Traditional Concepts

At the core of Traditional Concepts is the TCI Excellence System, a pyramid-shaped platform of company values, goals and principles the firm implements to maintain good relationships with employees, customers and subcontractors.

“What the Excellence System says is very much a part of our company,” says Ted Brown, president. “The reason it is so powerful is because of how it was developed. We had a team of people with the company charged with developing our system out of a period of months, and this is what we came up with.”

Goals for achieving leadership, vision and strategies are built upon a base of company values, with techniques and principles for achieving these goals lining the outside.

Brown says the only way to make a system like the Excellence program work is to involve employees in the process of creating it, and to continually refer to it and discuss how it applies to everyday tasks.

“It’s a reminder of the things that we know. We review it at company meetings and talk through the good things that have happened,” Brown says.

TCI has also added divisions to explore new business opportunities and expand its brand recognition. One division is the custom kitchen design group, and the company is currently working with millwork companies to design a line of cabinets. In 2002, TCI initiated the Home Services Group, a division of the company that gets involved in smaller projects as well as handyman services.

“We take on a lot of projects that are not necessarily design/build; they may be very messy, and no one else will take them on,” Brown says. It may include window replacement, siding jobs or solutions to HVAC or moisture-related problems.

The new service has allowed TCI to serve a market need and has become a source of leads for the company. “It gives us marketing exposure that we normally wouldn’t have for our design/build side,” says Brown.

TRADITIONAL CONCEPTS, INC..
Lake Bluff, Ill.
www.traditionalconcepts.com

COMPANY STATS
Full-time employees: 23
Industry memberships: NKBA
Annual design/build projects:
85 percent
Residential remodeling: 100 percent
Average annual revenue (including sales, overhead): $5 million