Birds, Design Build, & More

Before I start, my thoughts and prayers are out to everyone affected by the fires in LA and Southern California. This is truly a surreal situation, and it will surely take time and a village to recover from. I hope everyone in our world is hanging in and okay.

The first episode of 2025 for the “From the Fabricator” podcast is now live! This time out we kick it off with Marc Deschamps of Walker Glass. We spend a good amount of time in the bird-friendly glass realm, and Marc’s insights are always spot on. Then, Scott Lowe of The Beck Group joined me. Scott is the C.R.O. there, and Beck is a 112-year-old award-winning architecture and building company. (They’ve designed and built some incredible projects.) So that was fun to hear from someone from the design and contracting stage.  Plus, Scott likes glass! Obviously, he has great taste. Thank you for checking it out.

Watch on YouTube, or listen here, as well as by searching “From the Fabricator” where you get your podcasts.

Elsewhere…

How my 2024 predictions panned out

Each year, I spend the second post reviewing my predictions from the previous year. So, looking back, how did I do?

Rates Cuts late in the year & choppy waters- Unfortunately nailed that one. Not much more to say other than hopefully this year gets moving quicker than the experts say (mid-year.)

Potential company losses due to the slowing economy- Luckily, the industry's resilience kept this number relatively low. The lesson, though, is still to be strategic and diverse with plenty of communication, and many companies did just that to keep rolling.

Security Glass with a twist- I said we’d see more security glass but companies would innovate with fresh approaches and many did just that.  A few off the top of my head: Global/Isoclima introduced two new BR options at GlassBuild, Ballistic Glass and Armor Solutions hit the ground running with a new All Glass Entrance, Thompson Innovative Glass expanded its Defender line and hired the brilliant James Wright to focus on it, and Trulite came through with a new door and entrance system. I am sure there were others, but the point is- this was a good sector for innovation and positive moves.

Training and Certification- I thought this space would “explode” in 2024, and thanks to a lot of collaboration, AGMT did. (With partners like NGA, IUPAT, FHC etc.) NACC continued adding, but the need now is to see more of it in the specs, and I think 2025 should bring it. I did note that programs like MyGlassClass would make a difference, and not only did it do so, but it’s now free to NGA members. Huge.

Culture and Tech helping the labor pool- I thought we’d see more moves to automation and robotics and that went wrong for me- but I also think leadtimes to get these sort of machines and operations played into it.  So maybe I was a year early? In any case, if you are not looking at automating etc., you are missing out.

Next week I’ll make my fearless prognostications for 2025!

LinkedIn algorithm

I'm not sure if this is just me, but last month, my LinkedIn feed was a mess. I am getting served up really old posts, as in 2 and 3-week-old ones. I did flip the option from “Top” to “Recent” and even in the recent feed I am getting this mix of old along with a lot of irrelevant stuff. Anyone else having those issues? Did I miss a LinkedIn algorithm change?

"Bullet Proof"

Last week, I had the WSJ story on the “Bullet Proof” world and that had a lot of reaction, so I had to laugh when I was watching the new season of “Lioness” on Paramount+ and when an Army vehicle got into an ambush, the main character screams to the driver “This better have ‘bullet proof’ glass!” So yes, we really need to educate Hollywood too, right? Great show by the way despite that script miss.

NFL predictions 

Last this week… Back in September, I made my annual NFL predictions, and I picked KC over Dallas to win it all. Boy, did I put the hex on the Cowboys! Sorry Dallas friends! So, like always I take another look when the playoffs begin, and I am going to continue to roll with the Chiefs. They’re the champs until someone can step up and beat them, I’ll go with them. From the NFC, my heart is with the Lions, but I am afraid all the injuries there will haunt them, so I am going Eagles. Should be a fun playoff run! Good luck to your favorite teams!