Carr Consulting Services

Phone, 805 523-1575 Fax, 480 287-8340 Email, steve@electrical-estimating.com

Background

Steve Carr began his career in 1971, as a truck driver for Certified Wholesale Electric. During his seven years there, he was promoted to truck dispatch & warehouse, counter sales, pricing desk and assistant purchasing agent. He left the company with an extensive knowledge of electrical materials and their application. Concurrent with his employment there, he went back to college and completed courses in advanced electronics and digital logic. That was his first introduction to computers.

Steve's next job was as the assistant purchasing agent at the Los Angeles office of Howard P. Foley, the second largest electrical contractor in the nation at the time. He was in charge of daily purchasing, warehousing and administration of major purchase orders. While there, he obtained valuable experience in competitive pricing, vendor management, explosion proof applications and high voltage materials. There were several months in which he made purchases of daily materials exceeding one million dollars per month.

After working for Howard P. Foley, Steve became an estimator at Southland Electric. During his time there, he was required to visit a jobsite at least once a week. This gave him the opportunity to observe how electrical work was done, which helped him obtain the skills needed to accurately apply, factor and develop labor units. While at Southland, Steve worked with his first estimating system, Estimatic. This system required coding a takeoff for transmission via teletype to Estimatic's office. They would then teletype back the extension for the project.

Steve's next job was at Weiss Electric. Here he rounded out his estimating skills, completed intermediate and advanced estimating courses and began managing projects during his employment there. For the first year, estimating was done completely by hand. The company then purchased one of the first estimating systems from McCormick. The hand method required six to eight man-hours to price, labor, extend and double check a $200,000 estimate. The McCormick System, executed the same tasks within a few seconds. Steve immediately became hooked on the benefits of computer applications because of their time saving abilities. In addition, he attended several courses to enhance his abilities in this field.

Steve moved on to Arnett Electric, a company that specialized in the restoration of high rise buildings in the downtown Los Angeles area. He started as the senior estimator, and was quickly promoted to chief estimator. He was also responsible for replacing and maintaining the estimating computer systems. After a thorough review of the available systems, Steve chose the DataTrak system on the new IBM XT computer.

Arnett Electric provided Steve with the opportunity to fill in some important pieces that were missing from of his experience and training. While there, he completed change order, claims, and management courses. During his employment, Steve attended a course called the Management Action Program (MAP) which had more impact on his management skills than all of the other courses combined. Learning from his employer, courses and mistakes (his own and other's) he was able to solidify his position on ethics, methods and relationships.

It is also noteworthy that while employed by Arnett, Steve was interviewed and published in the Electrical Contractor Magazine (November 1985) for his use of computers in construction. Shortly after the article was published, he began receiving calls requesting assistance installing and using computers in contractor's offices. With Arnett's permission, Steve started providing installation and training on computer applications as Carr Consulting Services. He provided these services during evenings and weekends.

Steve's next employer was Electric Service and Supply Company (ESSCO). He was hired as a project manager/estimator, and was also responsible for upgrading and maintaining all computer systems, including estimating and accounting. His first project was to purchase and install an accounting system, as this company was still doing their accounting by hand. He also upgraded the estimating system to the A.L.E.C. estimating system from Trade Service.

During Steve's seven years of employment at ESSCO, he completed two of the most significant projects of his career. He prepared the winning bid for McDonnell Douglas's Building 54, where the U.S.A.F. C17 is manufactured. At the customer's request, written in to the contract, Steve was assigned the management duties for this project. In addition, Steve served as project manager for the Simon Wiesenthal Museum Of Tolerance in Los Angeles. Both of these projects won the N.E.C.A. Award of Excellence. Steve was also interviewed and published again by Electrical Contractor Magazine regarding Building 54 (May 1989).

ESSCO downsized from 120 to 4 employees during the construction recession in the early 1990's. Steve was the last person to be laid off. After a brief look at purchasing an electrical contracting company, Steve decided to make Carr Consulting Services a full time endeavor, providing estimating, management and computer services.