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GREEN |
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EV Movement Might Need DC Fast Charging
LEED Homes Sell Faster – And For More $
Macy’s installs 280,000 LEDs in 2011
New Mexico: Green Code Roll-Back?
Solar Panels Add To A Home’s Selling Price |
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Technology & Construction |
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AEC Technology Updates, Fall 2011
AGC Webinar – Social Media in the Workplace (Oct. 25)
ENR Video: iPads at Work
Web-based Contract Documents (from AIA) |
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BIM |
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BIM For Facilities Management
BIMx for the iPad
Journal of BIM (Spring 2011 issue, downloadable)
Residential BIM Alliance Group News |
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Electrical Info |
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Copper is a Commodity!
Heresy on LEDs & Fluorescents
Tough Economy Drives Meter Sales
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Training Dates |
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Standard training classes set for
our Chandler, AZ offices are scheduled for November 14-16 and December 7-9.
The next scheduled Advanced class in AZ is set for December 1-2.
BY-HAND ESTIMATING: AZ classes are scheduled for Nov. 3-4. |
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Standard class dates for Columbia, MD is December 7th - 9th.
Click here for the complete list of upcoming 2011 training dates
Training can be "suit-cased" to your facility. We can tailor our training to your needs. Ask us about customized training at your site!
Call to register for any of the above classes, including those in Maryland: 1-800-444-4890.
We've posted training dates, directions to our training facilities, and registration forms on our Web page. Click the "Education" button on our home page, or go directly to this link: Education
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Jump Drives are getting cheap
32GB models are starting at around $32 they make a great personal backup device when attached to a keychain.
even if your Company has a server backup system, it never hurts to get a copy of your own just in case. |
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Adapting To The Market
Keeps Mascal Steady
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With 38 years under its belt, Mascal Electric (www.mascal.com) describes itself as “one of largest and most respected electrical contractors in Northern Illinois.” While there’s certainly been a rough-on-construction recession there (as almost everywhere else), the company recently had 150 employees in the field.
“Our diversity has kept us afloat,” said Adam Mata, a company VP, one of five partners who run the company. “Our willingness to change has allowed us to grow with the changes that are occurring out there – and it’s kept us going.”
Mata runs one of three company offices, in St. Charles, IL; the company HQ is in Dekalb. And in Rockford, IL, there’s a Mascal operation with a name that might be familiar to some McCormick Systems customers – Manrod Electric.
What Mata means by diversity is the company’s willingness to pursue all kinds of electrical and related work. Recently, for example, Mascal Electric was involved in:
- A 45-day auto plant turnaround (for Chrysler, in Belvidere, IL).
- Training for some Mascal people (via Eaton Corp. and others) in electric vehicle charging station installation.
- Wind-farm and data-center projects.
- Low-voltage/structured wiring work.
- Service & maintenance work (this operation has as many as 15 electricians working in it full-time).
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Constantly updating the database
Heath Headley, another VP and partner, is head of the Estimating department. One key to success, he explained, was (and is) paying attention to the McCormick database installed at his company.
“Products are changing so rapidly, that the database is more important now,” he said. “We try to keep it as current as we can. We build different assemblies. As we do this, we make the work of estimating go a lot faster.”
Mascal’s database is located, with Headley, in Dekalb. There are 10 estimators at the company these days, with some at each location – meaning the company uses the WAN-capable version of McCormick’s software (formerly called the WIN 12000).
Care and tending of the database is one of Headley’s focuses, obviously: “We try to update it every month or so, as our estimators tell me they are seeing something new – products or assemblies that we should add.”
Project managers at Mascal also use the McCormick estimating package to price out change orders.
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| Not to be Missed! |
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See Mascal’s website (www.mascal.com), one of the better electrical contractor sites that you might encounter.
Of special note: The company presentation (an animated slide show) seems to be unique among many construction sites seen by this writer – note that you can let the presentation “play” or skip from one item to the next using a bottom-of-the-page menu. – Joe Salimando
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17 years with McCormick
“We’ve found that our estimators can pick up the McCormick System, and the uses of the database, easily,” Headley said. “Essentially, the estimating system we have here is an easy-to-use, number-crunching machine.”
Added Mata: “Just as we have to be flexible as a company, our estimating software has to do that, too. With McCormick’s system, it’s quite easy to add assemblies and to customize what we have and use to Mascal’s unique needs."
Faster, more-accurate estimates are the goal at Mascal. That led the company, in early spring 2011, to add Tra-Ser SX. And it usually leads the company to send two people to the McCormick Systems’ User’s Conference.
“They actually listen to their customers,” Mata said. “That’s another reason we like the McCormick system. They talk to us, they listen to everybody. And if there’s enough users who would like to see a certain change in the system, they actually make that change!”
Added Headley: “At the User’s Conference, the software code-writers are sitting there, in the same room as the users. They listen to us. That’s got to be pretty rare.”
As many users have in previous newsletters, Mata and Headley praised McCormick for its customer support. Traveling to the conference might help with that, Headley noted: “When you’re at the event, you get to meet some of the people in support. Eventually, it seems to me, you end up meeting all of them. So unlike other software companies, when you call support at McCormick – well, you’re talking to someone you actually have met.”
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What’s next
Headley and Mata positioned Mascal Electric as being ready to adapt to whatever comes in the industry. So what’s coming? Headley provided an example of the type of work that’s helping the company generate revenue:
“One of the biggest projects we’ve done lately actually came in a location that probably wasn’t even 20,000 sq. ft. It is a data center for All-State Insurance (in Rochelle, IL). There were stacks and stacks of conduit, the UPS battery banks, two giant generators – much more.”
Added Mata: “Our motto used to be that we would do any electrical job, from $1 to $13 million. It’s still a pretty good way to think about our company.”
Noteworthy is the fact that this very large union electrical contractor looks at the EV business potential from both sides – not just commercial chargers, but residential installations, too.
And there are significant reasons for optimism, according to Headley: “We will take it as it comes, of course. But it seems to us that there are lots of people these days with many projects on the drawing board."
“We know that, at some point, we’ll be bidding on that work – and doing much of it.”
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New From McCormick!
WIN1000, WIN3000,
WIN4000, WIN6000. |
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As explained in last month’s newsletter, McCormick Systems has totally revamped our main product line. You can get an in-person explanation and demonstration at this upcoming trade show:
NECA Show, Oct. 23-25, San Diego CA – show info
Find McCormick Systems in Booth #705
A contractor can begin
with the WIN 1000 as a stand alone system and
move up to the
WIN 3000 Gold to add in a
second estimator and get a few more features, then scale upwards to a WIN
6000 with multiple estimators and finally get to
the top with our WIN 6000 Platinum product so his two offices in different cities can use the same system and help work on the same job.
The game changer for us
is including our full database with all of our
estimating products including the WIN 1000,
which gives you the ability to work with your
own customized and massaged database throughout
your whole career.
For a contractor, there is now a wide-open vista
– the chance to get precisely the right product
offering for your company’s needs, the types of
work it does, and your electronic communications
set-up. You can describe the kind of work your
company does, and your needs, wants, and
capabilities to us. We should respond with
precisely the right software to speed your
estimating, make it more accurate, and help your
estimators and project managers become more productive.
How is this different from a few months
before? We’ve invested time and money in
developing precisely what it is contractors have
told us they have to have to gain ground. There
are now new tools in the McCormick universe that
you can put to work – profitably.
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Congratulations To Corbins Electric –
Southwest Subcontractor of the Year
Corbins Electric (which has offices in Phoenix, AZ and Albuquerque, NM) uses McCormick Software to get its estimating done. And it’s been estimating lots of work lately, as revenue increased 22% in 2010.
That was one factor in the naming of Corbins – by Engineering News-Record, the construction industry’s flagship magazine – as its Subcontractor of the Year in the Southwest. See Construction.com blog with more info.
According to the New Mexico Business Weekly, the company is growing in that state – see this July 26, 2011 news item.
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Mark Your Calendar: 2012 Users Conference |
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May 2-5 are the dates for the 2012 McCormick Systems Users’ Conference. It’s a special event for us (and, we hope, for you) – our 30th conference.
To make it memorable for all of us, we’ll have it at the Talking Stick Resort (Scottsdale AZ) – which is only two years old. Yes, it has a golf course on the property. And it’s a four-diamond resort, an “exalted” rating according to this March press release.
Too upscale to be affordable? Not at all – the rates we’ve negotiated are right in line with what McCormick customers have worked with in previous years.
Please put this on your calendar; details (including your U.C. agenda) will be coming to you soon. See the registration form below. If you have questions, please ask! |
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We Are Happy To Again Be Named
To The ConstrucTech 50 |
McCormick Systems was honored again – with ConstrucTech magazine’s inclusion of our company among the ConstrucTech 50 for 2011.
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According to the magazine’s explanation of the awards program:
The Constructech 50 is a listing of the most influential construction technology providers with a strong and ongoing market presence. Published in the July/Aug issue of Constructech magazine, this resource is determined by Constructech's editorial team.
The Constructech 50 is a new variation on the Hottest Companies awards that Constructech presented in years past. While in previous years companies were judged based on the success and growth found solely in the past year, those named for the Constructech 50 are evaluated on a continued and dominant presence in the marketplace.
See the list of the 50 companies here. See the McCormick Systems page here.
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If you’re looking for a way to electrify your driving experience you can opt for one of Nissan’s shiny new latest-tech all-electric Leafs for about $40,000 or you could keep an eye open for a good used model.
OK, OK . . . the thing was built in 1899. And we might be talking Canadian dollars, which are (slightly) cheaper than U.S. dollars.
But still. See Globe & Mail story.
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A Bloomberg.com item — Workers Play Cards at Indian Factories as Asset Sales Founder — started with these 2 paragraphs:
Each day, about 2,800 workers punch their time-cards in and out of Hindustan Cables Ltd.’s factories in India. They get paid, receive the occasional raise and eat in subsidized canteens, even though they produce nothing.
The state-owned company, based in Kolkata, hasn’t made any cable since 2004 and has lost $549 million after cellular technology made its telephone wiring obsolete. Labor laws which the World Bank says are among the most restrictive anywhere and tortuous bankruptcy procedures, a legacy of India’s Soviet-era plan economy, mean the government can’t fire idle employees or sell assets such as machinery or land.
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Prowling around the Internet, I happened on Enrecousa.com — where this graphic is on the home page: |
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I’ve seen a lot of graphics on energy use, electricity use, and lighting in commercial buildings before (they don’t all agree, by the way).
I had not previously seen one with Labor thrown in there…… |
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