Get Ready for the 2024 Midwest Roofing Expo! - PODCAST TRANSCRIPT

Editor's note: The following is the transcript of a live interview with MRCA’s President Robert (Bob) Poutre, Vice President Laurie Moore and Managing Director and MR Editor Rachel Pinkus. You can read the interview below or listen to the podcast.

Intro: Welcome to Roofing Road Trips, the podcast that takes you on a thrilling journey across the world of roofing. From fascinating interviews with roofing experts, to on the road adventures, we'll uncover the stories, innovations and challenges that shape the rooftops over our heads. So fasten your seat belts and join us as we embark on this exciting roofing road trip.

Megan Ellsworth: Hello, everyone. My name is Megan Ellsworth here at rooferscoffeeshop.com, and we are back for a roofing road trip and today I am road tripping over to see our friends at the MRCA. Hello, everyone. How are you?

Laurie Moore: Good.

Robert (Bob) Poutre: Hello.

Laurie Moore: How are you?

Megan Ellsworth: Yay. I'm so good. Laurie, let's start with you. Can you just introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about MRCA just to get us started, and then Bob and Rachel we'll have you introduce yourselves?

Laurie Moore: Sure. I'm Laurie Moore. I'm the current Vice President of MRCA. I have a roofing company in Peoria, Illinois.

Megan Ellsworth: Amazing. Bob?

Robert (Bob) Poutre: I'm Bob Poutre, President of Roof Tech in Stillwater, Minnesota and current president of MRCA, the Roofing Contractor's Advocate.

Megan Ellsworth: Amazing. Rachel?

Rachel Pinkus: Yeah, my name is Rachel Pinkus and I am the Managing Director for the Midwest Roofing Contractors Association. I'm responsible for event planning and planning the conference and expo that we're going to be talking about.

Megan Ellsworth: Amazing. I'm so excited to get to learn a little bit more about Midwest Roofing Contractors Association and your expo and conference coming up. So, how has the conference evolved over the years and how did it get started?

Robert (Bob) Poutre: Oh, it got started long before my time. I believe we're in our 75th year.

Megan Ellsworth: Wow.

Robert (Bob) Poutre: Generally, in the early days, the association was headquartered in Kansas City and that's always where [inaudible 00:02:00] the next folks were. And then with a change through a couple different management associations, some people thought, well, we are the Midwest Roofing Contractors Association. Why don't we move our show each year to a different location? It makes it easy for the local people to really come and get involved. We've been in Kansas City, St. Louis, Milwaukee, Omaha and then this year, October 21st through the 23rd in downtown St. Paul at the River Center. I'm looking forward to it.

Megan Ellsworth: Amazing. What makes the expo and conference this year in 2024 stand out?

Robert (Bob) Poutre: Stand out? Well, one, it's going to be in St. Paul. The MRCA hasn't been here in quite a while, but it's always been a great place for them. We're expecting big things. We have tons of educational sessions that will be happening throughout the three days. We have some groundbreaking stuff in our technical and research. There's been a plywood and OSD study, keep our fingers crossed that all that information should be coming out and it's going to be industry changing.

Megan Ellsworth: Wow, that's exciting. So Rachel and Laurie, who are some of the keynote speakers and industry experts presenting at the conference this year?

Rachel Pinkus: Well, our keynote this year is going to be a Pittsburgh Steeler running back, former Pittsburgh Steeler running back, Rocky Bleier. He has a great story that I think is going to be inspirational to a lot of people. He was drafted in his rookie season to be a Pittsburgh Steeler and then he was sent off to Vietnam and so he had the experience of being in the NFL and then going and serving our country and then he actually came back and served almost another decade in the NFL playing professional football and he's got quite a story that he's going to tell for us. Yeah.

Megan Ellsworth: Wow. That's powerful. Oh my gosh. Any other highlighted industry experts you want to talk about that are going to be presenting?

Laurie Moore: I think one of the ways that the MRCA has changed over the years, I remember going to the event 20, 30 years ago and there was mostly technical and safety topics and I really appreciate some of the newer topics we've gotten into with mental health and just some general business topics. Personality focuses like helping you work with people, helping you recognize that everybody is on a path of succession at some point and it helps us find people we can relate to, which has been invaluable to me in this industry.

Megan Ellsworth: I love that. Those are really important topics to be able to get out of a conference and keep learning and educating yourself throughout your career. So what are some major themes or topics you all are going to be focusing on at this year's conference and expo?

Robert (Bob) Poutre: Well, it's going to open Monday night with the ever popular YCC welcome party. It'll have a true Minnesota flavor. They're calling it the YCC Timber Bash. It will be a lumber jack, lumber Jill theme. The young people of our organization spend a lot of time on this. It's a casino night, so buy a lot of chips. Most of the money they raise, they then give to a foundation that funds our technical and research grants, funds our scholarships and Rachel will have to help me with how many scholarships we gave away this year, was like 20 or 21. Tuesday night then after the first day of the conference, we will have our black and white foundation auction and this is the event where we're out there to raise money to fund our technical and research, fund our scholarships. It's a great night. It has a black and white theme. You can wear a tux, you can wear a white T-shirt. It really doesn't matter. We just want you to come and be involved and have a great time in both of them.

Rachel Pinkus: Yeah, we've got a great list of auction items already lined up. Roofers Coffee Shop has donated a podcast and that always goes very well during our live auction. Karnak has come in again and they've donated 70 buckets of their sealant, their Karniflex sealant. That's always very popular. Lots of different things for everybody and if the live auction is not your thing, we also do a silent auction, so some items that are maybe not as large a ticket price, but equally as nice. We have a really large silent auction, usually between 40 or so, 40 and 50 items, so there is something for everybody at the auction. We always have live music, open bar, plenty of desserts and snacks and the camaraderie at the foundation auction, I'd say is probably one of the highlights of the entire event.

Megan Ellsworth: I love it.

Laurie Moore: And right before the YCC, we have a new member cocktail party and so it's a good place if people aren't familiar with this group to come in and meet some of the board members and just have a smaller group to talk to before you go into the larger event. It's sometimes overwhelming to just walk into a group and not sure where you want to be involved or who to talk to and we can help.

Megan Ellsworth: Yeah, absolutely. Kind of going off of that.

Robert (Bob) Poutre: And if I could-

Megan Ellsworth: Oh, go ahead.

Robert (Bob) Poutre: ... add on that just a little bit. It is a new members and first timers. I belonged to this organization for maybe 15 years before even taking in my first expo and that really introduced me to what the MRCA expos were about and I would say to every new member or anyone that's there for the first time, the board members are going to have name tags that'll have these ribbons on the bottom that says, "Board Member," "President," "Vice President," grab those people, start up a conversation. Everyone on the board loves MRCA. Our membership is what drives this whole thing and getting members involved is really what it's all about.

Laurie Moore: Yeah. The more you're involved, the more value you find. I wanted to mention this is a network of contractors, manufacturers, experts in our industry and it's not if you have a challenge in this industry, it's when, because that'll happen and it can be a very scary industry and so knowing that you can reach out and call somebody when you have a challenge is invaluable or just email a few people and see what kind of feedback they have for you before you invest in a piece of equipment or reach out directly to any of the one technical experts that we have involved in this group or a manufacturer. You get to meet them in person and then you have this person that you can reach out to and you just can't Google this stuff.

Megan Ellsworth: Agreed.

Laurie Moore: It's a difficult industry and there's a lot of things that you can run into that can be scary, so just having these connections through this group has given me comfort and taken some of the fear out of running a roofing business.

Megan Ellsworth: I love that. That's a great sentiment. Going off of that, maybe this is someone's first time and they're attending the conference and expo. What other tips do you have for them to maximize their experience?

Robert (Bob) Poutre: Really just get involved. Our website has a full list of all the educational sessions, the YCC event, the black and white foundation ball, but if I give one piece of advice is just really get involved. We have some amazing educational things. The list is really too long to go through them, but we've got a little bit of everything both Monday and Tuesday and if they just look at the website and go, I know there's a couple. If I wasn't so busy, I might set in on, and I've been doing this a long time, but people that come in and present, they're experts on this. They've had their ears bent every which way. If you've got some questions, they're more than happy to help you.

Rachel Pinkus: Yeah. We've got something for pretty much everybody. We have a business management track. We'll have some safety sessions. We'll have some steep slope and low slope, both specific sessions and of course, as Bob mentioned, we're going to have our technical side and Mark Graham from NRCA comes in and gives a technical update and then WJE is going to be doing our roof deck integrity study results, and those are two that I think people are not going to want to miss.

Megan Ellsworth: That's great.

Laurie Moore: Also, I think finding out about the committees we have helps people understand that we have focus on some smaller areas in the industry, or not smaller, but specific and so if your business is focused in one area or another or just right now, it's time for you to be interested in one area or another of your business. We have a steep slope committee that specifically focuses on the challenges for steep slope roofers. We have architectural sheet metal for people who are maybe building a sheet metal shop or maybe just getting involved with more sheet metal or it seems like it's challenge to build that department and maintain it no matter what level you're at. We have a signatory contractor committee, which focuses on the challenges for union contractors and a lot of us are negotiating new contracts in the next year, so we will have an in-person meeting at this event. There are, let's see, what other committees am I missing? Some of the other ones are more general to the operation of the association, but some just focus specifically on areas in the industry that we see needs support.

Megan Ellsworth: That's great. It's just really great for all those first timers and new members out there listening that you have a place that is full of community, rich in community and you all are giving back to that community through education sessions and the auction and all those things, so I think this is so great. How can people donate to the auction to continue to build this community that you have?

Rachel Pinkus: Very easy. We'll take donations in almost any form. They can email us at info@mrca.org. They can give us a call. They can email any of us here at the office directly. There's also an online form on the website where they can fill out a form and donate an item. We just ask that they be in by September 30th, just so that we have time to promote everything and for those people who don't want to think too hard, we have no problem being your personal shopper, so if you have a monetary amount that you want to spend on an auction item, you can just designate how you want that money to be spent. We'll be more than happy to take care of it for you.

Megan Ellsworth: Amazing. Makes it so easy.

Robert (Bob) Poutre: It does.

Megan Ellsworth: So how can more industry professionals get involved with the MRCA and contribute to not only the expo but future events?

Laurie Moore: I think that just finding a place that's interesting for an individual to get involved, find out more, what is this about? What are the committees about? What are they doing? And then for each person maybe at that time, well, what works for you? Is it a time in your life where maybe you want to be involved remotely or do you want to attend in person meetings or conference or what level of involvement do you want to have at that time and how can we help you get the most value out of this group? Everybody's got a different path and different times in their lives when they need different things, so it really is important to find maybe a board member to talk to so we can help them find that place or call the association office. They're great at helping people find a place that fits for them at the time.

Megan Ellsworth: That's fabulous.

Robert (Bob) Poutre: Yeah. One thing that I'll add, the website does a great job talking to members that have been involved in a while. Laurie touched on some of the committees that one of the most important to me is safety committee, and I think it's important to everyone in this industry, whether you're passionate about it or not. We all know that OSHA's out there, regulations change all the time. If you're new to the industry, our business management committee has a wealth of pre-plotted forms that you can take you slice and dice, everything from contracts to employment agreements to things like that. Again, if they just grab the arm of a committee member or a board member, we'd be happy to help them out.

Megan Ellsworth: That's great. Well, thank you all so much for sharing the great community you have and getting excited about the conference and expo. We will see you in October. Anything else you want to add about why people should attend the expo?

Robert (Bob) Poutre: Well, since this is happening in my hometown and we're so excited to have it really is, MRCA is the Roofing Contractors Advocates. Rachel has sold more booths since the last time we spoke because my account, we only have 16 left. This show is going to be sold out. My sponsorship, it's a who's who. GAL, Malarkey, John's Manage, Starting Fill, Advanced Industrial Roofing Service First Solutions, Data Homes, Prima ABC, Almond Man Furry, Attorneys Beat and Parna, Four C Spray Equipment, Langer Roofing, Quin City Roofing, Roof Tech, Bline, Carlisle, Larry Marshall Roofing, Rackley Roofing, Build Next Supply, Deema, Roofer Coffee Shop. Thank you folks very much and certainty. It really is a who's who in this industry. It's just such a great event to get together and share time together.

Megan Ellsworth: Absolutely.

Laurie Moore: And it's fun.

Megan Ellsworth: And it's fun. Exactly.

Robert (Bob) Poutre: Yes.

Megan Ellsworth: Come have fun with us.

Laurie Moore: Yes.

Megan Ellsworth: Well, Roofers Coffee Shop is super excited to see you all there and thank you again for sharing this great community and expo. We are so excited.

Robert (Bob) Poutre: Thanks, Megan.

Megan Ellsworth: Absolutely. Everyone out there listening, you can learn more about MRCA on their directory on rooferscoffeeshop.com, follow them on social media. All of that will be linked down below in the show notes, and we'll be seeing you next time on the next Roofing Road Trip.

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