The Smithfield Herald, Smithfield, NC

April 22, 2005

Tech center offers support

By Anthony Jeffries

A Raleigh business center is helping construction and small-business contractors in the Triangle, including Johnston County.

The Raleigh Business & Technology Center has a membership based plan room that tells contractors about bids and advises them on how to win bids. The center is especially helpful to minority and women contractors.

“There is a need for more minority and woman contractors,” says Joseph Francis of the business center.

Francis is head of the plan room in the building, which services the needs of contractors. The plan room is where contractors can view projects for bidding and where contractors can also prepare a bid. Francis, a civil engineer and general contractor, is available for assistance.

Francis says the plan room helps contractors in two ways.

“It is informative," says Francis. “You know what is available to bid on. You learn how to bid on these projects.”

Francis says several Johnston County contractors, including a few from Clayton, have used the plan room. But contractors don’t have to drive to Raleigh to get the information they need.’

Folks can go online at www.raleighbtc.com, but here’s the catch. You must be a member to access the plan room data from a computer, which is available 24 hours daily.

The plan room is essential for contractors, including many who lack the business acumen to gain bids or keep their businesses afloat. The center staff helps folks in several areas including bidding and scheduling, financial planning, accounting and bookkeeping, business plan writing and forecasting, bonding support documentation, marketing and communications and general business management.

The contractors, with help from staff, train on a state-of-the-art construction software package that strengthens their business skills on project. A Triangle workforce group which includes Smithfield-Selma Chamber of Commerce president Rick Childrey provided the software package.

The plan room also includes graphic files and plans from architects, planners and owners and updates construction project lists and forecasts.

One benefit of the plan room is that members can copy information and take it home. Another is the bulletin board which keeps members aware of new projects, bidder’s lists and important project information.

The city of Raleigh reopened the plan room in October 2004 at the five-year-old business center after it closed in a downtown building the previous year.

The plan room at first started out for Raleigh contractors, but it was discovered that there was a need for it in Johnston County and other areas.

“We will service the needs of clients wherever they are from,” Francis says.

The Raleigh Business & Technology Center is on the corner of Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard and South Wilmington Street in Raleigh.

To become a plan room member, call Joseph Francis at (919) 836-8618.