How Straight Line Construction Increased Close Rates by 15% with ArcSite

Industry: Foundation Repair 
ArcSite customer since 2020 
Headcount: 125-150
Locations:  Colorado, Arizona & New Mexico

Their Story: Founded in 1982 in southern Colorado, Straight Line Construction is a family-owned foundation repair company now run by Tim and his wife, Lauren — the second generation to lead it. Tim started working for his dad at age 12 and has never known another employer. Today, the company operates five locations across three states, handles everything from residential pier installation to high-profile commercial projects like underpinning the Wyoming State Capitol and installing micro piles atop Pikes Peak.

The Impact

• 15% increase in the close rate of new jobs, directly tied to the quality of ArcSite-generated reports
• 25% increase in average sale value since implementing new processes in ArcSite
• 3–5% increase in on-site close rate for simpler jobs, enabling reps to quote and close before leaving the home
• Eliminated 1–2 days of post-visit office time for reps, with more customers seen per week and no additional overtime

How the Business Started

Straight Line Construction has been around since 1982, but it almost looks like a different company today. What began in southern Colorado with a small crew has grown into a multi-state operation with five locations and a reputation for handling some of the most demanding foundation and structural work in the region — including underpinning the Wyoming State Capitol and a multi-year project installing micro piles at the Pikes Peak summit observation center.

Patrick Harmsen, the Director of Sales Operations, has been with Straight Line for several years — starting as a sales rep, moving into sales management, and eventually taking on oversight of the company's full technology stack, including their custom-built ERP system, CRM, call center operations, and estimating tools across all three states. It was Patrick who found ArcSite. And it changed the way the company sells.

The Challenge

Before ArcSite, Straight Line's estimating process was, in Patrick's own words, "very archaic." Reps would show up to a homeowner's property with graph paper, a pencil, and a tape measure. Some drew a basic square with dimensions written next to it. Others went further: colored pencils, shading, half an hour of effort just to get a drawing together before even starting to build a quote. One approach was branded graph paper printed with a 10:1 scale and the Straight Line logo — an attempt to look more professional using paper tools.

None of it worked at scale. Foundation repair is a technical, high-stakes sale. Homeowners are being asked to spend significant money on work they can't see and don't fully understand. Without a clear, credible visual, closing that sale was an uphill battle.

The team had looked at other software before. But the desktop-only tools they evaluated were rigid, hard to use in the field, and couldn't handle the detail foundation repair actually requires — where the furnace sits, where the crawl space access is, which walls might block a pier installation. Getting everything to scale was a challenge in itself. They needed something built for the field. 

The Solution

Patrick first came across ArcSite through LinkedIn. Further research confirmed what he suspected: this was something Straight Line could actually use.

"I found that you could draw a straight line in the field with a tablet — I was all in. It was 10 times better than anything we had ever hand-drawn."

He and the sales manager built a business case for the owner and got approval. They started with five to six user seats for the residential field team. 

What unlocked real value was ArcSite's ability to build quotes in the field. The sales manager took the time to configure most of Straight Line's service catalogue into ArcSite — services turned into drag-and-drop shapes with pricing tied directly to measurements. The workflow was rebuilt so that for simpler jobs, reps could draw the site, build a quote, and present pricing before they ever left the house.

The bigger win came through the professionalism and efficiency ArcSite brought to the inspection process. Instead of spending an additional 30+ minutes back at the office recreating rough field sketches into clean customer-ready drawings, the team is able to build polished, accurate diagrams during the appointment itself. Those detailed drawings — including the home perimeter, interior walls, fixtures, and site conditions that may impact design or pricing — become the foundation for a clear, professional report the sales rep can review with the homeowner.

"We couldn't do that before ArcSite. It would have taken way too long to try to put something like that together, not to mention the scale."

The drawings also go beyond the homeowner. Straight Line shares ArcSite-generated CAD files directly with the third-party engineers who review plans and approve building permits. A tool that started as a field sketching solution became load-bearing infrastructure for the company's entire sales and project workflow.

The Results

When their processes with ArcSite became standard practice, close rates on those jobs jumped 15%. Average sale value increased 25%. And reps who previously spent one to two days a week doing post-visit office work started spending that time in front of customers instead.

"Our guys are more efficient. They're not having to work as many overtime hours. They're still making good revenue because they're seeing just as many, if not maybe a 10% increase in customers, without having to spend a whole bunch more time."

The adoption story is one Patrick tells with some amusement now. The reps who resisted ArcSite hardest at first — the ones who complained it would take too long, that they weren't getting paid to draw — are now top performers. Once the ramp-up was behind them, they found that drawing in ArcSite was faster than doing it on paper and re-entering everything into a separate system. More bids out. Better bids. Same hours.

What's Next

Straight Line is actively working with the ArcSite team to build enhancements directly into the platform — eliminating the need to move data between multiple systems. With this new depth to our integrated partnership, it will reduce the number of people who need to touch each job, speed up report turnaround, and put polished survey reports in the sales rep's hands faster.

For Patrick, the lesson is straightforward: if your field team is still working off paper, you're leaving money on the table every single day.