Since our founding in 1990, Blacklidge has made a conscious and consistent effort to maintain the highest level of integrity in all that we do and to develop the best asphalt products on the market. To this day, we continue to instill the idea that you should always do the right thing, to strive to do excellent work, even when nobody is looking, to work harder than the competition, and to work and live with purpose and compassion.
The COVID-19 crisis is only the latest challenge our industry faces but has provided an opportunity for reflection and planning. Recently, the leadership team met to create a strategy for moving forward to continue the growth and success we have all worked so hard to achieve. We decided that right now there is an opportunity to capture our beliefs in a new brand promise: “Always the better road.”
“Always the better road” means our communities are proud of the contributions we make to the local area — from economic to environmental. It means our customer can always count on us to be at our very best every day and that when engineers choose our products, they have confidence that the roads they design will perform better, last longer and be more sustainable. We want all of us at Blacklidge to get up every morning and think, “always the better road,” not just at work, but also in everything we do.
In the literal sense, “Always the better road” means Blacklidge is a part of building a better America and world. This includes encouraging the use of more recycled materials into asphalt pavements while still increasing performance. The cost of mining virgin materials and the environmental impact is just too big. There is plenty of material inventory currently sitting out there on the road that can be reused. We must use advanced, high performance materials, data, technology and knowledge to increase the life of our products as an industry. Building a better America also means proactive diversification of the workforce in the asphalt industry. Supporting and developing more women and minorities to consider a career in asphalt is critical because the combined brainpower and life experiences will only make us stronger.
Always building a longer lasting road isn’t the easiest thing to do, but we feel it’s the right thing to do. Ultimately, longer lasting roads benefit everybody, even the asphalt paving contractor. Our goal should be to make asphalt pavements last more than 30 years. The cost (both economically and environmentally) of building roads is tremendous. Just backing up traffic during construction is a huge economic waste that can be addressed with longer lasting roads. If we can make roads last more than 30 years, it will benefit the industry, budgets, taxpayers and the environment. We have proven existing products like UltraFuse® and UltraTack® that improve the performance of new and resurfaced roads and products like ReGenX® that can extend the life of existing asphalt surfaces. We are committed to lead the charge through continual innovation in all parts of our business.
With the expansion of our advanced testing and development lab, we have great enthusiasm for the future. We spend so much time and effort researching, developing and innovating new products because we want to always provide a better road. We want to give our customers a better road and “wow” them with our innovation and service. I encourage all of us at Blacklidge to embrace our new brand promise – Always the Better Road – as it is my promise to you.