The Grit Blueprint

RESCUE!® scanned an insect's retina to design the pattern on its Indoor Fly TrapStik. Then the team put the simplest possible message on the box.

I'm live at the Do it Best Fall Market with Alyssa Ando, Director of Marketing at RESCUE!, who has spent 21 years, in her words, making bugs sexy. RESCUE! is a family-run company that does its own engineering, R&D, and manufacturing in one factory in Spokane, Washington, with organic chemists and a Ph.D. entomologist on the team.

We get into how a product goes from a bug problem to a...

Forty feet of brushes and rollers can stop a customer cold. A.J. Ernst says the right recommendation usually comes down to two or three questions.

I'm live on the floor at the Do it Best Fall Market in Indianapolis with A.J. Ernst, Director of Sales at The Wooster Brush Company. Wooster has made paint applicators since 1851, and that's their sole focus. A.J. shares the questions a store employee should ask, how he can tell when someone painted with a cheap brush, and what independent dealers should think about when they set their assortment.
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This house sits on the side of a cliff above Lake Burton, on a massive sheet of bedrock. Chuck Vazquez let the terrain decide how to build it.

In this episode of Behind The Build, I'm on Lake Burton near Clayton, Georgia, with Chuck Vazquez, Founder of CK Builders. The lot called for a ranch with a basement: three bedrooms on the main floor, a bonus room downstairs, and a little under 3,900 square feet. The main living area looks right out at the lake and mountains through massive windows.

Chuck partnered with David Ramey of...

One phone call turned up three projects a dealer's sales team didn't know existed. Two weeks later, according to Ryan Dempsey of SalesJack, that rep had won an extra $250,000 in sales.

On this episode of the Grit Blueprint Podcast, I'm live on the show floor at the Do it Best True Value Market in Indianapolis with Ryan Dempsey, Founder & CEO of SalesJack, a sales platform built just for building suppliers. I bring him the complaints I hear about sales software all the time: I already entered that in my ERP, my reps won't use it, and it...

Drywall has owned the garage for decades. Joel Koops says Trusscore installs three to four times faster, and the installed cost lands close to finished, painted drywall.

In this episode of the Grit Blueprint Podcast, I'm on the Do it Best Fall Market floor with Joel Koops, Executive Vice President and Co-Founder of Trusscore, talking about how garage wall panels made from PVC went from barns and car washes into garages, basements, and mudrooms. We get into why contractor add-on services like a garage makeover fit on jobs you're already running, and why lumberyards can earn better...

I found Trusscore on the show floor at IBS 2026. Now it's on the walls of Ben's office.

This episode of Building Grit starts at the Trusscore booth at IBS 2026 with Joel Koops, Executive Vice President and Co-Founder of Trusscore. Joel says Trusscore goes on three or four times faster than drywall. It's waterproof, chemical-resistant, and you can wash down your garage after it's installed.

Ben, Heidi Pearl, and I framed up an 11 by 20 office for Ben, watched some install videos, and did our first Trusscore project ourselves. Trusscore gave us the panels for this build...

Your sales team just made a promise.

Now operations needs to deliver.

In this episode of the Grit Blueprint Podcast, I’m in Clayton, Georgia, with Ron Herrin, VP of Sales, and Lee Allen, VP of Manufacturing & Procurement at Tucker Door & Trim, talking about the relationship between sales and operations, what happens when things go wrong, and how communication and experience help teams keep the promises they make.

We talk about the challenges of selling highly customized products, the questions sales needs to ask before saying yes, why problems are an opportunity to bu...

Do it Best and True Value members: Use code 'Pink Hat' for a one time 5% discount on your order from Service Partners, through October 31, 2026!

Call or visit Service Partners website: https://www.service-partners.com/

Today I'm joined by Chuck Lencheck of Service Partners, live on the shhow floor at the Do it Best Fall Market, to talk about the insulation products, service, and additional revenue opportunities dealers should be thinking about.

From choosing the right insulation for DIYers and pros to expanding into gutters, Chuck explains how dealers can evaluate their product mix...

My dad’s lumber yard spent two years supplying a 30,000 square foot custom home in Alpharetta. I have one photo to show for it.

I joined Megan Kacvinsky of Point to Point and Vardhan Mehta of ACELAB as a guest on Inside The Spec to talk about what that missing proof costs. We get into building materials marketing that shows the work, brand strategy for manufacturers who are tired of competing on price, and why personal branding for executives is the quickest win leadership teams keep skipping. I also share what to post on LinkedIn when your fi...

Most contractors lose market share slowly enough that they don't notice. 

Greg Rowland noticed.

When the suppliers in his market started installing siding themselves, the scope he had built a company around started shrinking. He didn't fight it on price. Instead, he added the services his customers needed. Roofing, then windows and doors, and turned GR Exteriors into a turnkey business that covers the full exterior. Along the way, he also started a manufacturing company because he got tired of waiting on gable vents.

Greg is the owner of three companies in the A...

A window that is off by a quarter of an inch does not tell you on install day.

It tells you three winters later when water is leaking in.

In this episode of Behind The Build, I'm in Monroe, Georgia with Tucker Door & Trim, a two-step distributor that manufactures windows and doors inside a 290,000 square foot facility. 

Chris Kotlowski walks us through the entire process of how windows are made at Tucker, from cutting the glass to staging for delivery. Chris shows us the differences in manufacturing processes between their vinyl, PVC, and w...

Building industry companies don’t lose customers because their people stopped caring. 

They lose them because growth added more approvals between the person taking the order and the one installing it, and their people don’t feel empowered to fix the problem if a job goes sideways.

In this episode of the Grit Blueprint Podcast, I sit down with Jonathan Harvey, co-owner of HarLand Windows & Doors in Atlanta, who I first met back in 2012 when he was one of my first accounts and I was the one writing up his door POs. He grew up in a...

Most people never see the building where their doors get made. This one is 290,000 square feet, and they are adding another 100,000.

In this episode of Behind The Build, I’m at Tucker Door & Trim in Monroe, Georgia, with Jason Gert, Production Manager, who has been there 28 years, walking the full floor from the custom millwork shop to the exterior and interior door lines. We see SDL bars applied by hand, a CNC table that runs straight off an AutoCAD file, a machine that sets four door hinges at once, and why some of these jobs take a de...

Most businesses die in 5 years. Lummus Supply Co just turned 101.

In this episode of Behind The Build, I'm in Acworth, Georgia with CEO Will Lummus and his team to see how a fifth-generation building materials and millwork business supplies some of the finest luxury homes in Atlanta. We're talking a 29,000 square foot house, million-dollar window and door packages, and a machine that drills 1,200 holes in a single I-joist package.

What's inside:
 ✅ The 29,000 sq ft Georgia home and how Lummus specs its engineered wood with full 3D modeling, roof to foundation

 ✅ The Boise Cascad...

Lew Oliver helped design Trilith, Serenbe, and Vickery, some of the most sought-after walkable communities in Georgia. His next act might surprise you: modular homes.

In this episode of Behind The Build, I'm in Clarkesville, Georgia near Lake Burton with renowned town planner and designer Lew Oliver. We talk about the Lew Oliver MOD collection, modular homes designed with the same classical detail as his custom work, built to make walkable neighborhoods attainable for people who have been priced out of them. We also walk the Burton community, tour his newly renovated office, and get into his...

Watch us install a brand new Plastpro Nova 90 fiberglass double door at Grit Studios, our in-person podcast studio, start to finish. Michael Tull of Tull Sales walks through the full process of replacing an old steel door with a new outswing double door, including the mistakes that cause warranty claims and how to avoid them.

The new front door completely changes the look of the studio where we film The Grit Blueprint Podcast. It's a 3/4 lite over panel with rain glass and Low-E coating, built by Harris Door & Millwork and donated by Plastpro.

What you'll...

I'm Stefanie Couch, and this is Building Grit, the behind the scenes story of how we're building Grit Blueprint into a category of one in the building industry.

This episode is the most hands-on chapter yet. We're building our podcast studio from the ground up at Grit Studios in Clayton, Georgia, and I'm taking you through all of it.

We start at the front door. Michael Tull of Tull Sales walks me through a full front door install as we pull out the old half-lite steel door and replace it with a Plastpro Nova-90 fiberglass...

When I first met Gina Schaefer, I knew she was one of the more interesting people in our industry, and this conversation proves exactly why. Gina is the founder of A Few Cool Hardware Stores, and she built a $55 million independent hardware store business after getting laid off three times in four years. She walked into a rundown Washington, D.C., neighborhood that no one believed in, opened her first store in 2003 with zero hardware experience, and turned it into 14 locations across DC, Baltimore, and Northern Virginia, with the fifteenth on the way. 

In this episode, we t...

Sales is not about pressure. It is about people. In this Grit Blueprint Podcast conversation, recorded on the floor of the Do it Best True Value Spring Market in Denver, I sit down with Sarah Krey of Do it Best Corp to talk about the human side of winning in the hardware industry. With 25 years in home improvement and a shelf full of honors, Sarah brings a rare mix of competitiveness and warmth that makes people want to work with her.

We start with building trust with customers, and Sarah’s simple rule: never lie, and never ba...

Inside Luxury Real Estate in the Appalachian Mountains | Burton at Lake Burton

I'm Stefanie Couch, Founder of Grit Blueprint, and in this episode of Behind the Build, I'm taking you deep into the Appalachian Mountains to the shores of Lake Burton, where a remarkable luxury real estate project is coming to life. Welcome to the Burton, a brand-new community in Clarkesville, Georgia, where master planner Lew Oliver has designed stunning luxury houses that prove thoughtful architecture can blend seamlessly with nature.

This community connects Laprade's Marina to the Appalachian Trail with mountain living on the...

What does it take to run a building materials company for 100 years and set it up to win for 100 more? That is the question at the heart of my conversation with Will Lummus, fifth-generation CEO of Lummus Supply, recorded inside one of the tiny homes his team built in their Acworth, Georgia, showroom. 

With consolidation accelerating across the building industry, Will makes a strong case that the independent dealer has a durable niche when it commits to service over price, surrounds every customer with a hands-on team, and brings far more value before, during, and after the s...

Technology is moving faster than our industry has ever seen, and on this episode of the Grit Blueprint Podcast I sat down on the floor of the National Hardware Show with Adam Gunnett, the VP of Business Intelligence and Strategy at Busy Beaver Building Centers. Adam has done something rare in independent retail. He took a 19-store neighborhood hardware chain in Pittsburgh and built it into one of the most technologically advanced independent home improvement operations in the country, earning a cover feature in Hardware Retailing and a CIO of the Year nomination along the way.

In...

What does it really take to carry a legacy business into its fourth generation without losing what made it special? 

In this Grit Blueprint Podcast conversation, I sit down with Brookelyn McClellan of Hardware Sales, a Bellingham, Washington institution that began selling dynamite to loggers and miners back in 1962 and has grown into a multi-million dollar retailer with its own e-commerce engine. 
Brookelyn was named a 2025 NHPA Young Retailer of the Year Honoree, and she is a textbook example of next-generation family business leadership done right. 

We explore hardware store e-commerce through her company's lea...

What does it really take to grow a career inside one company for 25 years? In this episode of the Grit Blueprint Podcast, I talk with Sarah Lee, VP of Purchasing at Blish-Mize Co., who answered that question by living it. She walked in the door as a receptionist in 2001 and worked through the catalog, advertising, and purchasing departments before becoming the first female merchandise manager and, eventually, the executive setting the assortment for a fifth-generation family business that has been running since 1871.

We get honest about the part of the journey nobody likes to talk about: the...

This is where Building Grit begins. 

In this first episode, I hand you the keys to Grit Studios on day one and let you see the messy, exciting reality of building industry entrepreneurship from the inside. We just signed the lease for this space, and you will catch the very first moments: taking down old shelving, lighting candles so it feels like home, and planning out every corner. I show you where the podcast studio is going, where clients will sit, where we will photograph the windows, doors, and product lines that fill this industry, and the p...

The best dealers in the building industry are not just stocking product. They are guiding people toward the home they actually want. In this conversation, I talk with Abeer Saeed, Merchandise Manager at Do it Best, about how consultative selling helps customers land on exactly what they want while believing it was their idea all along. Abeer came up through interior design and retail at JCPenney and Ashley Furniture before joining Do it Best, and she brings a rare blend of design instinct and merchandising strategy to the millwork and cabinets category.

We start with her core...

Some of the best builders in this industry started with a truck, a trade, and a decision to bet on themselves. In this episode of the Grit Blueprint Podcast, I talk with Devonie Hutchinson, founder of DGB Developments in Wichita Falls, Texas, about how she turned a 2012 weekend side hustle into a full-service construction and junk removal company, and why she walked away from the false security of a steady paycheck to do it.

We dig into the moment she realized she could count on herself more than any employer, and how that mindset shift moved her...

I have spent my whole life in the building industry, and one thing I know for sure is that the best people often stay the best-kept secret. NataLee Callahan refused to let that happen. In this episode she shares how a casual hobby in 2011 grew into more than half a million subscribers and a patented power tool line built for the women the industry forgot.

If you are trying to figure out how to start a YouTube channel, you will hear the unglamorous truth: it took two years and a lot of bad videos before anything went...

Most people who sell doors have never seen one built. That is a problem. The product is more technical every year, the margins are tighter, and the warranty claims come fast when something is installed incorrectly.

In this episode of Behind the Build, I walk through Magbee Contractors Supply in Winder, Georgia, with owner Bob Magbee. We tour the custom door shop and watch the process of making a door from start to finish.

You’ll learn how doors are made on the Kval door machine, the Lamborghini of door machines. We cover the st...

Most people who sell doors have never seen one built. That is a problem. The product is more technical every year, the margins are tighter, and the warranty claims come fast when something is installed incorrectly.

In this episode of Behind the Build, I walk through Magbee Contractors Supply in Winder, Georgia, with owner Bob Magbee. We tour the custom door shop and watch the process of making a door from start to finish.

You’ll learn how doors are made on the Kval door machine, the equipment that Bob calls the Lamborghini of do...

If you run a hardware store, lumber yard, or building supply business, this episode shows you how to compete without big box budgets. I sit down with Sharona Eiserer of Wood Shed Lumber and Hardware, Ashley Guest of Harbin Lumber Company, and Kerry Hasselbach of Do it Best to break down omnichannel marketing for independent dealers that actually drives foot traffic and revenue. 

Sharona Eiserer runs Wood Shed Lumber and Hardware across six locations in Missouri. She does live radio twice a week, and helped kick off the company's video content by recording their first reel. Now h...

Most lumber yards sell what their suppliers stock. Magbee Contractors Supply builds it. In this episode of Behind the Build, I head to Winder, Georgia with owner Bob Magbee, VP of Sales Stewart Brandon, and inside sales manager Melissa McDougald to walk a 20-acre, rail-served yard and the custom millwork shop that sits at the heart of the operation.

You will see how Magbee runs a real custom wood door shop. We find door slabs in white oak, poplar, and maple, raised panels, shaker designs, and a 48-inch wide door with a custom lattice grid built in-house...

Lew Oliver has spent decades doing something most designers never attempt. He does not just draw homes. He plans entire towns. From Seaside to Rosemary Beach to the first expansion of Edinburgh since 1805, his work has shaped some of the most loved communities in the world. In this episode of the Grit Blueprint Podcast, I sit down with Lew at his studio in Clarksville, Georgia, to talk about what real community building looks like and why so many developers miss it.

We walk through his philosophy on vernacular architecture, why a home should feel like it belongs...

Most leaders in the building industry know AI is going to change the game. Very few have a real plan for what to do about it. This episode is a working playbook on how to use AI in your business from a CEO who is already doing it.

Jason Blair runs Tal Building Centers, a family-owned company with 28 locations in the Pacific Northwest. Fifteen months ago, he started an internal AI committee with people from across his organization. Not just IT. Not just leadership. A real cross-section of his team. The goal was simple. Define what AI...

In this episode of Behind the Build I'm in Chatsworth, Georgia, with Chip Wade at The Perch Treehouses. The three luxury treehouses are located in the North Georgia mountains and have stunning views of their wild surroundings. The Jenny, The Tom, and The Jake, share the same square footage and the same engineered foundation. But the second you walk through the front door of each one, the feel is completely different. That's what custom design and real millwork do for a home.

I'm a door nerd, so the front doors are where I start. The pink Dutch...

I sit down with Dori Shoshan, head of Innovation and Business Development at Panda Windows & Doors, inside the Las Vegas showroom of one of the most respected custom luxury windows and doors manufacturers in North America. Dori is a working radiologist and the son of Panda's founders, Avi and Tiranit Shoshan, who started the family business in 1991 in Israel, where his father chose to start with the hardest product in the category, radius curve multi-slide doors, and built his own bending machine to do it.

Dori walks through how a family-owned window manufacturer is rebuilding the engine...

Most lumber yards stay invisible in their own market. They sell millions of dollars of product a year and the people next door still do not know their name. Ashley Guest is changing that at Harbin Lumber, a fourth generation, century-old building materials dealer in Lavonia, Georgia. She walked in four years ago with a marketing degree and zero industry experience. There was no playbook. There was no team. There was a blank canvas and a paintbrush.

We break down exactly how she built a brand from scratch. You will hear her four C's of...

Sharona Eiserer bought a struggling 60-year-old lumber yard at six months pregnant and grew it into six Wood Shed Lumber and Hardware locations across rural Missouri. In this episode of the Grit Blueprint Podcast, she shares how she saved a dying small-town retail business, why the Do it Best co-op model beat her franchise experience, and the exact social media and radio playbook she uses to win against bigger competitors. If you own an independent hardware store, run a rural lumberyard, or are thinking about buying a family hardware business, this conversation gives you a real plan. You will...

Jason Blair, CEO of Tal Building Centers, joins me to break down how to build a sales culture in building materials where every role drives revenue. He shares the weekly communication cadence he uses with 500 employees, how he reads company culture in the lumber industry the moment he walks a yard, and how AI fixed a three-department friction problem in 90 minutes. This episode gives LBM dealers, distributors, and building supply leaders a practical playbook on CEO team communication, AI for building materials dealers, and LBM dealer growth. You will hear how Jason doubled a 225 million dollar business, why he...

What does it actually take to sell a $55 million business you built from scratch? In this episode, Gina Schaefer breaks down everything: ESOPs, succession planning for independent dealers, finding the right buyer for your business, and why she chose employee ownership over private equity. If you have ever searched "how does an ESOP work," "when should I start succession planning," or "how to exit a small business," this episode answers all of it. Gina covers how to build your exit strategy lifeline list, what to look for in a business broker or attorney, and the three things every independent...