Yoder Concrete Construction:

Showing Ohio the Merits of Concrete

Juliet Farmer,ConcreteNetwork.Com Columnist

For Jeff and Roberta Yoder, owners of Yoder Concrete Construction in DeGraff, Ohio, hard work is a way of life. And they have worked hard, spending the late 1980s both farming and working construction -- simultaneously. "I did construction during the day and farmed at night," explains Yoder.

Yoder spent about five years working for another company honing his skills with concrete before opening up his own shop in 1991. Those early years also consisted of a lot of hard work, and for the first three years Yoder, an ACI Certified Flatwork Finisher and Technician, stilled farmed in conjunction with the concrete construction before concentrating solely on concrete.

In the beginning, Yoder was doing a lot of residential flatwork – mainly sidewalks and garage floors. Now, the company offers a variety of services including both residential and commercial driveways, sidewalks, patios, porches, pool decks, garage floors, barn floors, footers and docks.

Yoder Concrete Construction is a family-owned business serving west central Ohio, an agricultural residential area. "We're 45 minutes from a major metropolitan area," explains Yoder.

Although the area is heavy on the residential side, Yoder has found plenty of commercial work to keep him busy, including pouring foundations and doing flatwork for small companies in the area.

As for the residential work, it's primarily decorative exterior concrete, including patios and sidewalks, either stamped or stenciled. "The Large Ashlar Slate pattern was popular last year," says Yoder, adding that now brick stenciling is huge.

Yoder offers stamped patterns including Londonweave Cobblestone, Large Ashlar Slate, Sandstone Tile, Coquina with Seashells, Random Sandstone and Basketweave Brick. Stenciling patterns include over 20 varieties of various bricks, cobblestone and tile. They also offer decorative inlays and borders to customize projects.

As stencils grow in popularity, Yoder works to educate customers about their many benefits. "Pavers were popular 10 years ago," Yoder explains. "But with maintenance issues such as weed growth between pavers and pavers shifting over time, I am promoting stamping and stenciling concrete to replace pavers."

Yoder also says stenciling is more realistic for brick patterns than stamping because the stencils create realistic mortar joints. Case in point - at one job, the customer saw a pile of used stencils and asked, "Is that how you know where to lay the bricks?"

Yoder prides himself on customer education. He says that though color options are unlimited, he reminds his customers that concrete is unpredictable and colors aren't always exact.

Another way the Yoders educate their customers is through marketing. Roberta always takes samples with her on sales calls. "I've sold a lot of stenciling work due to (the) samples," she explains. The 2-foot by 2-foot samples of different patterns and colors allow customers to look at and touch the product right away. "That helps them make decisions and sells jobs," she adds.

Using samples is a trick the Yoders picked up at a World of Concrete seminar on marketing a few years ago. The samples they have include the six different stamping patterns in a variety of colors, as well as stencil samples.

Yoder Concrete Construction gets a lot of business through word-of-mouth and website referrals. They also participate in local home shows and try to get their name in the local newspaper with different projects.

One such project is the Village ofLakeviewdowntown project. The village improvements included new street lighting, sidewalks, water mains and other utilities in addition to the new roadway. Yoder placed regular and decorative sidewalks down Main Street and around the corner on Harrison Street.

The total price tag for Phase I of the project came to about $415,000 and was completed on schedule. Yoder's part of the project included 4,000 square feet of stenciled concrete with color hardener, and 5,500 square feet of regular sidewalks and driveway approaches.

"The engineer who drew up the plans originally wanted concrete stamped in a brick pattern," says Yoder. "I showed him stencil examples...and they approved a sample."

The first phase took five weeks and a team of four people to complete. Yoder says he is looking forward to Phase II, which will begin in May. "They're using us to make sure the rest of project and Phase I match," Yoder says. Most likely the excellent work they provided was sure to have bearing on the decision as well.

Yoder Concrete Construction, LLC
Jeff and Roberta Yoder
7984 St. RT 245
DeGraff, OH 43318
(937) 362-3210
Send Mail Now - Click Here
Visit the Yoder Concrete Construction web site

More Contractor Features

Site Sponsors