Feeling Optimistic

February 2023


As we push forward in 2023, this issue of The Voyage gives us the opportunity to take a moment to reflect on some of our accomplishments. Safety, morale, and new customer acquisitions were at the top of our list in 2022. 

Al Valdez and I worked diligently throughout the year to help our team achieve a quality work-life balance.

One way we were able to accomplish this was to invest in cross-training of our operators. Having operators trained to operate multiple pump sizes afforded us the luxury of being able to approve 99% of all time off requests. I have to say, these operators and their families put this time to good use. Some of the more notable time off requests came from boom operators like Bob Hurley, who, he and his wife spent two weeks touring Italy. Travis Milistefr, who also took two weeks off, went on a big game hunting trip. Armando Garibay and his family traveled to Las Vegas and then to Los Angeles to support their son’s competitive team baseball tournaments. Josh Matlock took his daughter on a cross-country road trip to Bloomington, Illinois to visit his 87-year-old Grandmother. It’s very rewarding to see our team spend quality time with their families.

With regard to our safety effort, we invested in what is called an “Air Cuff” system for all of our boom pumps.

Air Cuffs are a key component in preventing plug and release hose whipping accidents. An Air Cuff fits around the placing hose at the end of the boom. When the pump is shut off the air cuff closes tight around the placing hose stopping concrete from draining from the boom while not allowing air to enter the boom system. Air in the boom system is the primary cause for the aforementioned plug and release hose whipping accident. We also added Kevlar rear discharge covers on the back of the hoppers. This is the area where the mixer drivers stand while discharging concrete into the hopper. The Kevlar cover fits over the rear discharge pipe at the back of the hopper. If there was a failure to the rear discharge elbow due to a hard plug, the Kevlar cover would contain the blast and protect the mixer driver.

As we work through the current economic uncertainties, I feel our team is well-positioned to take advantage as we lean into growing our market share while expanding our service area.

We are seeing Clients who had left us during my transition into CF&T one year ago return as we are continuing to add clients in the Sacramento market. At last look, we have pumped for 25 individual General contractors and concrete subcontractors in the Sacramento region thanks to the efforts of Daniel Fink and all of his hard work. Well done!

I would like to note that the support I received from so many throughout our family of companies, in my first year, is nothing short of incredible.

Thank you all so much for all that you do!

Art Fink

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