This is Forest to Frame, where we explore how restoring forests creates beautiful spaces. A podcast dedicated to conversations with industry leaders, shaping the future of the forest industry. And now, here's your host, Russ Vaagen. Hey everybody, Russ here with Forest to Frame. This is one that I probably wasn't expecting to make, probably hoped I wouldn't have to make. There's some pretty significant changes coming to bog and As I've shared many of the other episodes and talking with others, the market for mass timber and construction in general has been very poor and I think all of us in the space in the construction space are struggling, with some exceptions, but our mass timber orders were down significantly. And we were focused more on making glulam work, but even that market was down compared to what ours and our clients expectations were. So it made it very difficult, if not impossible for us to, to make money and be cash flow positive. And because of those struggles, we got put into a position where we didn't have the capital to move on. And we made the decision to, me and the minority shareholders of the group, made the decision to enter into an agreement with Vaagen Brothers Lumber to sell Vaagen Timbers to them. The glulam business aligns very well with the dimensional lumber business, and many of the clients are the same or similar, and so you will see that that continues. know, to my understanding, as it goes forward, Vaagen Brothers Lomber will manage the business and they will continue to support the mass timber projects we have under contract. But we'll take a closer look at mass timber in general, because the market was so tight. The best way I could say it is it looks like there are some of our competitors that are really hungry for business to a point at which they're going to bid things under the breakeven point. So I think there's some opportunity in single family mass timber and some other spots where a plant like the one we have here in Colville can compete. But As part of this, I won't be staying on as the leader of Vaagen Timbers. And our team here will stay in place and they'll probably do some restructuring to try to get this business financially viable. And I'm not going to yet tell you what I'm up to. I'll wait for another episode to do that. But I've got some really exciting news. with another group that is going to be doing some amazing things. And I'm going to be part of that in a big way. And what I will say is we're going to work to restore our forests at scale and build the infrastructure to support it, which was always our mission at Boggin Timbers to be part of that. So for me, it's mixed emotions. You know, you never want to see what you've built not live up to your expectations, but that is the case. We did a lot of amazing things here. And some of our folks that were with us in the past and even up until now, and they're gonna carry on, delivered some incredible buildings and some incredible products. And we feel like we were producing as good or better product than anybody in the industry. We'd come up with some pretty amazing tools to deliver. our projects in a sequenced manner that really exceeded our clients' expectations. So we still have that know-how, and we're going to bring that to the market. When I say we, I think BOG and Timbers will continue to do that and build on that. But it's going to take the construction market to turn around. Interest rates need to come down to incentivize projects to go forward, both in the construction as a whole and mass timber. But it's going to take a little bit. I think this industry still has some consolidating to do and some downsizing if this construction pace continues to be anemic as it has been. But there will be, there is light at the end of the tunnel. And once we have a strong market, we're gonna see more and more mass timber. And we know this because there continues to be the pace of design of projects. It's just that they haven't been financially viable enough to keep going. And so at some point this thing will pop and there will be a need for lots of infrastructure and mass timber. Will that be six months or I don't know. But it's, But sometimes economics doesn't align with, you know, what doing the right thing means. And this is one of those situations. But as as somber and upset that as I may be, I'm also excited for the future. As I've always said, we need to restore our forests at scale. So I'm going to take my passion for that and push it forward. We need to build significantly more infrastructure in places that have federal forests and We're going to see what we can do to make that happen at scale and turn this around. We want to turn the smoke in our air into the buildings of the future. And there's no reason we can't do that and add value at every step along the way. So, yeah. It's frustrating to put this much effort and energy into a company and into an industry and have a setback like this. But at the same time, there will be brighter days and there will be things that allow us to move forward at a pace and scale that's beyond our expectation. you know, if I were to say we there's, there's a number of things we can second guess and do differently. But all in all, I've been part of successful teams and part of teams that have struggled. Many cases, the struggles are result of things outside of your control. And many times it's successes have nothing to do with what you did, you're just in the right place, right time. And I think this, this bull market, this strength of the economy has been going for so long that we forgot what a downturn looks like. I'm, I guess, fortunate enough to have experienced downturns in the past. I've been essentially in business since 2000, so 25 years. And, you know, after the global financial crisis, let's say 2010 on, we've been having a relatively great economic turn and great job market. And now we're having a little bit of a reset, a recession, whatever you want to call it. And a lot of people haven't seen it for a while. And so, you know, a lot of really good people and a lot of really good companies could get caught up in, in this. And I think we're one of those. I'm grateful that Vaagen Brothers is able to step in. And I think having the the integrated approach is going to make them successful in particular in glulam and potentially in mass timber. And I wish them all the best in their endeavors. And just thanks to all the people that entrusted your careers with me and what you've done with logging timbers. It's been it's been rewarding and and fun in many cases, it's a great business, but it's also a very difficult business. And even though we didn't succeed, you know, from a financial metric, we are leaving behind a history and a series of structures and stories and great things. And I think that this is going to pave the way for bigger things in the future. And I'm grateful for that. So Thanks for tuning in. We'll now focus a little bit more time on the podcast, and I'll take some time to work on writing the book that I've been working on, which will be basically the forest frame story. And we'll see where things go from here. But thank you for watching. Thank you for caring about what we're doing. And yeah, look forward to bigger and better things going forward. Thanks