News

By Terry Stephens
Special to the Journal

PermaCrete used on highways, bridges, building entrances, loading docks and walkways, is tough enough to stop a bullet.

Why should concrete be ugly, stained, faded or chipped? That's the way concrete is often seen but PermaCrete, a Nashville, Tenn., producer of protective acrylic polymer cement compounds for resurfacing new or worn concrete surfaces, believes all concrete can be beautiful.

A year ago, with a network of 600 Dealerships across America, PermaCrete opened its first West Coast distribution center in Los Angeles to help pave its way into new construction markets in the western states.

Today, there over 900 Dealers in the United States and many foreign countries.

The company's various PermaCrete products don't replace concrete, but they strengthen, protect and beautify concrete structures with a 1/8- to 2-inch layer of material that withstands 6,000 psi of compressed weight, effectively rated at twice the overall strength and endurance of standard concrete.

Applications in various colors work well over concrete, masonry and steel from highways, bridges and building entrances to loading docks, pool decks and walk-ways. Sealed and non-porous, the PermaCrete products are extremely resistant to industrial chemicals, oils, stains, mildew, intense heat and freeze-thaw environments. Recent ballistic tests have shown that even 1/8 inch-thick PermaCrete surfaces (applied to aluminum panels for backing) used on residential and commercial surfaces can withstand penetration from .38 caliber, .45 caliber and 9 millimeter weapons fired from only 18 inches away. Additionally PermaCrete's vertical coatings used on building exteriors, provide protection from tornadoes, hurricanes and hail.

The product is easily applied over worn,cracked and uneven surfaces in smooth or patterned finishes, can be used for either new or retrofitted projects and provides a slip-resistant surface that surpasses the Federal Trade Commission's standards.

Plus, its resilience means savings on previously high-maintenance areas once they're coated with PermaCrete and also adds to the intrinsic value of real estate properties because the coating is long-lasting.

"The concrete business in this country is a $100 billion industry," said PermaCrete's Senior Vice President Greg Hill."We've had phenomenal response to our product because concrete, once it's poured, lasts for a long time, long enough to deteriorate.

We just go in and fix it without tearing everything out. We do kitchen floors at McDonalds, interstate highways, bridges, interior floors, warehouses and exteriors of residential and commercial buildings."

There are other concrete-surfacing materials on the market, he said, but "ours are unique in their characteristics and wide range of applications, plus unique in being fire-rated that can be used on the sides of buildings as well as on a driveway, yet with similar strengths and sealing ratings," he said.

PermaCrete owes its existence to President and CEO George Henderson's search for a high-quality resurfacing product for the area around his swimming pool. Realizing the potential market for such a product, he formed Quality Systems, Inc. (QSI) with $250,000 of his own capital in 1990, hired two employees and began two years of research with several chemists to create PermaCrete. The product name has since become his business name.

But, Henderson didn't envision just the swimming pool market. He saw pallet-damaged loading docks, pock-marked highway bridge surfaces, worn stucco and plaster building exteriors and deteriorated paved areas around commercial and industrial buildings and warehouses.

Today, the company's files are filled with letters from satisfied customers that include the Sheraton Music City Hotel, for resurfacing its faded indoor and outdoor pool decks; the Allegheny Center Plaza for coating its shopping area with a surface that withstood Pennsylvania's harsh winters and significantly reduced annual maintenance; and the Nashville Convention Center, where a traffic-damaged 3,300 square-foot loading area was resurfaced, producing a new surface that engineers said looked better than the original installation.

PermaCrete adds five to 10 new Dealerships each week from its expanding backlog of more than 10,000 companies that have inquired about carrying the PermaCrete products. The company recently closed an exclusive contract with United Driveways to serve the United Kingdom, adding to its global markets in Europe, the Far East, South America, Canada, Mexico, Bermuda and parts of the Caribbean.

In 2002, Henderson plans to take his company public to raise capital to finance an expansion of its domestic and world markets. To date, the company has subsidized all of its growth from its increasing product sales, he said.