Spec Shaman

Behind the Specs: A Deep Dive into Product Specification Techniques

• Roy F. Schauffele • Season 1 • Episode 2

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In this episode of the Spec Shaman Podcast, we discuss drinking from the fountain of knowledge on the built environment, credibility over bottom lines and the connection between altruism, education and architectural specification.  

 We are joined by the accomplished Roy F. Schauffele, President and founder of Division 7 Solutions, Inc. Schauffele is an internationally published author and speaker in energy conservation and sustainable building envelopes. 

Schauffele is also a multiple award winner from Build San Antonio Green, a former elected official and Texas Senate appointee. He serves the City of San Antonio as the Vice Chair of the Small Business Development Advocacy Committee as well as the Bexar County Commissioners Precinct 3 appointee on the Bexar County Small, Minority, and Women Business Enterprise Advisory Committee.

Globally, he is the only person to be a Fellow of the Construction Specifications Institute and the air barrier association of America. He recently completed two terms as a Board member of the (Rainscreen Association in North America). He was among the first to achieve the Certified Air Barrier Specialist (CABS) designation. He recently concluded his services as Executive Advisor to the ABAA Board.

This podcast is not available for AIA CE hours. Please visit www.ronblank.com to participate in an AIA CE podcast.

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In this episode of the spec shaman podcast, we discussed drinking from the fountain of knowledge on the built environment, the importance of credibility over bottom lines, and the connection between altruism education and architectural specification. We are joined by the accomplished Roy F shuffle, president and founder of division seven Solutions Incorporated. schoffel is an internationally published author and speaker in energy conservation and sustainable building envelopes. He is also a multiple award winner from build San Antonio Greene, a former elected official and Texas senate appointee. Hi, Roy. Good morning. How are you? Laura, I'm doing great today. Thank you for asking. That's wonderful. It's great to hear. I'm excited to have a conversation with you. And I'm gonna go ahead and start with our first question. Could you provide an overview of how you got started and ended up where you are now? I can, but it covers five decades, and I'll be fairly brief. The first third of my career started out in research and development. We're a variety of fortune 500, and actually a fortune 50 firm. I became their technical director. And it dawned on me back in the day that I was driving in 1976, Plymouth Duster, slant six engine with a stick shift. And all the guys in sales and marketing, were driving Audi's and Beemers. And although I enjoyed my time in research and development, I realized that those who were in sales and marketing and working with the architects had a greater opportunity for their personal income growth. And being a very good American capitalist, I chose to pursue that path. So for the last, or whatever, call it 40 years I've been in marketing and sales, mainly architectural marketing and sales. And the last 37 years I have owned my own firm by the name of division seven solutions. Well, that's exciting. How did you get that one started? I was inspired by the great President Ronald Reagan, when he gave that speech about the shining city on the hill. So I formed division seven solutions and opened it up on July the fourth 1987. Well, congratulations on your recent anniversary, then. Thank you. Um, how does your company innovate as the market has changed over the last three or four decades since you've been in business? It's been very interesting changes in our business. A lot of the folks that I deal with, you've got to be architects mainly, or consultants, you've got to be able to demonstrate your knowledge and skills back at the turn of the century. And sort of like that term. Back at the turn of the century, everyone thought that the internet was the internet was going to replace all product representation. Quite the opposite. It's created a new niche for those conform at a very high level with the architects and the consultants. In other words we become as human beings, we become their Wikipedia. So over the years, I've seen an awful lot of changes to electronics, or internet communications. And it's really not a conversation. That's just an information flow. There's no context or whatnot. When I lecture for the spec, Shaman school, I do an hour and a half presentation about how to get to see an architect how to work with an architect, and what they do and don't do, and what you should do and what you shouldn't do. So there have been changes impacted by the electronic world or any electronic communication, but it's still a person to person business. That is the art of architectural selling, and that art has been lost over the years. And the spec shaman school is the best school to learn that art in today's world period. There is not even a close second. Well, that's high praise. Thank you so much for that compliment. I know that building those relationships really matters here at RBA. And it's really nice to hear your perspective on it. When you're when you're teaching those relationships and communication, skill sets. How does the evolution of product building products? How does that impact those conversations? Well, the evolution has been towards sustainability in green. And there have been very good leaps in technology in that regard. A lot of this is being driven by the US Green Building Council, which influences the building codes. Some of the green technology did not win worked out so well. It was way beyond some of the codes throughout the United States, and ideal throughout the United States had requirements in there where the product technology wasn't there yet. So consequently, the code required one thing, but no one could supply. So the conveyance of that sustainability, the green aspect of it, not harming the environment, has really become a crucial role. I'm a chemist by education, the chemistry has changed greatly from even the raw material acquisition viewpoint to how materials are manufactured. So do you feel like your company plays a role in that evolution by connecting maybe the goals of a sustainability driven market and the actual technology behind it? Yes, we have driven a lot of the green aspects in the state of Texas. And I'll give you an example. We were the first firm in Texas to embrace air barrier technology. Air barriers are a relatively new in the code, they came into the code nationwide in 2015. They have been in the code Massachusetts since 2002. We entered that business in 1999, we could see what was happening with the future. And air air barriers by themselves will save a building 40% energy. And that's a huge leap in technology. And over the years, both combining the air barrier technology with insulation in a building, insulation and low no longer uses CFCs insulation that can be reused or recycled at the end of its lifetime. Combined with air barrier technology, our buildings are substantially more efficient than they ever have been. And the design factor is now the entire building envelope. All six sides of the building are now thermally efficient, reducing reducing the carbon footprint of that building. So that's been the biggest arena that we have played in and we have driven some of that. My firm when we could not get someone to manufacture what we thought the market needed. We went into manufacturing up in comfort Texas, as a matter of fact. Yeah. And that was a pretty interesting. Few years, I had a full head of hair before I became a manufacturer. But you know, just joking. It's it's tough. But our plan, my plan was green, we used all water based materials. We had we used everything. We had no waste products at the firm. That was wonderful. Yeah, that was pretty cool. Even the five gallon buckets that we downloaded our materials into were recycled plastic. That's great. So it was a net zero initiative. Exactly. So there was a huge movement from year 2000 For the first 10 years, driven by coach driven by us GBC driven by the US GBC LEED program to come up with more sustainable products. Now. What RBA does, is they can provide a manufacturer with that documentation on environmental product documents and EPDs. In other words, and that's a service that Ron blank associates does provide to the industry. I can only urge the manufacturers you may think you know what you're doing. But you better hire an expert. I know that we really strive very hard to make sure that we can guide those those initiatives so that they're successful. I know environmental lyxor does really wonderful work in helping those manufacturers navigate a lot of those codes and criteria to make sure that they're meeting the mark. So Did Did you see sustainability as the biggest transformation over the last the last decades? Or do you think that kind of goes hand in hand with technology? Are there anything any other huge transformations that you've seen? Well, the transformations I've seen is the architectural community design professional has become more reliant on the internet. architects don't really enjoy people, people their perspective, my opinion, their perspective is that people screw up their buildings. Okay, you build these wonderful buildings and then people go in there and just mess around with everything. So they've designed a very thermally efficient, gorgeous building or a sustainable building. And then humans school in New York. Keep tweaking and playing around with settings that they shouldn't touch. But the Internet has become a primary source of initial keyword initial information to the architect. But it's got to be backed up by that context and a human knowledge point. The construction specification Institute calls it the trusted advisor. And that's really what I have been for the last 30 years here in Texas and effectively nationwide, as indicated earlier, by request have given over 1000, AIA learning units over these many, many years. So then you've definitely seen firsthand the evolution not only in the trades, right in the manufacturing and design process, but also the way that the education is delivered. Um, I would be interested to hear your perspective on that. How has the education market shifted to me a growing industry? Number one, again, electronically, Zoom meetings, I had never done a Zoom meeting until COVID Hit whole new technology, fantastic technology. I mean, you think back to the old TV show Star Trek, they had the first floppy disk. They did, they really did that the first floppy disks that Mr. Spock used, but you look at where we've come. So to delivery systems are critical. Now one of the problems with the delivery system like zoom, is you better have a damn good learning unit. Right? Better be a good speaker, right? The days of the speakers walking up to and reading their PowerPoint presentation are over, you will lose your audience in five to eight minutes, you will not be able to make the points that you make. But again, the marketing has changed to my firm will only give H SW rated AIA learning units, why? That's what the principles of the firm and the design professionals need to maintain their state licensing. Right. And again, this is where Ron blank and Associates comes in. They do guide the manufacturers that come to them into that are really saying now you don't want to do just this AIA learning unit. Because you won't get the decision makers in the room, you get a bunch of really good young architects, but you're not reaching the people who will make the decision that affects your product or your technology. So that's been a big change. I see that many of the poor speakers over time have been weeded out, they become known. Architects by nature design professionals by nature are nomadic. There was a firm for five to eight years, then they moved to another firm. So the information in this business spreads out through throughout the country, not just by the internet, but also by migration. Hmm, so like a knowledge diffusion. Exactly. That's, that's interesting. And the the challenges to the manufacturing process over this span of time. How do you recommend people overcome them? Do you think education is key? Education is absolutely key. As a sharing, which I share with some of my lectures. My firm never ever made a quote sales call to an architect. We never made a project call to an architect unless the architect call us everything my firm did. And it took three years to do this. We educated the architect about the product technology that we either represented or manufacture was our talking about the jobs they had on the books. We establish their credibility as their technical resource their go to person without having our handout for a purchase order or a sale. So we took a very altruistic approach took three years and a lot of my money to get to that point, but we proved ourselves time and time again, where eventually we were receiving the phone calls from the architect saying, I've got a division seven problem in roofing or an installation. Can you come in? Bingo, we had made it but we were always very neutral. We were very honest. And I do remember a project to San Antonio, the large architectural firm had and this is probably nearing the second year business. I was not really able to put food on the table at that point. And the architect asked me a question they said Roy We wrote the spec around you. There's this product that was submitted. Is it an equal? As a huge project? I took a deep breath, swallowed hard and said, Yes, it is. So I launched that project. Here's the Marriott River Center down in downtown San Antonio, huge project, oh, man, and I literally had just paid my income tax bill with my credit card. So let you and let you know where we're at. But at that point, that reputation, right, solidified, that you can call Roy, and you're going to get the right answer. Right. So credibility really does carry a great deal of weight in this industry. And it's not just credibility, you've got to be able to get in front of that architect, that design professional. And, again, this is where your group comes in, they do that for you. You know, you conduct your resident Dallas, cowboy freak on staff, Chris Massey is a great guy, he's just got a very myopic view on good football. But But with that, he gets you in front of those architects. You know, I'm not part of your presentation core group. If you're shorter speaker, you would kind of have to give me a call. But you're putting 40 People 40 design professionals in a room, in each one of these cities around the country. It will take you many months as an individual to make those appointments and get to them. Yeah, so the mass education that y'all do, getting a whole group of people. And that's the key to success, because it takes too long otherwise. So but you've got to be able to speak to the right people at the right decision level, or LOA level of authority to include your product technology in their design. You also need to do a little research, you know, what type of firm is? What type of firm is it? What do they do? You know, if they build buildings in Alaska, you better have your stuff together to talk about cold weather effects, right? If they're building and I've been involved with some of these, like embassy work, you'll never be told where the embassy is going to be located for security reasons. But you will be told about the climate. Right? So you've got to tailor your presentation to what that architect does. But more importantly, you got to have the credibility to get in front of that architect. Your firm again, RBA has that credibility. They will get you in front. I know that we really try hard to maintain the reputation of a place that people can come to for that that kind of conversation. When you're when you're discussing these things with them. Do you find that there are case studies or notable projects that are really useful? Especially when you're sharing your own products? If they're local? Yes, architects, they're nomadic, we discuss that. But they're also territorial. They want to they want to know if you have a project in their neck of the woods that's about five years or older. And they want to see that. And you do that with case studies. You know, everybody has testing data, it's required by the law, it's required by the code. So everyone has their testing data. Architects look at that and go, that's very nice. What do you have here? Then once you can say, well, here's a list of the jobs nearby, you can go look at, or here's a couple of case studies from this area. It doesn't have to be down the street, it could just be in the general geo specific area. Yeah. Because they deal with climate issues. Also, they deal with building codes in that area. They need to know that your product has been used. Yeah, I know that definitely. Even with the new co2 ratings and things like that originality is playing a huge role in successfulness of implementing project design. For young professionals that are entering in the construction and design trades. Do you have any strong recommendations that you would give them or any advice? Yes, I would like to share it and I'm not telling you what to do. This is just experience speaking. I do lecturer at University of Texas San Antonio. I do. Yeah. Is that where you went? Oh, no, but my actually my son is doing an athletic training program there. So I just was on campus yesterday. Which sport is he in? He is interested in track and field and baseball. So we need to talk afterwards. Absolutely. Absolutely. But when you look at that, and I enjoyed luxury today, younger guys, younger people, guys, I'm from South Philadelphia guys, is everyone. Okay? Are you? Yeah, Eagles fan? Actually, I was signed by them. You were? Yep. Mission quarterback? No way. We're going back 50 years. That's okay thing. Yeah. Never saw the field. So did I play? No. Did I sign? Yes, it happens. And that was one of the gold medals in one of the Senior Olympics in Norway for football. Yeah, football throwing accuracy. Time used to be swept. But, you know, when you're working with the younger architects, you don't want to come off as like, Oh, back in the day, you want to share information. You want to present information to them in a way that they can absorb it, they are hungry for information, they drink from the fountain of knowledge, right? Give it to them. Right? Don't talk at them. Rock wisdom. And one of the things I always urge. And it's worked out very well for me in my career. Two, rookies coming into the business, keep a notebook, keep a sacred National Book of Secrets. And you have in there a list of people that you can call who you trust in this business. They're probably salespeople. And that's a bad connotation. They're really architectural reps, right? A big difference between a salesperson and architectural rep, which is what you all teach. So But with that, keep that book sacred. Because somewhere in whatever division you're working, or whatever section you're working, you're going to need to be able to pick up the phone, call an expert in that arena, and have a good relationship with them to where they will take 10 to 15 minutes to advise you properly. That's huge. No, I've definitely I've noticed that as the lead instructional designer, I meet a lot with the marketing side of product manufacturing. And what I have really learned is that those guys really know what they're talking about. They're not there to sell you something just for the sake of selling it. And in fact, when we're tailoring our courses, I noticed that they say don't put that in there because that's not true. More often than not, they don't they don't want something that isn't authentic, or has the integrity that they work hard to build, to share. And I think that that's incredibly impressive, because I think there's they could they could try to oversell or over deliver. And I noticed that more times than not they don't know, they want to be a source of knowledge first, right? And your reputation is really all you have got to be able to deliver in a timely fashion. Right? Many of the product reps I deal with, don't return voicemail. Until the next day, if an architect is calling me, they need help them right then in there, right. And that's how our firm was built, you know, we will return all the phone calls in one hour. Man, that's an important mission. But for the younger folks, keep them book of secrets with you. Right? You know, when you intern in the summer, talk to the head spec writer or the head technical person who they deal with steal their list. Okay, you know, steal it, just take it get a copy of it. But there's a lot of folks out there. I'm not bragging but I've got patents and roofing. I've got patents in walls, innovative some things and over the years, published a lot have a lot of initials after my name. Right. And and this is all builds that credibility to where no matter how old you architect young or don't say old any more seasoned. Okay, younger season, you want to have that source that reference make it your own Wikipedia. Right. Right. No, I mean, my background is really academic. And I would always try to find the most seasoned professor in my workplace and spend as much time learning as much as I could from them and there's such a value in that. So do you feel like orienting yourself to being a Knowledge Hub is how you approach your marketing and promoting you're building products. That is 100% of how we're established from day one. That was our mission. Our mission was to be not the biggest but The best architectural rep firm that ever hit the state of Texas. And is that an egotistical statement? No, that was a desire that was a want. Because I saw what was out there in Texas. And my competition really wasn't providing that to the design community. I wanted to be the one that they call, I wanted to be the one they respected. And that was a personal drive on my part. Where did you find your source of information? Like what like, Where were your favorite places to learn to be that Knowledge Hub. At that time, it was a lot of the seasoned professionals but studying the history of the business that you're in. For instance, it may sound a little goofy, but you look at foam, plastic insulation, and that's had quite the history. Over the years roofing, another area has had a long history. I mean, I know of a roof at the Erie Lackawanna terminal station that is 123 years old. It's a flat roof, no way is made with burlap and culture, our pitch. But if you go back into history, and when you sit down with the design professional, one of the benefits I had, as a chemist, I can tell them why it didn't work. It didn't knock a product or fracture. This is why this system did not work. And again, the changes in the business. We started out everything was chlorofluorocarbons refrigerant. Now, they don't exist in any of the isolation products, right. And you're really talking a 30 year change, which is not that long. So learn your business, loan your competition, top to bottom. Do you go ahead? No, say Do you think those adjustments have been the biggest challenge? So maybe getting products specified? Yes. It's been one of the biggest challenges of the other challenge where we honestly, is some very poor representation in sales and marketing. I hear many, many complaints about, well, this guy came in and I asked him a bunch of questions, and he only knew his product that doesn't help me. I need to know how and the key issue for product rep. You need to know how that particular technology which is desired by the design professional fits into their project. They may want to use it but as you indicated earlier, we have to say no sometimes, right? I had one architectural firm in the Lower Rio Grande Valley, some Reuven doing it this way for 40 years. Yes. Is there anything wrong with the product? No. Then why are you saying don't use it? Because the fire code changed. And a product no longer met the fire crew? He said, Well, I didn't I didn't hear that from manufacturer, F or D or you know, whomever I said, Well, you got a bad rep. So ask them again, to provide the data. And the arc tech call me back through research. Oh, my God. Thank you. So I didn't tell you but we were designing a school and elementary school, right. And we would have built it this way. And we would have been violated national national fire code. Yeah. Yeah. Mess with NFPA. No. Yeah, you will go to jail. Yeah. You know, things like that. So our whole firm and what you do what you'll do at your firm, you give information. You literally give information, you give knowledge. And it's up to the product manufacturers to realize how to get that knowledge into the marketplace to the architects, right? You're pretty good vehicles for that. Yeah, we do we, I typically have an entire section dedicated to those codes, specifically because of how important it is. And it really does give that information out. So there's no one silver bullet that kills the vampire or the werewolf, excuse me, the werewolf. Yeah. But there are many things that that come together. Nothing's just standalone in this business. Nothing works by itself. So when you're looking to the future, internet's great. No two ways about it. But you have to add context to that. The context is added by the human component, but the human component has got to be extremely well trained, well spoken. And, and no more of a gestalt knowledge of everything that's out there, including competition because nothing gives you more credibility than saying no. I think you really ought to use manufacturer A and then why isn't he your competitor? Yeah, they are, but use them, you're better off. And your credibility just rises naturally. Right? That's, yeah, that's definitely important. When it comes to sustainability, do you find that that credibility is easy to attain, or because of the evolving nature of the sustainability initiatives? does, it creates some challenges, it can create shan't great challenges for a medium to small manufacturer. They don't have the financial resources in house to say a fortune 50 company has, right. So they're going to need help. Fortune 50 company needs help also, but they don't know what at first, it dawns on them later on after they get thrown out of a few offices that they need to hire someone to put this stuff someone expert in that arena to put it together. So you do need this information. Much of it is law now, much is desired by the design professionals. And it's an it's in their code of conduct, to have that happen to design professionals code of conduct, that's what they want, and a discussion. And there's a huge drive for net zero or carbon neutral. It's aspirational at this point. It is not factual, difficult to get to technologically may be too difficult to get to financially. But it's an aspirational goal that we need to strive for. But you need the backup was all your, your green data to support it, and recommend you hire someone to do it because you're not an expert in it as a manufacturer. Yes. And then it's an interesting dichotomy to between like a product that is sustainable versus a sustainable manufacturing process. So one of the things that we noticed a lot is that, you know, a company might not realize what they have in their process that really contributes to sustainability. It is and it's funny, you mentioned that Laura, one of the plants that I visited, they were making very important for Texas impact or hail resistant shingles. Right for residential. And that gives you in some areas of Texas 20% discount 25% discount on your insurance for your home. Yes, but when I when I went to the plan, I found that that all the little cutouts for the dimensional shingles, just those little three quarter inch wide sheets of shingles were cut out to is wasted, quote unquote, they were taking them and using them as a roadway bed as a sub as a base for roadways. And what a great use. Yeah, what a great use. They say we'll take all those cutouts that 30 years ago would have been thrown into a landfill. A guy came by person firm came by with their little dump truck and they would dump it into the dump truck and he would take it out as he was paving roadways. So everything's being used and reused much more intelligently now. Yes, the multi purpose of a product is an important one. Um, so do you have any final thoughts or advice that you would like to share? As far as manufacturers go, I urge you not to be so inward looking. You need to look out, there are experts there that can add to your efforts. Your intentions are good as a manufacturer, but you will need outside help. And Laura, you said it best, they may have processes internal to their manufacturing that they don't even know could be of great benefit to them, when they would help them become a perceive more green firm. As far as architectural representation, architectural reps. It's truly an art. It is not a science. And it has to be taught and learned. And if you can get to some of the courses that are out there to learn this aspect of it, learn from the best. Go to school, take the courses, you're going to be 1000 times better off, even down to tiny details. One of the things I lecture about is if you have just met an architect for the first time, the very first time you've taken up. Don't ever folks, if you're out there listening to me don't ever take up more than 15 minutes of an architect or design professionals time unless you're asked to because margins are thin right now. They need to be working in building hours but And if you when you get back to your office, take the time to write a thank you letter handwriting. Okay, include your business card in there, that's acceptable. When you say, hey, look, I know you're up against it. Thank you so much for your time today. Really appreciate the audience you gave me sign your name for your card in there. No one does that anymore. And you would be amazed at just something like that, what effect that has for your relationship. And beyond that, since nobody gets any mail anymore, you mail that thank you card. And they're like, Wow, what's this? Postage Stamp, and that's an envelope and right. And it has a great effect. So that's my advice for the young architects, young design professionals. Find find your book of secrets, find your book of knowledge. They're upright, they got two little legs to get two arms to find out from your more seasoned people who the hell they deal with, and go from there. But most importantly, education, education, education, and manufacturers viewpoint, educate the architects don't sell them, educate them. The design professionals take the education available to you. That's H SW rated, because that's the good courses. Yeah, so the rating really does matter. It does. And again, Laura, it's not just one thing. It's a series of things that come to a point to bring that architect the information and knowledge he needs to design a building properly. Yeah, especially in an evolving market, I think that that's the thing that I'm seeing a lot is, you know, just trying to stay on top of what they're asking. And there's, there's no better place. And then in the middle of it, this is, you know, I was having a reflective thought about it just yesterday, you know, there's there's the goal and the initiative, and then there's the implementation of it. So as we see these new code changes, and we see this progress being made to try to make a better built environment in a more efficient and built environment. It's the implementation of that, and the experiences that come out of it. That become really important knowledge too. And kind of keeping track of it. It is and consider also, a lot of folks don't remember this. A lot of folks were not in the business at this time. Up until the year 2001. There were only 16 divisions in a project manual. Based on the CSI format, 16 divisions to build that entire building. Today's world, there's over 40 divisions. Wow. 40 sections. So, you know, the knowledge base has exploded. Mm hmm. And if you're talking to the architect, you better know, you better know you your competition and the coach. Right. So yeah. Well, I really enjoyed talking with you today, Roy. Laura, thank you so much very complimented, that you would consider me for your podcast, of course, I have a lot of respect for your group. A tremendous amount of respect for your group and what you do for design professionals and equally for manufacturers. So thank you from an industry perspective. Oh, thank you. I know that the feeling is mutual. I know when we were creating our list you were at the very top of it right away. So thank you a compliment. So, have a great day.

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