The CWB Association brings you a weekly podcast that connects to welding professionals around the world and unrepresented communities as we continue to strive for a more diverse workforce. Join us as we celebrate National Volunteer Month to showcase the incredible contributions of our Chapter Executives from across Canada and globally.
Please note this episode is a replay, bringing you a blast from the past.
From the oil fields to the sales floor, and now deep into the mechanics of heavy-duty machines, Chase Lettvenuk is a testament to the transformative power of trades and the undeniable value of adaptability in today's job market. For anyone standing at the crossroads of their career, wondering if a pivot is worth the risk, Chase's experiences offer not just a beacon of hope but a roadmap to a career that evolves with you.
Follow CWBA-Regina Chapter:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cwbareginachapter/
Find your Local CWBA Chapter Here: https://www.cwbgroup.org/association/chapters
Thank you to our Podcast Advertisers:
Canada Welding Supply: https://canadaweldingsupply.ca/
There is no better time to be a member! The CWB Association membership is new, improved and focused on you. We offer a FREE membership with a full suite of benefits to build your career, stay informed, and support the Canadian welding industry. https://www.cwbgroup.org/association/become-a-member
The CWB Association brings you a weekly podcast that connects to welding professionals around the world and unrepresented communities as we continue to strive for a more diverse workforce. Join us as we celebrate National Volunteer Month to showcase the incredible contributions of our Chapter Executives from across Canada and globally.
Please note this episode is a replay, bringing you a blast from the past.
From the oil fields to the sales floor, and now deep into the mechanics of heavy-duty machines, Chase Lettvenuk is a testament to the transformative power of trades and the undeniable value of adaptability in today's job market. For anyone standing at the crossroads of their career, wondering if a pivot is worth the risk, Chase's experiences offer not just a beacon of hope but a roadmap to a career that evolves with you.
Follow CWBA-Regina Chapter:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cwbareginachapter/
Find your Local CWBA Chapter Here: https://www.cwbgroup.org/association/chapters
Thank you to our Podcast Advertisers:
Canada Welding Supply: https://canadaweldingsupply.ca/
There is no better time to be a member! The CWB Association membership is new, improved and focused on you. We offer a FREE membership with a full suite of benefits to build your career, stay informed, and support the Canadian welding industry. https://www.cwbgroup.org/association/become-a-member
All right, I can check. Check, I'm good. So I'm Max Duran. Max Duran, cwb Association Welding Podcast, pod pod podcast. Today we have a really cool guest welding podcast. The show is about to begin. Attention, welders in Canada Looking for top quality welding supplies.
Speaker 1:Look no further than Canada Welding Supply With a vast selection of premium equipment, safety gear and consumables. Cws has got you covered. They offer fast and reliable shipping across the country. And here's the best part All podcast listeners get 10 10 off any pair of welding gloves. Can you believe that? Use code cwb10 at checkout when placing your next order. Visit canada welding supplyca. Now canada welding supply, your trusted welding supplier. Happy welding. Welcome to another edition of the CWB Association podcast. My name is Max Saron and I have brought another fantastic guest from my neck of the woods poaching the local community. The best I can, I got Chase Letvinuk with us here, and he is also a part of the Regina chapter and involved in many of the things that is going on in this community. Chase, how are you doing?
Speaker 3:I'm doing well. How about yourself, Max?
Speaker 1:Pretty good, I practiced your last name in front of you and still dropped the ball when it was go time.
Speaker 3:It's okay. There's people I've known for years and they don't even bother.
Speaker 1:So, chase, let's start the interview at the start here. What is it that you do in Regina? What's your job?
Speaker 3:So my paychecks say that I'm a welder for National Tank Center. They're a subsidiary of a company called Trimac which is one of the biggest hauling companies in North America. So they transport fluids, like you know, like your oils, your ethanol, your gasolines. They do lots of hauling of like bulk powders, so food, different foods, concretes, stuff like that. I'm also a apprentice heavy duty mechanic as well. Just try to do as many different jobs as they can, Less likely for them to send me home.
Speaker 1:Well, that's a that's a very important thing. Going forward in today's world is is having enough skills to make yourself valuable so that companies can't let you go. You know now, I've known you for a number of years now and I've seen your career path take a number of different swings, and I think that is very interesting, one of the reasons that we wanted to kind of bring you on the podcast, because I know that it's an interesting story and a story that's becoming more and more common among welders. You know, a lot of people go into school to become a welder. They might take a welding program and even follow through all the way to Red Seal, but then 10 years down the road, they may not be welding anymore, they might be doing something different, and I think that you've had quite a bit of success in a number of different areas. So let's go back to the start and let's say where are you from? What's your roots? Where were you born?
Speaker 3:So born in Northern Manitoba in a town called the Paw, a small mill town, so they have a paper mill and they have a few other resources around there but kind of grew up north of Prince Albert in a little town called Christopher Lake, so basically got moved, moved there around. Time was four or five um, and then did all of my elementary school and all the way up to high school, or even to pre-employment, welding, and went to the high school in town, the, the comprehensive high school called carlton um, mostly because I wanted to be able to. They, they did a big push. Before you go to school, they go. This is the trade school, this is the one where, if you like to do projects, this is where you go, and so that's kind of how I first started in the trades.
Speaker 1:And did you know you wanted to get into the trades, like in high school? Did you already think like I want to do a trade?
Speaker 3:I'm not sure which one, but there's something I want to do like I want to do a trade I'm not sure which one, but there's something I want to do. No, um, well, I I had ideas of different things I would want to do, uh, but basically the thing that attracted me to it was just the fact, like you know, growing up at that time, when discovery channel was doing their their monster garages and american choppers and american hot rods, and I always, like those are just the shows I watch, so it's like, oh, we do these courses so that you can do this. Like, oh, cool, like I helped my dad with some projects around the house growing up but never got to do my own thing. So that was kind of one thing that really pulled me towards that school and going through high school I actually I liked a lot of the courses, did the mechanics, the machining, the welding, and there's actually a point where I thought, you know what, maybe this stuff isn't for me, because those classes were, uh, you know, they weren't very academically focused.
Speaker 3:So it seemed like a lot of times I was just like wasting my time. It's like, okay, they give you five projects, you do your five projects, and it's like majority people, they take the whole year to do it, but then anyone who's a little keener or anything like that it's like oh well, I'm bored half the time because I can only pad for so long, because and they didn't have extra projects for you like.
Speaker 1:I know that's a thing that schools struggle with and when you're at the association, we try to have like even projects online for schools so that if a student gets ahead they got something to do. I mean, back then, when you were in high school, did your high school have much for the keeners you know?
Speaker 3:not particularly. It was basically like you know, you have your your time where it's like okay, we're supposed to be doing um learning in class this week, so we'll be doing some safety stuff and we'll, you know, we'll have a test on friday. But between monday, where they teach the stuff, and friday when you take the test test, it was a little more open. So me being kind of ADD, I was bored out of my mind. So like, okay, well, at least if I do academic courses, at least I'm constantly stimulated, yeah.
Speaker 1:So what did you do right out of high school then? Did you pursue academic or what happened?
Speaker 3:So I basically well, the plan was to go to u of s, go be an engineer. That was something I really interested. But I kind of hit a wall part way through high school because I was working part-time as just at a staples a lot of hours there, plus that was, um, you know, doing all the sports and things like that, and I was like you know what, I'm kind of over school and I happened to be in the library during lunch one day just doing some homework so I could go to work after school. And uh, the shop teacher happened to be in there just and he was like, yeah, what tell me about your welding stuff? And then he started talking like, yeah, maybe I will do that. They ended up just signing up for SIAS instead. I was like you know what I can do? That that only takes eight months, only cost me 2,500 bucks, that's pretty okay.
Speaker 1:So you took the SAS poly or SIAS course then in Prince Albert yes, yep, and it was eight months, or the yeah, the eight month course you said. So that's the 34 weeker Yep, and how did it feel?
Speaker 3:Yeah, it was, I liked it Like it was. Uh, it was just, it's just seemed like something that fit. Uh, the teachers there were pretty good and there was enough that if you ask them, uh, kind of a weird question about something they actually like interested, like oh, oh, oh, you actually want to know about this. Okay, so you started learning about the, the, you know, the more technical side of it, and that was kind of my thing is like, oh well, I, I know a lot of people at least all the people I'd met at the time were just, hey, I, I just wanted to put the metal down. I don't care how it happens, as long as it looks, looks good, as long as it passes, I'm happy.
Speaker 3:And that was my experience of welders at that time. I was like, oh, I'm going to be something different. I thought that might spin off to other things, but just kind of was ended up meeting people like yourself, people who are actually interested in it, and I was like, oh, there are lots of these people. I just was never exposed to them. Yeah, I always thought of you know, welding is the guy that the farmer's kid does, um, and as long as it holds, it's fine.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I hate that. Well, I shouldn't say I hate it, but retraining farmer's kids as a teacher sometimes was very frustrating, like if my uncle told me this is how you do it. It's like, oh man, I got to fight, uncle, you know. So you know you come out of the eight-month program, the pre-employment program. That's a level one. Level two you got a few hours and lots of the times what I hear from northern communities in Saskatchewan or anywhere in Canada, really more remote communities is that it's sometimes tough to find a job. Now in today's market like today, right now, anyone could find a job, like you could throw a hat and find a job right now. But you know, 10 years ago it was, it was a little bit tougher. Was it hard for you to find a job? Were you able to get something right out of?
Speaker 3:right out of college. What? How did it work? Yeah, I, no problem I had. At the time. It was around 2011, 2012.
Speaker 3:Oil was kind of at its height and I had friends who had gone to lloyd minster area for uh, different trades a few electricians, some plumbers, stuff like that and he's like, hey, uh, the place we were staying, they had a free room. They said, you know, rent will be cheap, just if you can find a job here. And I called a few places and ended up working for a company that was like a subcontractor to one of the big oil field companies called Foremost, where they built those big crude tanks that you see in the fields and oil country sort of deal that collects all the crude. And uh, yeah, that was they said. Yeah, you got a job. So I went out there and started work. I think I worked there for better part of a year. So I went to another shop for a few months. It was definitely a higher paying job, but basically I was there for about maybe two and a half months and then they went and they did a big layoff. They were re figuring out how they're gonna do it, and so I had gotten more money for only three months.
Speaker 3:So I ended up at uh looking for work again. Um, ended up having I was off, you know, about a week uh trying to find work and ended up. Everywhere I applied they're like, yep, sure, here's a job, you want it, you want it. And ended up being job in advance. Uh, advanced engineer products at the time and lloyd minster. They basically like, oh, we've already done your criminal check, your paperwork's done. And I hadn't even accepted the job yet, but so I just kind of went with it. I was like, oh, that that job sounds kind of interesting, get to do a little mechanical, a little welding stuff like that. And uh ended up staying there for like four years or so. Yeah, and advance has got a good reputation?
Speaker 1:yeah, because they. You get to work with some stainless, some aluminum. You get to, you know, try different things out and trailer services.
Speaker 3:It never runs out of work exactly, yeah, I, yeah, I enjoyed it a lot. Um, finished, got my red seal and welding through them. Uh, even they were short on mechanics. So they what the foreman just kind of was slowly starting to give me more and more mechanical work to the point where I actually went and got my uh, heavy duty, my heavy duty trailer technician ticket. You know, it was just a glorified first year in alberta, uh, about a few months after that I was like, okay, well, I'm also working on trucks, might as well keep on going. Found another job again. It was, you know, paid. Well, it was uh, but it was that uh, it was actually just working for a guy who had a mobile rig, so it was just like kind of his hand Uh. But you know, after a couple of months it was just my skills work. What he was looking for. He was looking for something that someone who is more experienced, um, he was just hoping he could get a first year and pay him like a first year.
Speaker 2:But he wanted the work of a journeyman yeah, exactly yeah.
Speaker 3:so I just remember there's. There's a job where it's like I did a clutch one day and then the next day he had another one for me, and there's a couple times where I had some questions and he's like we just did one yesterday. You don't remember, I'm sorry, I don't remember what 80 thou feels like and you don't have it in, your dowel gauge is broken, so that's our deal. So that didn't last very long and that kind of had me just kind of looking like hey, maybe there's something else I should be doing right now and I kind of took some time.
Speaker 3:And you're still in Lloydminster at this time You're still in this area the whole time yeah still lloyd minster and but there was kind of some pulling towards saskatoon at the time. Um, mostly it was just family reasons, uh, just it wasn't far. But I found myself driving to saskatoon quite a bit and a job with Liquid Air or Air Liquide opened up, uh, just working on their debt on their sales desk, just inside sales job, and it was going to be a drop in pay but I saw some good potential there and, talking to um the manager at the time, uh, there's, there's a lot of good growth opportunity if not at saskatoon in the midwest, so saskatchewan, manitoba area.
Speaker 1:And uh, so I went and, yeah, went off, started, started working my career at liquid air so you know a lot of people in the industry and there's something I always tell students end up in sales and it can be in a variety of roles. Like pretty much everyone at lincoln was either an engineer or a welder, right, like that's just. And I actually have heard from like top brass that lincoln is looking to hire more welders to be sales reps because they find that they have a better retention and better service for shops from welders that become their sales techs as opposed to engineers. And you know, I know air lakid, praxair, lindy, messer, valen they all have red seal welders, red seal mechanics on their service lines. You know in terms of of doing service work or sales work.
Speaker 1:But in your mind, you know, when you're, you're like, okay, I've been welding. I, you know, dip my fingers in a mechanical. I like mechanics, um, you know how did you like think like I'm going to apply for this job, like I don't know if I would have even looked at it and been like man, not for me? You know, like, like, like, have you done sales before? Did you already know that you were good at it? Or did you just walk in like, uh, like a pigeon with a blindfold? Like you know, I don't know what the hell's going on, but I'm gonna do something uh, yeah, I did have sales experience when I was working at staples.
Speaker 3:I was actually one of their better selling uh like for the electronics, so laptops and computers, all that stuff, um, I'd done some technician work for them as well. So I've always been kind of just interested in learning all the facets to whatever I do, because, like you said, if if you can do five jobs, then the next guy can only do one. Well, when it comes down to we're a little slow or we need we need someone to move up, they're going to go for the guy that can do everything, not someone who's this and that, and I think that kind of a work ethic my dad's kind of put into me growing up yeah, be useful.
Speaker 1:Right, you want to be the best tool in the toolbox exactly well and Well and yeah, and you can have.
Speaker 3:You can definitely have people who are really good, like much better. I mean one little spot. But if you just need something fixed, well, sometimes there's like you're going back to work at events. If you got, you know, if you just need this big, you know six inch weld, but it's in a place where you have to take a whole bunch of mechanical stuff apart, you're gonna send the guy that can take it apart, weld it together and then you don't have to have multiple people in the same job.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, and that's huge. Being able to have one person do many roles is just a time saver, like it's just logical. Right now, when you made this move to the sales desk, did you feel like you were kind of stepping out, because it's not like you went to work for mom pa's convenience store. You went to work for air lakid. It's like probably like one of the big three you know uh suppliers in in canada, if not north america, and and and a very old, established company. You know liquid carbonics goes back over a hundred years. They were a part of the original signing of both AWS and CWB association, so like I mean, this is a storied historic company. Did you feel like it was easy, like you just dropped in and like, yep, show me. Or was there a lot of uh training that was required?
Speaker 3:There was a lot um that was required. There was a lot of. There's definitely a lot of process to everything and that's one thing I've found with big companies in general, like even the company I work for now, trimac. It's very much, it's a big process to do most things just because they have all this history, all this legacy and stuff. But as far as getting the job, it wasn't too bad. I think they like the fact that getting someone Red Seal Welder, getting someone who has a history in sales, someone who is somewhat technology savvy- Don't say you're too good at technology.
Speaker 1:I've seen you on some other projects, so uh I could usually figure it out.
Speaker 3:Uh, yeah, it just kind of seemed like a win win for them. Uh and I was actually in the saskatoon branch for about six months before they actually brought uh asked me to move to brandon manitoba, so they needed someone to be uh, they call it a coordinator for the branch.
Speaker 1:So making sure that you're inside and outside sales teams are working together, making sure the driver is doing what they need to do, yeah, basically manage your stuff without being out the fire and hire people, which is a little bit of a blessing, because the hr side of things is when things get real basically manage your stuff without being able to fire and hire people, which is a little bit of a blessing, because the HR side of things is when things get real bureaucratic. But so, so, like you're kind of a rolling stone right now. Like you know, you're coming out of the paw, where you know I got friends from the paw and that's a beautiful part of the country, but it's it's been struggling financially for a while now. The paper mill shut down so it was a big deal. You know, you end up in Lake Christopher Lake, which is beautiful, again over to Lloydminster, then to Saskatoon and now you're getting shipped off to Brandon.
Speaker 1:A good thing, you didn't have a lot of stuff holding you around. Like I mean, you know this is for the people that are looking to get into these lines of work that there is movement. That's required. So if you got a young family, things would get pretty complicated, right.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and I didn't move to Regina yet.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so so you're in Brandon, you're coordinating and you're helping, you know you're you're kind of leveling up within Airlie Kee. Now you know what happens now.
Speaker 3:I'm at the point where I'm already looking at going up to the full outside sales covering a large area sort of job. I've been talking to a you know some of the guys who were about to retire or that were looking at it. So there's opportunities coming up in Winnipeg, a few other places and actually Regina wasn't even on my map for a while, but then there was essentially one person was let go at one point and the so it was a two person territory down to one guy. The guy did it by himself for a little bit. It was like this is two man kilometers for me and he actually moved on to another company as well. So it was kind of a oh hey, we need someone quick. So I legitimately had two weeks. I like I was coming to Regina for the farm show or the egg progress show, yep, the farm progress show the egg progress show Yep the farm progress show, farm progress show.
Speaker 3:Yeah, there's so many names, they're so similar. Uh, so I was coming down anyways, and then at that point the the guy who is the regional sales manager for uh, basically yeah, northern Ontario to Saskatchewan was like, okay, uh, we're going out for supper the night you come in. And then he was just like, hey, this job's for you. If you want it, it starts in two weeks. Oh, so, exactly. So it was basically just like me going, okay, looking on Kijiji that night and like, okay, line up, this place, this place, this place. Hopefully I can find a place to live. That's really the deal.
Speaker 1:And yeah, it sounds like your boxes probably weren't even unpacked from the previous trip. You probably still had everything packed up.
Speaker 3:I was in Brandon for about a year and a half, almost two years.
Speaker 1:Okay, so knowing single young guys. Yeah, your stuff was still packed up. It was still packed up.
Speaker 3:Knowing single young guys yeah, your stuff was still packed up, it was still packed up.
Speaker 1:There were things in boxes. Yeah, the clothes and the weights are out. Everything else is still put on.
Speaker 3:Well, that's what holds the TV up.
Speaker 1:All right, so then you move to the thriving metropolis of Regina, right yeah, which is the capital of all things small. So what, what, uh, what was that? You came in? It sounds like it was like carte blanche here you go, here's a, here's a, uh, our, our location. And the Regina one also has like the ready arc you know, attached attached to it. So it's got some a little bit more complex. Was the one in Brandon also ready arc, with the rentals and stuff like that?
Speaker 3:No, uh, they're actually run as two separate businesses, but they just happened to be in the same building just cause. That's just. That's just what worked out. They both needed places at the same time. So they just oh hey, we're putting this big fancy building in. Uh, oh hey, we're putting this big fancy building in the Regina, so let's get someone else in there to help cut the rent, sort of deal.
Speaker 1:Well, and it was a very mutual agreement, like I mean. I think it benefited both sides really well.
Speaker 3:Oh for sure. Yeah, it's. And really there's how many times where something happens, where a guy comes in and he's like I just dropped off my machine to get fixed. He says it's going to be two weeks, like, do you guys have a new machine I can buy? And it's like, okay, well, we have a machine you can buy. Or you can just hand off to the next guy and be like, hey, this guy can rent you a machine for a month if you don't need to. You know, because a lot of times they want to buy something small, a little big or something like that to get them going. It's like, okay, well, here you can get the rent, the exact same what you usually have.
Speaker 1:You don't need to worry about pitching pennies, yeah, but uh, thank you both ways too. Yeah, so when you came in to regina, yeah, you know this is kind of when I met you, right. So how did that happen? Like, remind me how I met you? Tell, because, like you, you weren't a part of the chapter in winnipeg, were you? No, no no, and you weren't a part of the chapter prior to leaving saskatchewan no, uh.
Speaker 3:So essentially I has was kind of in a situation where I don't know anybody. I didn't know the area that well. I think I'd been doing the job for six months or so and my manager at the time had just like, okay, well, let's try focusing on certain areas. So I would go for, I would uh, go for egg production. There's a, there's a so many places that build egg and we had a few customers like your, your right ways, your Morris industries at the time in uh, in Yorkton, and a few other places, and so, like you know, focus on egg.
Speaker 3:And then I came to the boys like hey, came to the boys like hey, focus on schools. And that was one thing I figured was like, hey, if I can try and get into sass, poly and try and present my stuff so that, uh, the students, they think of liquid air first, then that might be a good stepping stone because, like you know, they're going to start as welders but they're going to eventually be foremans, they're going to eventually be lead hands and they're going to have a little more of a say is or if they just need stuff for themselves, they see gloves, they just need a box of rods so they can practice, I uh. So I think that's when I had met you as I'd come into the school and then I'm pretty sure you mentioned that the, the welcome, the opening uh night was like that week and I was like, oh cool. And I said, I think, to my boss like, could they, could I expense this if I do it? He was like yeah, for sure.
Speaker 3:And then I think after that you guys had like a lincoln and a feronius night and I was like man, this is awesome. I think I met kevin during that too and uh kind of started like, oh, hey, there's some coming back to. You know, when I thought back in the day I would think of, well, there's just people who want to glue things together all of a sudden, finding people who are passionate about like, oh, people are interested in this new stuff, like I would see something working for Liquid Air being like oh, oh, lincoln has this new technology. I would love to see it in person.
Speaker 3:But you don't get the opportunity, it's hard to Exactly If you don't happen to be in that situation. All of a sudden it's like, oh hey, I can go to these things. I can talk to people about welding stuff, and they're not just sitting there thinking, okay, when's this guy going to try and sell me something, because? And they're not just sitting there thinking, okay, when's this guy going to try and sell me something? Because that's always been a thing. I like cargo welding, but when you're in the sales position, they're just waiting for you to give them a price. At that point, if you just want to talk about something, that's cool.
Speaker 1:They don't usually want to talk to sales guys about that Makes it sound like you're trying to pitch him on something. Well, and that's the thing that you know. It's so inherent about the association and the chapters is like you know, when you move, if you go to a new area, you just like the chapters will immediately introduce you to a whole pile of people that are into the same stuff. You are. You know what I mean, like and and, and that's what what we're doing. And I read like I was teaching at the college when you came by and I can't stress enough. I just had a meeting with Sebastian the other day.
Speaker 1:We went out for supper Sebastian from Lincoln, sebastian Tremblay and we were talking about how important it is for for salespeople. You know the the from every sales company. Like it doesn't matter if it's a messer, lindy valen, whatever it is, but getting involved with your local chapter gets you in the schools, it gets you in the small businesses, it gets you into the presentations, it gets you out there and it's easy, like it's all set up already, like it's minimal work and, and let me tell you it, the students love when you know you. Like you said yourself, you did, and before you, todd from Praxair used to do these like packs. Okay, first day of school. You go to school you don't know what the hell's going on, but the supplier has it already set up. Hey, come by our shop. We'll give you a toolbox with everything you need in that toolbox at a big discount 150 bucks and it's got everything you need to get rolling. That makes it so much easier for the students and takes so much of the stress off.
Speaker 3:You know 100%, 100%, yeah, cause it. And really, like when I went to school, like for pre-employment, I had no idea what I needed. Like they gave you a list but it's like, oh, you need six pairs of gloves. Okay, what's a good glove, what's a bad glove, and what am I going to burn out? And found that out pretty quick, especially when you're first starting and you don't know how close yeah, put your hands the hot things are going to affect your gloves.
Speaker 1:Yeah, helmets and gloves. Your first helmet becomes a puddle and your first first gloves burn real quick. Grabbing hot steel teaching kids stop grabbing the hot steel, use bang. Go get your vice grips for crying out loud, stop grabbing. Yeah, I know it smells kind of like barbecue, but don't. Your gloves are too expensive 30 bucks a pair to buy. I'm like nobody wants to waste that, like no, all right. Well, it's a perfect time to take our commercial break. We'll take a quick break here for the advertisers and sponsors of the show and then we'll come come back with a little bit of. You know what happened after Air Liquide and you know what's going on in your life now. So stay tuned everybody, with Chase Letvinuk here from the Regina chapter and from National Tank Services.
Speaker 2:The CWB Association is new and improved, and focused on you. We offer a free membership with lots of benefits to anyone interested in joining an association that is passionate about welding. We are committed to educating, informing and connecting our workforce. Gain access to your free digital publication of the Weld Magazine, free online training conferences and lots of giveaways. Reach out to your local CWB Association chapter today to connect with other welding professionals and share welding as a trade in your community. Build your career, stay informed and support the Canadian welding industry. Join today and learn more at cwbassociationorg.
Speaker 1:And we are back here on the CWB Association podcast. My name is Max Saron. We have Chase with us from here in Regina, my hometown, and also my home chapter, regina chapter, and you know what, for the people that are listening, I still come across people in the industry that are like what's a chapter? Come on, come on, get with the program. Everybody, every major center in Canada, has a chapter for the association. Talk to them, talk to me, I'll connect you, become joined, become one with your local chapter and get involved and I will help you connect with hundreds of people in your area that are like, minded into the same cool things that we are into and it's all free. It's all free.
Speaker 1:So, chase, this is right where you start now in the story. You know you're a young sales person manager, I think at this point for you know, uh, air, lakita and regina, your boss, is saying you got to get more connected. You come to the college. I introduced you to the chapter. What was that like? You know you finding out what a chapter even is, what it does and what, what the, and then you get kind of wrangled into becoming a part of it. What was that part of it for you?
Speaker 3:Well, it was kind of funny because, realizing after a couple meetings, it's like, oh, I actually added a member, but it was a Saskatoon branch, basically. At one point during pre-employment, someone had come in and said, hey, check out, sign this sheet here, put your email here and uh, uh, you can use this card to get, you know, discounts on certain things. I was like, oh cool, I like discounts, kept in my card, forgot about it for years. And then uh, and then, yeah, all of a sudden it's like find out, oh, hey, this is that thing that they kept on talking about, but I didn't hear anything else about.
Speaker 1:So, uh, yeah and then it was like, oh wow, like this is a real thing isn't it?
Speaker 3:yeah, oh, this is this. This is where people actually talk about this stuff. It's not just theory now. It's like oh, I get to see lincoln's uh, two wire filler metal system. The.
Speaker 1:The.
Speaker 3:Hyperfill. Yeah, which was I remember that taking a minute to get used to?
Speaker 1:That was pretty cool, it's just so fast, but yeah.
Speaker 3:So from there I worked that area for a while and actually got a job offer from a company called Rockmount. They do the maintenance and repair welding supplies. I was familiar with a few of their competitors but they had started to want to get a footing in canada yeah, that's a niche, that's a niche market like you only have, like the eagle alloys.
Speaker 1:You know you got the buellers, you got a few odd companies out there that'll do like the nickels and the hard surfacing and you know that, that weird non-certified spectrum. But above and beyond certification, really, exactly.
Speaker 3:Yeah, uh, they were a great company to work for. They had lots of uh, uh, it's a it's still because they're not a huge company, it still feels like a family kind of company. There's a lot of positive and it's a really cool product. Uh, it's just uh, a lot of their structure was based on the, an american very much driving to all these something that's a little more population dense, being able to stop at all these different types of shops and have all these different problems where I find canada is a little more. We have to do this to cope, because we have this cwb standard for all the, for all these things we build. So we assume when we repair stuff, we're going to need to go to that level, which is a great way to think. But yeah, it makes for a lot of driving. It was a little too much for me and I kind of, after a few months uh, you know, driving out to bc and just kind of burnt out, getting kind of burnt out finding that I was like, oh, every two weeks, every month, I'm having this these days where I'm just not there anymore, it, it just wasn't my thing anymore, had to say, hey, sorry, we tried, we got some good milestones, but I won't be the guy to be able to do this. I need to. I'm a homebody, I like to be home every night, I like going to bed at a certain time.
Speaker 3:So I started looking at some other opportunities and a job. I think I had done a few interviews, job tests at like Brandt, the big production shop in town. Figured that'd be a good ladder to climb, um, and ended up national tank posted. Like the day. I basically was like, okay, I've gotten a few options. I got a management position offered at a local gym. I got to have, uh, you know, other positions for different jobs that keep me here.
Speaker 3:And now she's like oh, that's almost perfect, because I loved working at advance and lloyd, they even had offered me to come back and I was like I, like regina, I had some stuff going on. You know, uh, girlfriend, that I didn't want to leave yet certain deal, um and uh, still with today, thank god. Uh and uh got uh, yeah, star work, national tank and yeah, it was kind of a good situation because they don't do a ton of welding there. So I still get lots of time to do mechanical work so I can kind of make my journeyman rate but work as an apprentice, so that's kind of a bonus.
Speaker 1:So are you going to start working towards your heavy duty mechanic now through the company? Yeah, exactly, you're going to start working towards the, your heavy duty mechanic now for through the company.
Speaker 3:Yeah, exactly, they're very, they're very set up to get people through it. Um, you know they, they have a great apprenticeship program where essentially, they'll let, uh, you know, you get, you get your AI while you're gone. They'll boost you up to about 80% and then, I think, if your marks are above a certain point, they'll top you up again. Nice, so when, if you come back and it's like hey, I got all eighties, I got all nineties, whatever they're able to say, okay, all right, there you go, you just need to stay for so many months, but they're, uh, they're, yeah, like you said, they're a good company, they're big, big company.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they're big. I've known lots of people in in well, saskatchewan. There's a lot of truckers. People might not know that, but there's a lot of trucking companies and truckers and truck repair facilities and tank facilities, because we are basically like the center of Canada and everything rolls through Regina. We're on the number one for train and car, so you know everything at some point. So we got train like, we got pro cars, we got the GEs, we got all these transportation services, yeah, and it doesn't dry up like and they're generally very good paying jobs too.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's pretty reasonable. Like, uh, uh, it was the best offer I'd gotten. It was as close as it matters to 40 bucks, so Good gotten. It was as close as it matters to 40 bucks, so good. Yeah, it's pretty.
Speaker 1:Now have you gone back to do your your rounds of school? Have you gotten back in the desk yet for heavy duty mechanic.
Speaker 3:No, I uh actually it was just went unpacking into a place I just moved into and found my books for heavy duty, mechanical. Uh, I'm not signed up yet for my next bit of schooling. I think I need a few more hours before they'll let me do that, and I'm pretty sure once I just get my boss to sign a piece of papers how much I've done, it should be fine. But uh, because I've been there for about eight months now, yeah, roughly, so I should have enough, do you?
Speaker 1:uh do you miss sales at all? Do you miss, miss that world at all? Like you were in it for a number of years, you know, and we had a chapter member on, on on in the chapter before Dylan, all the way, you also was a welder who went to sales and then went back to welding, you know. So like do you miss it? Or you, you had enough.
Speaker 3:I am glad I had the skills I got from it, because you know, just learning about business as much as I did from talking to people at big multinational corporations, you find out all these cool things and all of a sudden you come back to welding and it's just like you can appreciate more things. So some things were just kind of like oh, we do things this way. Like, oh well, because I've seen both sides, I can be like okay, I can understand their decision for this because they have all these criterias to me. Or I can say it from the other way too, where they've always done it this way and you realize, oh, you can do it this way because I've seen the product or I've seen the service, either like, oh, that saved us money and it doesn't seem like it's a big push because I'm no longer a sales guy, so I just have those skills no, and that's very true.
Speaker 3:Those are very important skills and really every job has sales involved with it. When you, when you, uh, when a job's brought into you, you have to, you have to sell how you're going to do it. Or, um, if they're trying to say, hey, we want to, you know, we want to save money, we want to do this repair and you have to be able to add the value of what is the benefit of doing the proper repair versus the, the bandaid fix. Uh, sort of deal like bandaid fix might get them through safety, but next safety comes around. That's going to be a lot more work now.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, nah. Do you ever find yourself being on an encyclopedia? Now that you've been, you know sales for a couple of different companies. You can be. You know like. Oh, hey, you know what Part number 793-11442 would be the perfect product. I think it was last listed at $17 a pound.
Speaker 3:You know like I, you know what. I haven't had that exact thing. But there are times where it's like, oh, we, you know, going up to the, going up to your supervisor, being oh yeah, we need some 11 to 5 twos what the zip cuts. Are you sure that's the part number? Can you bring me the box? I'm like no, that's the part number, trust me, I know, I know yeah no, that has come up a couple times but it's not a regular thing.
Speaker 3:But it did build up the skill of uh, when you go to charge parts out, there's more parts I know the numbers of, just because you know you built the skill. So it's like, oh okay, you start noticing all these different uh, uh tendencies so it's like, oh no, that's not the right one, because that digit there means it's for a tapered, uh, tapered spindle, not a, a rat, not a cylinder, cylinder or spindle.
Speaker 1:Oh okay, that's what I mean well and you know it's interesting because years ago when I first got one of my first supervisor jobs in a welding shop, I had a. We hired this young kid and he had come from sales I believe. He came from praxair at the time and he had. Then he started in sales, was selling welding stuff and then got interested in welding and went to school for welding and became a welder and then he came to work at brant and he was on my team there and he looked at blueprints like a salesperson instead of like how welders look at them in terms of as a welder.
Speaker 1:So he would come up to me and be like, oh, this part's not fitting right. I'm like, oh, which one Like the upper shaft part? And he's like, no, no, part 1144-2. And I'm like part and I had to look. So he was going off the parts list with the actual part numbers and remembering which parts go in which part, which is actually a way smarter way of doing it than you know my old fart way of being like oh, that's the upper guide shaft, which doesn't say anything, that I just know. That's what it does. You know what I mean. But yeah, I really appreciate and I you know that was god. That's gonna be 20 years ago now. This is right before lean and 5s really started pushing hard, because now everything has to have part numbers written on it everywhere you go. Like if you're in a fab shop and you're not putting part numbers on every part, you're 30 years behind, because that's really just the way it's done now.
Speaker 3:Because there's way less mistakes when you know the part numbers 100%. Well, and it's funny because, like, we're very high tech on most of our stuff, except for welding material. So aluminum is a part number, steel is a part number, just generic. How many feet you needed? Yeah, exactly, so it's like all right. So I used a piece of plate that was this big. So how many linear feet is that? Oh great.
Speaker 1:And it doesn't matter if it's like a 53-51 or a 4100 or Nope.
Speaker 3:Nope, doesn't matter what type it is, is it the?
Speaker 1:shiny steel or the not shiny steel.
Speaker 3:The part number is literally steel and aluminum. That's an easy one to remember.
Speaker 1:Well, yeah, you'll be the one to change this. You're going to be the next person in there. You're going to be like, hey, you know what, boss? I think we should maybe break this into at least a couple categories I've brought it up.
Speaker 3:I've brought it up, but we'll see.
Speaker 1:We'll see so you know, in this, in this career path, you know mechanic to sales to no, welder to sales to mechanic. Okay, what's next? What do you want to do? Do you feel like you got a good spot in this company? You want to climb in here and see kind of where you end up? It sounds like it's a fun place to work or do you want to kind of explore something else?
Speaker 3:currently it's the plan a companies for me is always to move up.
Speaker 3:Um, I've talked to him about there's gonna there. We're basically building up the vagina branch, just, you know, getting more good hires, uh, just because a lot of times we can't keep up with our customer accounts, and that's what gives us money, as opposed to fixing trimax just to write it off for Trimax. More than anything, we're just a maintenance crew then. So as that grows, there's going to be a new foreman position coming up. There's more and more lead hand positions as well. So I'm already in the running for our next lead hand position once we get a couple more people. And, yeah, that's the goal is to get another red seal, have my on-road heavy mechanical and my uh, uh welding good combo, and if I want to go and do my off-road stuff too, that might not be a good, that might be a good option too. And a lot of the training is pretty relevant for even national tank too, because, like a lot of hydraulics on your you know, your boom trucks, your, your vac trucks, uh, anything like that. It's all relevant information.
Speaker 1:No for sure, A hundred percent. Like I, um, I worked for a hydraulics company building cylinders for a couple of years. Superior Hard Chroma was called they did it. They were mainly a chroming shop but they had a cylinder division. And that was when I probably got some of my best experience in working with exotics chrome, nickels, stainlesses and then working in the crazy high tolerance world of cylinder repair where you know you'd have these million dollars.
Speaker 1:Cylinders come in and like the, the, the, the one eyelet screwed and you got to remove it and replace it and put it and weld a new one on without throwing this thing out even one one thousandths of an inch, or else it's screwed. And you know those are. You know, when you're working, there's a, there's a Millerite, there's a hydraulics guy, there's, you know. Then everyone works as a team. You learn so much because you're learning from everybody. And when you're not welding, you're on the tools with them, because then you're just their, their helper, and they're like you know I, you take these lines apart or drain these and and then you see even even accidents Like I.
Speaker 3:I saw a ball bearing go through a guy's leg once because he, you know, cracked open a fitting with a thing still under 20,000 pounds of pressure, pressure, and well, that's not gonna work, you know well, it's funny too, just talking about tolerances, because, like, a lot of stuff that we do is just, you know, a lot of maintenance, a lot of repair work, and here always you're like, oh, it has to be within this percentage of this. But man, I have blueprints for half my stuff. It's like, uh, we need a, we need a place to put wheel chocks, everything's covered on the side. Here Can you fab something? And it's like, okay, well, I can't do the design of it last time because there's something there. So you're trying to figure out all these different things and using the material you already have, because they don't want to buy new material for that one job. So it's like, okay, so you end up with super thick material holding this little thing on. It's like okay, so you end up with super thick material, this little thing.
Speaker 1:I was like okay well, it works Outside the boss's office, cutting down the hand railing. We need some pipe.
Speaker 3:Not quite that far, but almost.
Speaker 1:No, I mean, I remember being on site once at a we were doing a conveyor system up in Northern Saskatchewan and we get out to this job and I even thought on the way up there that it was weird, cause we we weren't taking a truck with steel with us. And then we got told the materials were there. We get up there and when we get there, the first thing our boss our lead at the time, cause I was like 19 or 20 is like all right, so where's the materials? They've been dropped off already. Oh, and he pointed to a structure of the old setup and that's where you're getting your material from. So it was all just torches and zip cuts and we had to cut apart the old one to build the new one. And I was like, wow, but man, you learn lots.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, you can save stuff. Yeah, is it worth it? Maybe not, but sometimes parts are a month out.
Speaker 1:Yeah, especially Northern remote Saskatchewan, you're not ordering steel and it's getting dropped off in an hour. You know, when you live in the city you get spoiled. You know like, oh we're, we ordered 40 feet short. Oops, you can get on the phone and 40 feet will show up by the end of the day. You know what I mean. Or you can even just jump in your truck and go pick it up for work. You know Mm-hmm. But when you're up in the middle of nowhere it's like I remember we even we were running stringers for stairs and they had all these old stairs that we had cut off. But we were like two steps short and he was like well, I think Bob, two farms over, has a couple of stairs from one of his projects that came apart. Yeah, like, oh, no, here we go, like we're now we're going to be trespassing somewhere to steal two stairs.
Speaker 3:Yeah, exactly. Oh, so many weird things like that. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:So you know, for for the people listening, let's, let's try to do the, the association pitch, because you are on the executive for the Regina chapter and you know you do great work and and well, all the chapters in Canada do great work and obviously I have to say that, but I but I believe it you know, as the past chair for Regina and just across you know the spectrum of what the jobs are, what. Let me break this into two sections. One, what do you get the most? What? What satisfies you to keep you on the on the board? You know, cause it is work and you don't get paid for it, it's volunteer work and it it can be stressful sometimes and you know things can be a little bit up and down and and you're working with volunteers and that is what it is. But what keeps you here, what keeps you in the Regina chapter?
Speaker 3:I think the main thing is just the fact that, as I grew up, like welding didn't really seem like as much of an option. Like I went to high school thinking like, oh, I want to try this for the class, but I never thought of it as a career at the time. You know, just like everyone else been told, oh, you need to go to university, hence why I was lead towards an engineer, but then also really, oh, no, no, you can still do all right and not need tens, hundreds of thousands of dollars of debt you can do. Well, there's and it's not like, oh, if you're a welder, you're stuck as a welder for the rest of your life.
Speaker 3:Well, I've, how many things have I done? And I'm in, I'm 30. So, and uh, that's uh. It just kind of shows like those skills are very transferable, and that's one thing I've learned throughout all the jobs I've done. It's like, as long as you care and do a little bit, it's always going to be useful later. You can always. You might not need an exact detail, but the principle you learned from something is still going to be useful. That's awesome.
Speaker 1:And then the second part of the question is you know what do you see for the chapter going forward? What would you like to see the chapter do better? What could the community do better for the chapter? You know what's the future for the Regina chapter look like for you?
Speaker 3:future for the Regina chapter look like for you? Well, I just kind of I've been wanting to just use the chapter as a good place to start figuring out events and things like that that we can do to, for one, let the people who are coming to the events know about welding, what kind of opportunities, what the CWB Association could do for them, sort of deal. And also, just as we're getting those funds, as we're building these things, it's just helping out those schools. So when you do have the caterer, who is the little head, he might be able to find out oh hey, here's some material. There's this thing called Skills Canada. This is one of the things you need. This is one of the things you need. This is one of the things you can do. And then, all of a sudden, they start learning. You get one all-star out of high school.
Speaker 3:Now, all of a sudden, that program gets more funding just because we're trying to uh push more awareness of like, hey, trades aren't going anywhere anytime soon. Uh, you're always gonna need stuff glued together. You're always gonna need stuff, stuff rebuilt. It's a, it's a good job. It's uh, it's a great option. And I felt growing up it was very much hey, university. You need to go for this degree. You don't need the degree. It's great if you do, I would still consider going to university, but I don't have a reason to right now I'm literally signing up for another university class this afternoon, like I mean it doesn't, it doesn't need to stop right, like I mean, life is long and and it's your time.
Speaker 1:You know what I mean. This is what I say to a lot of young people is like get in the trades first, work for a bit, make, get that money, get that knowledge, and then decide if you want to go to university. Wait a year or two, then decide do I want to go to university, do I want to be an engineer, do I want to be whatever? Number one you'll have some cash. You're not going to be in the hole. Number two you have a little bit of life experience now.
Speaker 1:So going back to university when you're a couple of years older man, let me tell you it was not for me. It was whole hard and welding was not. I could just work and I had lots of energy and I was in shape and it was fun. You know, I had a blast. It's like the cruise and all my traveling was so much fun. Going back to university 10 years later was like also way more fun, because I have time and I'm not in debt, and it's like and there's no rush. It's not like, it's not a race. People are always like talking about the next destination. It's not about the destination. It's about the drive.
Speaker 1:Like, think about road trips, you know like hey, we're going on a road trip with buddies to go watch a hockey game in Edmonton.
Speaker 2:You know, half the stories are about getting there. You know what? I mean or coming back or coming back Right.
Speaker 1:So that's how life works right. It's not all just about A to Bs, it's about the line in between too.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and that's one thing finding too, like a lot of people I'm friends with. They, straight out of high school, went to university and they just did their basic arts and sciences, whatever, just trying to figure out what they want to do and it's like, well, you don't need to do that at a university want to do, and it's like, well, you don't need to do that at a university, you can easily do that just by you know you can get a job somewhere doing something that interests you and right, maybe, it's maybe in two years, you did like it and but but now you at least you've tried something, as opposed to I went to school and I still don't know what I want to do, and I'm in there for 30 grand in debt there you go.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know, all right, man. Well, this has been a great interview. I really enjoyed it and, you know, I really appreciate you taking the time to talk to us here.
Speaker 3:For sure. No, it was awesome, it's. I have to get caught up on some more of these episodes. Any shout outs, anybody, anything you want to say, or or, or, or, push or promote, not overly. I don't really do too much on social media or anything like that. Uh, I just yeah, I just like time of welding and uh, I like a lot of people in their giant chapter here. What we're, I think we're gonna, I think what the association is doing in general is good, it's great, it's it, you know it. It just seems like it's growing and it's going in a good direction.
Speaker 1:That's yeah, awesome man. Well, I appreciate it and I got a thumbs up from chase, so I'm good, so I'm not, I'm not fired yet, so we're good, all right, man. Well, thanks a lot and for all the people that have been following along, I hope you've been enjoying the podcast. We're creeping towards that hundred episode and we got some special, special news coming out in the next couple of weeks for the hundredth episode. So stay tuned, cause we got some, we got some stuff we got we're making some deals and there's going to be some crazy stuff going on around here. So, you know, keep it, keep following along. And also, I know, chase, you're not on the socials, but follow us on the socials here for the association, because we've got some announcements coming out soon. So, thanks a lot, chase, and thanks to everyone that's been tuning in. We hope you enjoy the show.
Speaker 4:You've been listening to the Cwb association welding podcast with max. If you enjoyed what you heard today, rate our podcast and visit us at cwbassociationorg to learn more. Feel free to contact us if you have any questions or suggestions on what you'd like to learn about in the future. Produced by the cwb group and presented by max, this podcast serves to educate and connect the welding community. Please subscribe and thank you for listening.