Brandon Burns joined CarbonCure in April 2018, shortly after graduating from Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia. 

“Studying close to CarbonCure’s headquarters in Dartmouth, I had heard about the great things the company was doing and I really admired its mission to decarbonize the concrete industry,” said Brandon.

Brandon earned a degree in environmental engineering and wanted to work for a company that was making real progress to combat climate change. Today Brandon’s two children, aged two and four, keep him focused on his own personal mission: to contribute to a more sustainable future for his family. 

What is CarbonCure Foundations? CarbonCure Foundations is CarbonCure’s customer success program. It ensures customer success throughout the entire CarbonCure journey—from onboarding, installation and testing to ongoing technical support and market development—enabling producers to gain all the advantages of CarbonCure with none of the risks.  Learn more

Supporting Customers on Their Path to Sustainability

Brandon was originally hired as a field engineer with responsibilities for building, testing, installing, and commissioning CarbonCure’s technologies at customer sites. 

His passion and work ethic were reflected in the level of service he delivered to customers and the support he provided to his teammates. As a result, Brandon was quickly promoted to supervisor and then to his most recent role as domestic engineering manager for CarbonCure Ready Mix. 

Today, Brandon’s team is a core part of CarbonCure’s Foundations Program. It works closely with customers to define the right implementation plan for each unique plant and acts as an extension of CarbonCure customers’ quality control teams.

“My favorite part of the job is seeing the growth and development of my team and the company overall. I get a lot of satisfaction from the positive impact that we're having on the built environment through our customers,” said Brandon.

Simplifying Installation Processes for Remote Rollouts

Brandon’s team at CarbonCure always strived for seamless customer implementations. Their goal was to set customers up for success with minimal disruption to their day-to-day plant operations. Brandon would often travel to customer sites to work side-by-side with customers to ensure everything was set up safely and efficiently.  

When COVID-19 closed borders, Brandon’s team realized it needed a way to install customer equipment remotely. Brandon helped establish a new project management team. He trained new project managers and worked to help simplify the installation process with customers, training local contractors and customer maintenance staff to install equipment and creating ways to commission the equipment remotely, while adhering to CarbonCure’s high installation quality and performance standards. 

Due to the ongoing demand for installations, the new team grew rapidly. Brandon now directly and indirectly manages a team of 13 people including four project managers, two QA specialists, one logistics manager, four assembly specialists, an installed systems specialist and a field engineer.

Building a Successful Team

No two days are the same for Brandon and his team. They are on the front lines with customers each day, working with CarbonCure’s assembly team to ensure equipment supply meets demand, supporting the installation of systems at customer sites and addressing any issues or questions that arise.

On a weekly basis, Brandon takes a step back to forecast for team growth to ensure they continue to be successful—and make CarbonCure customers successful—in the long term.

“It makes me proud to hear customers praise my team for the level of service and support they provide,” said Brandon.

The team scaled up fast over the past two years so Brandon constantly strives to support the team in its growth by creating repeatable, scalable processes and ensuring they take a proactive approach to challenges that arise. 

For example, as CarbonCure scales globally, Brandon’s team ensures they understand the logistics and customs requirements of each new country CarbonCure expands to. “During onboarding with customers in a new country, we work with customs brokers to identify any new entry requirements unique to their governments so we can proactively avoid holdups in shipping. We also actively monitor all outbound shipments and take any corrective actions required,” said Brandon.

Another demonstration of the proactive attitude of Brandon’s team is how it balanced supply and demand during the pandemic. “The extended CarbonCure team managed our supply chain really well so we never got to a point where we were waiting on a single component that delayed a customer installation,” said Brandon.

Customizing Installations for Each Customer

CarbonCure is easily retrofitted to any concrete plant. The equipment is simple to install and requires very little training and maintenance on the customer’s side. However, how Bradon’s team actually implements it with each producer is unique. 

“What surprises customers the most when they're having their systems installed is how simple it is,” explained Brandon. “For a system that has such a big impact on a producer’s carbon footprint, it's not a huge lift to install.”

Brandon thrives on his customers’ success. One of his most memorable moments is working with Miller & Long to install CarbonCure at several portable concrete plants in the Virginia area at the height of the pandemic. “Miller & Long was one of the first customers that followed our new self-installation process and they were a pleasure to work with. Communication between my team and their team was excellent and they had full confidence that they were supported in their process,” said Brandon.

Brandon is hyper-aware that CarbonCure customers need to be able to produce concrete 24/7. “We strive to reduce downtime because of our system. Even when it’s out of our control—for example, a CO₂ tank delivery—we will still step in to help expedite shipments from our partners to ensure customers have no disruption to their plant,” said Brandon.

While Brandon’s team is just one small part of the overall Foundations team, it is integral to creating a consistent, reliable customer experience. Along with the Customer Operations, Technical Services and Support (TSS) and Market Development teams, Brandon’s team helps ensure customers thrive and grow their business with CarbonCure.

If you are interested in learning more about how CarbonCure’s Foundations Program can help you with your mix designs and maximize every opportunity CarbonCure has to offer, contact us or give us a call today.

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