Truss Components: Top Quality Structure for Your Building Project

by Kathryn Millhorn

Behind every great accomplishment, individual, or building are unseen but vitally important components. We can’t always see behind the curtain, but we rely on the quality materials, long hours, skilled workmanship, and wealth of knowledge that goes into each success. At Tumwater’s Truss Components, they’ve spent the last three decades supporting the building industry from top to bottom; roof, walls, and floor.

Truss Components crafts top quality roof and floor trusses for every wood framed building type, whether residential addition, new home, agricultural, commercial or multi-family project. Additionally, they provide pre-framed wall panels to assist in reducing on-site framing time and job-site waste, while limiting exposure to the often soggy and damaging elements.

General Manager Rudy Pierce explains that “We manufacture solutions for contractors and DIY’ers. Today’s buildings are complex, and there is a shortage of skilled labor to frame them in traditional ways. We are constantly seeking ways to reduce the amount of labor required on the job site to construct wood framed projects, thereby reducing the cost and speeding up the timeline for those projects.”

Founded in 1992, the company currently employs about 25 people. Owner Chad Johnson worked with the founders for 22 years before purchasing the business in 2018. Johnson has since joined the Chamber to get to know more local business owners, increase opportunities when hiring, and to look for ways to promote manufacturing careers and trade programs to people entering the workforce.

Because construction workers were considered essential throughout most of the Coronavirus, business has stayed busy. Add to that the many DIY’ers looking to expand on the homes where they spent months of stifling quarantine, and the Truss Components team are ready to help. “We focus primarily on residential and multi-family construction projects and those projects are plentiful,” says Pierce. “I feel that as long as interest rates remain low like they are, we will continue to experience a robust building market. I definitely hope they stay that way for a while.”

Thankfully, the nationwide wood scarcity and supply disruptions we’ve all heard about over the last year didn’t truly impact Pierce and his team. “Fortunately, COVID-related issues have had little impact on the supply of our raw materials: lumber and metal connector plates. Prices have gone up, to be sure, but we have not experienced any shortages of those materials.”

Beyond crafting individual parts, Truss Components prides itself on helping its customers build quality structures for the benefit of the greater community.  They do this by providing expert product knowledge, excellent customer service, and high-quality products at fair prices, while offering the opportunity for a fulfilling career for each employee and a reasonable rate of return for its owners. With this Mission, Truss Components has been recognized as the structural building component supplier of choice for the Pacific Northwest.

Looking towards the future, Pierce admits that uncertainty is very real. “Just as things start to re-open, they are now closing back down a bit, at least in Thurston County. Our biggest COVID-related challenge has been keeping people at work, as well as getting them back to work after a COVID exposure. My hope for the rest of this year is that this will finally go away. As for the longer-ranging future, I am very optimistic. We live in a very desirable part of the country with a very diverse economy. I believe people will continue coming to this area and needing homes.”

And that desirability is evident. Low inventory and strong demand have existing homes selling in days and new projects are springing up all over. Whatever the need, Truss Components can help. They’re also hiring through their website’s application portal. Questions about a position or which product would be a perfect fit? Simply email sales@trusscomponents.com or call 360.753.0057 today. Follow them on Facebook for photos of recent jobsites, projects, and daily operations.

Houses and businesses are built with time, effort, community, and heart. And thanks to dedicated teams like Truss Components, they’re also built with quality materials, minimal waste, and a passion for this beautiful region we’ve all chosen to call home.