When a customer enters Capitol Drilling and Sawing's Indianapolis showroom for the first time, he may well think he's entered a tool distributorship. And he'd be right.

After learning more about Capitol, though, he may begin to realize that he can rent as well as buy some of the equipment he needs. Broken equipment? Capitol can repair it. And eventually—if this customer is a construction superintendent, for example—he will come to realize that Capitol can also consult and even perform any concrete-cutting jobs he may be facing.

Capitol has remained successful over the years by adding to its list of features for customers, but the company is "first and foremost a contractor," says Kevin Ogden, Capitol's manager of sales and promotions. "This is our 40th year. We were incorporated in 1964 as a concrete-cutting and core-drilling contractor. We are one of the oldest full-service contractors of this type in the country."

Capitol also has an active distribution business. Its Indianapolis showroom features a variety of construction-related tools and supplies. While the skilled carpenter could find something here, most of Capitol's customers require a more specialized line of products and equipment. A typical customer might be that superintendent for a construction company, for example, or from a maintenance company.

"Everything in our facility is of a higher end nature," Ogden explains. "We really don't overlap with a Home Depot. We have a few items [in common]. But you'll get the better quality and more variety [here]; rotor hammer bits that are 36 inches long, for example. Our customer knows they can get that specialized stuff here. And I think that's why they like coming here as opposed to the big boxes."

Being able to meet the equipment needs for different people and different jobs is how Capitol has grown. At one point in its development (late '70s), Capitol contractors would go out on jobs and receive requests to purchase equipment comparable to what they were using. The company used this as motivation to move into sales. At that time, it could be a challenge to find a hammer drill or larger rotary hammers, for example. So when people would see them on Capitol trucks, some would want to purchase them right off the truck. In a nutshell, that was how the sales end of Capitol evolved from general contracting only.

The company continued to do both the sales and contracting at its Indianapolis location before purchasing an adjacent building in 1988. In addition to the Indy headquarters, it has two branches: Champaign, Ill., and Elizabethtown, Ky.

As it added repair and rental divisions, Capitol progressed to the point where today, workers joke, only a little, that "We do it, we sell it, we rent it, we repair it," one-upping Nike's slogan in a way.

While they still "rent it," that part of Capitol's business is changing. Certain pieces of equipment make sense for a rental market—for example, a flat saw, or "walk-behind saw," as it is sometimes called—which is not a technically demanding tool to operate.

"It can be more of a rental item and doesn't take extreme skill to run one," Ogden explains. "Some contractors do their own sawing so they'll rent them and put a couple of laborers on them. It's the most forgiving of saws, let's say, compared to a wall saw, for instance."

Much of the equipment today is more complicated, technically, and not everyone can simply stop by, sign a lease agreement, and be allowed to leave with the tool. Capitol has to be more cautious, asking itself, among other things, what the chances are that a renting customer may not be familiar with an item if it has to be rented in the first place. There is a potential liability on the renting store, and sometimes Capitol staffers will look at a customer and wonder, "Can we send them out there with this tool and feel confident that they know what they're going to do, and not hurt themselves?"

One cautionary story that illustrates Capitol's concern involves a company that rented a core drilling machine to someone who assured them he was a skilled craftsman.

The company went over the features and benefits of the machine with the customer. The renter claimed he was familiar with the tool and felt comfortable with it. But the user didn't anchor it properly, and stood on the machine when he started it up. Unfortunately the man using it was thrown from the mezzanine he was working on and killed. Lawsuits, obviously, resulted and dragged on before being settled.

"My gut feeling is you'll see rental change a lot. It will go away to a degree," Ogden. "The liability of rental with the insurance companies is huge. And a lot of insurance companies don't like writing that rental insurance anymore."

He thinks it may well develop that only the large corporations will be dominating the rental field, pointing to the consolidation of the rental industry over the past few years.

The increasing technical sophistication of newly developed tools makes training a vital part of Capitol's present and future success.

Jim Wight, regional sales manager for Diamond Products in Elyria, Ohio, has worked with Capitol since 1990. He wears two hats when he visits Capitol, he explains, as he calls on both their distribution as well as their contracting side.

When Diamond has some new items coming out, Wight will bring demo models to Capitol, "just to make them aware of any new tricks of the trade," as he puts it. "We do demos for new equipment as well as new bits and blades. And my company also offers them training at our facility in [Elyria] Ohio. So they'll send salesmen to Ohio for a three-day, hands-on training session that we do every year," Wight says.

The developing technology means that the training itself is constantly evolving, Ogden realizes, and he says he appreciates the challenges that can represent for him and his sales staff.

"Honda, for example, has a new generator model with digital readout and on-board diagnostics. It's like automobiles going from carburetors to fuel injection to computer control," Ogden laughs. "We're seeing some of our items go that way now. Today, our business is of a more mechanical and technical nature. It's a hands-on business, being able to pick up the tool and demonstrate, train a customer on it. And some people will be more comfortable with that than others."

He notes that the outside sales position is changing, calling it "more like a consultant; some call them 'sales engineers' now. It's not just shaking hands and handing out flyers and brochures. They need to walk the walk and do the training, do these demonstrations."

And this includes inside sales, he adds, stating that "whoever's on the phone has to be pretty adept at this, too."

Online training is getting more attention from Capitol and others in the industry, Ogden says. Husqvarna, the chainsaw and concrete-cutting company, are doing this very well with their Husqvarna Online University, he explains.

Wight and other suppliers have confidence in Capitol's ability to stay on top of whatever new developments come at them. Among other things, this has contributed to a long relationship between them and Wight's Diamond Products Co.

"A lot of companies will set up the sales side mainly so they can buy product for their contracting side at a better price," Wight says. "But that's not the case with these guys.... They're a good company, very good people to work with, from the guys in the [repair] shop to their salesmen."

As one of their customers, Kevin Kincaid, administrator for field reps for Custom Concrete Co. in Westfield, Ind., appreciates what Capitol does. Custom Concrete buys generators, hammer drills, concrete saws, water pumps, etc. from Capitol, Kincaid explains, and likes its attention to detail in general.

"It's their service. They bend their backs over for you to deliver things," he says. "And if you can't get there, they'll say 'Well, I'll meet you somewhere.' They're people who are willing to make things happen and do their best to make you look good, too.... They're hands on and get to know you on a first-name basis."

While Capitol's business is steady, no company in the general construction area is without worries. It's no shock to find that steel—prices and availability—is being watched carefully.

In 2004, some jobs did not go ahead as were scheduled due to steel uncertainties. And it can impact sales of tools as well. Quality saw blades, for example, and even the saws themselves, have a lot of steel that goes into them. And by definition, "quality" saw and blade manufacturers don't want to use substitutes.

For a company that has done well the past few years, Capitol does little work in the residential construction markets—precisely the type of work that has been a lifesaver for many construction-related businesses. Most residential homes, foundations aside, don't require an enormous amount of concrete-related work, still one of Capitol's specialties.

"We're more the industrial, commercial side," Ogden explains. "We do the residential jobs as they come up, but they're fewer in between."

Actually, some residential-related work comes Capitol's way, such as cutting curbs in neighborhood developments and work related to water, sewer and gas lines. Supplying special diamond blades to masonry contractors for bricks used in the wall of a residence, for instance, makes up part of Capitol's work as well.

And when a tool breaks, repair work is something Capitol can provide.

"One of the old rules of thumb is 'half of new.' If the price of the repair is half of what a new one is, people elect not to repair it," Ogden explains.

But in many cases the past few years, he adds, "people have decided to get by with what they've been using," when deciding whether to repair or replace.

A visitor to Capitol's showroom can't help but be impressed with the sales staff's familiarity with returning customers. Ogden credits Capitol's branch managers John Joest in Kentucky, Mike Long in Illinois, and, on the contracting side, Allen Wiles, for making this happen. Capitol's staff greets customers more as returning friends than "another sale." It's a personal approach that a supplier also notices and appreciates.

Chris May is a sales representative for Dimas, Inc., which manufactures diamond blades and other accessories sold by Capitol. Based in Chicago, he has worked with Capitol for the past eight years.

"Yeah, they're a very down-to-earth group, and also very professional," May says. "They're really focused on excellence and on being fair to the customer."

Once a year, Capitol holds an open house for select vendors and customers. May has taken part in many of them.

"It's a great informational time for their customers to learn more about the product," May says. "And, in turn, it helps us sell more products."