, like somebody looking for metal fabrication, like fabrication shops and CNC is a part. Well

David Crow:16:03
Most fab shops, they do not have machining centers. Okay. They they will do fab work and form out the machining portion. But our strategy was let's do that. We're not gonna go to market as a machine shop, but we want to be able to take care of those needs in-house. And so the point to all that is is when part of the reason I don't want to do machining is because you've got a lot of people out here that say they were a machinist for 35 years and they retired. Well, they bought a HOS DF4 and put it in the shop out in the backyard and they take on these little jobs. And so you're competing against that. And I just did not want to go down that trail. I wanted to go to market.

As a fab shot, not a machine shot.

Carl Holden:16:54
Okay. And that's a good that's a good way to understand where you're going and and how people perceive you because sometimes people underestimate the manufacturing industry that it also understands how to do marketing and strategy and like those are kinds of things that if you're perceived the wrong way, you get the wrong types of business. Yeah. Correct. Now the last couple of years have been tough for everybody as far as like kind of the shifts with tariffs and Backups on supplies, like what has, if anything, or needed to, what has Wallace done to kind of adjust to some of these recent logistical issues?

David Crow:17:31
Yeah, so you are correct. And we hear it the most from whom we buy our material from. In other words, we buy a tremendous amount of flat sheets of material, whether that be cold rolled, aluminum, stainless, you know, and they would come in A year and a half ago telling us, hey, everyone's slow. Man, what are you guys doing over here? Because everybody I sell material to, they're in there sweeping the floors trying to find something to do. And I can't keep you guys supplied. What are you doing? And I'll be totally transparent. Some of those cards I kind of keep close to my chest, you know? Right. But I just determine that we're gonna flourish in the day of famine. Sure.

We're gonna put a plan together that even though the market says, hey, everyone's down, we're gonna be up. We're gonna flourish. For example, you mentioned tariffs. We took that and we turned that curse into a blessing. And we said, you know what? These tariffs are really tacking off. And and and it was coming to us. It's not that, you know, we did something so spectacular. And we kind of did.

But our phone was ringing by the dozens of calls a week saying, Hey, Dave, you know, I've got my parts from overseas for the last seven years and everything's been kind of good. The price point's great. But now I'm out of parts. They're telling me that our parts are stuck on a ship in the harbor and the tariffs, so they're working through all that. And I've just got to do something different. Could you make these parts for me? Yes, sir, I can.

Just send me over the PDF and the STEP files, tell me what kind of quantities you're looking for. And now we both know the price point that I'm gonna provide you is going to be fair, but it's probably gonna look a little bit different than what you've seen coming from across the water. And so we took that opportunity to flourish in the day of famine.

Carl Holden:19:39
And I'm guessing once they get to and once they become a client and they they think, you know, I could probably cut the corners, but that company overseas is not going to care near as much as Wallace does about my business succeeding. It's going to take longer. they're going to cut corners because their entire business is a cost ratio versus a company like you who actually gives a crap.

David Crow:20:03
You are correct. And I'll tell you s I'm so glad you said that, Carl. We stand very tall and proud that we are American manufacturing. And we're very proud of that. We fly that flag up high in the air. And we take pride in the fact that, you know, we're an American manufacturer. You need parts. We can make those parts for you. Yeah. Well

Carl Holden:20:30
And while it may have caused obvious issues for businesses because it did disrupt their flow, I think that was partly the point was hey, let's maybe have some conversations about how we can source this here. Because all it would take, I think, that people realized is for prices to flux just a little bit. And it's really not that great of a deal in comparison to just. doing it here. And you also feel better about doing business with other people in the country because that that's literally what being a country is, is voting and working and living together. And so I love hearing that you're able to, you know, make make lemonade out of lemon.

David Crow:21:12
Yep. Yeah. It's you know what I found out, Carl, is you know, they say in your career, it's said that you're supposed to make the most money between the ages of forty-five and sixty-five. Now there's always exceptions to the rule, but that's just a saying, you know, from forty-five to sixty-five, you should make your strongest dollar figures, you know, per person. And so what I found out is a lot of the business owners.

That I deal with, a lot of the people in purchasing that are at the top of the food chain within that company, where they're that age, a lot of them are between 45 and 65 years old. And they are the shot callers. They are the ones that make the final decision. And what I found out and discovered is that age grant, I fall in that group on the north end of it, but I found that within that group, there's a little spot in their heart that says, You know what? I grew up in this country. I've lived here my whole life. I've been in manufacturing for thirty years. I wanna go back to dealing with American made. And I found that to be

Carl Holden:22:19
Yeah. Yeah. And that's that's a that's the exact kind of stuff that we're we're hoping to encourage on this show is to help people recognize that it also makes you feel good, like to do business with other businesses. We've been pitched for the longest time the global economy. But when it all comes down to it, I actually care about other businesses in my country.

I don't have some kind of allegiance to somebody overseas and kind of had Amazon weaponized against us and just saying, well, just get everything when it's most convenient and don't worry about where it comes from and all that stuff. And we really should. Yeah.

David Crow:22:55
Yeah, that that's a trail, Carl, that you probably don't want to go down with me on your podcast because I've got very strong feelings toward that. And it's so funny when your team reached out to me and said, Hey, Mr. Crow, we would like to have you on our podcast and dah dah dah. And I said, Well, what's the podcast, you know, regarding American-made manufacturing? And I immediately, without hesitation, said, sign me up.

Carl Holden:23:23
Awesome. Yeah. We we have a lot of customers and clients within the manufacturing space. And so we've had so many conversations that we thought, man, we really need to start like recording this and and and also talking to other companies. I I don't make anything with digital marketing is is what we do, but I help a lot of other people. get found and grow their businesses. And as someone who has lived in the United States my whole life, I'm but I'm I'm married to someone who's not from this country. I have those two different like visions and appearances of like what is perceived. I just really have a warm feeling in my heart for other entrepreneurs, and I want to see people succeed. And especially in the last couple of years, and we try not to get too political. on the podcast as far as what people's opinions of who's right and who's wrong. But I think everybody can agree that it's in the best interest of any country to do as much business within the country so that you don't, you know, have that revenue, have those jobs escape the country you live in. And and that's just Basic math, you don't want to outsource it. And America has had, including companies like Wallace, a really long history of making stuff. And this these last couple of years have shown us like we can't lose sight of that. Absolutely. Because when you drive around a truck or you go in a house and you know those things were made by somebody right here, you know generally also like Those people care. They live close enough you can find them. Versus you buy something overseas, like you have no idea where that's coming from. And and that's part of the problem. So we really appreciate, especially companies like Wallace that have been around for as long as you have, yeah, on what you do. And we're really excited to see you keep growing.

David Crow:25:14
Well thank you and it is much appreciated and and we're enjoying it. It's a lot of hard work. We work extremely hard around here. As I tell people this, if they're if they work at Wallace, you'll recognize two things. They've got bloodshot eyes and a smile on their face.

Carl Holden:25:32
I like that. I like that. Well, David, thanks so much for sharing about Wallace. We'll ask a couple of personal questions here just about the United States, because that is the theme of this show. Do you have a favorite place in this country that you like to visit?

David Crow:25:45
I do I'm a pretty big fan of Texas. You said personally, so personally, here's why. I'm a very outdoorsy hunting and fishing kind of guy. Gotcha. And I very much spending time in Texas hunting and the game there. Well, first of all, obviously Texas is Texas. Everything's big in Texas.

Carl Holden:25:49
Okay. Yeah now.

David Crow:26:11
And so there's a lot of room to hunt there, a lot of different animals that I enjoy just viewing and enjoying being out in nature. And there's just something about Texas that I don't know. I have a just a warm, you know, I'm not really a beach guy. Gotcha. I kind of live in the foothills of the mountains. So I have that for me. So to answer your question, when I go visiting, I enjoy I've been i in Texas, I've been from the very top.

To the bottom and both sides, and I enjoy every part of Texas. Yes, I do.

Carl Holden:26:45
Do you do any bass fishing? Yeah. Okay. You need to come to Huntsville area, go to Gunnersville. I know a guy, he's a client of ours that does like tours and guides you through Gunnersville Lake. They have a lot of competitions, professional competitions there in Gunnersville because the fishing is so good. So we'll have to have you come in town and introduce you to Donald and you guys can go fishing and

David Crow:26:57
Yeah.

Carl Holden:27:10
Love to have you come visit sometime. What is a childhood or younger memory of the United States that you hold dear? That might

David Crow:27:17
I have a belief that the 80s, this is just personally. I felt like the 80s were the best decade of my life, of my generation. And I say that to go along with your question. I drew my first official paycheck in the 80s. I went through high school in the 80s. I met my wife of 34 years now in the 80s. And I drove, I learned I got my driver's license in the eighties. So I probably answer it more as an era of time than one specific moment of time. But the decade of the eighties were just a lot of fond memories and a lot of benchmarks in my life during that decade.

Carl Holden:28:08
Yeah, no, I I look at I watch some of the eighties movies and I'm like I think back at that must just have been 'cause I was born in eighty eight, so I came at the end of them. But just growing up in that time, like the technology that was coming, kind of man, the music was so good and just a great time to be alive in the in the US. Some economic issues then, but the the US was doing good. We were making stuff. We were making a lot of things back then.

Way one. So I I hope that we can one day kind of get back to that kind of golden age of you know America making and doing things and being seen and appreciated for it. If you could voice your opinion, your to to the younger up and coming generation of US citizens, of professionals, what's like one thing you would want them to know as we're passing the baton?

David Crow:28:58
That is a question near and dear to my heart because I've got three children that are all right, you know, they're grown but in their twenties. And my son, who actually worked here for us for two years, was on a very strategic plan to become an entrepreneur. And so he now owns his own transport company at twenty-five years of age, but it was mapped out.

You know, don't despise the day of small beginnings. And he started very small beginning. And I was trying to help him understand that a very strong work ethic will take you a long way. That, you know, if you've got shortcomings in one area or the other, like for the generation that you speak of, you know, there's a lot of kids that come from a very healthy environment.

But there's also a lot of kids that come from a very unhealthy environment. And so I would say to those kids, regardless of where you come from, regardless of your circumstances, if you get a little bit of grid in you, well around here, we call it dog. You gotta have that dog in you. And you gotta have that part that says, if nobody makes it to the finish line, I'm gonna make it.

And I'm gonna be there when it counts most. And so I would say, you know, for example, with my own son who's doing very well as a 25-year-old entrepreneur, I said, son, when I was back in the 80s, you know, if you come out and get a college degree, you've got a significant leg up on most everyone else. I do not believe that is the case this day and time. I believe that there are a lot of ways.

To make really good money if you've got the work ethic to go and get it. And so that's what I would say, you know, to the younger generation. Matter of fact, we've got guys in our shop here. Little, I'm glad you asked the question. We've got a handful of 20-year-olds in our shop and they want to talk to me and ask me questions and yada yada. And I tell them this, I said, Sergio, look around the shop. I said, You see all this gray hair?

David Crow:31:18
I said these guys are like me. They're they're getting to the end of the road and it's not gonna be long and they're gonna be retired and gone. Well, at that point, guess who's gotta take their place? You do. So when you do that, at some point you're gonna be able to make the money that you want and then some because you're gonna be the only guy in the building that knows how to do it. So I tell these young kids, if you want to go to technical school or college.

I'm for all of it. Or if you wanna just come in and start working and learn a trade and make that applicable to your life, you got great days ahead of you.

Carl Holden:31:57
Yeah, I think we get pitched so much my generation and forward like do what you love, follow your passion. And I very much believe it's more like do what you're good at. Do what has been instilled in you by God or whatever you believe in as as your skills, because you'll actually enjoy getting paid for what you're good at more than your passion, in my opinion. Very few people will will just do what they like for fun and get paid for. The rest of us You know, we gotta pay our bills. And if you can be passionate about what you're good at, then it that's a good balance. And it doesn't have to be just the same path of go get a degree. If anything, those people are who are really struggling and you need more Sergio because you got more work than the one Sergio can get done. And I think we also need to be saying that to the youth of our nation of there are so many opportunities for you now.

Especially as we make the shift. Well, thank you so much for sharing everything that you did today, David, about Wallace Sheet Metal and everything that you do. We we wish you the best and continued success. And we at What's Made in the USA are very happy to be a part of this conversation. But you're the real heroes of this podcast, not us. We're just here to let people know, look.

These people are making stuff and you can make things too or encourage other people to make stuff. So thank you so much for being on today. We're f

David Crow:33:26
You, Carl. And again, truthfully, it's been an honor and a privilege to be with you. we live in the day of podcast. You know that far better than I do. So I very much, very much sincerely appreciate what you all are doing. And I wish you nothing but the best going forward with your podcast. And I hope that it reaches many people. So thank you.

Carl Holden:33:49
Thank you, sir. Have a good day. You as well.