By Greg Allan, tradesman and creator of Data First Coaching
Why does a concreting quote that looks profitable still land thin in the bank?
Because a concreting quote is rarely one line of pricing. It is a bundle of labour, ready-mix, steel, formwork and site-specific detail, and if the margin disappears between the quote and the final invoice, it is usually because one of those details was missed, underpriced or changed after the job was booked.
A driveway or a commercial slab might look like a single number on a quote, but behind it sits concrete supply timed to a pour day, a pump truck booked around weather, steel and formwork labour, and finishing work like expansion joints that have to be cut within hours of the pour or the slab cracks where it shouldn't. Miss one of those lines, or price it on memory rather than on what the last similar job actually cost, and the job's gross profit margin looks healthy on the quote and thin once it's built.
Ground conditions add another layer most trades never deal with. A set of drawings might show a footing or pier depth that assumes stable ground, and the architect's figure can be well short of what the actual soil needs once the hole is open. That difference between what was priced and what the job needs doesn't show up until the job is already underway, and by then it has already eaten into the margin.
Why does most business coaching fall short for a concreting business?
Most business coaching starts by asking the owner to explain the business, then hands out the same pricing, marketing and hiring advice regardless of trade. A concreter's margin problem usually starts on site, in a detail the coach never asked about, so that kind of coaching never gets near the real gap.
Picture a concreter quoting a job where the drawings show a standard footing depth, the quote is priced and signed, and the pump truck is booked for a set pour day regardless of what the ground gives up once the hole is dug. A coach who has never run a construction business has no reason to ask about any of that. They will look at the quote total, the invoice total, and tell the owner to raise prices or chase more leads, which treats the symptom and leaves the actual gap, the one between what was priced and what the ground, the weather or the pour day actually demanded, completely untouched.
That is the risk with a coach who only knows business coaching in general. Concreting is a trade where the margin leak is usually buried in a line item or a site condition, not in the top-line quote, and generic advice has no way of finding it.
What should a concreter look for when choosing a coach?
You should look for a coach who has actually run a construction or concreting business, starts from your own job and finance numbers rather than making you explain everything from scratch, and treats a thin margin as something to trace back to where it started, not something to patch with a worksheet or a pep talk.
Someone who has run that kind of business recognises why pour days get booked around weather and pump trucks, why a builder paying on progress changes how cash comes in, and why a seemingly minor change on site, deeper piers, a missed joint cut, an extra load of ready-mix, is exactly where a healthy gross profit margin quietly becomes a thin or negative net result.
It also helps to ask whether the coach can show you where AI agents fit. An AI agent is simply software that does a piece of office work the way you would do it yourself, with your prices, your wording and your rules. For a concreter, that might mean the non-billable quoting and admin work gets handled consistently, freeing your time and your crew's time for the jobs themselves rather than the paperwork around them.
What should you ask before you pay for coaching?
Before paying for coaching, ask whether the coach has run a concreting or construction business, whether they start from your own data or ask you to explain your business first, and how they would approach the gap between a job's quoted margin and what it actually banked.
Ask them directly: have you run a trade business where a quote and a finished job's cost could end up looking very different? Will you look at my own job costings and my own numbers before you suggest anything, or will I spend the first sessions explaining my business to you? This matters because a data first approach starts from what your numbers already show, so the time goes on fixing the actual gap rather than describing the business all over again.
Also ask what they do when a job's margin has slipped. A coach worth paying will want to trace it to where it started, whether that's a site condition, a supplier cost, or a step that got missed in the quote, rather than offering a general fix that would apply to any business.
What are the warning signs it's the wrong coach for your business?
The warning signs are a salesperson leading the conversation before any coaching happens, a coach who has never run a construction or concreting business, and advice that would read the same whether it was given to a concreter, a cafe owner or a retailer.
Another sign is a coach whose answer to every margin problem is hire someone or raise your prices, without ever asking where the cost actually blew out on a specific job. Concreting has its own patterns, ground conditions, pour day logistics, progress payments from builders, and a coach who skips past all of that straight to generic growth advice is not going to find where your margin is actually leaking.
Be wary too of a coach who talks about AI agents as a way to replace judgement on site, rather than as a way to take non-billable office work off your plate. The first misunderstands how a concreting business runs. The second is the one worth paying attention to.
How does Data First Coaching approach this?
Data First Coaching, built by Greg Allan, starts from the concreter's own job and finance data through the Trade Business Intelligence, not from the owner explaining the business from scratch. It looks at where a job's gross profit margin on paper and its actual net result start to pull apart, because that gap is where the real problem usually begins, whether it sits in a quote line, a site condition or a supplier cost. Greg has run businesses in this world himself, describing his own background as “two construction companies building and concreting”. The how of finding and closing that gap is worked through inside the Academy, with members, because the Trade Business Intelligence is powered by every member who is open minded, innovative and willing to share what they learn.
Looking for a business coach who starts from your numbers? Concreter Business Coach or every answer for concreters.
