Ralph Bush, HydroBlok’s Chief Revenue Officer, brings a wealth of building product experience to the role, earned through architecture, real estate development and years of advocating for materials that outlast the buildings they clad. An award-winning designer with a background in high-performance design, Ralph led Bush Architects in Dallas and served as president of StoneCoat as well as leading architecture and operations for a major Texas development group.
His conviction is simple, “every layer added to a wall is another chance to get it wrong.”
Accordingly, at HydroBlok he is focused on showing builders and installers how taking layers out takes cost and time out with them.
Many in the building products channel earn their credentials through sales. Ralph Bush arrived… he claims, from the drawing board.
In fact, HydroBlok’s new Chief Revenue Officer spent the bulk of his career on the design and development side of the industry, building a professional career promoting greener alternatives to stucco, manufactured stone and brick.
“I spent most of my career drawing wall assemblies and then watching what actually got built,” Ralph says. “The gap between those two is where most building failures begin.” Closing that gap continues to be his priority. Recognized as a specialist in NetZero, Bush continues to explore how to improve exterior walls… based on what they are designed to accomplish. And questioning why so many of them fall short of the drawing.
Taking layers out of the wall
More than two decades on the exterior, first from the drawing board and then in the field, taught Ralph about the layers applied underneath those finishes. And recognizing that the finish is only as good as the assembly carrying it. Most have become too complicated. Beginning with sheathing, then a weather-resistive barrier. Followed by insulation, then lath… with trades stacked up behind one another. Each contractor, waiting their turn.
Adding time to the schedule.
Every one of those handoffs is a place where the drawing -- and the building -- part ways.
“Every layer is another chance for water to get in. Another trade to schedule. And another detail nobody catches until it’s covered up,” Ralph says. “HydroBlok takes those layers out. That is the whole point of the argument.”
He points to a wellness-focused custom home currently under construction in Atlanta as a clear illustration. The builder estimates roughly three weeks saved against a traditional stucco application. What’s more, the innovative system provides a secondary water-resistive barrier, insulation, lath, scratch coat, and non-shear substrate layered across roughly 80 percent of the wall.
“Faster and better are often in competition. Here they aren’t,” explains Bush.
That design background is what makes the conversation land. Ralph can walk a builder through the assembly the way an architect drew it, then walk the installer through the same wall the way it actually goes up. He knows which detail the crew will fight on a Friday afternoon. And he can show both of them where the labor hours and the schedule days come out: margin for the builder, a shorter and cleaner scope with fewer callbacks for the installer.
Outside the office
Ralph enjoys the cool mountain mornings in western North Carolina with a cup of Joe and tending to the daily chores at the farm.
Building forward
Ralph holds a BA in Environmental Design from Texas A&M University. With specialization in design, development, materials and simplifying the most failure-prone part of a building. Leveraging experience from the design side… he’s been on the receiving end of a lot of product claims. Which informs how he intends to grow this one.
“Architects have long memories,” he says. “Tell them something works -- be right -- and you have a career. Be wrong once and you spend a decade earning it back.”
