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Brown Drainage and Construction
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Overcoming
challenges for high calibre organisations in the 21st
Century |
Brown Drainage
and Constructions
Director Michael Draper fondly recalls the story behind the
birth of his company, Brown Drainage and Construction. Dick
Draper, Michael’s father, decided to submit a tender for a
project on his own, separate to his current employer.
Obviously, he couldn’t use his name as it would alert his
current employer, so when he arrived to pick up the tender
document he plucked a name out of the air. He simply thought,
‘Brown’ something-has-to-go-with-it ‘Drainage’. Hence
the name, BROWN DRAINAGE LTD.
The rest is
history; 30 years on and Dick’s son, Michael, who along with his
wife and Operations
Manager Sherie, are taking the reigns of this highly respected
company that operates in New Zealand’s Waikato region. The
chief driver of growth to this point has been a widely respected
reputation for high quality work, built around the instilled
values of strong family and work ethics, reliability and doing
the job well.
Challenges for the high calibre organisation
For Michael and Sherie, the challenges are only just beginning.
They view the next important phase for the business as upgrading
and maintaining the systems required to operate such a high
calibre organisation in the 21st Century.
One of the systems that Browns Drainage and Construction saw as
critical to their future direction was the estimating system.
Coming from estimating in spreadsheets and by long-hand, Michael
realised the need for a system that would organise and control
the estimating process, making it
more beneficial for the long term.
“I was looking for a system that kept all the estimates in one
place so I could go back into past tenders and see how jobs were
performed. Benchmark Estimating Software allowed me to do this,
and more. If I have a job that is similar to one we have
previously completed, I can bring up the past tender, make a few
quick modifications and it is ready to send to the client.”
In addition to this, Michael benefits from functionality in
Benchmark that allows the import and automatic pricing of a
client’s schedule. Michael says, “When I receive a schedule to
price, I can bring it into Benchmark via the Load Spreadsheet
function. I can then run Auto-Allocate which automatically
assigns our costs to our clients estimate, making the process
accurate and efficient.”
From its humble beginnings, Brown Drainage and Constructions has
grown on the back of strong values and high quality work to
become a highly respected drainage and civil construction
company winning Action International’s Business of the Year
for 2006. Now, Michael and Sherie are eager to tackle the
challenges of the 21st Century, sound in the
knowledge that they have control over their estimating, and that
they will continue to efficiently produce accurate tenders.
For more information
visit
Brown Drainage and Construction's website |
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