Contractor Investment Analysis

As you can see from the comparison chart, the differences between the labor and equipment needed for ACMU wall system and the OVE stick-built wall system are vast. These two walls systems carry very little common ground when it comes to the bulk of the labor needed to produce them. For example the ACMU system requires mainly trained masonry work while the stick built wall system requires mainly trained carpenter work. If a contractor already had a trained carpenter group in place to do a job and Aerated concrete units were needed, the contractor has two options. The first option would be to acquire a subcontractor to do the work for the Aerated concrete units and the second would be to buy/rent new equipment and hire new employees or train his/her current carpenters to work with Aerated concrete units also. Training the workers to work with ACMUs is not any different than working with normal CMUs; so training workers to work with CMUs or ACMUs is the same process and covers both types of construction.

Option one (subcontractor) seems like the easiest choice for the contractor to go with. This option saves the contractor the initial cost of having to buy new equipment and train current employees in a new skill. This is a short term investment and a "quick fix" to the Aerated concrete issue. The subcontractor option is a good option if the contractor does not expect the feature to burst into the market or if the contractor does not believe future jobs will call for this particular skill.

The second option calls for either training current employees or hiring new ones with the skill of constructing Aerated concrete walls. There are several aspects the contractor needs to consider when faced with this decision. Training current employees (carpenters) with a new skill does broaden their work spectrum; however it also could cut down on the total work the contractor could use them for. By doubling their skills, anytime they are using one skill the other skill is not being utilized on another project; this is why hiring new employees with the necessary skills could also be a viable option. Examining the comparison chart would also reveal that while the tools required for the separate wall systems are different, they aren't that expensive. So the contractor may want to consider purchasing new tools rather than renting for a small initial investment.

In our opinion, finding a subcontractor for the job would be the quickest and easiest option. Hiring new employees with the desired Aerated concrete skill along with buying new tools with be a large initial investment. While the subcontractor route is a faster one and cheaper initially we believe that the payback period of this investment is short enough for the contractor to see profitable returns in a short amount of time. Renting tools, paying subcontractors, and training current employees would eventually cost more than acquiring the tools and laborers needed to do the job.

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