Crush, Grind, Haul and Dump
A-1 Sandrock Inc. brings it all together
![Ronnie Petty, President, and Eddie Lathem, grinding crew leader, in front of a CBI 5800 series horizontal grinder from Powerscreen Mid-Atlantic in Kernersville, North Carolina.](storyassets/carolinas/feature_stories/F18_NC_FS3_Crush-Grind-Haul-Dump/F18_NC_FS3_Interior1_530x370.jpg)
Ronnie Petty, President, and Eddie Lathem, grinding crew leader, in front of a CBI 5800 series horizontal grinder from Powerscreen Mid-Atlantic in Kernersville, North Carolina.
![The quarry division at Viewmont Drive in Greensboro screens sandrock using equipment from Powerscreen Mid-Atlantic.](storyassets/carolinas/feature_stories/F18_NC_FS3_Crush-Grind-Haul-Dump/F18_NC_FS3_Interior2_530x370.jpg)
The quarry division at Viewmont Drive in Greensboro screens sandrock using equipment from Powerscreen Mid-Atlantic.
A-1 Sandrock Inc. is a family-run business in the Piedmont Triad, a north-central region of North Carolina that is home to an extensive freeway network. Currently, four major interstate highways and numerous secondary interstate routes and U.S. routes serve the region, and this network is still in the process of major expansion. The construction of these roads has for decades been the catalyst for an ever-evolving business that spans across generations.
A Business Is Born
Gene Petty launched A-1 Sandrock in 1979, after he was approached several times by a paving and grading contractor asking to extract the sandrock from the 50 acres of farmland surrounding his home as a base material for the construction of new roads. The land, formerly a tobacco farm, was in Gene’s wife’s family for generations. Seeing a clear business opportunity to make use of the unused land, Gene started the business in order to mine the sandrock and sell it.
Mining the sandrock created an open pit in the ground that needed to be filled. Gene identified a second business opportunity: he set to work to gain the permits needed to start a landfill. By 1987, A-1 Sandrock had expanded into the waste management business, drawing in waste, construction and demolition debris from contractors and residents throughout Guilford County.
Gene didn’t stop there. The cities of Greensboro and High Point had an excess of waste that couldn’t be managed by local landfills. In 2001, he built Guilford County’s first solid waste transfer station at the front end of his property, a large industrial building that allows for waste to be temporarily collected and held before it is loaded into a bulk transport trailer and hauled to other sites across the state. A year later, Gene sold the building to another company called Republic Waste (now Republic Services) to own and operate. By 2009, he purchased more land across the road from his original property to expand his landfill. The land, which already had landfill permits, was eventually passed down to his grandsons, Ronnie and Jimmy.
The Next Generation
Ronnie and Jimmy Petty adopted their grandfather’s pragmatic and enterprising approach to the business. Like him, they don’t shy away from a mess or a challenge, and they use the tools and resources available to them to great effect. That is how they’ve managed to grow A-1 Sandrock from a sandrock mining and landfill business into a six-division company with 42 employees, offering turnkey transportation, waste disposal, recycling and mining services for major paving and grading contractors across their state.
“We have a unique blend of experience, being in the waste business, the mining business and the dump trucking business. Our employees have done heavy grading work, they’ve been landfill managers, they’ve been quarry operators, so there’s a unique blend of experience all in one spot,” Ronnie says.
As company President, Ronnie handles the mining and landfill operations on the ground day to day. A-1 Sandrock’s landfill now produces one of the highest volumes of construction debris in North Carolina.
“I like the heavy equipment, working for myself and working with our employees in the field,” says Ronnie, who is the older of the two brothers.
“We’re always having to plan out how fast to move dirt in order to make room for trash, so that and handling expansion, engineers, lawyers, the permitting—those are the things I’m drawn to,” he adds.
Jimmy, who is the general manager of mobile operations, looks after the company’s mobile crushing and grinding divisions. He and Ronnie originally invested in mobile recycling equipment to use on their own landfill. Mobile crushers recycle concrete into residential and commercial base material, and mobile grinders recycle wood debris into different mulches. The brothers quickly realized that, when the mobile equipment was not in use on their site, it could be used to build business in other states and regions.
The Mobile Crews
The company now has five mobile crews that work throughout North Carolina, and occasionally in Virginia and Tennessee. Two of the crews crush asphalt, recycling old roads to be used to pave new ones. The three other crews are grinding crews. They recycle asphalt shingles into what looks like coffee grounds. Those are then mixed back into the aggregate that goes into the pavement for the roads. The same machines also grind all types of wood and trees into mulch.
“We can move a crew in a day if conditions are right. A typical crew is five pieces of equipment and two guys, and we run five of those crews,” Jimmy says.
All of the mobile equipment has tracks under it, which means that each piece can be easily rolled onto a trailer and moved quickly from site to site. For example, A-1 Sandrock was hired by the city of Greensboro to grind wood after a tornado struck down a number of trees. A grinding crew transported equipment from another job site in Tennessee, and the company mobilized a team in Greensboro in just four days to start the work.
The mobile crews are always in use. Even in winter or wet months when demand for them is lower, the equipment can be pulled back to the A-1 Sandrock landfill and be put to work there.
The Next Frontier
The company is currently in the midst of permitting for a major expansion of its landfill involving the construction of a retaining wall around the outside of the landfill. This sloped wall, to be made from mechanically stabilized earth, will be the first of its kind in North Carolina. When completed, it will run 4,800 feet in circumference; at its tallest, it will rise 63 feet high. The wall will increase the life span of the landfill by an estimated 20 years.
The brothers also know that their business and services will continue to evolve over time, as technology shifts toward more sustainable practices for waste management. They’re happy to embrace that change when it comes, and they’re optimistic about their future.
“In 20 to 30 years, landfill will no longer be the norm,” Ronnie explains. “But since we’re set up right next to the major interstates, we will still have the location to provide whatever service that is needed, or whatever alternative waste management technology that is required, to continue to serve our clients.”
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