A New Hope for the Skilled Trades?

Late in February I made my way out to Las Vegas to attend the Kitchen and Bath Industry Show—you can read our full coverage starting on the cover, and our KBIS Product Pages Takeover starting on pg. 48.

There are plenty of shows that move around the country from year to year, but I hope KBIS never leaves Vegas. Both the city and the event set out to dazzle—to make a statement—and in that they seem perfectly matched.

This year KBIS was being held at the same time and in the same city Associated Builders and Contractors was holding its annual convention, and, as a part of that convention, the National Craft Championships (we have coverage and the winners of the plumbing competition on pg. 6).

While I’ve covered the competition as a news story, I have never been able to attend. Thanks to an open block in my schedule—and a generous invitation from ABC’s indefatigable head of media relations Erika Walter—I was finally able to check the event off my industry bucket list.

The Championships are an inspiring sight. Plumbing, Carpentry, HVAC/R, Electrical and Welding competitions (just to name a few) all happening at the same time, with competitors, coordinators, judges and spectators all in the mix.

I was putting together my coverage of the Championships when Al Schwartz’ latest column, The Decline of Trade Craft – Where Have We Gone Wrong? hit my desk (you can read it on pg. 18).

It is far, far from the first article in this magazine to lament the shortage of skilled trade workers, but Al does make a very important point: if this is an industry we care about (and I wouldn’t be writing this and you wouldn’t be reading it if it weren’t), then we all share to some degree responsibility for the current state of things, and we all have a role to play in turning things around.

And I think that the National Craft Championships point the way for how that might happen. There were three elements of the competition that struck me as important for changing hearts and minds.

First, the Championships are all about pride in craft. Yes, there are cash prizes for the winners, but the top prize is $750 while the registration fee is $1,000 (and that doesn’t include transportation, hotel or meals). No, this is about doing your best work in front of the top professionals in the industry. There are young people out there feeling that pride in their work—which says to me that there are educators and employers out there cultivating it.

Second, a lot of those young people competing have families supporting them. They wear T-shirts blazoned with TEAM MIKE or TEAM DANA. They come with banners and signs to cheer on their people. Imagine what that must feel like for a person competing? Imagine what that must be like to see, even if your own family couldn’t make the trip? That what you’re doing is valued the same way a championship football game or basketball game is?

And third (thanks to the Construction Management Competition), that the trades can take you in a million different directions—to anywhere you want to go. It’s not just the guy in the trench or under the sink, it’s also any of the guys back at the office—scheduling, planning, designing, presenting. You could one day be the teacher who trained you. You could one day be the owner who hired you.

Pride, value and possibility—that’s the package I think we need to be selling to young people. And I think competitions like the Craft Championships are only one way to get them to buy in.