Expert: Paul S. Brown, AIA - 7/26/2007

Question
We have been salvaging 1800's homes for the past seven years.  We finally decided to start our own business and we are looking for Architects/Preservation Architects on the East Coast who may be interested in our items.  We salvage everything, and the homes are taken down piece by piece; brick by brick.  Any suggestions?

Answer
Hi Wendy; fascinating... I have done some preservation work in the past, so yes, I do have a suggestion or two:
Where do you store the dis-assembled homes, and what has your market been in the past, and how do you contact your market?
My suggestion, is to directly target preservation architects.  The American Institute of Architects has various 'interest groups' and action committees for it's members; a few of those center on issues of Historic Preservation.  I think one of them is called the Historic Resources Committee.  You should directly target your marketing to members of these committees and Interest Groups.  The AIA probably has lists that it sells to companies like yours.  If they don't sell the lists, then you can approach your research as if you were a client looking for an historic preservation architect for a project; this will take more effort, but is likely to have better, more specific, results.  To do this, browse the listings of architectural firms on the major city AIA websites, to see which firms offer preservation design services.  Then, I would call each firm and ask to speak with the partner who does preservation design work.  Once you have that persons name, I would send them a simple one-page letter, explaining your business.  And a card that they can put in their business card file for future reference.  And then an email with your contact info.  Architects are visual people, so graphics and neatness are important.   Pick one or two nice images to insert into your letter, of projects you have done in the past.  Also, you might want to offer tours of your storage yard.  If you can get architects to come visit, and perhaps put them up in a local hotel for a night, (for the best prospects) this is almost certain to produce results.  Again, architects are visual people, if they can see the stuff you have, they are more likely to get excited.  Just reading about it won't work as well with this group.
I hope that helps.
Good luck; sounds like a great venture.
(I am presently involved with a project with my own extended family, where we need to fix a cracked stone chimney on an historic lakefront home in the adirondacks.  I am fighting to get them to agree to number the stones, and dismantle, and then put back up the same way it was; as opposed to just tearing it down and throwing it away.)