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"My theory is you promise less and you deliver more," says Jake Sikes, owner of Sikes Asphalt Group, Santa Rosa, CA. "We're very service driven, in 2008 we did no advertising, and everything was all relationship based."

Not surprisingly, then, most business is from customer referrals, and that's just how Sikes Asphalt got an opportunity to bid the huge sealcoating job for Union Pacific Railroad profiled in the upcoming March/April issue of Pavement Maintenance & Reconstruction. Sikes Asphalt Group had done a large project for the Port of Benicia repairing, sealcoating and striping a staging area for cars. That job had a $50,000 penalty if Sikes missed the deadline, but they completed the job on time, the Port of Benicia liked the work, Union Pacific Railroad rented space from the Port, and that's how Sikes got the lead and the opportunity to bid the job.

"I had a track record of doing other bigger jobs, and that enabled me to sell it to them," Sikes says.

That, combined with his approach to estimating and sales, gave Union Pacific the confidence to hire a small contractor for a very big job.

Sikes says his planning for the job - and for every job - begins with the estimate. "When I walk a job for an estimate I assume I already have the job and I stake it out and paint the pavement as I walk with the customer," Sikes says. "While we're walking we talk through the whole job from A-Z, from when we start until when they can drive on it."