u/Disastrous-Current32

I’m not a concrete contractor myself, but I work in operations and have become really interested in how blue-collar businesses manage estimating, leads, scheduling, quoting, etc.

One thing I’ve noticed from the outside is that a lot of contractors seem to still juggle:

• texts
• phone calls
• paper notes
• spreadsheets
• memory

I’m curious how true that actually is in the real world.

I’d genuinely love to hear from actual concrete guys here:

1. What’s the MOST annoying part of running the business side of concrete work?
2. How are you currently handling estimates and quotes?
3. What causes the most wasted time during the bidding process?
4. Do leads ever slip through the cracks or go cold because you’re too busy on jobs?
5. Have you tried any CRM or contractor software? If so, what did you hate about it?
6. If you could wave a magic wand and automate ONE part of your business tomorrow, what would it be?
7. Would photo-based estimating/AI-assisted quoting actually be useful, or is that unrealistic for concrete work?

Not trying to sell anything — I’m honestly trying to learn where the real pain points are from the people actually doing the work every day.

I’d appreciate any insight you guys are willing to share.