“Weathered,” is not a good look on your door frame…
Do you enjoy painting? We don't either... we'd rather be at the cabin.
Do you enjoy painting? We don't either... we'd rather be at the cabin.
In a previous blog we talked about the elements and principles of good design. This morning, while flipping through photos we’ve taken of finished projects, I stopped on this image. It’s a beautiful space and a gorgeous photo. Like all good design, if we spend just a few minutes thinking about those basic elements and […]
In the Midwest we’re looking for a change. Spring isn’t here yet but we’re ready for the snow to melt. We can’t wait to see the trees begin to bud and the grass begin to sprout. A change of scenery might be coming in the way of a trip to a beach but if you’re […]
This great, big team of ours feels like another family and we're thankful for that!
From my office window, I can still see green grass. Any good Midwesterner, with half a lick of sense, will not be fooled by this abnormality in the second week of November. That green grass could become white at any moment! Starting around the day before Halloween, the ol’ Blizzard of ’91 is recollected and […]
The sound of leaves crunching underfoot and a chill in the air is Mother Nature’s signal that the holidays are coming. Has your “Honey-Do,” list reached an unreasonable length yet with indoor AND outdoor projects? Prioritizing can be a snap if you think top to bottom. Outside gets top priority because those of us […]
We couldn’t have asked for a better turn-out or better weather for our annual Customer Appreciation Event. This year we welcomed 146 golfers to Albion Ridges Golf Course just outside of Annandale, Minnesota and another 46 to our fishing contest on Clearwater Lake. It was a great way to spend a Friday and the photos […]
It might have been windy, but that didn’t deter any of our customers from attending our annual Customer Appreciation Event in Humboldt, South Dakota. We had 172 men and a couple of women join us for a day of fun in the woods and prairies of Hunter’s Pointe Shooting Club. With two, ten-field courses and 94 […]
Once considered an impossibility in our buggy, Midwestern climate, outdoor spaces are getting a second round of consideration. Why subject yourself to one more dreaded mosquito when the sofa lies inside waiting to be visited? There are birds! A good breeze (sometimes)! A bonfire waiting to happen! And at dusk…stars! Add an ice cold beverage […]
When your home improvement budget has a limit, deciding where to invest your dollars can be challenging. A new bathroom? A kitchen upgrade? A finished basement? Lucky for you, a recent research project has made your home improvement budgeting quandry a little easier. Each year, the National Association of Realtors and Remodeling magazine join forces […]
Looking for an exterior door with a bigger view and more natural light? Good news! We’re adding one to our product offering and it’s smooth edges and wide glass are just two of the reasons we love it. It’s rare to find a door that offers the versatility Masonite’s Vista Grande does. With an 18% […]
“Color is a power which directly influences the soul.” – Wassily Kandinsky When I was a girl, I remember the first time I watched my grandmother prepare beets for a summer lunch. I exclaimed, “Grandma! Look at your hands? What will you do?” Everywhere the beet juice had run there was a trail of deep […]
Even a ten minute run-through of architectural history would include a study of the ancient column orders (or styles). What’s the big deal about columns, you ask? They are one of the few, enduring architectural elements utilized in every historical period across the globe since they were established in ancient Greece! There is, quite literally, […]
Last week we were honored to receive recognition from the Star Tribune as one of the top 150 places to work in Minnesota. In fact, we ranked 43rd out of 343 mid-sized companies! Workplace Dynamics, a […]
When selecting the materials for your home, the options will often seem endless and confusing. In my work with consumers, I’ve watched their eyes glaze over when we start with exterior selections and begin discussing the advantages and disadvantages of six different types of siding. Six choices for one selection! More often than not, we […]
Open windows and sunshine-filled mornings can create a sense of delirium only a Midwesterner can fully understand. We’ve been tied up inside for a long, long while and it’s as though the captain of our ship just announced we are free to move about the cabin. No matter what the high temperature may be, the […]
1. Consider all other options. I type that only partially in jest. While it can be very cost effective to stay in your home during a remodeling project, there are significant trade-offs which might persuade you to re-evaluate you and your family’s happiness vs. monetary savings. The stress of having things un-done and out of […]
Organizing yourself and your family for a successful week likely begins with a good amount of preparation up front. At our house, Prep looks like (this) Mom at the kitchen table with a large, desk-sized monthly calendar; color coded by kid and revised Sunday night, then inputted into the computer. Maybe you have a list […]
Last week’s blog included a drum-roll presentation of our #1 most requested color; Custom! Despite sticking to the facts, many of you didn’t like the answer. “Custom isn’t a color!” To satisfy our readers, we tabulated the numbers again but this time limited them to the paint and stain categories we offer within our color […]
The doors in this photo are taking their final run through prefinish and then leaving our plant for their intended locations throughout the Midwest today.
We had the great pleasure of welcoming Dean Johnson from the PBS television program, “Hometime,” to our plant last month. It was fun to introduce he and Miriam to our Bayer Built family and walk them through both our prefinish and production facilities. Dean started Hometime in the early 80’s when Bayer Built was just […]
The following picture shows our three-panel interior doors in warm palettes. The color on the walls, the color of the prefinish stain and other finishes in the room are all from the warm end of the color spectrum.
In the Midwest, we are nuts about daylight; literally. Without it we establish something un-affectionately referred to as “cabin fever.” Talking to ourselves, becoming short with each other, sleeping for 14 hours because it’s dark at 5pm…these are the maladies of winter; some would say, “a gentle form of torture.” In just a few weeks, […]
The holidays are approaching and throughout the United States, uncles will be cracking corny jokes and mothers will be crowding the kitchen. Families will gather, friends will congregate and inevitably, memories will be recounted over a glass of wine or at the dinner table. We have a fancy word for this sentimentality for the past; […]
If your Fall To Do List, included replacing the front door, it’s not too late… yet! Mine will be replaced in the upcoming weeks and I’m looking forward to an updated and fully-functioning front door. One that doesn’t drag on our tile floor and will keep us cozy, and heat efficient, all winter long. To […]
It seems we are often worried about not having enough. Not enough time and not enough money and never enough space, “could you give me another closet?” Architect and author Sarah Susanka calls it, “the fear of too smallness.” Prior to the recession this concept was evident everywhere. “Why add 10’ when we could add […]
Tuesday was a busier-than-usual work day at Bayer Built. Aside from daily production, the stretch of County Road 32 we care for was on the schedule for its bi-annual cleaning. The teams involved this season were from several departments, including: Interior, Specialty, Warehouse, IT, Accounting, Customer Service, Materials Management and Logistics. They had a windy, […]
Painted cabinets and millwork is not a new trend. It gained popularity during the recession because of its very attractive price point. Plus, there are few things more enjoyable than a clean, bright, spanking-new kitchen in the whitest of whites! And while trends do come and go, paint is sticking around…at least a little while […]
Designing, selecting and constructing staircases is an overwhelming task. Each one is unique. There are many parts which have to be selected and all those parts can be any number of different finishes. How to start? Begin with the first step (which is not really a step at all) but a railing… 1. Would you […]
Last night autumn arrived, quietly, but with plenty of notice from our weather forecasters. Per the usual (like the good Minnesotans we are) we met autumn at the door with surprise, scorn and concern. The change we feel is much more than just temperature. In our astute Midwestern minds, fall is the reminder that the […]
No matter where I am now, I notice millwork. Aside from the overall quality of light and the design concept for any given space, my eye goes directly to the doors and trim. Surprising? Maybe. I mean, there would appear to be very few changes in the world of doors and millwork. While it is […]
It’s that time of year… when all moms and dads breathe a sweet sigh of relief. Back-to-school we go! At our house, the home office-school work space is getting a clean out and re-work. Whether you’re getting students ready for school and homework or your own work area needs a little update, below is a […]
A few weeks ago I had the opportunity to see the first house my great, great grandfather Gjermund made when he came to Minnesota in the late 1880’s. All that’s left of it today is a sunken, rectangular space in the side of a hill, nestled in a little valley in northern Kandiyohi County. There […]
Homeowners make choices, lumberyards and contractors make selections, architects and designers write specifications. No matter which of these titles suits you best, or what you call the act of choosing, there is an easy way to indicate which doors and millwork are the right fit for your project. We have a couple of powerful tools […]
This is the time of year that begins to feel unsettled; at least at our house it does. Summer’s not over but school hasn’t begun. Activities for the kids are running out, the weather is a little hotter than I’d like it to be and the propensity for a storm to hit becomes a more […]
91% of ALL purchases in the home building industry are made by women, not just decisions but actual purchases. What does your lumberyard showroom look like? According to Forbes magazine, we have 7 seconds to make a first impression and 90% of what we say is non-verbal! Chances are good that before your customer is […]
Summer is not over. And you are free to enjoy it for as long as you are willing to call it summer. At our house, we make guesses as to what day will be the last day we eat outside at the table on the patio. Because as long as we are able to eat […]
This was going to be an article about the vibrant colors of summer and painted front doors. But today I helped a friend make a decision about a new piece of artwork over the lunch hour. She had arranged to see a piece by local artist, Michael Schmidt and needed help deciding which one to […]
Of the many fathers I know (including my own) there are few who haven’t built or helped to build a deck. To date, I can recall witnessing at least six deck installations in the last twenty-some years. That seems like a lot; particularly since none of those installations were happening at my house! When I […]
The question might instead be, “what is your current door costing you?” The exterior of your home communicates a message to every person that walks, bikes or drives past. What does your home say about you and what would it cost to improve upon your front entry system? Local, Twin Cities realtor, Brian Gute (along […]
It’s the 21st century and we are gluttons for information. We seek it out and it finds us immediately via our “smart,” devices in the form of pictures, tweets, videos, blog, posts and pins. Back in the old days, we read newspapers, magazines and listened to radio shows to be informed and inspired. Today, the […]
Behind every product that leaves our facility are many busy hands and machines. While we wouldn’t diminish the importance of well-oiled equipment, our people make us who we are. There are so many good people at Bayer Built and we have many to celebrate but this week we’d like you to meet Cory VanBeck. […]
How do we keep that sky both blue and clean? What is environmental stewardship and why do we care? Just about everything we do as humans contributes something positive or negative to our environment. Earth is habitable because of two cycles within our ecosystem; the carbon and hydro cycles. Within this process the earth recycles […]
Just as the Sandhill cranes migrate together at this time of year, so too have we… into a much larger space! Over the course of the last year, our plant has been busier than usual. The smiles in this photo were not always present on the faces of this hard-working team; it has been a […]
Prairie Style homes look as though they meld with the landscape. If you’re driving too fast or you blink, you might miss one. Granted they are few and far between but the style was imagined and inspired in the American Midwest. If you’re going to happen upon one, your chances are better in Illinois, Wisconsin, […]
If you were to ask anyone living in the community of Belgrade, where Bayer Built is located, what it means to be part of a team, they’ll likely reference the very recent State Basketball tournament. The Belgrade-Brooten-Elrosa boys brought home the Class A Championship Trophy again for the second time in three years! You can […]
There are some rather large piles of snow in my yard. Whether yours looks the same or has just the remnants of a snowman left to melt, April is the ideal time to begin shopping for a new exterior door system. In fact, you’d be ahead of the rest if you considered the door style, […]
The 80’s are back, have you heard? It’s been said that John Hughes films only get better with time and chances are very good that half of the homes in your neighborhood contain a Rubik’s cube; even if it is at the bottom of a box in the attic. Hopefully, we can get our 80’s […]
Barn doors are a trend that is sweeping the nation while offering many style options as well as outstanding functionality.
Does the daily grind have you stuck in an all-too-familiar loop; one day blending into the next? We may have that in common. Yesterday’s schedule included stops in Mankato, Mendota Heights, Edina, back to Minnetonka and then over to Roseville. Lately, more time is spent in the car than at home; with or without a […]
The rate at which my children grow out of their jeans is alarming. On mornings when it is discovered that the closet is void of even one pair of pants long enough to wear to school without public humiliation, I ask myself, how could we have prepared for two full inches of, “overnight-vertical-expansion?” And why […]
You’ve likely observed that the best way to teach any person born after let’s say…1980, is to set them in front of an instructional video. Forget about 35-page instruction manuals; watch from your smart phone or your laptop or your iPad and you won’t have to try to figure out what that universal stick person […]
At some point in the history of the world, a tree became something more than just one part of a forest. It was collected or knocked down and used as a tipi pole; a bent frame for a wigwam; a stick frame for a farmhouse. Did you know the oldest wood saw known to man […]
Our goal is to provide you with the best quality prefinished millwork we can in a timely manner while also being stewards of the environment we all share.
Ready to meet another Bayer Built team member? While the most visible of our team are our fifteen outside sales people who ride the roads year-round, they are but a fraction of the people that make up our Bayer Built family. It takes many individuals working on teams to get every order off the line and […]
Just as there is Fashion Week in London and in New York, this coming weekend could aptly be referred to as Home Design Week in Minnesota! If you live within an hour of the Twin Cities and west, you have the unique advantage of not one…not two …but three home tours going on; likely in […]
Now that the sun is starting to set earlier in the day and a few colors can be seen in the tree leaves, it’s time to start thinking about getting your home ready for the change in seasons. Notice we didn’t use the dreaded word beginning with a, “W”? To help you get started, we’ve […]
This week, in cities big and small, we’ll be celebrating our great nation’s beginning and our declaration of independence! Burgers will be grilled, bevvies will be opened and laughter will fill the air. Parades, carnivals, music and fireworks; cousins, friends, neighbors and grandparents…what a celebration we will have! Many triumphs and losses took place in […]
With 35 stain colors and glazes, 43 stock paint colors, 6 distressing options and the ability to custom blend any color, we have the perfect finish available for your home!
Spring is as good a time as any to stock our shelves with new offerings for your upcoming project. With that... (drum roll, please)... we are excited to announce these new Elite and Designer Series additions to our Stock Product Offering!
Bayer Built Woodworks will be at the CMBA Home Show at the Rivers Edge Convention Center in St Cloud, MN this week.
Happy New Year! From all of us at Bayer Built we hope you have a fun and safe start to the new year? Did you know… The song Auld Lang Syne is traditional sung at midnight to toast in the New Year. Auld Lang Syne means “old long ago” or “the good old days.” The […]