Back to Clemson - 16 years later

It is kind of weird that a professor from Clemson is helping Chad create a concrete mix for his new venture in manufacturing vaults – Cardinal Vault that is. He is starting this new business as an offshoot of his grave service business. It seems like a no brainer after we ran all the numbers and it won’t take any considerable time away from his man hours or his grave service. Bob, my mom’s husband, is an engineer and also went to Clemson, although he graduated from there. He suggested we contact a professor with an expertise in concrete. Every year, the engineers at Clemson, have a contest and build canoes out of concrete – I know it sounds like it wouldn’t work. Bob has been going back and forth with the professor and we took a ride up to Clemson, last Monday, to meet with the professor and show him what a finished concrete vault looks like. We are all really excited about this because the professor has a lab to test the concrete mixes for strength, flexibility and substance to help us come up the perfect mix to pour for the vaults. First Chad is going to get him a piece from a broken vault and the professor and his students will use their equipment to break it down and determine, as close as they can, the substances and amounts that make up the mix. The best part about all of this is that we can sell our vaults for less than the current guys and make a better product. We will have all the data to back it up for our sales tools. Clients he’s already talked to are excited about buying a better, cheaper product from him. He is going to order the mold next week and we’ll be up and running in about a month. We couldn’t have been luckier to have Bob helping us with all the research on this product, it has been great to have an engineer’s mind helping us with all of this.

We are so proud of Chad for how he has grown his existing business and now he has really done a lot of research into how to build this one. GREAT JOB BABE!!!!!

We took some pictures at Clemson when we walked around after our meeting. They have some of the best ice cream I have ever had, fresh from their cows. It is very strange that I have not been back to that campus since 1994. When we were driving around, it sure didn’t feel like it was 16 years ago since I first set foot on that campus. I still sort of knew my way around. It was great taking pictures with Chad and Ava, when I was there, I never could have imagined I’d come back with my husband and daughter some day. I guess I never thought I would come back because I transferred to Miami my sophomore year and never looked back. I would love to bring Ava and Chad to Hurricane territory some day. That, I could have imagined!!! University of Miami was so much more me than Clemson was…..We are looking forward to catching a football game sometime this year at Death Valley..

Stay tuned for more news on Cardinal Vault…….