From: "Susan Jerome" <gefjon@gilanet.com>

From Cottage to Industry: Adobe in the 21^st Century

An Abstract

By Susan Jerome, owner, Mule Creek Adobe, Inc.

Adobe, traditionally a family or community endeavor is a quiet art, something quaint and primitive, not something that most people think of as having been subject to the industrial revolution or massive technological upgrades. The local adoberia is often a sporadically busy place–making the adobes for a neighbors’ house or a local building, but rarely does it constitute an ongoing, serious business. Of the few adoberias that survived the popular resurgence and then decline of adobe manufacture in the 1970's and 80's, even fewer are profitable. Those icons of the adobe manufacturing business are themselves at risk through static methodology and management. The challenge for adobe producers today is to become that serious commercial endeavor and embrace all the various facets of business management in order to survive. If adobe is to flourish as a mainstream building method, and be a leader in the transformation to green building, adobe manufacture must make the jump from sleepy, transcultural organic elitism to assertive, credible and iconoclastic marketing.

1. The adoberia is the logical first contact point for "green" construction education and advocacy.

2. Legitimacy as a business lends legitimacy to the product.

3. Profitability requires innovation, legal compliance, and available product.

4. We must adopt some of the same strategies as other building systems to successfully compete for the same target market of home buyers.

5. A consistently high-quality product with measurable standards lends credibility to the business and the industry as a whole.

There are inherent business advantages that adobe manufacture represents–qualities which are beyond the scope of financial analysis, but have a significant "human" return.

Adobe is uniquely positioned to maintain its cultural and historical attractiveness while providing a gathering point for the whole community in cooperative projects. MCA has helped sponsor reconstruction of a community chapel, and has given a materials grant to the local domestic violence shelter. We participate in the annual Ft. Bayard days, wherein hundreds of fourth graders learn New Mexico history via reconstructed venues and absolutely love mixing adobe in a wheelbarrow and building walls. They receive a brief history of adobe, a work sheet and their teachers get a lesson plan and recipes. This inexpensive advertizing has impact in every home with a fourth grader—"what did you do in school today?" And if his/her parents don’t pursue it, there’s a good chance that fourth grader will eventually invest in a home.

Adobe is a perfect manufacturing partner in economic development scenarios, providing basic skilled jobs, and a spin-off point for other commercial ventures, especially in rural HUB zones.(Historically Underutilized Business). In the Southwest, local governmental agencies as well as federal entities should be using adobe construction for housing, office buildings, parks gardens and other structures. These groups must be approached carefully, after criteria as an approved contractor/purveyor have been met by the adoberia. But the potential projects are lucrative, high profile and fail-safe.

The economic, environmental and aesthetic benefit is widespread and long-lasting. In the 2000 census, 41 percent of New Mexico single family homes were manufactured or mobile homes. These structures are generally of mediocre quality, have poor insulation, and cost more per square foot than an owner built adobe home of the same size. Benefits are expediency of ordering and set-up and innovative, if not always equitable financing. Adobe in Southwestern New Mexico must be able to compete favorably, with "one-stop shopping" for prospective homeowners.

Contractors and builders must be introduced to the virtues of adobe.