Transcript

 

Michael Palumbos (00:59.716)

Welcome everybody to the Family Biz Show. I'm your host, Michael Palumbos with Family Wealth and Legacy in Rochester, New York. And today we have a incredible show for you. 

 

Michael Palumbos (01:10.67)

We're joined by Andy Breuer from Hueber Breuer, construction company, build design, you name it in Syracuse, New York, but does projects all over the place. Welcome, Andy. 

 

Andy Breuer (01:23.822)

Thanks Mike. Happy to be here. Looking forward to a good discussion. 

 

Michael Palumbos (01:28.44)

So you don't know this, but I spent some time living in Syracuse and raising kids in Syracuse for a few years. I drove past your facilities on a pretty regular basis. 

 

Andy Breuer (01:42.632)

we like to call it. 

 

Andy Breuer (01:44.711)

Our humble beginnings on the south side of Syracuse. We're still here. 

 

Michael Palumbos (01:48.812)

Well, what I like to do when we start the show and I'm somebody new into the show is just to tell you, family business is that weird thing where everybody has their own journey of how they made the trek and started in the business. So if you don't mind, share with us, what was your journey like to enter into the family business? 

 

Andy Breuer (02:13.486)

I was the first born of three. So think early on, was kind of that expectation that Andy was going to be working summers and Christmas breaks and whatnot with the family business. I was working at Hueber Breuer before I could drive, sweeping floors and hanging doors since 94, I say. So a lot of early interaction on those job sites. 

 

Andy Breuer (02:42.584)

just as there's some family succession at the leadership level of UberBru, or we also have a lot of superintendents whose fathers and sons have worked for us, some good lineage in the field too. So it's been great over the 30 plus years I've been involved to kind of how that is tracked over multiple generations at different levels, different sectors of the company. And I would come back from... 

 

Andy Breuer (03:10.926)

Christmas break, even from college or whatever, and would work a couple of weeks on some of the job sites and would always attend the Hueber Breuer Christmas party and whatnot and stay in touch with all those superintendents and all the guys I worked for over all those summers. when I graduated from college in Atlanta, I went to Emory University in Atlanta. I ultimately took a job with a real estate developer in North Atlanta in Roswell. But frankly, 9-11 was kind of that defining moment. 

 

Andy Breuer (03:40.43)

for me where there was that tug to come home, that longing to be closer to family and probably put some things in perspective. And looking back on it now, can say there was probably at age 22, there's probably some ego involved with feeling like something was given to you, right? The lineage is there for you with nepotism, but you don't realize at age 22 how difficult it is even to maintain the status quo, especially in a 

 

Andy Breuer (04:10.51)

in a economic region like central New York and upstate New York. So I was probably a little ignorant to it. But I remember being in one of those Christmas parties and talking to one of those old superintendents. And, you know, I was in Atlanta at the time and he's like, so when are you coming back? I'm like, well, you know, I'm not sure yet. And he kind of gave me like, what do you mean? Like, of course you're coming back. Like, this is your destiny. And that was exactly maybe what I was turned off by at the time. And at the same time, 

 

Andy Breuer (04:39.766)

It is what led me back and so glad I did. It's been, it's been a great journey. It's been an absolute honor to work alongside not only my father, but now my brother to be at a position where my 14 year old son just got his working papers. And while the OSHA rules have changed, I can't put them on a job site yet, but I can certainly put them working in the Hueber Breuer warehouse or the Hueber Breuer office next summer. So, I look forward to being able to share those kinds of experiences now with my kids. 

 

Andy Breuer (05:09.87)

Andy Breuer (05:10.552)

I'm generation six, 151 years, so no pressure to my kids. We gotta pass that baton though. 

 

Michael Palumbos (05:17.46)

understand that's, I want to make sure that people heard some of the things that you said that I think are just a testament to who Hueber Breuer is. generations of not just family members, but superintendents and people in the field that have been there. And that there's only one thing that, that, that allows for that. And that's creating and keeping an incredible company culture. 

 

Michael Palumbos (05:47.438)

You, your family, and through the years and the generations, the Heuer Ruer Company is known for a great place to work. 

 

Andy Breuer (05:56.682)

And there's nothing that makes me prouder than that. And we spend a lot of time talking about culture and talking about legacy, talking about solutions, you know, that at end of the day, if we're going to be, frankly, pretty hyper regional, we don't seek really to, to be multi-regional throughout the Northeast for generally, you know, within a hundred miles of Syracuse. And if you want to keep that number one, you have to have the esteem of your repeat clients. It's a small town and it doesn't take long for. 

 

Andy Breuer (06:25.762)

reputation to spin out of control. But furthermore, you have to be a bit of a chameleon in terms of riding the wave of the sectors that are hot at any given time. So we've seen a couple of different changes in industry and the creativity and frankly, the desire to be flexible, to be nimble with what kind of product types and what kind of projects you want to pursue and be successful with. That's part of the secret, right? 

 

Andy Breuer (06:56.194)

That's certainly been a big part of our legacy and of our, I just think, reputation in the community. 

 

Michael Palumbos (07:03.694)

So, it's 150 years. 

 

Andy Breuer (07:07.438)

151, 1872 is the time. 

 

Michael Palumbos (07:10.574)

That's HB 1872, talk about that. I don't wanna spend too much, I wanna talk about today. Give us a little bit of background, 1872. 

 

Andy Breuer (07:22.158)

Yeah, so it's one family, right? The Hubers and the Brewers. What happened is my grandfather, Vladimir, they called him Vic. Vic Breuer went to work for his father-in-law. So my father, the Hubers are my father's matriarch lineage and the Brewers are his patriarch, if that makes sense. So the lineage is kind of on both sides. So it's always been one family and I don't know why the vowels are 

 

Andy Breuer (07:51.01)

so similar and the mouthful that it is, but just luck of the dry, guess. But the Hubers would have originally come over here from Alsace, Lorraine, France. They were likely stone masons and probably came here, this would have been after the Erie Canal was largely completed, but there was still, you know, continuous maintenance of the canal. So they probably came here as masons affiliated with some of the canal work. 

 

Andy Breuer (08:18.114)

They settled in the East side of Syracuse, Minoa, Fayetteville. We used to say it was 1880, but actually just five or six years ago, we unearthed history from Immaculate Conception Church in Fayetteville, New York, where they found evidence that the Hubers had done some work there on a convent in 1872. So we got to have our 150th party eight years earlier than originally planned. So that was last year. So that's the history in a nutshell. 

 

Andy Breuer (08:46.851)

three generations of hubers and now three generations of brewers when my basically my father went to work for his grandfather and father. So that's where it kind of changed from hubers to brewers. 

 

Michael Palumbos (08:58.018)

That's awesome. And one of the things that also resonated with me that you're talking about is no pressure, legacy, six generations. So I wanna give you a little tiny gift and that gift is most S &P 500 companies don't make it 20 years. So we always focus on the legacy and how hard it is to do this and how much weight there is. 

 

Andy Breuer (09:11.703)

Okay. 

 

Michael Palumbos (09:27.554)

but even if it stopped tomorrow, the family should be cheering and the community should be cheering. And I wanna make sure that there's a positive spin on that and you focus on the positive piece. That's their friends of mine, colleagues of mine have written a book called Wealth 3.0. And that's kind of the, a nutshell, we push that, ooh, that negative and what few get to the third or the fourth or the seventh generation. 

 

Michael Palumbos (09:55.394)

But if you just look at it from the different lens, it's like, congratulations, nicely done. 

 

Andy Breuer (10:01.134)

Thank you. Yeah, there is some college in Chicago. can't remember if it's University of Chicago or might be Loyola, but one of them has a dedicated study to family business and legacy business. I remember seeing a stat, this is probably a decade ago, that it's like 0.3 or 0.03 % of companies make it to a fourth generation. So you compute that out over two more generations. can't even imagine what the... 

 

Andy Breuer (10:29.046)

Next, you know what minority we are in. So yeah, there's a lot of pride in maintaining it for that reason. And also, you you do have to reconcile the fact that like, inevitably, someday it might, it might not exist. it's 

 

Michael Palumbos (10:44.494)

But to your point, you're doing some things already and this is not a, let's talk about what Hubert Breuer is doing great. I just wanted to have you on. I wanted to have this conversation. I never know where they're gonna go, but you've got a 14 year old son that's coming in and talking about. So there's a couple of good things. I would highly recommend that there be a choice from my perspective. 

 

Andy Breuer (11:03.842)

Not necessarily by choice. 

 

Michael Palumbos (11:13.838)

But, you know, it's that getting involved and finding out if it is something that you want to do, finding out why, why dad and his uncle and his grandfather are so proud of the work, introducing them to the son of somebody who's, you know, father or grandfather was also a foreman in the company and weaving that story without the pressure. 

 

Michael Palumbos (11:43.144)

is that's the, if you can pull that off, that's what you have to master in my opinion, is how do I not put the pressure on this person? Because at the end of the day, if your son said, dad, you I really like what we do and I'm really proud of who we are and I'm glad that I'm a brewer, but I want to be, you know, a dancer or I want to be in the arts, you know, our job as parents, number one is to make sure our kids flourish and are happy, right? 

 

Andy Breuer (12:12.248)

Well, and think that, you know, we are construction managers. You take the construction part away. Construction is the product, but it's like in manufacturing, you make a widget. In management, you manage a product and process. And ours happens to be construction. But the reality is if my son or my nephew, you know, if they're interested in or even tolerant of the, you know, the sector of management, 

 

Andy Breuer (12:38.478)

then of course, why wouldn't you gravitate towards the man, regardless of what you're managing? Yes. Why would you not gravitate towards the sector where you have the additional benefit and honor and legacy of all this, all that we've done? 

 

Michael Palumbos (12:54.638)

1000%. And I would even, it's every CEO I meet, the ones that get it and you get it. You can't be sixth generation without getting this, you know, going into the seventh generation and then it's culture and what culture is all about is people. you know, you're not in the widget business, you're not in the service business, you are in the people business and your people 

 

Michael Palumbos (13:21.422)

Actually, everybody says customer first. No, because I won't have any customers if I don't have a team. 

 

Andy Breuer (13:29.614)

That's right. When you say our people, we don't self-perform anything. I don't have 50 guys in the field who are cranking out concrete forms or framing or plumbing or HVAC. when you talk about our people, mean, it's that multiplier effect of how we lead our, call it 75 people, and then the spider web of what they create to carry that out amongst their 100 and 200 people on a job site. 

 

Andy Breuer (14:00.078)

have to remind ourselves sometimes, especially on the days when, you don't, you, end up not managing to do a thing you set out to do that day because of whatever came up, which is often, right. And you have to remind yourself that when you're in the management business, it is your job to keep the train on the tracks, right? That if all the subcontractors showed up every day and all the material showed up when it was ordered and, you know, the architects got every last detail right on the drawings. 

 

Andy Breuer (14:27.64)

then there'd be no role for a construction. All we do is align things and maintain, you know, budget schedule and expectations. And yeah, if you don't like talking to people, you're not gonna be good in any management business, let alone construction where it tends to be a lot of rings in this circus. 

 

Michael Palumbos (14:48.674)

Yeah. Talk about, if you would, from your perspective, you hinted at the fact that, I'm in my twenties and I'm pushing back and I'm gonna go a different direction. You've made that switch, you flipped over, you get the legacy, you understand all of these pieces. What are some of the things that you love about being part of a family business? Right. 

 

Michael Palumbos (15:17.614)

And then the flip of that is what are the things that are difficult and then how does your family navigate those difficulties? 

 

Andy Breuer (15:27.214)

So I'll say, I'll change your question a little bit and I'll say, what do I love about the construction business, family business or otherwise? And with construction, I can't imagine being in a role, like even being like a restaurateur of like, you have a product come in and then a product come out and then you come in and do the same thing following day. I love the fact that I can drive around, especially as localized as we are, can drive around Syracuse and every other block I can say, yep, we built that in 1993 and we did the addition to it in 2014. 

 

Andy Breuer (15:57.186)

You you can, look at this tangible product and there is literally the fruit of your labor. And that's wonderful, right? And you hope that those buildings stand for hundreds of years. The most challenging thing obviously is turning it off, right? It's like the family dinners or those moments when you are having some R &R with my folks or all of us together. how do you not have some of the, you you never have enough time in the workday to get to it. So of course, when you're having those 

 

Andy Breuer (16:27.022)

supposed to be moments of rest and fun. It's hard to not gravitate towards some of that same discussion that would be dominant at work. that's definitely the hardest part of it is trying to find time to turn it off. And especially in a community like Syracuse where your social life and your work life, I mean, we're not a bedroom community. It's not like we live in Westchester and work in New York City. You go out for a burger, chances are you're to run into somebody you know from a project. 

 

Andy Breuer (16:56.558)

So you never really escape it in your social life in a town like Syracuse or Rochester. 

 

Michael Palumbos (17:04.942)

And I think it's funny, I look back at my career and most of them, once I started working with business owners, that was my favorite part is that every day was different. Even though I was doing the same thing each day, I was in a different facility. was learning something new, whether it be from a cabbage farmer or from a construction manager, know, it's pretty fabulous that you... 

 

Michael Palumbos (17:33.912)

keeps your brain active. And for you, I love the idea of we built that. That's something we did. For me now, it's like when I see that business make it from the second generation to the third generation, and I think about all those jobs and the community and the impact that my team is having to help make those things happen, it's fun for us. 

 

Andy Breuer (17:58.626)

No doubt. It's just great to be able to share that with your team and your family. And frankly, but for that reward of feeling like you have that tangible achievement, this business can be very maddening sometimes. there's not a lot of people who would do it if it was just a sandcastle that got washed away after you were done. it can take it out of you sometimes. So you need the pride in that achievement and the team. 

 

Andy Breuer (18:28.558)

the team share in that pride. 

 

Michael Palumbos (18:31.756)

Yeah, agreed. You mentioned being able to be, not so much visionary, but flexible and adaptable. When you look through the years and the projects and the things that you've taken on, who's responsible for doing the SWOT analysis and what are the things that you're looking at? Because I think that's really important. 

 

Michael Palumbos (18:58.498)

to say it's one thing for the CEO to have done it through the time, you know, to get the leadership team and everybody that's, you know, on there to get, you know, on the same page and be aligned through the different things. How do you guys go about doing that? 

 

Andy Breuer (19:14.05)

Well, I think it says a lot to the culture of the company and not just our family, but the families who work for us. that, you know, there are construction companies out there who go and they build Walmarts all over the country, or they build Delta Sonics all over the Northeast or whatever it is. And that's never going to be us. Our, for the most part, our people expect to be able to come home and make it to their kids' soccer game or get, you know, be there to, support their spouses, whatever it is. 

 

Andy Breuer (19:43.618)

business or otherwise. And so I think that as, as those opportunities inevitably came across my father, my grandfather's desk, whoever, you know, we, always said, no, let's focus on the best opportunities here in Central New York, rather than worry about a sector and then taking the show on the road. And so then because of that, and because of those kind of cultural dynamics within the company and the desire to be close to home, 

 

Andy Breuer (20:11.32)

think that that has forced us to always be thinking about, all right, you see a project on the horizon and then you try to say, all right, what's gonna equip us to differentiate ourselves? What nuance of work we've done in the past or what could we be doing to better prepare ourselves when that opportunity does really arise? And then they turn into waves. We've done waves of higher ed work and waves of K through 12 work and waves of senior housing and multi-housing and purpose-built senior housing. 

 

Andy Breuer (20:41.85)

parking garages. So it's funny, there is a little bit of you know, institutional keeping up with the Joneses sometimes when Colgate might build a building and then Syracuse University has to have one comparable to it or, you know, a medical office building goes up for one medical institution and then you can sense there's going to be a similar competing project from a competing institution. So yeah, there is a little bit of that herd mentality, I guess, with some of the projects around. 

 

Michael Palumbos (21:10.486)

Nice. When you look at the projects that your company's done in the last 30 years, ones that you just, if you're going to bring somebody that doesn't know Hueber Breuer at all, and you're going to show them the top three, what are the projects that you guys are most proud of? And it's not most, but they just stand. 

 

Andy Breuer (21:18.435)

What are some- 

 

Andy Breuer (21:33.656)

Well, anything having to do with really public assembly, right? Those are the projects that really resonate the most with the community. So I could rattle off, you know, half a dozen of them that kind of check that box. When the Mets came to take on our minor league team here in Syracuse, they dumped a bunch of money through the county into the new stadium. So we got to do all this new lipstick on the NBT stadium. That was a great project to do because you get the... 

 

Andy Breuer (21:59.736)

The fun of being there with the Mets organization when they cut that ribbon. And then you see all these thousands of people come into this new stadium and the kids eyes lit up, stuff like that. the Lakeview amphitheater, which was now the St. Joe's amphitheater on the shores of Onondaga Lake. got to work with Gil Bane, to do that. And it was really a game changer to, you know, to compete with CMAC and Saratoga and the rest of these, kind of aging, amphitheaters for largely for, you know, summer concert series kind of things. And I love live music and. 

 

Andy Breuer (22:29.834)

It's certainly a source of pride to go to a concert at the amphitheater and look out over the, you know, the setting sun on Onondaga Lake and just feel like, wow, we really, there's a sense of place here for the community that did not exist two, three, four years ago. The Nexus Center in Utica, which is the new, the new hockey arena. So they had an existing single rink. They call it the odd or the Adirondack Bank Center. And now they have a three rink addition to it. So they have four rinks now they can host all of the youth hockey. You know, you go in there on a Saturday in December. 

 

Andy Breuer (22:59.512)

just crawling with families. So projects like that where you feel like they're really part of the fabric of the community and public assembly of the community, those are hard to beat. Expo Center at the New York Fairgrounds, we built a really cool indoor lacrosse arena on the Onondaga Nation, South of Syracuse, things like that. just fun, they're unique, and they contribute to the community. 

 

Michael Palumbos (23:22.584)

Love it. Culture, let's go back to that for a second. When, you know, I'm a big believer that the head of the company, regardless of title, head of company is in charge, their number one priority is to make sure the head of company is doing head of company activities. So head of company activities for me are company culture is number one, and strategy is number two. When you pick on, 

 

Michael Palumbos (23:51.512)

company culture, what are the things that you and your predecessors and your brother, what are the things that are important to make sure that company culture stays at that high level? 

 

Andy Breuer (24:05.208)

Yeah. And right now, and you're absolutely right. It is very easy to get, to become a micromanager in this business. And so part of the culture is instilling the trust and the leadership from senior management to that, you know, that next level of project managers and assistant project managers so that you feel like you can properly delegate and do it in a way that doesn't keep you up at night. Still keeps you up at night, but maybe less up at night. 

 

Andy Breuer (24:35.022)

But I'll say that the highlight right now or the focus area, the spotlight of our culture, the focus right now is really on the succession plan. How do you plan for growth? Like probably every workplace in America, we're at that same kind of aging, know, baby boomer transition. And particularly with 

 

Andy Breuer (25:02.306)

you know, the skillset of the old salt bricks and mortar construction managers who probably came up much more out of the field as compared to coming out of a construction management program where they're learning as much software and systems as they are, you know, physical construction properties. That's a, that's a big part of what we're trying to capture now and what we're trying to, you know, in some ways extract from the old dogs and invigorate 

 

Andy Breuer (25:32.206)

So, yeah, succession planning is absolutely the pinnacle of cultural success. 

 

Michael Palumbos (25:44.046)

So when, and it sounds like when you're talking about succession planning, it's not just, you know, for your family, it's all of those positions all the way through and making sure that you've got backups and you're taking that knowledge base, right? 

 

Andy Breuer (26:00.674)

And think across all industries right now in Syracuse, we're kind of, I'm not sure how well coined this term is, but it's kind of like the micron, the micron moment is kind of hitting here. And it's this kind of rising tide floats all boats, right? So we're, we are bracing for inevitable growth for, for years. We've never really had the peaks or the valleys in construction. It's always been just kind of steady, which is great. And that it's been very predictable. But you know, we, 

 

Andy Breuer (26:30.242)

We definitely are looking at our project pursuits and the pipeline and saying, three years from now, we're gonna need to be at 2X. We're certainly gonna have the opportunity to be at 2X our volume. So what does that mean for succession planning, recruitment, retention, all those things? 

 

Michael Palumbos (26:49.097)

One of the things that I liked about looking at your website, one, obviously, you know, I love the fact that it's HB1872.build, which just is very fitting and very, very few people in my opinion, put those things right into their, into their, you know, URL. 

 

Andy Breuer (27:07.182)

And so there's all these automated like apps and stuff you try to register and they don't recognize the dot build and then you're like, maybe this was not well thought through. But we do have a default back door old.com too. But yes, thank you for picking up on that. 

 

Michael Palumbos (27:19.95)

But the other thing that's on there, so one, you honor the history of the family that came before you. You're talking about succession, you happen to live, we all live in Onondaga world, the Iroquois Indians, and that seventh generation thinking. It's very cool, and you guys are on the cusp of living it. 

 

Andy Breuer (27:42.124)

Is that cool? 

 

Michael Palumbos (27:47.384)

So honoring the people that came seven generations before you. And so I would push you to be thinking about when you're thinking about succession planning is to be putting out there to say, how are the decisions that we make today going to affect those seven generations from now? 

 

Andy Breuer (28:05.57)

Yeah. And I had a really interesting conversation, once community conversation that included some Native Americans. was, it was talking about the seven, seven generation principle. And another way of looking at it is that I knew three of my great grandparents. I, you know, I remember my interactions with them and you hope you live long enough that you know, you're great grandchildren. So that is seven generations. Right. And so, yeah, my, when I think about it that way, my grandfather, 

 

Andy Breuer (28:35.918)

who might, it would have been great if my son had known him, but like it's that close, right? That he would have been kind of that middle generation and seven generations of heapers and brewers. And yeah, it's just great to know that you're kind of living what that parable should be. 

 

Andy Breuer (28:56.812)

It goes without saying in construction, there's a lot of buzzwords around sustainability, right? So when you think about doing what's right for the community today and for the world that we hope to lead to our children, like the principles of sustainability, which no one knows better than our Native American community members like that. I'm encouraged that it is starting to become a little bit more, not even an ambition of the construction industry, but 

 

Andy Breuer (29:26.156)

What we used to think was like a aspiration for a lead accredited project. Now it's kind of just common, like, no, that's part of the life cycle analysis. That's part of the energy code study. That's part, it's just become a little bit more industry standard. But of course we can always do better. And we're seeing it every day with, you know, mass timber structures or certainly with a lot more solar geothermal energy. 

 

Andy Breuer (29:55.534)

So I think all those things play into that seven generation look ahead. I don't know, I was talking to Christine earlier about how it's hard to think back to how we used to have to shut jobs down in the wintertime because of the anticipated snow accumulation and the cold. I think we have a very local example here of how real climate change is and that we don't really plan to shut jobs down anymore. We're just kind of grin and bear it. 

 

Andy Breuer (30:24.536)

So, know, climate change is real. The need for sustainability is very relevant. 

 

Michael Palumbos (30:30.798)

I'm gonna stay on the topic of company culture, because I can't emphasize in my opinion, how important it is. And so when I look at company culture, it's the blending of three different things. It's that vision for the future. It's that big, audacious goal to get everybody excited about where we're going. And core purpose, which I think, know, is I'm listening to you and not everybody defines it with these words, but I think that 

 

Michael Palumbos (30:57.742)

We get there all the same way. We just might use different words to get there. where, you you're talking about seven generation thinking, you're talking about succession planning and not succession planning as an event, but succession planning as kind of that purpose. How do we make sure that there's jobs for the grandchildren of the, you know, the form and that we're feeding today and that we're taking care of today? 

 

Michael Palumbos (31:24.428)

The other side of that, so if I take my vision for the future, I have my core purpose of what drives us. And I love the idea of succession is what drives us. then the other part to me is always core values. And when you blend those three together, that makes company culture come together. And your website does a really great job of talking about them. 

 

Michael Palumbos (31:52.654)

caring and safety, quality, integrity and innovation. And I would say that, you know, from talking to you, many times you look at somebody's website or you look at them, the words on a wall, they're aspirational, but you guys live them. I would, and I'm throwing a curve ball at you a little bit, but just how do you see people, how do you capture people living those values? 

 

Michael Palumbos (32:20.45)

How do you keep those values alive at Hueber Breuer on a regular basis? 

 

Andy Breuer (32:26.766)

So the most tangible way we do it is through employee recognition. So we literally have a program where we ask people to catch folks in the act. And on a quarterly basis, we call out those moments and we commend those people for exhibiting those values. And they literally go up on a wall here. They are a brick on a wall. 

 

Michael Palumbos (32:49.91)

cheering for those of you who can't see me and are listening to this. This is like, we call this actions to live by. And the fact that you guys are doing that, I didn't know, but I could just feel that. I mean, I wasn't trying to lead you or anything, but this 

 

Andy Breuer (33:03.818)

It hardly a curve ball, it was a softball. Yeah. No, it was easy. And we've increasingly tried to put some emphasis on that because as the company gets larger and as there is maybe less interaction between, know, Jim Breuer and the average carpenter or whoever on the job site, like you need everybody to be the eyes and ears and the advocates for the company and for, you know, the successes of their coworkers. 

 

Andy Breuer (33:33.71)

who doesn't want a little bit of recognition for going above and beyond and try to build that and celebrate it. It's increasingly something we're doing more of. 

 

Michael Palumbos (33:43.086)

Yeah. And again, you're in the people business. You're 22 years old, 24, whatever it was when you came over to Hueber Breuer, came back home. Nobody, very few people. I know there are some people that feel that leadership is just, it's an eight and you're just born with it. And I challenge that on a regular basis because I feel that it's something that it has to be learned. Yes, there are some people that have more emotional intelligence than others. 

 

Michael Palumbos (34:13.186)

and they're gifted in that arena, but leadership can be learned. If you look through your development as a leader, you probably learned a lot of things. What were some of the things that, or books that you read that you sat there and said, I went through this, or maybe defining moments where you messed up and said, that's not happening again. 

 

Michael Palumbos (34:39.631)

Michael Palumbos (34:42.424)

boy. 

 

Andy Breuer (34:44.141)

Andy Breuer (34:45.241)

I guess the answer to the last question of, know, that that's not happening again, the best way to combat that is to get into uniformity of process, right? And I am not good personally at the discipline of sitting down with my team and developing standard operating procedures and having, you know, the employee handbook. If there's anything that I learned, it's that I learned that that's not 

 

Andy Breuer (35:10.872)

That's not something that I'm ever going to be good at. It's something that's always going to be in my back burner. So finding somebody who is good at, know, bringing people onto the team who are not only capable of doing that, but are drawn to doing that and see the value of it. Getting to that uniformity of process is the only way where you can grow. And increasingly so with systems, right? With software, scheduling software, project management software, accounting software. 

 

Andy Breuer (35:37.006)

We all become dependent on these systems, but if we don't all use them the right way in the same way, then what's point in having them and paying all these extensive licensing fees and whatnot? So yeah, we've made a big jump to add to the kind of verticality of some of that process, uniformity of that process to equip ourselves to grow. And that's been a big effort here the last, say 10 years. I don't know, in terms of some of the leadership, I think some of the simplest ones are the good to great. 

 

Andy Breuer (36:05.71)

That's, that one certainly is, I think you can look at any company at any stage and say, well, we're a good company. You you try to make it better. And then in the, in the context of looking at your competition, you're always going to be good, but you can always be better. Um, and I like that old saying, you know, things get better or they get worse. They never stay the same. Um, I'm also lately on kind of a brevity kick. Um, I really like part of this is, has grown out of my. 

 

Andy Breuer (36:35.138)

disdain for polarized news sources, right? A couple of years ago, I said, I'm going to try to find a middle of the road news outlet. And I landed on Axios. And if you're a fan of the Axios news source, you know that they do a lot to promote brevity, both in how they deliver the news as well as what they promote as the life lessons and work lessons, which is an interesting part of it. 

 

Andy Breuer (37:02.744)

So I've steered a lot of my coworkers to it. They have a book called Smart Brevity that naturally is a pretty short read. And it just kind of speaks to the amount of content that we're all taking in. We're always on our phones, we're on our computers, we're hearing it on the radio, we got print media, we're on the television. It's coming at us in so many ways and people don't get past the first paragraph. So don't waste that first paragraph. I think it's just very important. 

 

Michael Palumbos (37:31.584)

So I don't always get takeaways when I'm doing this. So I've already pulled up Axios. So take a peek at it. Thank you. 

 

Andy Breuer (37:39.374)

Another smart brevity book is definitely worth a read and you can read it in about an hour and a half. 

 

Michael Palumbos (37:44.258)

Love it. Perfect. So we've got company culture. You've done a great job with that. We're talking about leadership, great book, good to great. That's one of the books that we foundational in our, how do we build the business? The other piece that we talk about head of company is in charge of his strategy. And the way when I talk about strategy, 

 

Michael Palumbos (38:10.754)

And again, I think I might be throwing you a meatball across the home plate on this one. But when I talk about strategy, it's all about how are we unique? We don't compete. You can't compete to be the best. If you're competing to be the best, everybody's gonna be, it's price and this and that and those pieces. The only thing that you really can compete on and build a strategy around is what makes you unique. So if I'm one of your... 

 

Michael Palumbos (38:39.278)

if I'm thinking about hiring Hueber Breuer, what are some of the pieces that make you stand out, that make you unique? 

 

Andy Breuer (38:49.25)

You've nailed it that, and know, a sea of competitors, what's the differentiator? And, there's always an intangible, especially in a community like Syracuse or Rochester. we, we try to ingrain ourselves in the community and it's not just the Breuer family. We, we, we are kind of openly, promoting and, and advocating for our team to, to get involved in something that they're passionate about in the community. 

 

Andy Breuer (39:18.382)

And I don't care if it's dog rescue or meals on wheels or an artistic venue, whatever it is. 

 

Andy Breuer (39:32.416)

It gets you out of your comfort zone because you inevitably end up on a committee or a board, you know, a group of people that you wouldn't necessarily see by going to the little league game or your school function or whatever. So now you're out mixing with people from all around the community. And it just, it always leads to an opportunity to a differentiator saying, yeah, we know that person or we. And then supporting those organizations, you know, leads to, I don't know if pet projects is the right, but there's. 

 

Andy Breuer (40:02.36)

There's lot of organizations that I feel like because we are so community oriented, they look at us as kind of a natural problem solver. So, and sometimes years before there's a project, it's, you know, help us navigate this program challenge with our facility, help us think through this. I love those calls because number one, I feel like I'm helping the community. And number two, I know that two years later, there's going to be some project that comes of it after the capital campaign and after the, so. 

 

Andy Breuer (40:31.858)

yeah, I think that just immersing yourself in community, and not to do it in a way that is not rewarding to our, to our, team members. Like if our employees, I don't want them to get involved in something they're not passionate about. So we just encourage them to do something that, that rings true for them. And if there's some gravy that comes out of that, the business or community relationship and great. 

 

Michael Palumbos (40:57.112)

That's awesome. That's perfect. That is a really, mean, there's so many tendrils that go out and spokes to that wheel that really make a difference. 

 

Andy Breuer (41:08.974)

Especially in a small town. 

 

Michael Palumbos (41:11.03)

Yeah, and to the other side of it, my gut says, whether it's a foreman or a leader in the business or a manager, when they're involved in these pet projects, their pet project, meaning the charity that they're involved in, someplace that they're passionate about, when they come back and say, hey, they're doing a campaign for X, Y, and Z, are you guys okay backing me on this? 

 

Michael Palumbos (41:37.998)

So you're getting it, that goes, mean, think about it just from a company culture perspective, the company cares about the projects that are important to me. And how about the community being an advocate for and the face of the company, just brilliant. yeah, and it wouldn't be real, like you said, if they weren't passionate about it. 

 

Andy Breuer (41:56.206)

It's just two-way street, 

 

Michael Palumbos (42:05.324)

And if you didn't mean it, and the reason why it's so meaningful is because you guys care. is one of the core values. You really care about the community that you're in and the legacy that you're building. 

 

Andy Breuer (42:16.364)

Yeah, going back to the whole, you if we were building Walmarts all over the country, you don't have that opportunity because you don't have the genuine connection with, with community. So I think the reason we've become these, you know, this chameleon in central New York is because of that genuine commitment to our team and that team's commitment to the community. So, I'm super proud of it. Really am. 

 

Michael Palumbos (42:39.95)

Should be. Looking at, all right, so we've got company culture, we've got strategy. What is communication like through your organization? What are, you know, how does the company communicate? What's the rhythm for communication through the company? 

 

Andy Breuer (42:59.138)

Funny, the cadence and discipline of that communication is something we're always trying to improve. And if there's anything that we kind of test through surveys, it's looking at the frequency and the format of communication. And this kind of goes back to the brevity piece. I don't want to insist on people sitting through a monthly meeting if they don't, if they just feel like it's redundant or it's a drag. So. 

 

Andy Breuer (43:26.914)

Yeah, there are people who sit around, you know, the, I'll say the boardroom table, you know, every Friday morning, who know most of what's going on in the company. The people working on a specific job site for 18 months, they certainly don't have the same pulse or have the same understanding of the pulse of what we're chasing. So you have to be cognizant of that, I think, with how information is disseminated around the company. And some of it is just that people want to feel confidence that because we 

 

Andy Breuer (43:55.48)

tend to work on job cycles that are a year or 18 months or two years, but where am I going next? There's a lot of that communication that's, don't worry, the pipeline is intact. So I find that the communication is much about the confident. mean, if we do our jobs well, we're constantly working ourselves out. So the communication needs to be around the confidence in the perpetuity of the work. And we're doing a better job with that, but we can always improve. 

 

Michael Palumbos (44:23.062)

Nice. In terms of succession and how that relates to company culture and building out your, you know, the A player leadership team, as they say, is there, or has there been any talk about like Hueber Breuer University? 

 

Andy Breuer (44:45.048)

Huh, it's funny, we didn't really work with a leadership consultant until about two years ago. And it's funny, I can even go back 10 years ago when it was kind of like Jim Breuer and everybody else. It's taken us even that, know, here we are 140 years into our company. We didn't necessarily have the verticality of saying, we have a pre-construction department and a construction department and a operations and accounting department. So that's all like relatively recent in the... 

 

Andy Breuer (45:14.126)

know, arc of the company. So we're now just kind of getting to the point where in that succession, we say, okay, well, now we need to define what our leadership development looks like. And the first thing to do in that is getting to those standard operating procedures and protocols and employee handbooks so you can accurately define what somebody's role is so that it is replicable. 

 

Michael Palumbos (45:38.444)

Yeah, just, I just gonna, I love that conversation because you're right. I mean, you're right there. We call, come on, scorecards instead of John. And I would like to call them trading cards, but everybody gets mad at me because you know, you can be traded to another company if you so choose and that's fine. But that may be a little, little crass, but scorecards are brief. 

 

Michael Palumbos (46:08.334)

job descriptions are too long. Scorecard is, what are my function accountabilities? What do I need to bring to the table and what are the KPIs that I'm getting measured on? And if I keep them that simple and that brief on one page, oh, and by the way, the company values, add that to the everybody's scorecard and then rank them on a zero to five on the company values. So can say, how am I holding up on these different company values? 

 

Andy Breuer (46:33.964)

That's it. And they, as I'm learning more about what a leadership academy of sorts would look like, I'll think, I'll say that probably the scariest, boldest part of it is the inevitable kind of 360 review, you know, looking up and down the chain that I, it doesn't matter what role I play in the company. If I'm kind of tapped to be a leader, I have to have the thick enough skin to be able to say, well, I need to know what people above me, the people below me, and the people around me kind of think of my leadership style, my strengths and weaknesses. 

 

Andy Breuer (47:05.197)

That's a scary prospect for an organization that's never done a true 360 degree review process and survey. So, you know, we're right at that point right now and something we're going to need to embark on as we think about succession and growth. So it's a very relevant topic for us right now. 

 

Michael Palumbos (47:05.262)

That's a 

 

Michael Palumbos (47:22.478)

If you look at the next 12 months, and I think I know the answer to this already based on what we've been talking about, what would you say is your number one top priority? Is this what, this is it right now? It's just how do we put our success? 

 

Andy Breuer (47:39.251)

Leadership succession leading to growth, making it replicable. 

 

Michael Palumbos (47:43.47)

Okay. There you go. HBU, I'm gonna coin it for you. HBU, Gordnoor University. I'm a big fan of every company having their own university and not as a farce, not as a, know, not just to have the name and think it's cool, but to actually really delve into those things. you know, happy to at any time. 

 

Andy Breuer (47:51.886)

Too many use. 

 

Michael Palumbos (48:10.786)

feel free to say, about this or what about that, Mike? You now have my email and I'm happy to share those things. 

 

Andy Breuer (48:17.006)

Our company marketing people already coined it. say we're going to have it on Tuesday afternoons and we're going to call it 1870 Tuesday. 

 

Michael Palumbos (48:23.406)

better than I. better. 1870 Tuesday. They win. That's why I'm not in marketing. 

 

Andy Breuer (48:32.891)

Yeah, right. Me neither. I can come up with that. 

 

Michael Palumbos (48:36.174)

When you look at the current pains and frustrations that you're dealing with right now, what would you say are the top one or two pains or frustrations as a CEO that you're dealing with? 

 

Andy Breuer (48:52.79)

I I'd like to think we're kind of, we're through the. 

 

Andy Breuer (49:00.014)

What were they calling it? The great. 

 

Andy Breuer (49:04.466)

Where everybody was kind of leaving their job here two years ago. What is the right calling? Anyway, I like to think we're over that part of it. We didn't lose a lot of people. We were very fortunate. But I didn't think we had a lot of grasses greener kind of moments here, which was encouraging. But I still was reading enough headlines that it had me worried. 

 

Andy Breuer (49:29.558)

I don't know. mean, of course you're always worried about risk management and insurance with construction, right? I my father jokes that he never asked to go to the casino because he just goes to work every day. And we just hope that nobody falls off a ladder. The risk management climate in New York state, labor laws, some of the frankly medical legal groups that are out there. 

 

Andy Breuer (49:58.058)

employee employment law and whatnot. mean, there's just a lot of, it's a tough risk management risk environment as a state. And so we're always looking at how we're managing best practices and safety and best practices and insurance, whether that be, you know, lines of general liability and auto and workers' comp, or even looking at health insurance planning. It feels like those programs are probably the thing that are the most burdensome and therefore worrisome. 

 

Andy Breuer (50:27.63)

That's really the thing that comes to mind. But I'm not worried about the pipeline. I'm not worried about the job pursuits. I'm not worried about the culture. So that's the good side of it. 

 

Michael Palumbos (50:41.816)

Nice. You're sitting in an auditorium, you're on a panel and the audience is second and third generation family businesses that are hoping that they can make it to six and seven themselves. What are you telling them? What are your top three? Don't take your eyes off of these balls. 

 

Andy Breuer (51:05.122)

Yeah. Celebrate the little victories. 

 

Andy Breuer (51:11.778)

Don't be afraid to be your own advocate. 

 

Andy Breuer (51:17.43)

And it might be almost a bit of a central New York thing too. I think that we are sometimes our worst enemy that we don't, we just have a little bit of pessimism here. And it's from generations of, you know, the flight of business and just feeling like we're kind of an underdog. We have a lot of... 

 

Andy Breuer (51:37.934)

differentiators and knowledge base and frankly just grit in this community. sometimes you have to remind people that we're not the underdog or at least we're not anymore. So be your own advocate. 

 

Michael Palumbos (51:51.438)

And I want to add, I want to just add to that. I think that's not just Syracuse, it's Rochester Buffalo Syracuse. Just write it for this I-90 corridor and what we've all been through, you know, and how we all have a lot of grit. 

 

Andy Breuer (51:58.634)

It's the Rust Belt, right? 

 

Andy Breuer (52:08.27)

And 

 

Andy Breuer (52:08.93)

the people who are often the whiniest are the ones who've never lived anywhere else. they don't, you know, I've lived in Atlanta. You go to Atlanta for six years and deal with that traffic and that, you know, move to Washington, DC and deal with the traffic. Move to Boston or LA or wherever, Texas. So I think that sometimes the people who are the most vocal or maybe the least qualified to have that, have that opinion. And the people who are most satisfied here are those that have 

 

Andy Breuer (52:37.518)

gone someplace else and then come back to the four season towns that we love here. And realize the, I don't know, the simplicity sometimes of our lifestyle here. Yeah, we have high property taxes, but we also have an abundance of water. We have places where my kids can go skiing in the afternoon after school. Not many places in the country level in the world. Anyway, my last one is the team dynamic. 

 

Andy Breuer (53:06.254)

Nobody can do it themselves. So probably goes along with celebrating the little victories and that celebrated as a team, not as an individual. 

 

Andy Breuer (53:17.016)

Yeah, prioritize the team. 

 

Michael Palumbos (53:19.032)

Love it. I had a question and then I was listening. Last one is, it's not about books. Usually that's one of the things I throw out. do you, I guess that's, what do you do, know, leaders are learners. When leaders are always, you know, reading something or learning something, how do you learn and. 

 

Michael Palumbos (53:47.138)

What are some of the things that you shared Axios with us right now? 

 

Andy Breuer (53:52.142)

Yeah. What is my wife would tell you? I haven't really read a book in years. It's true. I haven't sat down and read a book cover to cover in multiple years and yet I'm always reading too often probably on my phone and too often when I should be shutting off the lights and going to sleep. But, 

 

Andy Breuer (54:09.132)

I think any good manager of people is also a student of people, a student of emotional intelligence. 

 

Andy Breuer (54:21.358)

my business is my family, but you have to remind yourself when you're in a leadership role of the family business that it's not everybody else's family and that you are never going to be as important. You're, know, you can never expect an employee to treat his work as the, as the number one thing in their lives and more importantly than their own families, than their own home lives and their own passions and recreation. And it goes a long way, I think to 

 

Andy Breuer (54:52.59)

to be, I don't know, astute enough or perceptive enough to know when that employee, when something is so important to that employee that I have to say, you know what, we have to backfill this because I want this employee to respect their job and respect what's important to me enough, then I better have the perception to know that this is a very important weekend or event or moment for that person. So. 

 

Michael Palumbos (55:19.47)

That's good. That's gold for a lot of people. I think they feel it and think it, but maybe not out loud. And you need to bring that to the forefront. The fact that your employees' families always gonna come before your family, always gonna come before the business. And if we don't realize that, then it could be detrimental. 

 

Andy Breuer (55:41.998)

That's right. If you want to gain that forever loyalty in an increasingly fickle recruiting and retaining environment, you better know what makes those people tick. 

 

Michael Palumbos (55:53.358)

Yeah. All right, last, last one. Favorite family tradition. 

 

Andy Breuer (56:01.486)

Oh man. So we like to get away to the St Lawrence River. We have a place up on Wellesley Island and I'll say the best tradition is just the ability to have summer weekends up there. it's growing up, you know, that's where I got into trouble and it's where my kids are going to get into trouble. And there's a certain, you know, reliance that kids develop, I think with, you know, they can only get in so much trouble, but it's like a different. 

 

Andy Breuer (56:31.246)

you learning to be on boats and learning how to fix a motor or learning how to, you know, install that part of the dock or whatever. Like it just, there's a certain craftiness that comes to, you know, that time and everybody's got that place. Whether it's their garage, their camp, their summer home. We just are always trying to prioritize those moments because there's a certain self-reliance that comes out of those experiences, you know, camping, whatever it is. 

 

Andy Breuer (57:00.726)

I try to hold on to those. 

 

Michael Palumbos (57:02.67)

Thank you for sharing. You don't know this, but my wife and I just were up in Ottawa in the beginning of September and we went across the Thousand Island Bridge. And we both looked at ourselves as we were going through, we're getting to that point in life where all of our kids are out and we're like, we always think about the Finger Lakes, we're totally missing it by not coming up here. And I just started looking at real estate up there. it's... 

 

Andy Breuer (57:29.682)

will create self-reliance in a 15 year old kid and getting pulled over by the Canadian Customs vote and having to answer those questions, right? And wondering if you're going to find yourself in some Canadian jail and you're both being impounded. So yeah, I think there's just a certain amount of self-reliance that comes out of our time up there, which is great. 

 

Michael Palumbos (57:46.368)

Nice. Andy Breuer from Hueber Breuer in Syracuse, New York. Thank you, thank you, thank you for sharing your time and your wisdom with us. 

 

Andy Breuer (57:56.462)

Andy Breuer (57:56.823)

I really enjoyed it. always learn from moments like this, events like this. I appreciate being included to program. So thank you. 

 

Michael Palumbos (58:04.696)

You got it. Thanks everybody for listening. My name's Michael Palumbos with Family Wealth and Legacy in Rochester, New York, and you've been listening to the Family Biz Show. We cannot wait to host you again on the next episode. Have a great day, everybody.