For manufacturing chief Scott Gates, success means greater than rising earnings; it’s about rebuilding lives alongside the best way.
Gates is president of Awake Window & Door Co. based mostly in Gilbert, Arizona, a fast-growing U.S. producer of luxurious glass home windows and doorways, constructed to large sizes. Apart from their area of interest product providing, the corporate can be set aside by their hiring mannequin: Greater than half the workforce is previously incarcerated. “We wished to be an organization that noticed this group of individuals for his or her potential and their future, slightly than the errors of their previous,” says Gates. “Consequently, at a time when most corporations like ours are struggling to seek out entry to employable labor, we have now discovered an immense pool of untapped expertise.”
It definitely has paid off: The corporate started with slightly below $200,000 in whole gross sales in 2021; below Gates’ management, they’re slated to exceed $30 million in gross sales in 2025.
In an interview, Gates shares how this people-first method has grow to be a aggressive benefit, what it takes to scale a mission-driven enterprise and what different corporations get improper about second possibilities and expert trades.
Inform us about Awake Window & Door Co., your manufacturing operations and the way the corporate has grown?
Awake Window & Door Co. was based in 2020 by a core group of leaders with in depth expertise within the window and door market. Whereas the fenestration trade is just not actually recognized for start-ups, Awake’s founding staff believed there was a distinct segment want within the luxurious housing marketplace for giant home windows and glass doorways constructed to large sizes, however interrupted with very slender, minimal frames. Architect’s and owners’ want to maximise views was a crucial answer being missed by most home producers. Awake’s founders employed a proficient group of engineers and labored tirelessly with focus teams in 2020 to convey a completely new household of revolutionary merchandise to the market.
Awake manufactured its first merchandise in late 2021, ending the yr slightly below $200,000 in whole gross sales, however has since skyrocketed in progress, with anticipated annual gross sales of $31 million in 2025. The product has exploded in reputation amongst up to date architects in luxurious residential markets all through the West Coast, with speedy gross sales progress in California, Texas, Arizona, Utah, Montana and Hawaii. Awake at present employs simply over 100 individuals and manufactures all of our home windows and doorways in our plant in Gilbert, Arizona.
You’ve got a daring hiring mannequin: Greater than half the workforce is previously incarcerated. Inform us about your mission-driven enterprise and the way your mannequin has grow to be a aggressive benefit.
Once we determined to step out of company careers and start our entrepreneurial journey, our founding staff had an outlined aim that was centered on creating an organization that was fueled by a mission that was greater than progress our earnings.
Previous to launching Awake, the problem of mass incarceration and the residual issues it causes with very excessive recidivism charges had come to our consideration through a sequence of heartbreaking books and podcasts. We determined we wished our firm to be a part of the answer. The primary explanation for recidivism is the troublesome time residents which can be re-entering society have to find an excellent job. Regardless of their typically stellar {qualifications}, angle and loyalty, the stigma surrounding their previous is a barrier most employers are unwilling to cross. We wished to be an organization that noticed this group of individuals for his or her potential and their future, slightly than the errors of their previous.
Consequently, at a time when most corporations like ours are struggling to seek out entry to employable labor, we have now discovered an immense pool of untapped expertise. As we unfold the message amongst the varied authorities businesses, parole officers and jail techniques about our distinctive mission, the end result has been a flood of requests coming from so many nice people who merely wanted an organization to offer them an opportunity. We now have a ready record of potential hires who’re ready to have their lives modified like so a lot of their family and friends who work at Awake.
Presently greater than 56 p.c of our workers have a justice concerned background, however one hundred pc of our workers are utterly purchased in and keen about our mission. Our total workers now sees progress of our firm not as a approach to promote extra home windows and doorways, however as an alternative as a approach to make use of extra wonderful individuals like our fellow coworkers whom we have now seen flip their lives round. It’s actually an unbelievable factor to be part of and the work I’m most pleased with in my profession.
What classes have you ever discovered all through your profession?
Previous to beginning Awake, I used to be the CEO of a window firm referred to as Western Window Programs. In my time at Western, that firm grew from $6 million in gross sales once I began, to over $150 million in gross sales once I resigned in 2020. Now I’ve gotten to be part of rising Awake from $0 in gross sales, to greater than $31 million in simply 5 years.
Certainly one of my greatest classes in rising two profitable companies is studying that the playbook doesn’t should be the identical. At Western, a lot of our progress was tied to savvy gross sales and advertising choices, together with some inventive promoting partnerships, a profitable rebrand and a sensible diversification technique that noticed us diversify from being luxurious residential market unique to a technique entry into the manufacturing builder phase.
At Awake, the playbook has been much less targeted on gross sales and advertising, and far more targeted on design, innovation and operational excellence. Pushing the boundaries on customization and design options has fueled our progress at Awake, whereas at Western we out-marketed the competitors and located new prospects with a product line that had been designed years earlier than.
By working very completely different playbooks, I’ve discovered that enterprise success is about realizing what your present prospects want and are searching for. Awake’s clientele are very completely different than Western’s, and as such, pleasing and thrilling them means it’s a must to present options in a a lot completely different method. Listening to your prospects and offering them the options they’re searching for is all the time key.
If I had been to say what’s one consistency lesson of success that I felt at each corporations, it’s the significance of getting a strongly outlined firm tradition. Whereas each of my corporations had completely different visions, completely different core values and completely different firm cultures, each had been extremely sturdy and enticing to staff that wished to be part of a successful staff. As a CEO I’ve discovered you will need to form that tradition, outline what it’s, clarify why you do it that manner and clearly present your staff how they will succeed inside it.
What’s subsequent for Awake?
On the facet of our core enterprise, we proceed to be motivated and fueled by the need to push the envelope with excellence in innovation. As we have now boomed in reputation within the mountain states, the need to develop our product providing to incorporate triple-pane options that may deal with rigorous winter climate has led our staff again into the R&D lab. We’re thrilled to start taking orders in late 2025 with triple pane functionality, whereas nonetheless providing among the narrowest sight traces and largest sizes out there.
From a mission perspective, Awake’s success has led to curiosity about our hiring mannequin as companies contemplate second-chance employment themselves. As such, our advertising staff has launched a sequence of recent mission targeted communication channels below the model “Awake Gadflies” which highlights finest practices, recidivism training, podcasts, worker hiring suggestions and normal training to unfold the message on succeed wildly when embracing this mannequin. It’s our deepest want that different corporations would contemplate boldly embracing a second-chance mannequin like Awake’s. We try to unfold the phrase on why we consider that not solely is second- or fair-chance hiring like ours the proper factor to do morally, it is also a strategic win that can enable you discover unbelievable expertise, encourage your total workers and make your staff really feel related to a much bigger goal that can gas firm success.
