Vince Van Heukelem Leads Colorado Hardscapes Into Future

Colorado Hardscapes' chief executive officer Vince Van Heukelem, PE, is a Colorado-licensed professional civil engineer with over a decade of engineering experience. But his background in the company spans decades, as he has worked side by side with both his grandfather, Wendell, and his father, Calvin, to create the company that exists today.

"My grandfather started the company in 1947 with a pickup truck and trailer mixer," explains Van Heukelem, adding that the company was sold to his own father, who eventually sold the company to him.

"When I was 16, I ran a crew for the summer and didn't like it, so I went to college trying to stay out of this industry," he continues. "I worked in a geotechnical lab for a couple of summers. When I graduated, I was a civil engineer in Denver and did that for five years, but it didn't meet the hands-on creativity I was looking for."

He says that when his father was looking at retirement and selling the family business, he sold it to Van Heukelem in 2000, a process which was officially completed in 2004. In short, Van Heukelem's involvement in CHI has been as a technician, foreman and superintendent. After growing up in the company, he officially joined CHI in 2000 and was named CEO in 2003.

Van Heukelem says that his focus from the start was education.

"When I came in, my goal was more education for architects and designers, to continue the process we had in place and grow it with others as well," he explains. "Because with that education, we have a real teamwork setup with the client before any pour ever begins."

Part of that enhanced education also included a new design center spearheaded by Jay Fangman.

"This was his brainchild," says Van Heukelem of the 16,000-square-foot building they moved in to in October 2001, half of which is dedicated to the design center. "This is where people can see, touch and feel our products, and it also helps designers, who can use our design center like they would any other, such as when they shop for tile or carpet. Before that, we just had a courtyard with samples, but now we have over 1,000 samples and ideas in the center."

CHI also gathered case studies, which they post on the website. Van Heukelem credits Teresa Unruh with both the case studies and the overall website, which they maintain in house. "She ran with it," he notes, adding that the website mirrors their design center as much as possible.

As for the importance of case studies, he adds, "Just about every job we do has elements of other jobs in it. Also, on larger projects they often ask for prequalification packets, so we are able to send them our case studies."

Recently, CHI signed to be the Colorado licensee for Lithocrete, which is seeded aggregates within concrete, or blends natural rock and concrete.

"This fits the Denver lifestyle--people who love nature and natural rock looks," explains Van Heukelem. "But it's expensive to put stone down and there are issues with natural stone. Lithocrete is a nice answer to that, because it's between granite and concrete slab. It has a nice texture and it's a wearable surface, and it's part of the green movement. You can use recycled glass in it, and the process to expose the glass or rock aggregate is a green process as well."

In addition to Lithocrete, CHI also offers concrete services for commercial and residential clients including Bomanite (imprinted or stamped concrete), Sandscape Texture (acid-etched concrete), Artificial (faux) Rock Features, Natural Rock Features, Fountains, Water Features, Porous (pervious) Paving, and Grasscrete.

Those offerings all play into what Van Heukelem thinks will be a long future for decorative concrete.

"I'm just so excited to work in an industry with so many new innovations coming out. We're doing things that in the past couldn't be done...It's just at the beginning and we're only starting to realize its potential," he observes.

"Stamped grew the market well, and the green movement adds to that. Porous paving, recycled aggregates--we can now pour mixes that are made of 85 percent recycled products, so if somebody wants to recycle they can. In fact, it's more cost effective and is starting to be mandated. Plus, we're finding more uses for decorative concrete, and new technologies help grow the uses and future of it."

And Van Heukelem says that fooling people is fun.

"There are options on water features and park amenities that can be made out of concrete that the general population won't know is concrete—it's fooling a lot of people, and that's when we know we have done our job well, when we fool people," he laughs.

That playful attitude doesn't go unnoticed at CHI, but when work needs to be done, Van Heukelem is ready to roll up his sleeves and pitch in.

"If we get in time crunches, I'll help in an area of the company that needs help," he says. "The key in any business is to help out in the constrained areas and pitch in. And my management style works and most employees seem to welcome it."

That style also differs a bit from the generations that ran CHI before.

"Both my grandfather and father had different approaches to management. My grandfather thought if you worked hard, you'd be rewarded. And my father was focused on looking for the next big thing, which is how the company got into decorative concrete and how he took the company to the size it is now," Van Heukelem explains.

One of the changes Van Heukelem implemented was job costing, which he says is critical to success, but met with some resistance at first.

"But when they saw it work, they appreciated it," he adds.

He also added drug testing and benefits for employees across the board, such as paid holidays, so there is no disparity between office workers and those in the field.

"I find that if everyone is treated similarly, morale throughout the company improves," Van Heukelem notes.

He also streamlined the bidding process to include actual cost and profit, which can then be measured against reality and tweaked accordingly for the next job.

"That's a lot different than square foot guesstimating like most people do," he adds. "Getting a good estimating process is the key, and to do that you have to track job cost. That process can prove invaluable."

In the end, Van Heukelem credits his team with the success of CHI.

"Having the right employees involved in the company is important. My grandfather and father built a strong team that's stuck by us for many years. I was so fortunate to have a great team as the foundation of my business," he concludes.

Colorado Hardscapes
8085 E. Harvard Avenue
Denver, CO 80231
(303) 750-8200
www.coloradohardscapes.com