Building from the Inside Out

Fresh Eyes on Modular By Jorie Wisnefski 

When Candice Delamarre moved from France to attend Stanford for graduate school, she spent her days studying Sustainable Design and Construction inside the university’s high performance Y2E2 building, a benchmark of energy efficiency and smart solar shading. Her off campus rental apartment offered a sharp contrast though. Its drafty, single-pane windows made her bedroom walls frosty at night. 

The paradox caught her attention. In the heart of the Bay Area, the knowledge to build high performing environments clearly existed, but everyday housing didn’t always benefit from it.

Candice became fascinated by the puzzle and wondered what invisible constraints were keeping attainable housing so difficult to modernize. 

Industry veterans have learned the rules, understand the constraints, and have found ways to work around the problems. Workarounds become so familiar we don’t question them. 

Sometimes it takes someone with Fresh Eyes to ask why. 

Making a change means understanding why things work the way they do and listening to the people doing the work. It’s important to figure out where a different approach might help. 

Candice and her cofounder, Armelle Coutant, didn't set out to solve every problem in housing. With Kit Switch, they focus specifically on interiors—chipping away at one problem. 

Kit Switch delivers ready-to-install kitchen, bath, and storage systems for multifamily housing. The idea is to make these parts of a home easier to manufacture, coordinate, and install for new construction, renovations, or adaptive reuse. 

That focus was deliberate. 

Candice recognized that some people might see interiors as too small a piece of the construction process to make a meaningful difference, but she and Armelle saw opportunity in concentrating on one part of the problem and doing it differently. 

It's a practical lesson for anyone looking to change an established industry. You don't need to reinvent the entire process. You can make a meaningful difference by rethinking one piece and how it works better alongside everything else. 

Prefabrication offered one solution. By manufacturing components before they reach the jobsite, teams can make installation more predictable. That doesn't eliminate every construction challenge, but it creates an opportunity to work differently. 

And different doesn’t mean complicated. 

Kit Switch’s approach is proven by the people putting it into practice on-site. They work closely with manufacturing partners to push beyond traditional limits, while designing installation workflows alongside tradespeople to make assembly intuitive, safe, and significantly faster. Several general contractors actively build with Kit Switch because the systems remove friction at the site.   

That’s huge. A new idea only goes so far on paper. When the people responsible for making it work see value and want to keep working with you, the idea has real potential. 

Anyone in construction knows it’s a relationship industry. If a different approach creates more headaches, it’s unsustainable. 

In an industry as complex as construction, the hardest part of early growth is resisting scope creep. Candice and Armelle realized that staying true to their vision meant learning to say no—turning down projects that offered quick revenue to protect their focus on scalable and mission driven industry partnerships.  

There's no shortage of reasons why something might not work. Experience helps people recognize legitimate constraints, and it makes familiar limitations harder to question. 

Having Fresh Eyes doesn’t guarantee better answers, but they can open doors to opportunities others have stopped searching for. 

Kit Switch delivered interiors for more than 70 housing units this year and signed $2.4M in supply agreements since the completion of these deliveries. Those numbers show clear traction, with developers, contractors, and architects adopting their prefabricated interior systems from design through delivery. 

The company still has plenty to learn, as every growing business does, but it’s moved beyond the concept stage. 

I love when someone understands a system well enough to see where it falls short, but is still willing to ask, “Why not do it another way?” Candice didn't come into construction thinking she knew better than everyone else. She listened, found a problem worth solving, and worked with the people in the field to come up with a solution they could actually use. 

The answer isn't obvious to everyone. Folks loved candlelight until Edison thought of a better way, but someone willing to flip the switch can make all the difference. 

A fresh set of eyes can help us see a better way forward. 

 

Jorie'sSummary: 

Jorie Wisnefski, joriefaith@hotmail.com

Solving a big problem takes Fresh Eyes and a willingness to question how things have always been done. Candice Delamarre and her cofounder are rethinking how interiors are designed and built in order to build more housing and preserve affordability. 

Kit Switch is looking for project and capital partners for their current fundraise and next stage of growth. Candice welcomes conversations and partnership inquiries. 

Gary Fleisher interviews Jorie Wisnefski about Uni-Frame and the October 28 East Coast Factory Innovation Roundtable

One thing I’ve learned about offsite construction is that introducing a good idea and getting people to seriously consider it are two different jobs. Factory owners have production schedules to protect, builders waiting for answers, and enough daily interruptions that another presentation can feel like something they can postpone. 

That is part of what makes Jorie Wisnefski’s involvement with Uni-Frame and our East Coast Factory Innovation Roundtable worth discussing. Helping people understand an innovation means connecting it to the problems they already recognize. With our October 28 gathering in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania, approaching, this conversation focuses on those connections—and the questions we hope people bring. 

Gary Fleisher: When you’re helping introduce something like Uni-Frame, where should the conversation begin? 

Jorie Wisnefski:  We should start with how the factory works today. Before talking about a different system, I want to understand how modules are moved, where transportation equipment gets tied up, and what problems people have learned to work around. It's hard to see the value of something new without first understanding what it could solve. 

With Uni-Frame, it's about more than the steel frame. It's about how the building and transportation systems work together. Factories need to understand what's different, what stays the same, and what they will need to consider before deciding if it makes sense for them. 

Gary: How would you explain Uni-Frame to someone hearing about it for the first time? 

Jorie: The idea is that the frame becomes part of the module and its transportation system. Uni-Frame uses a steel frame with front and rear dollies to move the module without a separate carrier underneath it. 

But it's not just about how it moves. Factories need to ask the Uni-Frame folks  

1. How the frame is engineered 

2. How it connects to the module 

3. How loading and transportation work, and  

4. What happens when it reaches its destination.  

It's important to understand the whole process.

CLICK HERE to register for the East Coast Factory Innovation Roundtable.  

Gary: Why do you think the carrier issue deserves more attention? 

Jorie:  When something is part of a daily routine, people stop thinking about it. A flat tire, an unavailable carrier, or a delayed return might seem like separate problems, but together they reveal the bigger issue. 

Carrier fleets come with their own costs. Depending on how a factory operates, there may also be deposits and the challenge of getting carriers back where they belong. Every factory is different, so they have to start by looking at what they're spending and dealing with. 

Gary: There is always pressure to put a big savings number in a headline. How should we handle that? 

Jorie:  Each factory has to look at their own numbers. A large factory with its own fleet will have different costs than a smaller factory delivering to nearby builders. We can't use one savings number for everyone. 

They need to ask useful questions about factory costs, the investments required to make the change, and which costs could disappear or shift. Factories need to look at the whole picture to know if the change really makes sense. 

Gary: What makes the October 28 Roundtable a good place to have these conversations? 

Jorie: It's a chance to ask questions and talk through how something might work in the real world. A presentation can introduce an idea, but the conversation afterward is where people can ask how it might work with their factory. 

Different people will have different questions. An owner might focus on cost, an engineer on how everything fits together, and a production manager on how it affects the workflow.  

When people share those perspectives, they can catch things they might not have considered on their own. 

Gary: We’re planning to show a full module carried using Uni-Frame. What should attendees look for? 

Jorie: Seeing a full module lets people see how the system works beyond a drawing or video.  

They can see how the frame supports the module and think of questions they might not have considered before. 

The demonstration is a starting point. Attendees will still need to understand the engineering and how the system would work in their own factory. The goal is to ask the Uni-Frame team good questions and to leave with a better understanding. 

CLICK HERE to register for the East Coast Factory Innovation Roundtable. 

Gary: Uni-Frame is part of a broader program. How do the other companies fit? 

Jorie: Each presentation brings a different perspective.  

Ben Hershey from 4Ward Solutions brings his factory management experience.  

Max Quinn and Blaine Comeione from Ground Up bring a focus on tools and information for offsite businesses.  

The Uni-Frame team helps people understand the connection between the building, how it's transported, and how it's set. 

 

These topics may seem separate, but they affect each other. Changes in transportation can affect the factory, and management decisions can affect how the whole operation runs. Hearing these different perspectives together can help people see how the pieces fit and what they need to consider in their own business. 

Gary: Who should a company send? 

Jorie: Anyone involved in making decisions about how modules are built, moved, or delivered should join us.  

Owners, production managers, engineers, and builders all bring different experiences to the table. The more perspectives we hear, the more we can learn from each other. 

Gary: With so many events competing for attention, what makes this one worth taking a day off for? 

Jorie: You get time to ask questions, hear how others approach the same challenges, and talk directly with people who know the work. It's a chance to learn from each other, not just sit through presentations. 

Registration starts at $99 and includes breakfast and lunch. The real value is taking home ideas you can use. 

Gary: What would you consider a successful outcome? 

Jorie: If people leave with a new idea, useful connection, or next step for their company, that's a win.  

I want attendees to be comfortable discussing obstacles and asking questions. They don't need to make decisions that day. They just need to leave knowing more than they did when they arrived. 

Gary’s Observation 

I’ve sat through enough industry presentations to know that enthusiasm is easy to generate for an afternoon. What matters is what someone does when they return to the factory and look at the same problems with better information. 

That is what Jorie and I want from the East Coast Factory Innovation Roundtable on October 28 in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania. Bring your curiosity, your practical concerns, and the questions that never fit into the last two minutes of a presentation. We intend to give those questions some room. 

CLICK HERE to register for the East Coast Factory Innovation Roundtable. 

Bitchin’ Doesn’t Fix a Factory. Neither Does Ignoring the Problem.

 

Walk through an offsite construction factory, and you will hear complaints. Somebody is waiting for material. Someone else has drawings that don’t match what's on the production line. A supervisor wonders who approved a change, while the person doing the work wonders why nobody told the supervisor.

If you have spent enough time around factories, you know that complaining is practically an unofficial department. It doesn’t have a budget, although it can certainly help explain where some of the money went.

My first reaction when somebody starts bitchin’ is to wonder whether they want to solve something or simply find an audience. But making that judgment too quickly is dangerous. The loudest person might be pointing to a problem management should have addressed three weeks ago.

Here is the approach I believe makes sense: “Bitchin’ doesn’t fix a factory. But neither does ignoring the person who spotted the problem. Tell me what’s wrong, bring an idea if you have one, and let’s figure out what we can do about it.”

That puts responsibility on both sides. Employees need to explain what they are seeing. Management needs to do something useful with the information.

We’re Teaching Machines to Think. Who’s Teaching Our People?

Somewhere right now, a company is explaining how artificial intelligence will transform the offsite construction industry. It will help schedule production, track materials, prepare estimates, answer customer questions, and perhaps eventually explain why the forklift is never where anyone left it.

Meanwhile, a new employee on a factory floor is trying to figure out which drawing to use. The one on the table looks different from the one attached to the wall, and the person who knows the answer is at lunch. He spent yesterday following someone around and was told this morning he should be getting the hang of it.

I’m interested in what AI can do for our industry. There are useful possibilities, and some deserve serious attention. But I keep coming back to a fairly ordinary question: Why do we spend so much time discussing how to make machines smarter and so little time discussing how to help people get better at their jobs?

Before You Build an ADU for Mom and Dad, Have the Conversation Nobody Puts in the Brochure

I’ve been around housing long enough to know that people enjoy talking about what they’re going to build. Show them a floor plan, an attractive kitchen, and a little porch, and the conversation practically starts itself. Before long, someone is choosing cabinets while someone else decides where the flower boxes should go.

But if you ask whether Dad expects to eat dinner at the main house every evening, everyone goes quiet. That conversation rarely makes it into the brochure, though it may matter more to the project's success than the cabinets ever will.

An accessory dwelling unit, usually called an ADU, is a separate living space on the same property as the main home. For families considering one for aging parents, the appeal is easy to understand. Mom and Dad can have their own home, their children can be nearby, and everyone can spend less time worrying about the distance between them.

I can see a lot of good in that arrangement. However, before anyone signs a construction contract, I think the family needs to sit around a table without a salesperson, a floor plan, or a cabinet sample and talk about what they are actually proposing. 

One Day, Only $99, and Ideas That Could Change Your Factory

The East Coast Factory Innovation Roundtable brings offsite leaders together on October 28 in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania.

There is never a convenient time to leave your factory. Somebody needs an answer, a delivery is running late, and the production schedule that looked reasonable on Monday has developed a personality of its own by Wednesday. Spending a day away can feel like adding another problem to an already crowded week.

But sometimes, stepping outside your operation is exactly what helps you see it more clearly. That is the thinking behind the East Coast Factory Innovation Roundtable on October 28 in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania. Jorie Wisnefski and I are bringing industry people together for practical conversations about managing factories, understanding new technology, and rethinking how modules move from production to the jobsite.

Registration is $99 per person for up to four attendees from a company, including breakfast and lunch. This is an opportunity to bring different perspectives from your operation without turning professional development into a major budget decision.

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER FOR THE EAST COAST FACTORY INNOVATION ROUNDTABLE

Bring the Questions You Have Been Putting Off

Our industry has plenty of presentations about what the future might look like. Factory owners and managers also need time to discuss what happens when a new idea meets an existing production line, an experienced workforce, and customers who expect their homes on schedule.

The Roundtable centers on short presentations and extended Q&A. You should be able to ask how something works, what implementation requires, and where the difficulties might appear. A useful discussion does not end when the speaker finishes the slides. Often, that is when it finally gets interesting.

Bring the questions that keep surfacing in your management meetings. Why does the same bottleneck return? Why does information reach production too late? What would have to change before a promising innovation could actually help your company?

Factory Management Deserves a Seat at the Table

Ben Hershey of 4Ward Solutions will bring factory management into the discussion. For companies trying to improve performance, this is an opportunity to examine how daily decisions, communication, and operating practices affect what gets accomplished.

Buying equipment is usually easier than changing habits. A factory can install something impressive and still struggle because responsibilities remain unclear, information arrives late, or departments operate with different priorities. Those problems deserve attention alongside any conversation about innovation.

I encourage attendees to think about one recurring operating problem before arriving. Name it, describe its consequences, and be prepared to discuss it. You may discover that another company has wrestled with the same issue.

Asking Better Questions About AI

Max Quinn and Blaine Comeiore of Ground Up will add another important perspective to the day’s conversations. Artificial intelligence has captured the industry’s attention, but factory leaders need understandable discussions about where it fits into their businesses.

The useful questions go beyond whether a system looks impressive during a demonstration. What information does it need? Who will use it? How does it fit into the work people already perform? What would indicate that it is making a meaningful difference?

Those are the kinds of questions I want people asking. You do not need to arrive as a technology expert. You need to understand your business well enough to explain where time, information, or coordination keeps slipping away.

A Different Look at Moving Modules

Daryl Snader, Heath Sartini, and Eric Scott of Uni-Frame Carriers will focus attention on another familiar challenge: transporting modules. Uni-Frame integrates its frame into the module as a permanent building component, with the system serving the transportation function instead of requiring a separate conventional carrier.

The event is scheduled to include the first public exposure of a full module carried using Uni-Frame. Seeing the system with an actual module should give attendees a more concrete basis for discussion than a photograph alone.

For factories managing aging carriers, tire problems, return trips, and equipment availability, you'll have plenty to ask. Bring your operational questions and consider how the concept might fit your particular products and shipping requirements.

Gary’s Observation

Gary Fleisher, modcoach@gmail.com

I have spent enough years around this industry to know that a good conversation can stay with you long after an event ends. Sometimes it changes a decision. Sometimes it introduces you to someone who understands a problem your own team has been trying to solve.

On October 28, breakfast will be available until 9:00 a.m., and lunch is included. Come ready to listen, question, and compare experiences. For $99, the opportunity is straightforward: spend a day working on the business with people who understand the business.

SIGN UP HERE FOR THE OCTOBER 28 ROUNDTABLE IN LEWISBURG, PA

AI Can Help You Do More. Who Decides What Comes First?

Why prioritizing deserves more attention from offsite construction owners as artificial intelligence becomes part of everyday business.

I’ve been wondering whether one of the most basic responsibilities of owning an offsite construction business gets lost in the excitement around artificial intelligence. We hear about creating marketing campaigns in minutes, preparing proposals faster, analyzing information, and generating enough ideas to keep an entire management team occupied until retirement. We hear less about deciding which of those things actually deserves to be done first.

That responsibility used to be called setting priorities. It still is, although it doesn’t come with a software subscription or a particularly impressive demonstration. And as AI makes it easier to start more things, I believe deciding what matters most is becoming an even more important part of the owner’s job.

There is nothing wrong with using AI to accomplish more. The trouble begins when accomplishing more becomes the objective without much discussion about what all that additional activity is supposed to accomplish for the business.

A $99 Investment in Your Factory’s Future

Join the East Coast Factory Innovation Roundtable on October 28 in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania

What can $99 buy your offsite construction company today? Perhaps a few supplies, part of a service call, or lunch for a handful of employees. On October 28, that same $99 registration fee buys something that could last much longer: a seat at the East Coast Factory Innovation Roundtable in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania, with breakfast and lunch included.

Hosted by Gary Fleisher and Jorie Wisnefski at the Inn at Lewisburg, this gathering brings factory owners, managers, production leaders, engineers, and sales professionals together to explore practical ideas for improving their businesses. Builders and developers are welcome, too, because better factory performance and better project execution depend on understanding both sides of the relationship.

Three Companies Bringing Ideas Worth Discussing

Ben Hershey of 4Ward Solutions will bring his factory management perspective to the discussion. For companies looking at their operations and wondering where improvements should begin, this is an opportunity to ask questions about the challenges that show up between the morning production meeting and the last unit moving down the line.

Max Quinn and Blaine Comeiore of Ground Up will introduce their company’s approach and tools for the offsite industry. Attendees can explore where those tools might fit their businesses, ask how they work, and discuss what adopting something new would mean for their teams.

Daryl Snader, Heath Sartini, and Eric Scott of Uni-Frame Carriers will discuss a system that integrates the transportation function into the module’s permanent structure. The first public demonstration carrying a full module is planned for the Roundtable, giving attendees a chance to connect the explanation with something they can see.

Bring Your Questions—and Your People

The Roundtable is designed around conversation, with short presentations and extended opportunities for questions. If you have ever listened to a speaker and wished you could spend another twenty minutes asking how an idea would work inside your own factory, you understand the value of this format.

It also helps to bring someone who sees your operation differently. Your production manager may ask about workflow, your engineer may consider integration, and your sales manager may think about explaining the benefits to builders. Those conversations can continue long after everyone returns home.

Registration is $99 each for up to four attendees. Breakfast will be available until 9:00 a.m., and lunch is included. With October 28 approaching, now is the time to reserve your seats and decide which questions you want answered.

Gary’s Observation

I have always believed one useful conversation can justify the time it takes to get into the room. Sometimes it introduces a new solution. Sometimes it helps you recognize a problem you have been working around for years. Sometimes it simply connects you with someone who understands exactly what you are facing.

For $99, you can learn, compare notes, and return to your company with fresh ideas. I hope you will join us in Lewisburg.

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER FOR THE OCTOBER 28 ROUNDTABLE