Three generations of Lower Mainland builders have bought their lumber off the same Queensborough yard.
In 1964 James Clark Griffiths, known as Griff to everyone who dealt with him, opened a building supply yard in Queensborough, the flat industrial elbow of New Westminster where the Fraser splits around Lulu Island. Sixty-two years on, the sign still says GRIFF, the yard is still on Ewen Avenue, and the business is still in the family.
- Still family run. Griff’s daughters, Carole Albertson and Deborah White, own and run it.
- A new sales manager. A new sales manager came into the role wanting one system the whole team could run on, rather than eight reps each working their own way.
- A real yard behind every quote. 6.5 acres of stock and a 20,000 sq ft retail warehouse.
- Everything that frames a building. Lumber, engineered wood, plywood and OSB, mouldings, hardware, insulation, rebar, concrete.
- The 100-foot reach. Their own Lower Mainland fleet, with Hiab cranes that place a load up to 100 ft: over a fence, across a foundation, onto a second storey. No crew waiting on a forklift.
- Founded
- 1964, by James Clark Griffiths
- Ownership
- Second generation, family owned and run
- Yard
- 340 Ewen Avenue, Queensborough, New Westminster
- Footprint
- 6.5 acres of stock, 20,000 sq ft retail warehouse
- Sells
- Lumber, engineered wood, plywood and OSB, mouldings, hardware, insulation, rebar, concrete
- Delivers
- Lower Mainland fleet with 45 ft, 75 ft and 100 ft reach Hiab cranes
The problem worth solving
Eight capable reps out on the road, each working their own way, and a new sales manager with no view into any of it.
- The reps’ time was going to the wrong things. Research, chasing plan sets, calling the office to check a price. All of it necessary, none of it selling.
- A CRM nobody updates is worse than none. Ask eight reps to learn new software and type their day into it a second time, and they stop within a month.
- The manager was flying blind. The new sales manager could not see which leads had gone to which rep, why, or what had happened since. Coaching on that is guesswork.
- Estimating took days. A builder’s plan set went into a queue and came back as a takeoff much later, by which point the conversation had cooled.
- Pricing questions went unanswered in the room. Standing in front of a builder, a rep who cannot confirm a price says “I’ll get back to you”, and the momentum goes with them.
How BuildMapper helped
One process, eight reps, and nothing new to learn. The work the reps already do is what keeps the system current.
- Leads arrive already routed, with the reason attached. New permits are assigned to a rep with the why shown: account ownership, past work with that builder, or area. The manager approves the week rather than building it.
- The pipeline updates itself. Reps move their own cards as they work, or tell Scout what happened and it updates the card for them. Either way that is the only record anyone keeps: no second system, no CRM data entry, no weekly spreadsheet.
- Product Brain answers the price in the room. Griff’s own catalogue and price documents sit behind it, so a rep standing in front of a builder can ask what something costs and answer on the spot instead of promising to call back.
- Plans in, estimate out, in minutes. A rep sends a drawing set to Product Brain and it reads the plans, does the takeoff and drafts the line items from Griff’s real prices. What used to take days now happens while the builder is still deciding.
- Scout keeps the day on track. Every rep starts the morning knowing the new jobs in their territory, and gets a check-in through the day so a follow-up does not slip.
What changed
Two outcomes: one for the reps out on the road, one for the manager.
- Roughly 20% more productive, per rep. The hours that went into research, chasing plans and checking prices came back as selling time. Nobody had to learn a new system to get it.
- No CRM to update, ever. There is no second system to update. Reps move their own cards as they work, or tell Scout and it does it for them, and that is the only record anyone keeps.
- Full visibility for the manager. The sales manager can see where each new permit lead went, why it went there, and what the rep has done on it since. Coaching became specific instead of general.
- Estimates in minutes, not days. Plans go to Product Brain and come back as a takeoff and priced line items fast enough to matter to the builder asking.
- The week became measurable. At the end of the week the manager can see which areas and which builders actually moved, and point the team at them next week.
How Griff Building Supplies uses BuildMapper
Feature by feature: who leans on it, what they actually do with it, and what it gave them back.
Every permit inside Griff’s delivery radius on one scored map, filtered to the trades the yard supplies, with high-value multi-family work surfacing first.
Scout opens the morning with the new jobs in a rep’s territory, then checks in through the day on what is outstanding, who has not been called back and what is due.
Reps move their own cards as they work a lead, or they just tell Scout what happened and Scout updates the card for them. Either way there is no separate CRM and no second place to type anything.
The week’s new permits are routed to reps with the reason shown: account ownership, past work with that builder, or area. The manager approves the assignments rather than typing them out.
Griff’s own product and price documents are loaded in. A rep asks what something costs, what they stock, or what the alternative is, and gets it from Griff’s own material. It will not invent a price: if something is not in their list it says so and offers what they do stock.
A rep sends the builder’s drawing set in and it reads the plans, does the takeoff and drafts the line items from Griff’s real prices.
Griff’s repeat multi-family builders are watched by the rep who owns the relationship. A new permit from a watched builder flags immediately.
What changed
The gain came out of removing steps, not adding software. No training programme, no rollout, no second system running alongside the first.
The reps working their own cards is the record. A process nobody has to maintain separately is a process that survives past month one.
Where every permit lead went, why it went there, and what the rep has done on it since. Coaching stopped being guesswork.
Product Brain holds the catalogue and the prices, so a rep answers in the room rather than promising to check.
Plans go in, a takeoff and priced line items come back fast enough to keep the conversation alive.
Scout opens the day with the new jobs and checks in through it, so follow-ups do not depend on anyone remembering.