Latest / The Slump Monkeys Concrete Podcast / 021 - Scott Thomas
Transcript
- Paul: And welcome into the Slump Monkeys Concrete Podcast. On our way to being the world's number one concrete podcast, this is still October, and the entire month of October, we are brought to you by our premier sponsor, Southern Concrete Machinery. Chris Davenport. Thank you, brother. You're the absolute man. If you don't know Chris yet, if you don't know Southern Concrete Machinery, please allow me just a moment. They represent the Aztec brand of batching equipment. Concrete plants all over the country being erected today. Maybe it's the Conoco Low Pro. Maybe it's the BMH Customs Series. Maybe it's RexCon and they're so famous portable plants all around the country. If you happen to live in Kentucky, Tennessee, Mississippi, Arkansas, and Alabama, then you probably got that from Chris. Now, if you've been under a rock and you didn't know That Southern Concrete Machinery has doubled its territory. That's right. you just follow the Mississippi River north and you're basically touching all of his land. It's like the scene in the Lion King. There's looking out, I was like, everywhere the light touches is our pro area. Yeah, yeah, yeah. All right. The Mississippi River is Chris Davenport's area. So Southern Concrete Machinery. On all the way up to Michigan. If you're looking for a concrete batch plant, he is your guy. Wot Southern Concrete Machinery dot com. As for Chris Davenport, let them know. We sent you this www.southern concrete machinery.com. boy, this has been a heck of a 10 day stretch since the last time I talked to you guys on a full episode. Yeah, in between that time, we spent four days at Concrete Works. That was NRMCA's to me, it's the greatest event that they do. they put it on in the fall every year. It's at a Gaylord property. It's fun. So people are bringing their families. It's a really sweet thing. it it highlights the concrete truck drivers. They're they're the focal point of this thing. They they have the Driver rodeo, which is always hilarious. You got the driver dinner at the very end, which is if it's hard to even imagine what this thing is like. it's it's it's exciting. it's it's it's an awards banquet with a a lot of energy. They went above and beyond. They took it to the next level this year with the the videos. Whoever made the videos for this thing are just out of this world. Absolutely out of this world. I don't I don't know. if they hired an outside firm, if they hired people on the inside and now they're they got these like a new team in there because they had to have done these videos quick. They got done in like twenty four hours. So whoever put these things together, pat on the back. Salute to you, sir or ma'am. The videos were absolutely incredible. the whole thing was just very touching, very wonderful. Congratulations to everybody who competed. Even if you didn't win first place, just know that you're still a winner just by being there. the guy that won was from IMI, by the way. Very cool. And his speech was great too. They give a give the winner gives a a thank you speech or whatever. And was his was awesome. He was he was actually a really good speaker. You know, I don't know what you I don't know what I was thinking, a truck driver would sound like, but he got up there, he was incredibly eloquent and well spoken. It was really, really good. If you're on YouTube, you see me drinking a cup of coffee, you see the sun shining brightly there. It's actually late in the afternoon. Mm. Mm. That is good. And if you're wondering why I need coffee in the afternoon is not that two thirty feeling. No, it's having a seven month old, not getting as much sleep as I should. I hate to even complain about it 'cause my wife may listen to this and she gets even less sleep than I do. So it just is what it is. we're getting there. And once once Bubba like sleeps through the night, like we're gonna be fine. but if any again anybody has any tips, like I'll I'll take all. Concrete works was fantastic. I was able to run the booth for our regular company, Fall Line Minerals. That's my day job. owner one of the owners of Fall Line came there with me, so it was good that he was able to man the booth while I was off giving talks, you know, did some demonstrations and presentations on our plant capabilities, making the calcine clay, how it's changing the concrete, working with Google and Amazon. And we're in the lab stage with meta, so we're not there yet with meta, but It's been absolutely fantastic to put the cow sign clay out into the market. Really looking forward to seeing how that grows. and when I wasn't doing all that, I was over there in the Vince Hagen booth and we were interviewing everybody under the sun. The guest list, the lineup of folks that agreed to be on the show is absolutely insane. President of Delta Industries, Lance Bonner shout out. We had technical difficulty at his appointment time. I couldn't get him on. He's gonna come on for a full episode. I'm so thankful. Felt terrible, of course, that technical difficulty. We just put out a short episode with Justin Lazenby. Also had technical difficulty in him. It just cut off the end of it. So if you listen to that on audio and you're just like, hey, that did that just end? Yes, it did. I'm sorry. This is what happens when you have a concrete guy be a podcast guy. Things are gonna mess up. But with those two, and then we missed one other we'll get you get you next time, man. but other than that, we had like 20 people come through. Shout out to everybody that made it possible. Just you know, really extra shout out to Chris Bingham, even though he is a Tech San fan and Alabama had to whoop up on them this past weekend. Still though. Just super, super thankful for all the work that he put in behind the scenes. And it was a lot. Big thank you to the audience, by the way. So we have probably one of the most engaged audiences of all time. thank you. Thank you for engaging. Thank you for being here, downloading, subscribing. Subscribers, the subscriber count has gone up by at least 25% in the last week, which is fun to see. there's several hundred of us now here enjoying this, and I just can't thank you enough. Thank you to the sponsors, Vince Hagen for Let's Be in the Booth, Chris Davenport, Southern Concrete Machinery. They were our very first premium sponsor, which helps us do this the right way by having that level of sponsorship. And what's really cool, shout out to Chris real quick. Let me, I really this is really important for to me. Chris sells concrete batching equipment. The month of October was his as a premium sponsor, blocks out everybody else. We're highlighting Southern concrete machinery. They also so they just happened to pick the month of October, which was Concrete Works, so that was purposeful. But when I went to go do the show at Concrete Works, their competitor, Vince Hagen, said, Hey, you can use our booth to do your show. And I called Chris. Said, Hey, Chris, I know this is your month, but I've got an opportunity to do the show. It's gonna be bigger and better than ever. And this is who's wanting to partner, and they're gonna partner with some other stuff for us. it just happens to be during your month, and it's actually your competitor. I just wanted to run that by you and let you know if if we need to work something else out, we can. And you know what? Without even hesitating, Davenport was, no, that's great, man. I'm so happy you found more people to help you out and make this a success. I want to see slump monkeys do great. You're a small business. We all need, you know, a hand up as we get growing. And I I love those guys and we're friendly competitors. I want to beat them. But this is this is absolutely great. I wish you all the best. Can't wait to see ya. And he came and even recorded in their booth with me. and that that shows you the kind of guy he is. It shows you the type of industry we're working with. And I hope that, you know, if you're not friends with Chris Davenport yet, anybody who's in the slump monkey community, you know, connect with him. Southern Concrete Machinery, Chris Davenport. Make sure he's on your short list for friends. Another thing, the Pick'em contest. College football is in full swing. It has literally been the wildest weeks ever in college football. Literally, literally ever. Check this out. This this was written by somebody called Bobby Football. And that's a great name, by the way. this college football season is historically chaotic. After last week's insanity and this past weekend's wildness, there have been eleven losses. by top ten teams over the three week period, that's the most ever, ever in the history of college football. Eleven losses by top ten teams in a three week span. It's the first time since 2007. Now a lot of people my age they remember that 2007 season because if you were ranked number two, basically a guaranteed loss like every week for like six weeks to end the year. this is the first time since 2007 that a top two team has lost to an unranked opponent three weeks in a row. Lastly, there are fewer than four undefeated teams left in college football this early in the season for the first time since nineteen seventy seven. It's actually, I think there's only three left now. So absolute pandemonium in college football right now. It's unbelie it's it's unprecedented. We've never seen ever be this crazy. Mm. It's so crazy. And so the pick league is crazy. The whole all the rankings are upside down. Nobody had a good week last week. I actually went seven and three. I might have had the best week out of anybody. And I did I did like a strategy that my brother had told me. And he said, You know, when I don't know, I just go with the opposite of what everybody else thinks. And I'm I've been down bad lately. So I went through and I I picked the opposite. If 80% of the league was on one team, I took the 20. And if 70% of the league was on one team, I took the 30%. And said, I gotta have like, I have to have the opposite. So as an example, only 23% of people pick Cincinnati plus the points. Yep. I did that. We win. Miami, 39% of people picked them. Yep, got that one right. LSU, only 44% picked. Yep, got that one right. Michigan, only thirty percent of the people picked them. Yep, I got that one right. California, thirty-two percent. got that one wrong. So it's not perfect, but UCF, eighteen percent of the people picked UCF plus the points. Yep. Got that one right. So, it was it was hilarious that I took the opposite side of the bet almost every time, except Kentucky. I thought that was ridiculous and and we were right, Kentucky dominated. But other than that, it was funny to use that strategy and to have it turn out to be successful. was a lot of fun because everybody it was just a bloodbath. a lot of people started the started Saturday and five and the pick them leak. Almost every single person. we had a request from someone, a listener says we need to unmask Joe Buck yourself. Does anybody know who Joe Buck yourself is? We'd love to know. We need to talk some trash, get in his head, figure out I mean this dude is just absolutely dominating. our our league here. So Joe Buck yourself, please reach out. Admin at slumpmonkeys.com. I'd love to hear from you. Joe Buck yourself, please email admin at slumpmonkeys.com. It anonymizes everything. I can't see who the winner is. So I'm hoping at the end it'll tell me at least because whoever wins, we're gonna if you want the prize and the trophy. Speaking of trophies, look at this bad boy. 3D printed this is the icon of the show. If you're on the YouTube, this the one time you want to be there. if you're on the YouTube, you can see the 3D printed this is be the top of the trophy. We get a base. We're gonna paint it. It's gonna be absolutely beautiful. But a little sneak peek there of the trophy that'll come along with your cash prize. it that's a lot of fun. it was it was great to see Alabama get a win. Thank you to my wife for being home the entire game. The whole family was home. That is the one superstition that's absolutely true in our house. the wife has to be home for the entire game and Bama is guaranteed to win. Interesting stat about Alabama, by the way. During the game against Texas AM, we were the youngest team in all of college football. You know, every everybody has injuries on their team, so I don't wanna act like we're the the first team to ever be injured. But we're missing like half our starting lineup. And we're missing twenty five percent of the number two people. And it's it's been pretty rough. Our O line is absolute trash, but we got a bunch of third stringers out there doing their best. And, Tex A and dang near, took their head off. I I I actually surprised we scored as many points as we did. It was really tough moving the ball against them. And Marcel Reid showed up. He showed up as his normal self in the first quarter. And then after that he looked like a real football player. I think they were about to bench him and he was like, no, no, no, okay, I'll I'll actually get out there and play quarterback like I'm supposed to. Here's another fun stat. about how crazy this college football season is. sixty-four out of the sixty-seven power four teams have at least one power four win. The three schools that have not beat a power four team, they're all in the Big Ten. Maryland, Michigan State, and Penn State Have not beaten a power four team. Didn't think didn't think that was ever possible to go this far to the season and have the Big Ten just sinking like an anchor. Indiana looks terrible, Ohio State looks beatable. Just what is going on in the Big Ten? You know what the Big Ten does have? It has it isn't UCLA part of the Big Ten now? It's it's a weird am I getting that right? I think I am. It still feels weird when the Pac twelve dissolved. It's hard to figure out where everybody went. I think UCLA is in the Big Ten. Regardless, they are number one. Number one in the Bell Pole. That's right. Bell pole is back. UCLA is at number one in the bell pole. They are 7 0. Absolutely hilarious. Number two is Alabama right now. And we all know Alabama is not the number two in the team in the country, much lower. The the poll will resolve once Bama has their bye week this week. So the the poll doesn't take into account the fact that you have or haven't had a bye week. It's not average adjusted over the number w number of games that have been played. So when Ohio State and some of these other teams had a bye week last week, it allowed other people to overtake them because we had the opportunity to earn points. We beat a power four team. So we earned points for that while they stayed at home and got zero points. So this week we have a buy. So when you know these other teams go out and they win their games, they're gonna launch up ahead of us. It's a lot of fun to see this new polling system that Joey Bell made, the Bell pole. It it to me, by the time the season ends, especially after the conference championship games, this will be the no doubt number one pole in in the country. We used to have something called the BCS. So a lot of people listening to this are going to remember the computerized BCS formula. And I'd like to take a moment and read through the top 10 on the bell pole and compare that with the top 10 of the BCS. So if the BCS were a thing today, Miami would be number one, followed by Ohio State, Indiana, UCLA, and Notre Dame. That would be your top five. Miami, Ohio State, Indiana, UCLA, and Notre Dame. Top five in the bell pole today is Alabama, Kentucky, Wake Forest and Notre Dame. So only two out of the five are the same. We jumped down into the top ten. We got Georgia, Kentucky, Utah, Texas, and Alabama, where the bell pole has Miami, Ohio State, Utah, Indiana, and Ole Miss. I actually think they're gonna line up very, very, very closely after next week once some of these these buy games you know, filtered through. So be on the lookout for that. if you're on Instagram, follow us at Slump Monkeys. That's at Slump Monkeys on the Instagram. we're we're combining with the bell pole. We're helping those guys out. It's a lot of fun. every week here on the show, I've been giving you pick of the week. I would like to continue doing that. I got one pro I got I do have one problem. I'm recording this on Monday and the picks aren't available. So can't do that. Also. I'm doing the rest of the season under protest. Why am I doing it under protest? October seventeenth, that week, so to be week seven of the contest, the system says I didn't make any picks, which is not true. I made my picks on Friday, October sixteenth. I was at lunch at the NRMCA convention, eating with Ben Lintinny from Heidelberg, and Chris Davenport of all people, we just talked talked him up a minute ago. He he shows up to the same lunch spot to sit at the table next to us with some of his customers. And we were laughing about college football. And I said, by the way, I gotta make these picks. Do you wanna help me make these picks? He didn't join the league with us because he doesn't picking against the spread. It's just a really nice thing. But I explained it real quick and I said, What do think? And he starts picking and he makes all 10 picks like that's awesome, dude. Thank you so much. Sat back down with Ben, typed in at the very bottom what I thought the score was going to be as a tiebreaker, and and off we went the rest of our weekend. But l apparently the system thinks I didn't make any picks. So I don't have as many points. I'm I'm still 17th in the league, but it's not fair. I don't have all the things. It's absolute nonsense. I probably went 10 and 0. I knowing me probably went 10 and 0. Knowing Chris Davenport, Our combined intellect and fandom probably went 10 and 0. And I don't get any credit for it. It's it's a sad world we live in. Sad world. I I just I need you to know I did not miss a week. System is against me. It's against me. It's not fair. It's not fair. If it was my fault, I'd throw a hand up. I'd give you hand up accountability. It's not, this is not me. It's the system. And and I, for one, I can't live with corrupt systems. So I am playing under protest for the rest of the year. another announcement. white paper of the month. It'll go out on the next episode. So actually I said bell pole was gonna be next episode. That wasn't entirely true. White paper of the month is on the next episode. Bell poll is on the upside of You're getting two episodes this week. this one's going out today on Monday. the next one is going or Tuesday. The next one's gonna go out likely on Friday. it'll have white paper of the month in it. We are having a guest for white paper of the month. It will be Dustin Highland of Concrete Supply Company. the we're actually going to go over a white paper that his folks over there helped do make the concrete for it. And they're taking microspheres and Yeah, trying to eliminate air entrainment admixtures. So you no have no longer have to put air entrainers in your concrete. Instead, use these microspheres at a 1% dose rate. Boom. It does the exact same effect that you would want from a freeze-thaw durability standpoint, but you don't lose any of your strength. Absolutely fascinating. We're gonna go deep on that paper, the good, the bad, and the ugly. Next time here on Slump Monkeys. Guys, I really appreciate everything about this this network, everything about this podcast. This is my favorite thing to do in the world. I get to have our partners come in. We're able to do the live shows. We have twenty mini episodes coming out. You're probably seeing those. we still have Scott Brewer. Chairman, executive chairman at the NRMCA. You still have Dr. Brown, Dr. Heather Brown, now at IMI. These are the people that I haven't even been able to get to yet. Teddy Keller from Vince Hagen. Haven't even been able to get his out yet. That's how this lineup is so deep that I'm what? How how many of those have we released? Five, six, seven of those already? And we're we haven't even gotten to some people that were dream, dream guests for me. And we just keep pumping out content after content. It's it's incredible. The whole thing, the whole list, the whole experience is incredible. We're doing it again. Live show coming in December. We'll talk more about it on the next episode of Slump Monkeys Concrete Podcast. For now, we're gonna get into the interview portion of this show. quickly, one last housekeeping note. There are still some spots in 2027 available for sponsorship. Yes, 2027, you heard that right. They are were already like 60% sold out. So if you're hearing this and you're thinking I'd like to be a part of it, they're going quickly. Please give me a shout. Admin at slumpmonkeys.com. That's M-O-N-K-E-Y-S.com. Admin at slumpmonkeys.com. I can get you the media kit. We can get you signed up. They are going quickly. The live shows have been an absolute hit. Thank you so much to all the new listeners. Appreciate everyone out there. And I'll see you in the interview portion of the Slump Monkeys Concrete Podcast. And welcome into the interview portion of the Slump Monkeys Concrete Podcast. I've got with us a very new friend, Mr. Scott Thomas. How are you, sir? Scott Thomas: Hey, I'm doing great. Thanks for having me. Paul: Absolutely, man. any friend of Manny Tejano's is a friend of mine. So it was really nice to meet you this weekend at Concrete Works. How'd you enjoy the show? Scott Thomas: Yeah, it was it was amazing. it was interesting though. I was coming right off of the AgNexus conference out in Austin and so just reconnecting with people that I was meeting for the first time out there and you know, had some great discussions and yeah, it was a it was a great event all around. Absolutely. Paul: What's Ag Nexus like? Scott Thomas: So Agnexus is pretty new. It's that was their third year. and it's really unique because it's an in invite-only type event. So they're keeping it small, like 100, 150 key decision makers from businesses and whatnot. And again, Manny, who you mentioned, connected me to that event because their their main focus is technology in the industry, trying to bring the newest stuff and kind of their promise to those hundred, hundred fifty. or so people is that they're gonna not really recycle material or vendors they're gonna bring in the new things so I was invited out brought my my trailer simulator that we'll talk about and but yeah it was a really really cool event I was a little bit nervous about you know how how many people am I gonna get to engage with specifically for what I was out there for but the sometimes those smaller crowds you know you get you get a lot of traction with them Paul: Yeah, well, I feel that way about concrete works as well. you know, it's a concrete works a thousand or two thousand people, but it does have an intimate feel to it. And the people there, they care and there are lot of decision makers. Did you say you got to take your simulator we're we're gonna talk real quick, and in just like catch everybody up, but you got to take your simulator to Agnexus? Scott Thomas: Yeah, yeah. So yeah, that was the kind of thing they they were looking at. Any anything new, any of the latest technology solutions out there and I hauled it from I'm based out of Atlanta, so I hauled it out to to Austin and set it up right on we're at the University of Texas Austin's campus. So it was a it was a perfect set in, you know. Paul: that's sick. I guess we should probably tell people what you do. It alter. Scott Thomas: Ha ha ha. Paul: I talk to a lot of people in this space, in the in the concrete space. Everybody's got a different perspective. And that's what I love about this show is I get to dive into their perspectives and then you today coming from one perspective, but you didn't always come for from this perspective. So if you don't mind, let's take the next thirty seconds just to tell everybody about your company. And then I wanna I wanna go back to how you got started in this business to even end up on this r ridiculous podcast. Scott Thomas: Yeah. No, so I started Ultra XR a few years ago. Actually, we started a consulting business first in 2020. but basically it transformed into providing XR services, so extended reality. Those of you that don't know, you know, you got VR virtual reality, MR mixed reality, AR, augmented reality, all of that sits under the umbrella of of extended reality or XR. So Ultra XR really we built it to to really create solutions that shift perspectives and spark transformation. So we're not Creating really game situations with the technology. We're looking at ways to maybe shock people or one way or another just get their attention in a way and in an immersive way so that they remember whatever we need them to remember, whether it's a safety process, a storytelling, we do brand forward, you know, recruiting type tools. one of my favorite things we've been able to do is partner with nonprofits. so I'm I'm a follower of Christ, so when So we have that is the foundation of what I do is are we connecting people to you know what their calling is and who they need to be. And and so I get to do some international trips where we film and put these immersive experiences together, kind of just share like what are some of these great organizations doing all over the world. So those are some of the things that we're doing. Paul: That's awesome, man. But before you attempted to change the world by strapping truck drivers in an F1 simulator and having them experience rollover scenarios, that that isn't you didn't come out of the womb thinking this is what I'm gonna do for my life. Take take us back. You get out of high school, do you go to college? And then how on earth do you get here? What's this journey like for Scott? Scott Thomas: Yeah. Yeah, it's really funny part of my story 'cause I have to tell people, especially my main commercial customer is in the Ready Mix space. And so I have to tell I if you don't know me, I'm not a VR tech guy, I didn't come from that. I came from the industry. So yeah, I graduated high school, went into university and interned for Lafarge up in Michigan. That's where I'm originally from. And that was my first in exposure to the industry working for Lafarge. I was working in cement and really got hooked. I loved the the industry. they hired me on And then we could not wait. My wife and I could not wait to get out of Michigan. So I had an opportunity with Lafarge to relocate to Georgia and had the opportunity to get into an entry-level safety role. And four months into that role, we had an employee unfortunately get killed at a plant just outside of Atlanta. And For me, not even the obvious shock of somebody losing their life, you know, was was a learning in and of itself. The the the thing that really struck a nerve with me was the disconnect that I saw between upper management, the executive team, and you know, the people ultimately making all the decisions and pulling the strings and writing the checks, they were so disconnected from the reality of what was happening in the field every day. And so it put me on a path of just pursuing the front line in a different way, especially from the context of safety. You know, what are we doing to equip those people with the right tools? And so I spent a lot of time with maintenance groups in the operations. And I guess you could say my approach probably was a little different but but effective. And I moved around quite a bit. So Lafarge relocated me. a number of times, ended up back up north for a little while, then ended up joining Argos in the Carolinas. and moved back to to Georgia. and then with with Argos, I had participated in a big project with DuPont and that got me some exposure. I ended up going down to Colombia for a meeting and by the end of that week was convinced I want to live in Colombia. I I loved the the culture and everything. My wife and I had always wanted an international kind of experience and so so they were looking to form their their official kind of corporate safety team and so we relocated to Columbia, lived in Medellin, Columbia for two years. So if you've seen Narcos or you know anything about Pablo Escobar, that was our neighborhood for for a couple of years. Paul: that explains that super cool haircut you got there. I was like, where like you got it, that's an international flavor to it. I was like, man, is this guy German? What? No. Scott Thomas: Is it real? Paul: Friggin' Colombian. All right, now we got it. Scott Thomas: That's funny. That's really funny. Yeah. Yeah. So but it's funny too, 'cause my Spanish, the accent that I have is is from Medellin, so they they refer to him as Pisces. So like that's the accent whenever I speak Spanish, I guess I get told like, I I can tell where you're you learned your Spanish. So th I guess I I did carry some things, you know, from those two years. Paul: That's hilarious. And what your Michigan accent's gone though. You've you've wiped that one out. Scott Thomas: Yeah, it's funny. I was just talking to somebody about that at at at Concrete Works, that you know, when I first moved to Georgia, I remember I couldn't understand, especially like over radio, like truck the truck drive I'm like, this is I it it blew my mind. I'm in a p I'm in a disp you know, in a batch plant and I'm thinking, How are you doing like how are you coordinating these drivers? Paul: Yeah. Scott Thomas: I I this does not sound like English. It doesn't sound like any I can't even understand it. So, And then what's funny is I I guess over the years I've my wife is the one lovingly points out that I've got this like condition called like chameleon syndrome or something that when when I speak I mimic kind of the accent what I'm hearing and it just means I absorb kind of the environment a little bit differently and so I start to speak it. But yeah. Yeah I'm I'm not ashamed to to to have kicked the the Michigan accent because I hear it now. My sisters I'm like, this is terrible. This is like such a weird accent. So Paul: man. Well, I think I think we all have that a little bit, like when we go back to where we're from, especially, and and I get around, you know, my family in the deep south, and all of a sudden I start talking more like a hick than I was before. So I could imagine you you get tied up with Michiganders and yeah, you get that that nasally wine back to you. so you're in Columbia, you're having a good time, you're forming the International Safety Council with Argos. but you're back here now. So what gets us from Columbia back to the States? Scott Thomas: Yeah, so I was I was asked to to come back to the States by Argos. they were going through a a restructuring and and had started a combined the the Southeast and the the South Central kind of market. So they were looking for someone to to lead the safety group for US Ready Mix. and that was you know it was it was a little bit of a bittersweet. We were excited to come back to the States. loved Columbia but it was an awesome opportunity to just come back in that kind of role and oversee a team. that I fell in love with. Just we we did some amazing and incredible things. But one of the things that I inherited, this is kinda coming in now to the technology, but I inherited a a significant problem with rollover. So, at that time we were aver averaging thirteen rollovers a year and if you're familiar with the cost of those rollers. we were five to seven million dollars, cost just from from those one type of incident that we were having every year. And so, you know, of course, Paul: Mm. Scott Thomas: me being in the head role and and kind of, you know, navigating and and managing that team and our efforts, I will say this is this sounds really strange to say, but we really had an incredible training program already. We had some great people. I had spent some time with my team retooling and and finding the right people and kind of standardizing our our approach to training, but we still were just having this issue where, you know, six months after training or a year, year and a half after they they were, you know, on their own, we were we were just having these these rollovers. So The idea came you know, and it it was interesting. I'll I spent a lot again going back to my original hook into safety, yeah, went and spoke with a lot of our drivers and really spent a lot of time just kind of mining for like what are we missing? I mean there's there's clearly we have a great approach to training that's missing something really significant. And what I found was Paul: Mm. Scott Thomas: that we had drivers, some of our most experienced drivers and some of the ones that had, I would say, all around just our best drivers, safest, most efficient, all that. a number of them had actually had a traumatic incident early in their driving career. some of them had had rollovers. And so just thinking through the psychology of that, you know, we know that trauma can be a really impactful and effective teacher. So that's really where the concept was born of, hey, maybe we could simulate this. Maybe we could put people through something that just emulates a little bit of what that feels like to lose control. in that kind of vehicle. So so yeah put the first one together and again it was a perfect storm because we had unfortunately you know a costly issue we had had a couple fatalities as well and the executives were like we need to do something so it was just the perfect divine appointment time where the money the need the problem was all there and I had an idea and so we we ran with it and and it was massively successful successful from the first day of training people to when I left the company. we had nearly eliminated the issue by the time I left and then since leaving they've maintained a close to zero record for rollovers across that footprint. Paul: I don't know of any Redimix company. This is the first time I'm hearing anything like this, where they saw a problem. Someone said, I have an off-the-wall idea for safety training, and they let you go build a virtual reality, extended realities, or whatever the the term that us common folk are are meant to use here, to scare the crap out of the driver and and make Scott Thomas: Yeah. Paul: them act right. Like this is this is an insane origin story. what so w take me back. What's that conversation like with the executives at Argos where you say, I think I have an idea, but it's it's virtual reality. Like I I can't even imagine pitching Scott Thomas: Yeah. Paul: that. Please take me into that room when you're giving that pitch. Scott Thomas: Yeah, yeah. Well like I said, even before me presenting that concept, I remember in Atlanta specifically, the industry was really taking a hit as a whole around rollovers. We had Eleven Alive News in Atlanta ended up doing a whole segment on concrete truck rollovers. And it was because one of our competitors at the time had rolled a truck onto the former mayor of Atlanta's vehicle was a part of this accident. And so, you know, they put this segment together and everyone's trucks were Paul: Jesus. Scott Thomas: yeah, ev everyone's trucks were on in this in this reel and you know, it just it looked bad and We our our president at the time called us all into a meeting at seven o'clock the next morning and was like, you know, what are we doing? Well, you know, I I was I couldn't sleep last night thinking the media's gonna show up and we're you know, we're we're gonna have to give some examples of what we're doing to to prevent this. Paul: All right, Scott, the hard transition here for everybody on audio. if you are watching on YouTube, you can see we've made a massive transition. So I don't know if the government was listening or or what happened, but they cut Scott off and we had him relocate to a different place on the property. If you're on YouTube, you saw he was broadcasting inside of his company's trailer, one of these the installations that he's gonna do. It's a mobile installation. We were gonna talk all about it. It's cause it's freaking awesome and nobody else is doing it. So it was really cool that you tried to broadcast from inside there. But I guess the aluminum paneling just didn't agree with us, Scott. Scott Thomas: Yeah, yeah. Well I think we need to install Starlink in there and and be able to have connection good connection anywhere. Paul: That's awesome. That's absolutely the next upgrade. So make sure you check the box when you order one of these from Scott that you check the Starlink package. So Scott Thomas: Absolutely. Great. Paul: we left off talking about how the CEO came in, had an all hands meeting, said he would was up at night, not sure if the press were gonna be hounding him. He needed answers. He needed action. All right, take us back to that and and what happens from there? Scott Thomas: Yeah. Yeah. So not long after that, obviously, you know, I'd already been doing some bird donging on what a you know, what are we what are we doing. It wasn't a new issue for us, it just happened to hit the spotlight for everybody. and so I had some ideas and in some subsequent conversations with with the leadership team. I brought in a developer for just a demo just to kind of help people wrap their head around again for me, we we had looked at other solutions that were already out there. We had looked at simulators, we had looked at you know, anything that was already out there. We didn't we didn't go out with an idea that, hey, we need to recreate something that might be might be good and we just don't know about it. But nothing was really hitting and checking the boxes that that we were looking for. And VR was for me was still very new. this was in twenty eighteen. And you know, so part of it was getting over my own skepticism, but I saw a couple unique solutions, one that Home Depot was using, it's kinda cool. and I was like l you know, let's just bring this technology into a meeting and let people see how immersive it is. And so that really followed not long after this all hands on deck meeting. And so the idea was really just in in a sense, the concept was there. And then they got a taste of a little bit of the technology and were like, okay, let's put the money together and just let's go for it. So so they gave me the the budget and the liberty to really spend a year building the first version of this. And funny story is I had been telling them all along We have we have 2,000 drivers from the Carolinas, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Arkansas, Texas. you know, we don't have a mechanism of getting this out to them. So what are we gonna do? And you know, of course I had an idea of putting it in a trailer, but they're like, we're you know, we're already spending enough money on this development, let's let's figure something else out. I'm like, we can't we can't disassemble this thing and put it in the back of a a van or a pickup truck and just haul it around and set it up everywhere. So Two months before we actually were finished with the the VR development, they Paul: Mm-hmm. Scott Thomas: were like, go buy a trailer. So I w I went out that day, put a deposit on a trailer, and started a you know, for two months, put everything together in this in this first kind of initial package. And we just went on a campaign training in each of our major markets and then going back and hitting everybody and getting out all the all the drivers through. And like I said, from from really from day one, we just saw a a tremendous response. Now, I'll have to say that, I was still skeptical of this technology. you know, just because it's new and that nothing nobody else had been creating yet, I was really skeptical of it. So a key component of what we spent time putting together was a facilitation piece to go with the the the VR component. And the idea there was Let's come up with a way where we really land this well with people that, hopefully the VR experience is is is shocking and and really good. But if in case it's not, let's have a really deep conversation to to help people understand the behaviors associated with rollovers, to touch on the statistics around s you know, rollovers, to show footage from actual rollovers that have happened and Paul: Yeah. Scott Thomas: just really try to to pull on every learning mechanism that we all have. And so that beautiful combination just happened to work together. And fortunately the VR component was really powerful and compelling. And this facilitation piece was was equally as powerful. So you know, we we trained our our our fleet and and it was yeah, it was a tremendous impact. Paul: tremendous. I I've saw the brochures and I watched the videos and stuff, and the brochures will tell you that you we went from fourteen rollers a year to one or even zero on all the years after that. And then, the funniest thing to me though is in the videos and you see the guy you see the dic the truck driver, experiences the rollover incident inside. the virtual reality setup and he is shook. that guy, Scott Thomas: Mm-hmm. Paul: it looks like he just had a had a heart attack and Scott Thomas: Yeah. Paul: and into something that wasn't even real. And then his manager was like, yeah, that's exactly what we need them to feel. You know, especially these young guys, you know, we don't need them whipping around corners or texting on their phone or whatever else. Like they need to know this is really a possibility. But like the look on that guy's face When you just experienced that virtual rollover was unbelievable. Scott Thomas: Yeah, yeah. It's funny after the first week of training drivers, we ended up putting an AED on the trailer because we were we're like, Bam, what if somebody does have a heart attack or something, you know, that that really we gotta we gotta prepare for this and and and that actually speaks to again, because of my skepticism early on, I was like, you know, we gotta survey drivers of course after they go through this, but we don't know how long it's gonna take and we won't know if it really will produce the results that we're looking for. So one of the Paul: Mm-hmm. Scott Thomas: other data pieces that we captured is I put heart rate monitors on drivers for the first month and we were able to see and track kind of this, you know, s a certain percentage increase of heart rate. And and we just knew, again, I mean, you just saw those responses, like you said in in one of those videos. When was the last time anybody went through training where they weren't either falling asleep because of the training or, you know, in this case, they're grabbing their chest 'cause they're like, man, that was that was so real. And and so once you there's a there's a really cool quote around this idea that curiosity makes things sticky. So when you're when you're curious, when you come through something and there's an emotional response to it and you're just like, what was that? And you have questions and you're frustrated. I mean we get all all you know aspects of of responses we get people we've had people that have cried through this, some of them having like almost like a PTSD. They had a rollover earlier or twelve years Paul: Mm. Scott Thomas: ago. They go through this. Cause they don't you gotta remember, they don't they don't know that this is a rollover training. We don't broadcast this as rollover training to the drivers. so they come in and they just think, hey, this is a a new simulator. so we're we're we're going after that kind of shock so that they're not anticipating it. And so you know, when when they come out of it, there's usually again a mix of emotions. Some of them are obviously, you know upset. some of them are are mad. We get a lot of them that are just really mad. They're like, I don't yeah, I didn't do anything wrong. what and so any any emotion, which Paul: I believe it. I believe it. Yeah. Scott Thomas: is ironic 'cause right, I mean when it happens in real life, that's that's typically the default answer too. I didn't do anything. Paul: Yeah, yeah, but we we talked about this at the show. You you force that incident sometimes. if they're if they're too good at driving the truck, yeah, you make it kinda go off the road and catch the Scott Thomas: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Paul: sight of the asphalt and flip. So yeah, I can imagine Scott Thomas: Yeah, yeah. So they're mad and but again, any emotion, think about it, any emotion from training is is a powerful opportunity with that conversation piece. It's I I'm adamant again because I don't come from this tech space, I'm not sold out on the technology the technology doesn't replace the human to human interaction. The training I mean, I have over the years of the people that we've trained, I have trainers that will say, Hey, I know when a when a new driver comes to me. I know if they've been through the simulation yet or not, just because of the way that they're, receiving information, the questions that they're asking, they're curious. They're inquisitive of, you know, hey, how I I know what that feels like. They they a lot of drivers talk about it in the past tense, like I've had a rollover, like I've been it's been through the simulation, but you know, they'll they'll speak about it as if they've actually Paul: Mm. Scott Thomas: had a rollover. So when you're training somebody with that kind of mindset, I mean, you've got a great, you know, opportunity to really embed the right behaviors and Paul: that's super super interesting. it's so fascinating like how you arrived at this and then what you're putting people through and how you're putting them through. Like they to imagine the air conditioned trailer had inside of it like essentially an F1 racing simulator, but when you put on the goggles, you don't you don't sense the track handling of an F one car. You're gonna see out the windshield of a mixer truck and you know, you got those types of senses. I I can imagine like guys being fearful or whate whatever the emotion is that comes on, whether it's anger, fear, scared, excitement, whatever it is. And I never thought that that would be the case. And then I was with my daughter at by God, man, were we at like Dave and Busters or somewhere? We were somewhere, and it was a ride it was a virtual reality thing that you had to pay for. And it was like five bucks or whatever, right? And you you strap in. I was like, great, here we go. Little kids ride. And you put on the goggles. And sure enough, you can see around you, you know, left and right and up and down. And anywhere you look, there's a A virtual world around you and it's a virtual world. It's not so good. The the graphics are not so good that you ha have any illusion that you're outside. Like you know what the experience is. But when you're strapped into this roller coaster seat the wind hits you, that they're blowing on you on purpose, the seats are rattling and rocking, and suddenly you launch off a cliff virtually. you feel in the pit of your stomach as if you're falling from the heights of this cliff. And it was right then that I was like, my gosh. This is why the people who build virtual realities think that they're so powerful. It's because they're having these experiences and the rest of us are not. And I Scott Thomas: Yeah. Paul: could imagine if you take that same environment and and and now we're not riding roller coasters or launching off of cliffs and soaring through the air, but instead we're having an impactful event inside of a mixture truck that that could absolutely stay with you. Scott Thomas: Yeah. Yeah. you you gave a great example. And I think that's why, you know, a lot of people, I would say ninety some percent of the people that we train through through our solutions, you know, have never put on a headset to begin with. And so you're coming at it with the technology in in in the assumption that it is just gonna be some kind of game. It's not gonna be anything that's gonna really relate to me. And I think that's what's interesting about I'm super just blessed to be in this particular situation because I had the experience. I'm not the developer. And a lot of times we have developer led tools that come out. I mean, again, when I was working in in my, you know, career, past life, you know, you see that all the time. You've got People that have developed a tool, but they've never lived it. They've never been in it. And and so when you have that combination of the technology that can trick the mind and immerse people into these experiences and and the experience informing kind of how to how to build that experience and in that environment. I mean, I use drivers for all of our development phases and testing. 'cause I I'm not a concrete drug driver and and I wouldn't want to replace their experience and feedback and so It's what's exciting now is because we're, we've got rollovers is our hook, but we've got a development roadmap for other scenarios that drivers themselves have been the ones that are like, hey, we really need this, or we notice with our new hires, or now with everybody's that they've got cameras in their cabs and they're like, wow, all of our AI analytics and different things are showing these different behaviors. Can we simulate some of the things that we need to communicate better with them and just get that message across? you know, and that's That's what we're going for. Really, I I like to look at it as it's a it's a microwave experience where you're you're you're immersing them in specific selective situations. I never want to personally use this technology to teach people how to drive or how the mechanics work in in certain situations. Cause that becomes obsolete the hands-on portion has to be there. We're just giving Paul: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Scott Thomas: them an an experience to set up that, you know, training. Paul: Well, I I couldn't imagine trying to tell somebody like, driving l let me let me put you on a on a road and teach you to drive a car virtually and then expect them to go out into the world and drive a car. It just it's not the s it's really not the same. So yeah, I think you're exactly right. It's not a it's not a holistic training. It's an it's it's very scenario specific. And rollover seems like a good Scott Thomas: Yeah. Yeah. And you're talking about the Paul: start. Scott Thomas: You're talking sorry, you're talking about the roller the roller coaster and you think like it's it's really interesting in in our simulation. So the seat has motion and you've got haptic feedback in the steering and the pedals. And so you're you're you don't need a lot of motion. And that's what's really interesting and similar to what you experienced on the roller coaster. It's just it's just enough to to trick your mind. actually one of my favorite things the drivers always get shocked. So when they start off in this scenario scenario, they have to buckle their seatbelt and start the truck and then they actually get pulled up under a plant and get loaded. And that's really the first time that I think that really kicks in that the seat is mimicking what's going on because if you've been in a concrete truck getting loaded, like there, you know, feel that surge and the weights hitting hitting that. So you're starting to really I I relate it to the the movie Inception where you're you're creating a dream within a dream and you're planting this idea. So every every different touch when they're virtually buckling their seatbelt, when they have to start the truck, when they pull up under the plant and and they feel that surging, you're you're taking them deeper, deeper into that immersion and tricking them into, yeah, they know, their brain knows, like I'm not really driving on a road, but it's starting to feel like it's it's it's pretty realistic. Paul: Yeah, it does something. I and I wouldn't believe it if I wouldn't believe y what you're even saying if I hadn't experienced that roller coaster, like actually for me personally, like the VR like I've put on the Oculus and and things and just It g it makes it gives me motion sickness personally. Have you experienced that Scott Thomas: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, there's a Paul: with any of your guests or anything? Scott Thomas: Sure, yeah. So the the the technology industry or VR XR industry will say that actually thirty percent of people have are prone to motion sickness in VR. I collect our own data with that and we really are hovering around ten percent. So it's not it's not a lot, but it happens and we're always ready for kind of informing and part of that is again, if you have the physics right and you're matching up motion correctly, then there's so there's two aspects of that. One, you have to match the motion and and whatnot with what you're seeing so that your brain doesn't your equilibrium stays in sync. But the other thing is you can't be in it for an extended period of time. So it's also why we're going for these kind of microwave, you know, situations. so you know, fortunately, like I said, we we we only see that around ten percent of people that go through it. For our we have another solution. again, we're not sharing solution, but one one of the things that I would came across was using VR still but using 360 video for different training scenarios. Now we haven't really done driving scenarios, but we do I mentioned earlier different process pr procedural training, things like that. What's really interesting about that is because it's real footage in a 360 environment, I rarely I don't actually I would I only have the percentage. It's so low of people that have complained of any kind of motion sickness in that. And the the reason I think that is is because it's not a computer generated environment. So their brain's not trying to understand like this isn't real. I know it's not real. And yet these things are happening. So when it's real footage, real video, you're not faking really anything. And so your brain's, I think, a little more comfortable in that environment. Paul: Yeah, I I think it I I I thought it was more back to the motion l and not syncing up because I can't read inside of a car without getting incredibly nauseous. And there are times where I'm traveling for work and someone else is driving, I'm like, I have to get on this email and I have to produce this thing while we're on our way to the next meeting or wherever we're going and I you have to pull out the laptop and it's like I just have to get through this without being sick. So I I looked into it. I was like, why is this happening? It doesn't have my daughter. She doesn't she care. Scott Thomas: Hmm. Paul: why is it happening to me? And so what's not syncing up in our brains is that I'm looking down at a still image which would be a book or in my case a laptop and I'm trying to read the words that are still but all around me the trees are whooshing past and the road is whooshing past and my brain is having a hard time finding equilibrium And so the way to prevent the nausea is to not be able to see anything outside of the car. So I was like, well let me give that a try. So you know got my laptop down and I I hunched down and I I I made sure that pulled my hat down low. I couldn't see anything out the windshield. I couldn't see the only if I looked l right or left, all I could see was the door of the car, the or the console of the car. And that solved it. And and it didn't solve Scott Thomas: Yeah. Paul: it forever. But I could get through thirty minutes of work and then be like, Okay, cool. I'm good. I'm I'm gonna put that away now and it saved me from throwing up all over my own laptop Scott Thomas: Yeah. yeah, my my wife is the same so it's it's kinda funny over the years. She's become an unofficial test dummy for my simulations 'cause she's she's, you know, highly sensitive and motion sickness prone. So she hates it. But I'm usually somewhere early on when we're trying something new, I'm like, Hey, you know, I I I want you to try something and just let me know when you actually start to feel it. When you start you know, I wanna how sensitive it is. And so but yeah, she's God bless her and you 'cause it's it's it's unfortunate for people that can't can't function Paul: Mm. Scott Thomas: basically in a car ride, you know. I and I give her all the time. I I don't know how it is with you and your wife, but I I drive all the time and so anytime she she's riding, I'm like, Man, I would be on my phone, I'd be doing something, you know, and she can't she just can't handle it. So Paul: yeah, same thing. We have phone two actually. yeah, it's not gonna catch me scrolling my X feed while I'm riding shotgun in a car. I can't do it. It'll Scott Thomas: Yeah. Yeah, she's tried those dots that you can have on your screen. I don't know if you've seen that. There's if you have an iPhone, there's a there's a motion sick and you can go in your settings and there's something for motion sickness and it puts these dots on your screen that float over and it's supposed to curb that motion sickness. Whatever. She she can use that for a little while and then eventually it's like it's just too much still. So Paul: No, I but I think it's doing the same thing as trying to get you to not focus on what's around you. Yeah. Yeah. Scott Thomas: Emotion around you. Yeah, absolutely. Paul: Not yeah, don't look at what's around you. But I don't even it's not even worth like me trying to fight the the brain's equilibrium. I I'll just I don't need to look at anything that badly. so if it's work and it's Scott Thomas: Yeah. Paul: like super important and it really has to be done like right now for whatever reason, like then I'll I'll do my best to to block out the real world. I don't know anybody on a personal level that thought that virtual reality was the thing that they were gonna, put their blood, sweat, and tears into making making happen. And Scott Thomas: Hm. Paul: unfortunately, I look around and other than Oculus being a you know a home device, I don't I don't I don't see like a lot of I don't personally see like a lot of success stories. out of virtual reality. Now the sandbox if you if you find a sandbox VR and want to go play those games, they look really freaking cool. Putting on a half day feedback suit and slaying zombies in an empty warehouse looks freaking awesome. but Scott Thomas: Yeah. Yeah. Paul: I don't I don't see a lot of success stories. So I I want you to be successful. I I so I'm curious what does success look like to Scott Thomas: Hm. Paul: alter XR? What does it look like to scott Thomas? What what do you tr what's the goal here? What what are we trying to do? Scott Thomas: Yeah, yeah. So you know, i it really probably hangs on what I originally left my career for, which was really under the notion that, you know, these these kinds of tools are too good for, you know, one company to have. you know, and and there were other things. There were some other things. That's why I started consulting at first, just 'cause I was like, you know, that we've done a lot in in my relatively short career of eighteen years, but you know I I I I just saw this need to bring the technology to more companies. And so when I saw you know, the impact of in particular the rollover, you know, situation, I I I it was really something that people kept asking me about. When I had left my previous employer, it was like consulting and I ever anytime I run into people, I was still tied into the industry and they're like, are you gonna build you know more of those? Are you gonna build them for other people? You know, what are you what are you doing? And so you know, what I see as a real tool and opportunity to collaborate as an industry and create an industry tool built by the industry for the industry. I really see that in in under the context of safety, really, we we miss out so much on these kinds of opportunities when we stay isolated. and again, firsthand, working for two pretty big companies in the past, I saw, I mean, we're we're putting our heads down. We're trying to solve our own problems. I don't have time to to really network in a way where it's gonna benefit, you know, multiple competitors of ours, right? And so Paul: Mm-hmm. Scott Thomas: I I just see us we're we're in a transition now where we're we're gonna be providing more training services. so really right now as far as this the simulator solution, it's you know, more or less two offerings. We've got a training service where, you know, there's a lot again, there's a lot of companies that just can't put together the budget to buy one of these things. And you know, fortunately the technology's getting better. It is getting more and more affordable, but it's always a competition, right? There's there's better technology that keeps coming out there. So the pricing, is there. but there's some companies that either don't have the budget or don't have the need right now to to maybe own and buy one of these, or they they really honestly just don't you know, they don't want to have to manage a a program like that. It obviously comes with a lot of, you know, support and hands-on engagement to to make it work well. And so the training services, something for those companies that, you know, hey, either one, we may want to buy one, but as me, you know, as I've said or a number of times, I'm I'm skeptical of this. I don't know how well this is going to work. How's it going to be received? So we we love to come in kind of our first engagement is let's train your drivers. Don't don't we don't do we don't do Paul: Mm. Yeah. Scott Thomas: demos where it's just the executive team coming out. It's Paul: Yeah. Yeah. Scott Thomas: your drivers, those trainers that you have, you they need to see this and experience it and then let them tell you, hey, yeah, we absolutely need this. so success again is that we've got, you know, hand in the industry and helping us all around just become better. Whether you're using our technology or not, I don't I don't really care. I think we're we've been stuck and our industry's been kind of stuck in in a in a a place of you know where we just can't touch this technology. We can't touch this. It's it's too expensive or those different things and it it's not gonna work. We've got a proven solution that's working. We've got a lot of data from our customers and so we know that this is the the the trajectory that you know we just want more people to join and be a part of. Paul: That's awesome, man. And if some and if somebody saw this episode and they're like, That is friggin' awesome. I would like to at least get a demo of this thing. how do they reach out to you, Scott? Scott Thomas: Mm-hmm. Yeah, I mean you can email me at Scott at alter xr dot com. you know, go to my website, alter dash xr dot com. We've got some more information. There's some videos in there and contact information as well. also on LinkedIn, Instagram, so you can find me. Yeah. Paul: Absolutely. And don't forget, while you're finding Scott, you gotta find the Slump Monkeys Concrete Podcast. We now have an Instagram at Slump Monkeys. That's M-O-N-K-E-Y-S. You can find us at slumpmonkeys.com and also on LinkedIn. Scott, it's an absolute pleasure having you on the show. I'm so glad Many introduced us this past weekend. I don't think I've ever had anybody on this quickly from meeting them for the first time to having them on. I love somebody from the industry. then found a solution a novel solution and said, You know what, I'm gonna make this my life's work. That's a an a really powerful story. I'm happy that we're friends now and so thankful you came onto the program. Scott Thomas: Yeah, thanks for having me. Looking forward to staying connected, Paul. Thanks. Paul: Absolutely, brother. and we will see you on the next one.