The Huddle - Episode 209. Technology in the Trades: Real Help or Industry Hype?
The flooring industry isn't short on technology. The real question is whether it's solving problems or simply creating more things to learn.
This week on The Huddle, Paul, Daniel, and Jose are joined by James from Measure Square to talk about the tools that are changing the way contractors estimate, communicate, and manage projects. The conversation goes beyond software demos and marketing buzzwords to focus on one simple question: what technology actually helps flooring professionals do their jobs better?
Paul also shares how TradeTap was built around the same philosophy. Instead of adding complexity, the goal is to remove friction by helping contractors find qualified installers, verify skills through the Verified Trade Index, simplify hiring, and connect training with real career growth.
Technology isn't replacing craftsmanship. It's supporting it. When the right tools are built with the industry in mind, they free professionals to spend less time chasing paperwork and more time doing what they do best.
If you've ever wondered which technology is worth adopting—and which is just industry hype—this conversation is for you.
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What is up, guys? Welcome back to the Huddle, the number one podcast in flooring. We're here every week to help
you guys gain forward progress in your career. Simply put, we're here to help you win. For all our new viewers,
welcome to the team. I would love to uh introduce everybody.
We're going to start with James. James, the CRM solutions manager over at uh Measure Square, right?
Yes, sir. Yeah, that's my title. I work mostly with our new product, Measure Square CRM. Uh but I come from the
industry. I was uh my dad's a plumber. I was a plumber for eight years. Um so then I moved over to flooring, did
estimating, uh project management for, you know, switched over to project management for a few years and uh and
then I ended up here at Measure Square a couple years back. So So I think I I can relate to to your side of the table
quite a bit. circle. Yeah, full circle. Um but uh but now on the tech side. So happy to be here.
Thank you guys. Awesome. Well, as always, Mr. Daniels here. Jose is uh
we can hear you now is uh on but
issue. So, uh we'll see if we can get Jose back on. But Mr. Daniels with us
today as always. And today's topic, the reason I wanted James to introduce
himself ahead of time is technology and the trades. So, he just told you, he's kind of made it full circle. Uh, the
second part of that topic is real or industry hype. I think what we're trying to get kind of um across here. It's not
whether or not technology is real or industry hype, just kind of the pros and cons about it all. Um there's there's
awesome things about technology and we probably all have our little stories about difficulties with technology,
especially if you're on the development side of that technology. Right.
That is right. So, James and I share a uh a um path of being an installer
uh and then moving into the tech side with Trade Tap and and the what used to
be Go Carrera on our side and and building out uh technology for the uh
you know the professional services world and uh I'm sure he shares the the
difficulty in making a p a program do something that people really want to use
and um and then making it actually usable. So, uh those are some of the
things that we have found. Uh one of the just to kind of kick it off, you know,
technology is awesome and Daniel is probably one of the the best guys I know
in our trade at adopting new technology. He is my right hand when we're at any
convention, anything because not only does he understand how to use software and things of this nature, he's also
very techy uh from a gadget perspective, which I am not. Uh I understand
software, but you start getting into it and putting the stuff together and wiring networks together, I'm lost. Uh
this guy kind of has a a a better uh perview of that. But
with all of that said, the biggest problem or the biggest concern that I found in building out Trade Tap over the
last six years, seven years is you buil you build something that seems
so intuitive, put it out to your user network or your your users and they have
a hard time using the software. uh that is not only my experience, it's
also my experience on the user side with other softwares. So usability of
technology is where I'd love to kick it off and how does Measure Square um think
about that and do you guys do you guys think about that and if you do kind of uh from what angle do you guys look at
it? Man, great question. I'm I'm really really fortunate to join the Measure
Square team a few years ago here. Uh we have some of the best developers. It's unbelievable. So, you know, the people
who have used Measure Square for takeoffs for alongside a long time probably know what I'm talking about. That's a really great piece of software,
Measure Square 8 and Measure Square Mobile. Um but I mean usability is almost our primary focus, you know, and
that's going to be the case for a lot of software companies. Um but in construction in particular, you have a
wide range of ages. You have a wide range of techsavviness, right? Um so definitely a tough crowd to
to meet at all fronts. Um so you know, I think you you win some and you lose some
with each uh with each customer type usually is how it ends up working and and the game is trying to determine
which wins will apply to the most uh the biggest part of your user base.
Yeah. user uh usability and and and user
uh ease of use I guess is got to be has to be the primary focus.
Um how do you go about building that roadmap though? I like more
specifically, you know, you you we will have a focus group and talk about a
certain feature or something to the application. We think it's great. We think the idea
is great. We go into building some some level of an MVP or something, do a
little bit of testing, send it out to network and we have had it fall flat,
bring it back, revamp some things, you know, um, how do you guys go about that
as a more mature team? Wow. Yeah, this is this is a great
question and kind of a good insight into uh into the workings of Measure Square. So, it's it's definitely a mix. Um we
have about 50 developers on the team. Um so our you know our head architects do
uh a fair amount of planning where they will theorize some of the features and kind of present them to us on the front
end where we'll validate with customers. Um so they do contribute on their side aside from just the customer requests.
But the uh the vast majority of features are added because customers either directly request them or customers are
trying to solve a problem related to that. Um, so you know, we'll we take
feature requests constantly, right? I'm sure Yeah. You know, you know better than anyone. Um, but you know, we have
thousands of of feature requests and prioritizing them is really important, not only for us, but but for the users
as well. Possibly more important um because you know, I actually spoke about this with Dan a couple months back um
because Dan's one of our best users in pro providing feedback and and prioritizing it. But, you know, if you
need 20 things from a system and you asked your software company for all 20 of them, there's a pretty low chance
they're going to implement all 20 of those, right? Um, but if you give them three or four and say, "Hey, these these are the ones we really need to operate."
Makes it a lot easier for us on the software side uh to to prioritize those. So I would say it's a mix between a
customer requests, b our architects feeding feeding into the customers and then we have a little C element here uh
who's our our CEO and founder Steven. Um so he is a developer by trade. He has uh
you know he has a a doctorate in software engineering. So he actually kind of directs our long-term vision and
our long-term pursuits um by kind of staying ahead of the industry and uh he
works with our emerging products. So uh whereas Measure Square 8 and Measure Square Mobile are are heavily
established throughout the industry, we have some newer products in Measure Square CRM and Measure Square Stone that
are still working their way up. So Stephen is kind of leading the charge on that side. Um looking at new tech in the
general construction industry because they're usually a little ahead of us in in flooring. Uh they have the bigger companies like Procore and Autodesk who
are really dedicating a lot of resources to those problems. Uh so we kind of look to those guys in some scenarios,
determine what we could pick out. Um and then Stephen just kind of is looking even ahead of that.
Do did I uh hear did you state do you have a beta group that you use
as well? Like you'll release some a feature to a beta group to uh test out
for you, that kind of thing. Yeah. And we do have a beta group. Um
and the beta is kind of almost public, right? If if we're releasing something to beta, it's it's one step from being
public. And the majority of the work actually happens in kind of an alpha or prototype phase um before that where we
you know we really need the customers to validate the concepts. Um so you know in this active development of the CRM with
with dozens of developers working on it uh we'll bring in a c uh bring a customer in even when we just have a
prototype uh sometimes we'll say hey try this for a week or what do you think of this? Um but the yeah the beta program
we do have um I would say the people on the beta list may be disappointed with how often they get beta releases because
when I was a user that's what I was thinking. Um so I think uh it's more of like the prototype uh kind of personal
level at this stage. Well, I wanted to bring all that up just
to kind of, you know, display to the audience the not only the complications
of releasing stuff in technology, but also the the extreme amount of effort
that has to go into that part just to get a sometimes a small what seems to be
just a small feature for a user. Hey, can this can I click this and go there
instead of having to click through? Can be maybe not a major uh deal, but it it's a
bigger deal than usually you would expect uh for even some of the smaller changes. So, the the amount of work that
goes in to try to make sure that the software uh comes out in a in a usable,
productive format takes a lot of time and effort and energy. So, um, Daniel,
you guys have have worked with Measure Square for a long time. Uh, we've had
Measure Square at my flooring company for 10, 15 years probably. Um, but you
guys use it differently than we use it, which is another kind of uh um juggling
thing for a software company is users use things differently and not always the way you envisioned it. and and
depending on who's using it, where does that handoff to another software take place? I think is the big question with
everyone right now, right? Because you can use it 100% of everything or you're only using
it for certain things and then you're handing it off and where is that break point at and how do you how do you do
that cleanly? Yeah, that's exactly Yeah, that's
exactly the problem as we see it too, Dan. Um Yeah. And that's that's really what we're doing with Measure Square
CRM, we're actually changing the name in the near future to support that concept
more. But um I think in 2026, yeah, people are looking to connect that whole workflow and a lot of people try to do
that in one system. Um you can do that with with measure square absolutely, but
there are other options, right? The API connecting systems seems to be very underrated in the construction industry
from my perspective. Um, if you build a good API integration, it it can be as seamless as having it in one platform
really. Um, so we have, you know, we're going with the integration strategy. We have an open API. Uh, we have an MCP
connector so you could connect your AI. Um, so we're we're just trying to give everybody this nice foundational spine
where you can store all your project data and then you can run with that through our whole system. You can attach
that to other systems. Um, and I think I think the open open integration policy
is is probably going to be more and more beneficial as time moves on with these AI models because if you give them
access to your data, um, they can do pretty much anything. Yeah, these agents are crazy. And then
not only the API, it's MPC servers and stuff now where it's like it's it's not
just talking back and forth, it's actually controlling everything.
Yeah. And those APIs that I I think one of the difficult things in construction is some of the older legacy software to
integrate they they didn't build it in a modern stack or modern way and didn't
upgrade throughout the years and uh preparing for what is here today. Um
we found it very difficult to integrate with some uh some of the legacy softwares and their development teams
being willing to support an API integration um due to having to build an API out or
you're open source. You said open API.
Yeah, open sorry not open source but an open API. Yeah. Yep. Um yeah. Well, that makes things a lot a
heck of a lot easier. And uh but that's one of the hardest things about I I
think it's not just where it hands off. It's there's a lot of older legacy
software. We use one at my flooring company that they're finally getting ready to uh to do a pretty massive
upgrade, which is going to be nice. it'll bring it more into uh today's kind of uh modern technology and allow allow
us to tie some more things together over there. But um
the bottom line is it's not hype. all these things. What I wanted to get to is all this work that we've talked about
ends up in what type of benefit to you, Daniel? Cuz you guys did, and I'll share
our um um experience as well. But
you guys did manual takeoffs in the early days, too, right? You had a ruler and a and a and a blueprint and a and a
notebook. This guy over here was one of those guys that's like, I don't trust software. And it's like, man, it's like
it's just so I just interrupt. I don't know if you guys can hear me well or not. Yeah, we hear you loud and clear.
Some issues. But it was one of the things where and I knew how to do it on paper. I knew that if there was a
mistake that that it was from me and it was the trust factor, trust in
technology to do what I already knew how to do, not really knowing how to navigate through it. That's the hard
part and that's where trying to keep that open mind and and
and trying to understand that it it's not going away and listening to to Daniel and everyone else who's embracing
technology and just re coming to the realization that
my way was going to be outdated very quickly. Um and and yes, I did grow up
on that graph paper rulers. Um even even the little uh the uh the automatic one,
right, with that that you with a little wheel on it that gives you the dimensions and you set the scale. Yeah. Even though that was not accurate,
right? I just used that one for a quick square footage if needed uh on some takeoffs. But
I su wasted all that space. Did you guys go through this the slight
uh time frame with the digitizer where you taped taped your drawing onto
a board and you had a little uh it was like a mouse. You would click
on all the corners. Of course, it didn't draw it like it does on on screen stuff, but uh we we we even
tried that. So, but you you're breaking up just a little
for for some you're breaking up just a little bit. So, I'm sorry to uh the audience if I
interrupt Jose's train of thought, but the bottom line is these things kind of
build on themselves. And right now the what's really fascinating to me is how
fast the things are changing and building and like our team has to stay on top of
things. Um it's it's mindblowing how quickly the technology and the capabilities uh
particularly with AI is is changing and and so I wanted to get to the to my next
question for you guys. Uh James, what type of
uh how are you guys approaching AI? How how how did that come to be? Was it were you early adopters? Did Stephen see the
the trend coming? I mean to the consumer, AI is kind of like a two to threeyear deal, but it really got
developed 15 20 years ago. it was started but it it caught that you know
hockey wave kind of hockey stick growth of adoption uh when somebody came out
with a one usable product one usable product and the rest is history. How did
you guys approach the AI revolution? Yeah, great question. U awesome question
honestly and definitely a few different ways. Um there are people in my company
who say we've been using little little AI models um for 15 20 years, right? But
uh our earliest introduction to AI was with the auto takeoff. So we've been building that for about uh sixish years
now. Um and that that tool has seen significant enhancements uh in that time
in the past couple years especially. So that that was really where we were kind of a little bit ahead of the curve. Um,
now with the introduction of these insane large language models the past few years, everyone is creating all
kinds of tools and we're very focused on that. Uh, so I mentioned the MCP connector. So, uh, we're able to
connect, uh, your large language model to the measure square cloud and to the CRM. Um, so it can read data, it can
perform actions for you, which is really powerful. Um, we have a AI plan analyzer
which will read through read through your plans and and uh pull out the materials, create the materials for you in Measure Square. um and and that kind
of stuff. We're working on AI agents. Um so we have a lot of different solutions going, but it was, you know, Stephen is
kind of directing that side of it. We have a a whole team of developers dedicated just to the AI. Um yeah, I
don't want to say how many of them, but it's getting bigger and bigger. Um [laughter] and you know, essentially that's the
branch of the the product side that can apply everywhere, right? So all of our products can can benefit from AI and and
sometimes you can have one solution blanketing over all those products. Um so really you know attacking it from all
angles and trying to find a useful application is really the challenge.
There's so many ways to use this thing and we're all so new to it. Um even the
even the most advanced companies I think I think are experiencing some lag there.
But it's not only coming up with a good solution, it's implementing it in a way
that makes sense for you, makes sense for the the user. Um, so that's that's the challenge and we're full steam ahead
on that side. I I think when you look at software too, right, it's it's harder for you guys
because sometimes you have to come up with something that people might not even know they
want yet. like you've got an idea and it's like this is gonna be great and then you put it out there and I mean you
look at the big guys Apple for instance right just their Apple Watch um the
walkie-talkie app on the Apple Watch they're saying that that it's probably going to be discontinued they thought it
was going to be this huge thing and not going to lie I was messing with people for a while when it first came out and then you just stop using it and the when
you don't see that usage anymore it's like what's the point to keep on having your resources to to focus on, you know,
keeping that clean in there when you can just get rid of it and focus on something else.
Couldn't agree more. Yeah. I mean, there's there's a lot of Oh, I'm sorry. Go ahead, Dan. No, I was going to say, and then you get the people that are mad because they're
like, I use this every day, but it's like, well, you're you're one of the only people that uses it every day.
That's the hardest thing honestly is that you will find you'll build something that some users love and think
is the cat's meow but it just never got market adoption in a way that makes the
even like you said the big guys like Apple let alone somebody like I mean
certainly uh measure square is much larger than uh trade tap but you go to measure square from Apple is a pretty
big jump and even you guys I would assume have to judge those things and
even at our tiny size as a technology company uh you know there's some parts
uh I'll give you an example link you know our video software that like would connect the field to the office and
allow video calls to happen in real time and it would log it to a work order for
example so that you never lost that that piece of of
that interaction, that communication. Dude, some people loved it, but it got used so little we had to discontinue the
use. It wasn't cheap. It wasn't cheap to to to have that. And um you know, one of
those things you had to to uh make a a difficult decision on. So, what what's
that? H how do you guys have uh surely you've you've come across that kind of thing before, James. What's that? What's
that look like for for Measure Square? Something that like Daniel said, you know, some people loved it was the Apple
Watch uh uh uh walkie-talkie. Walkie talking.
Yeah. Kind of thing. Yeah. My brother says they need to come back with next hose,
but actually [laughter] it's in Teams. They have a walkie-talkie feature that we never use, but it got
rolled out after we started using it. And he he he does mention that it's uh
ease of use for non- techsavvy people is one of the hard parts.
That's it, you know, and it's it's ease of use and even just positioning, you know, and I have a good example of that
on our side. So I I mentioned our AI analyzer tool and this tool reads your
plans, right? It tells you which pages you need for the takeoff and it makes your products for you. It just just saves you a bunch of time. Um, we
initially created this in our CRM and we got near zero adoption on that side um,
for a few months and then someone on my team smarter than I am suggested that we put it into Measure Square 8 in the
takeoff and it took off. Um, so so yeah, it's even if a tool is usable, if you
don't present it the right way, that's it's not going to it's not going to catch on and nobody's going to really benefit from it, you know. So, it's it's
there's more to it than just building something good, believe it or not.
Yeah. Uh yeah. Yeah. I'm trying to think of another timing. Oh, absolutely.
Could even be uh the right product in the right spot and not the right time.
And it's amazing how all those things have to come together for software to actually get adopted. It's got to be
Yeah. Like timing is one of the big ones and I don't know if every uh some of the
smartest guys in software know how to figure that out. Others we just uh put
it out there and either wait for the timing to be right or you you keep trying uh if it's a good enough idea.
Yeah, that's really it. Yeah. And adoption. I'm glad you mentioned adoption. That's I don't know if you plan on on talking
about that later. That's a good one to to talk about, too. I wanted to get into this right here because Rometo asked if
you know these softwares are too much for residential and I think
that there probably is certain
tiers that are too much. But that's why there's kind of tiers to everything, right? You don't need to use 100% of a
commercial software. So there's probably tiers to things. And I mean, um, I don't
know because I don't do much residential, but I know on the Measure Square side, you guys have a ton of
people that do residential, right? And then on the trade tap side, it's really
good for residential, especially if you're not super huge because you can do all your
billing and everything right from it, too. So, Mhm. Yeah. I think it's a uh it's not a
residential commercial question. It's how do you like to work
um you know you could do you know say five houses a month or four
houses a month or a low number of houses a month whatever that would be. I'm primarily commercial as well in my
flooring company. But um but if you took advantage of all the tools and you're a
one-man show and that's how you like to work. So it
would be extremely beneficial in someone in that that case. So I I think it has to do more with how do you like to work
and then how does that software fit within your your human workflow and um I
think residential commercial it it is not the line that you're crossing it's
how do you like to work and and maybe how big are your projects or because obviously the larger more complicated
projects the more time you save with an AI analyzer for example.
Yeah, absolutely. Right. Um, so with the AI tools for analyzing plans in
particular, uh, that'll depend. Yeah, if you're doing new construction me residential, absolutely. You know, if
you have a set of plans, um, this stuff will help you. Uh, and I understand the hesitation, Romero, because there's a
lot of times that you get into a software and it's you're like, uh, this isn't for me. Um, but no, so Measure
Square, we built this for flooring. I don't know if you're referring to our software in particular, but we have
essentially profiles. We have the retail profile, the commercial profile to kind of set up your account for the
residential workflow. Um, so yeah, we we definitely accommodate that. We have you guys in mind. Um, and the we actually
have a full on-site workflow where you can open up your phone uh and you create a quote and and get it signed and
everything on the CRM mobile app. It takes like 30 seconds to make a quote with with three or four products. Um, so
yeah, absolutely. we that's one of our primary focuses and yeah I definitely agree with Paul you know we're not
really staring at at one industry versus another usually um but it's more of which features can help both you know
and then there are certain times you have to veer uh towards one way or the another to kind of to jam in those
really really beneficial features on on each segment you said how does it compare to house
pro and I don't even have any experience with that at all so I don't know if you guys do
I I have a little um if you're talking about trade tap uh the the and I'm not
like a house pro uh pro uh so I don't know it enough to to talk uh in depth
about it but I would tell you that one of the things that trade tap really
focused on is bringing opportunities to the in the installer from either the
marketplace place or from stores and shops that are looking for quality installers, but also need to be able to
see that that guy's quality, right? And so finding guys, as we've always said,
Daniel, it's not always uh, you know, being found or finding guys. It's being
quality and finding quality guys, like finding the level of the installer that
you need. So, uh, not sure how Hous fits in there, but that's kind of how Trade Tap looks at um the connections and
where we're trying to connect the industry, uh, homeowners as well as business owners like flooring companies
and connect them to a network of in of cataloged and credentialized installers.
From Measure Square standpoint, I'm not real sure what HousePro does in the measuring CRM world, but maybe James can
speak to that. Yeah. Um, so HousePro Romero is a uh
it's a similar function to our CRM. It's supposed to be an all-in-one software. Uh, the difference there would be House
Pro is a general general construction solution. Um, so ours is made specifically for flooring. So your take,
you know, if you do a takeoff, that flies right into your your CRM. Uh, you have all your products, your product catalogs in your CRM and stuff like
that. if you have to make an edit to a quote, you can just edit your takeoff and click okay and it, you know, it'll
edit your your quote for you. Uh, so a lot of advantages to using a system that's built specifically for you over
one that's more general kind of built for everyone. Yeah. And then my brother does point out that uh and I he's doing voice detect,
so his next comment was what he changed this weather to the weather that it's supposed to be. But whether it's
residential or commercial, you want a program that's rated for more than what you actually need it need it for. And I
think yes and no, right? Because you don't want to over buy and then never use
a bunch of stuff. But you also Well, ideally, you want a system that that can that has some starter spot and
can grow with you or you can grow with it. One of the two.
Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. And a lot of those times those softwares that are too big uh they take more to to get through to
do to do things right. And I'm experiencing this. We use uh we use Zoho CRM internally uh at Measure Square and
a couple of the the systems that we have in there are so bulky right very very
convoluted and it takes a lot of clicks to to do things. So you know uh the residential there are some solutions
where where having a much simpler interface you know much simpler app to use is just better and I think I think
residential that ends up being the case for some people definitely depends how you operate like Paul was saying.
Well that's a good point too James because uh Zoho is a we use uh HubSpot
now. We we started with Zoho. I tell you what, you can overbuild some software.
And [laughter] no offense to the Zoho guys, they got uh they're doing just fine, but I'm telling
you that that software grew like mushrooms on mushrooms in a forest of
mushrooms. And you really got to know where you're going. uh and and even and
that is the that is something at least on our side and I'm sure measure we try
to avoid this thing of stacking things that make getting to something too deep
u too deep for the user um I hope I'm making sense uh but what I'm
saying is I see James shaking his head because he's knows exactly what I'm talking about but you build things and
something ends up almost hidden that was never intended to be hidden. Um, and
some of these bigger softwares, that's where some of us little guys can come in
and really fill in a a a niche is that the big guys
have overbuilt uh for other big guys in a lot of cases. um they listened to
their user base and they kept asking for more things and they kept building more things. Um but it's something we tried
to uh uh avoid at Trade Tap and we we
why we created kind of a single sign on solution uh for multiple different
softwares. Um and uh but yeah, that's that's a that's a real thing, right?
Like Zoho is a good example of that. I know from experience. Oh, absolutely. Yeah. And that's a big
concern like you know like we like we spoke about before especially in construction and
yeah it's it's more important than making good functions you know making them usable definitely and and I I see
that in a lot of systems we use a lot of competing systems and and in our systems occasionally right but usually we'll
we'll try to try to hop on that and make it as easy as possible. But you you have a lot of problems to solve, right? And
yeah, like you said, it's those dang big guys. My biggest customers uh need the world in the in the
software. And a lot of, you know, sometimes we have to try to give it to them. Yeah.
Yeah. I just [clears throat] I've talked to some of the other
flooring specific people, right? And a lot of them are really geared towards bigger residential
dealers. And it's like, you guys are trying to sell me something. Again, going back to what my brother said, um,
you know, you're trying to sell me something that I don't need.
And I think only one of them finally came up came back with, you know
what, you're right. I don't think this is a right fit for you. Everyone else was just like, you know what, you'll get there. Just we we'll get a hold of you
in in a few months. Again, keep at it. I like the uh when I'm trying to sell is the the people are
just like yeah this this is not for for me or and that's how I like to respond
to software people. I'm like I don't it's not a good fit because of these reasons and then move on. But uh that's
just a side note. [laughter] No, that that transparency is critical.
It's critical. you know, um, if you if if a salesperson approaches you and
they're they're super salesy and you're just looking for something to make your business a little better, you [clears throat] know, I' I've been in
that seat. Software is not at the top of your list if you own a flooring company, right? Um, I I have a lot of meetings
where people end up being too busy to show up or an emergency bid or uh that's just kind of the reality of it. Uh so
you know it takes time a to identify problems b to research and then
obviously you know implementation is its own its own animal. Yeah, and you're
100% right. Like [clears throat] it's pretty easy to uh to uh get get offended
if you don't have thick skin uh in software because we while the solution I
mean you could sit somebody down and explain the benefits and they could without without pressure they could tell
you yeah measure square hill. I mean, I don't know how I'd live without it, you know, but then
if you have a meeting with them and they have something in the real world that's that's, you know, important to them,
you're you're going on the back burner really really fast and maybe for months if it's a big enough problem they're
dealing with. And we've experienced that and, you know, had people uh
disappear for a while and come back. It's it that timing thing is a real thing and it's hard to to get right. Uh
the timing of from a marketplace standpoint and from an individual customer standpoint, the timing for them
has to be right, which is what why it's so offputting if someone's trying to
talk you into something. It's not that you don't need it, it's that the timing isn't right. That's what I found.
And as a consumer, we just look at things like, hey, this is what I need. It should be easy enough to just add
this right here, but they don't see all the the coding and everything behind the
software where it's like, all right, I can add that right there, but like you were saying earlier too, right? Well, I
added this, now this don't work. Now this ain't working. What is going on? It's not just that simple. And I only
know because I was working on trying to build like um a little check-in checkout
system for our tools. Yeah.
Well, even even um you know the the best thoughtout plan
can you you one thing that uh uh you know stuck with me is uh a guy told me
one time he says you know how to make a million dollars in software and I was like how's that? He says, "Spend five
million. [laughter] That'll do it."
Point being is you have to persevere through that timing. And uh for all the
users out there because most of you guys don't like build software. The you for you guys um a lot of times the the
hurdles for you is fear though. And that's kind of one of the things I
wanted to bring up in all of this because of our demographic being so
wide. I mean, there are people who are in retirement age still out there trying
to utilize some of this software in their day-to-day stuff. And then there's guys that are coming into the industry
brand new. uh the the the you know I always say thank you to
Facebook for getting some of the older uh generation
used to touching screens and getting results but at the end of the day
it it usually boils down to fear of this thing's going to break when I need it or
it's going to One of the big things I mean when we first got in was like I don't want to give my data any
information to this for for it to do well. I'm like, well, you got to have a
profile. You got to have like a user to use it. And it's the fear of
big brother. It's the fear of technology. It's the fear of doing something different. All those things.
Um, and the only way you you get over it, my
advice to another user is to just do the thing. Just if you have enough other
people that are doing it and you know some people that are using that software
or using that technology, uh, put your faith in in them or your your trust in
them and and just give it a shot. Um because you know fear is a real thing in
in the software side of things. I don't know that there's a perfect uh solution but it certainly um you know
right certainly is a thing. Romeo says that he's gone through four different softwares in six years and he definitely
knows what you're talking about about timing and you know a lot of that could be because you you you're like yeah I
have this idea let's start using this and then you purchase it and then you don't use anything and then it's like
why did I even pay for that and then you go to try to use it and then you get frustrated because you don't know how to use it and then it's like I I totally
get that that too but I mean technology is one of those things, man, where like
you you were even saying, I don't want to feed it any information, right? I don't want it to have my information.
And now we're at a point where we're like, I need to feed this all of my information so that it can make decisions for me. [laughter]
Yeah. It kind of goes back to Jose's uh Jose was saying he distrusted software. You were saying he did. Uh we're kind of
seeing like a new a new wave of that with AI now, right? You know, people people just got used to computers. were
just starting to like computers. Now AI comes along and now we have this new this new element of distrust. Um where
some people think it's the solution to everything. Other people think it's it's really risky to even use for for most
things. Um so yeah, some kind of middle ground is probably where we all end up.
Um but but tough to say. I yeah, I lean on the let's feed it everything side personally. Um so I'm good to I'm glad
to have people in my company that can uh keep keep some of us in check on [laughter] that side. Well,
yeah, the the the whole LLM and and uh all the competing models and then the
you know on almost an on premise AI you know through
well there's multiples now uh but that can the thing that's so fascinating
is since the first of the year though this thing can live on a local device a local unit and do real work for you now
like Claude and in particular, I think they're they've they've uh they're at
least winning that game so far. But it can do real stuff. It can replace it
could be a full assistant for you if you train a little bit. Uh I talk about AI a lot because we're building AI agents
here uh for Steuart and Associates for our flooring company to handle sub everything from submitts to ordering
uh contract reading the the blueprints and the the takeoffs. We're going to use
uh you know we leverage existing technology. No no reason to build that. But after that it's like I don't want to
do submittals. I I I've already, you know, we have an agent now that does our
closeouts. All we do is send it the specifications and send it the um
literally this is live. Uh send it the specifications and send it our material
uh our uh material list that we from our accounting software and it creates our
entire closeout package with warranties, our warranty letter.
Complete done 100% in 30 seconds. a complete closeout package. So, you know,
I'm the guy that wants to try everything pretty early. I like to get in there and and just do it and then if something
breaks or if I break something or if I spend a little money that I, you know, maybe spent unwisely on that
thing, uh I I I can cut the cord. I don't have to continue. But giving stuff
a shot is uh probably why at 50 I'm still pretty in tune to all of this
stuff is because I want to be in tune to it. I want to try it. I want to see what it can do. And I also don't look at new
stuff as the devil. We've done this generation after generation after generation. you know, Aussie Osborne was
the devil and rock music was the devil and then other music genres took that
over and then the computer was the devil and like we demonize all these things.
Um, when they're there, there's always a pro and con to to new tech new software,
but also more fundamentally new technology. And find your guard rails
and and drive the highway, man. Just once you know your guard rails and what you don't want to hit, get after it.
Yeah. So, we do have a question from Jimmy right here. He says, "Measure square. What's the learning curve? He
has a store that has an account and is offering for him to use it." Uh because they have never they have it
and never used it, which is crazy because again, you're paying for something that you're not using. So,
um I guess it depends on what measure square and there's dude your guys's like
YouTube library is crazy. Yeah. Yeah. So, uh good question, Jimmy.
I think you're probably referring to Measure Square Mobile where you can go on [clears throat] site and and like basically create a takeoff uh from from
a house. Uh so that yeah, the learning curve on that is is very quick. Uh I
mean really all of our software is pretty quick but measure square mobile in particular uh you know we have inoff
trainings and a lot of the time people will come in for one day in office and that's that's all they need. Uh we have
an online course that's I think two hours that that kind of gets you where you need to go. Of course it takes a
little bit to become a master but you can get a job done uh after your first training session.
And I like we use the iPad version too, right? I went and measured
um an adult daycare the other day. The entire building, it took me probably I think I was there for 30 minutes.
And then I went and measured a house the other day. I measured the entire house except for the two bedrooms. And I was
in and out of there in 20 minutes. And that was only because they talked to me for an additional 10.
[laughter] Yeah. Yeah. When I was in the field, uh, I I did all commercial, but we did a lot
of work for a hospital and a lot of times these old hospitals, you can't find the plants. Yeah. Yeah. So, I would
just, you know, I would go in and just, okay, this suite, just measure it up with the laser quick, or oh, this hallway, you know, measure measure a
whole uh batch of rooms there. But, yeah, lot anytime you don't have a plan plan set, that's the way to go.
Yeah, I would probably add to that Jimmy that to get proficient or
you know where the software is usable measure square is [clears throat] a day
a day would be there. Uh, I think a day is a a pretty good deal. Now, to become
really really good at it and everything, obviously that takes more time, but to get to that first rung where it's a
usable piece, it's it's got a pretty low learning curve. I'd encourage you to
We've been using it for years on I'll jump on YouTube and I'll just be watching videos sometimes and be like,
man, I didn't even know it could do that. Yeah. [laughter]
Yeah. Absolutely. Uh and Jose threw in a little bit too. He said there is a learning curve, but for him that's uh
some of the scared of technology thing. No, I was going to say I popped it up on
the screen for you so you didn't have to look at it all small. Oh yeah, there you go. No, perfect. But
um but yeah, you know, Jimmy, we have we have free trials. You know, Measure Score is not one of those companies that locks it up. Uh, so if you I mean you
could take your your buddy's license there from from the other store or just go online and you know and grab a free
trial yourself. Um, definitely feel free to reach out. You could send an email to supportmeasuresquare.com
if you want any uh guidance from our side. Romeo asked a question that I was just about to get into, right? Because it is
it liar and if you have the newer iPhones, you guys do have the room scanner app that you can just go
through. I did it at my friend's house the other I was like, "Oh man, I forgot my iPad. I knew that they wanted me to
measure their porch, so I just went and scanned it real quick." And he said, "Bro, you got that new technology stuff." Like, [laughter]
yeah, that is a cool one. Um, if you haven't, if you're in residential and you haven't taken a look at that LAR
app, the room scanner, I definitely would take a look. It's only for Apple. Um, yep, that's it. We use the uh
Apple's LAR technology as a lot of the companies are doing and it's getting better and better. Um the reports that
we've heard is it's accurate uh to a laser within 2% is the average. So uh so
it's dead accurate. It's it's really cool. And it it even picks up like a couch or a fridge. Oh fridge windows.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's it's cool.
Yeah. The uh unfortunate thing is it's not in Android and uh so all the all the
uh I I keep thinking that surely somebody's got to get it over there or develop something similar but uh nothing
that I know of has come out that's comparable.
Yeah, I think it's a hardware issue. Honestly, the Yeah, the Apple Apple has it built into the but I'm not sure.
That's That's a little past my fivestar pay grade. I just say that Paul, it's time for Paul
to get an iPhone, but I've been saying that since I met him. Yeah, I think everybody might be
in my in my purview has an iPhone. I'm the lone Android cowboy.
All right. So um a as we've went through you know like
this discussion and and the the second part was real help or industry hype. I
think it the the goal of displaying that a lot of the technology is real help.
You know trade tap will connect you uh give you credentials in a way that
you've never been able to communicate with your customer. uh measures square
can reduce the amount of time you spend on a takeoff by multitudes of time. So
it's very helpful. It's it's really about adoption. It's really about using this stuff. And uh I know you wanted to
touch on that, James. I wanted to give you a chance kind of from your guys' side uh you guys have grown tremendously
since we started using Measure Square and a lot of that is um
you know a lot it takes a little bit of time. I forget what they call that, but there's a a time in the market kind of
uh uh saying. I can't I can't remember what it's called, but essentially if you stay in the market long enough, you're
going to you'll you'll find your clan. And uh there's been a lot of great softwares out there that didn't last
long enough for that to happen. Uh, you know, I I can tell you from Trade Tap's
side, I mean, for the first four years, five years, it it was like battling to
get anybody to open their mind to to a new way of doing business. And now it's
more of keeping up with our user base and trying to keep up uh than than
trying to make all of us happy. [laughter] Yeah. It's like so
adoption, that adoption curve, I guess, h how did that look for you guys in your history? You've been around a long time.
Um I know we've used you for at least 10 years, if not longer. Um
how long have you been with [clears throat] James? So I've only been been here about three
years. Uh but I I know the history. I can give you guys a rundown. Mhm. [clears throat] Um so, so uh yeah, Steven, our CEO, he
founded the company around 2000, so almost 25 years now. And um at first
they were actually focused on retail flooring. His wife was a carpet salesman, so saleswoman. Uh and he just,
you know, he was just got his PhD in computer science. He was doing some programming and he he actually took on
the problem of let me figure out how to solve rolled goods in in a piece of
software. So he he built the system that rolls out carpet and does the seaming. It's all by himself. Um so then they
were focused on retail residential flooring for a while. Um and then about
12 13 years ago is when they realized that um you know we're we're really good
at these uh small details that are actually more prevalent in commercial. Uh so they switched over um and our so
the the head architect for Measure Square uh the takeoff software was actually before he was a software
engineer he was a civil engineer. Um so he he knows like a lot of the details
with like how how all that stuff fits together and and just building in general. So uh so yeah they landed on
commercial. Uh that was our primary focus for a while which is kind of where it started ramping up I think around 10
years ago. Um and then the past five years in particular it's been uh pretty
exponential after we you know we got a a customer base with uh with measure the desktop and the mobile side. Um so
definitely uh really consistent growth over these past five years in particular.
So it's all basing on that. Yeah. My brother says he needs to figure out how to do carbon based out of row
broadoom now. [laughter] Yeah. Yeah. That's a That's a tough one.
And he does have a couple of things that he he commented. We'll go I want to go through them real quick. Um he said
Android Surface Pro. Can he use the desktop version on that and walk around like a tablet? And I know you guys have
the laser on there, too. So, I imagine you can
you can uh you can with the Surface Pro. I have heard about this before, but I'm
not an expert. I would have to talk to my support team, but it is. And then this is for both of you guys. He says that Measure Square and Trade
Tap need to partner up and so that way there's a training so we can uh up our
VTI. Create a training program. I think that sounds pretty good.
Uh so yeah, we're Yeah, I think I think we could talk about it, Paul. I uh we're working on some stuff similar to that
and that could that could definitely make sense. Yeah, we'll uh we'll uh exchange contact after this and and see
what we can do uh around the installer. That's that's our primary role in in
this whole industry is cataloging, credentializing installers and then
giving companies and and the marketplace in general uh uh an easy way to connect
with them and then track the project that they're doing with them. Uh, so
yeah, I'll uh share a little more in depth on that with you offline.
We'll get somewhere there. Jose to Horge because he says that he's used Measure Square for rooms, but it really
doesn't work for the staircases because he he's primarily um you know high-end
staircases now where he's not doing wallto- wall. So, I don't know how
I'm not going to lie, it it it is pretty limited on the stairs, but
yeah, stairs are a tough issue to solve. Well, um so especially for the mobile
version, it's going to be tough to do a custom staircase. He said, of course, especially the type that that uh that uh
Jorge does that Jorge does. Yeah. Yeah. the the training could be a part of the installer progression to
hopefully get off their knees one day. And cuz that's what we keep on pushing,
you know, here at Preferred Flooring. It's like learn what you can now so that way if I know installers that it's like
they blew out their knee, they cannot install anymore. So if that ever happens, you already have some knowledge
somewhere else. Yeah, we've talked about that on the huddle a lot and I I've got to say that
it's been a consistent message from us to installers is, you know, obviously we
want you guys trained on hand skills and knowledge about adhesives and substrates
and moisture and installation techniques and tools and equipment and logistics.
All the stuff it takes to be a good installer. On the other side of that, we want you to get used to using and be
brave in using software because just like Daniel mentioned, you blow your
knee out one time, uh, we had an installer that just had to have surgery on his knee. He was out for eight weeks.
Well, we put him to work here in the office, [laughter] you know. We put him on light duty, takeoffs, doing safety stuff, like
because when when stuff happens, having your mind to go to fall back on
if your body starts to uh give up on you is a great thing to have. and you can go
in an installer that's not scared of technology and that uh not only not
scared but maybe is proficient in it. Um man, they are a high commodity for us. I
would hire I would I will hire them every day as long as they got a great attitude. And I have found just as a
note that the ones who are willing to explore in technology seem to have a better attitude. they're not so uh
gruffy about what the future holds, you know. Um so those guys are in high
demand is what I'm getting at. At my flooring company, I would hire an installer that knows understands
technology and is not scared of it long before I'd hire uh like a computer
scientist that I have to teach flooring. you know, having having somebody that
can just kind of step into your office and use your software or at least learn to use your software that has some
flooring background, that's incredibly attractive to flooring companies. And guys, there's 30,000 of us in the United
States. So, there's plenty of opportunity to go get a job if you uh you know, overcome that. If you do have
the fear and you uh overcome that and just use the software, it ain't going to bite you.
All right. Well, we have uh zoomed right up on our deadline of four o'clock here.
I want to thank James with Measure Square for joining us, specifically the CRM solution side. Uh great piece of
software over there. If you have a chance to uh to try some stuff out,
James just gave you the insight. Free trials. Go give it a shot. get reach out
to support, see if if you do have any issues and and give it a shot. So QR
codes up on the screen, make sure to click that, go give it a a trial run, see if it works for your business.
That's a good thing with these free trials. You just go try it. If it doesn't work for your business, no harm, no foul. If it does work, you could save
yourself a lot of money and time uh and and create yourself a a almost
cover a whole another job. That's what software's job is today is to like take take you guys from having to do
everything. Let let this software do some of that. So, uh Nick says Measure
Square can uh be used in practical ways for nicer stairs. I would say less installation estimated.
Yeah. So, he's saying you can use it on stairs if you are diligent. Not super practical for the installer,
but uh yeah. So, just um as we close out, if
you catch us on YouTube, you know, give us a subscribe and a like and and comment on there, whatever uh platform
you're watching us on, whether you're watching us live or you're watching us on one of the other uh streams. Uh make
sure to give us some love. We appreciate it. That's why we're here every single week, every Tuesday at 3:00 p.m.
Central, uh, to try to feed you guys with great interviews like this with James and, uh, you know, help you out in
your business. And we still got comments coming in, guys. Uh, but we do have to close this
thing out. Uh, [laughter] appreciate all the comments. Really appreciate the engagement, guys. And
James, thank you so much for your time today. We really enjoyed the conversation and and uh getting to know
you a little bit better. We we could do this every week. Um my pleasure. Really? Yeah. Yeah. Let's do it every week. I'm in.
[laughter] We we probably do need to have a more uh uh uh consistent cadence around
technology. Um thank you, Ben. Appreciate it, guys. And uh hang in
there, James. And for our audience, we will catch you guys next week.
