Op/Ed: Building connections, one egg at a time

This is an essay on building business relationships by Jacob Felts, the Charlotte business development manager for LeChase Construction. He also owns Felts Farm in Monroe. 

When I first stepped into business development in the construction world, I did what every other BD guy was doing. I built relationships the way the playbook said: by showing up at industry events, grabbing coffee, setting up lunches, hosting dinners, hitting happy hours, and, of course, plenty of golf. I stayed active on social media and kept the meetings coming.

And to be fair, I was good at it. People knew my name. They returned my calls. I could build rapport, and I made it a point to ask about their families, hobbies, and lives outside work. I’d remember the details, follow up, and show I cared. But even with that effort, I knew 15 other business developers were doing the exact same thing, and I was always aware of it, wondering if my relationships were truly stronger.

Then my wife and I bought a farm.

At first, it had nothing to do with work. It was personal. Our son had food allergies, and we wanted to understand where our food was coming from and what was in it. So we bought a farm. We started small: a few animals, a garden, and the steep learning curve that comes with both. We learned patience from waiting on the weather. We learned grit from chasing cattle across muddy fields. And we learned that no amount of spreadsheets can make a tomato ripen any faster.

It didn’t take long before the farm came up in conversations at work. Someone would ask what I’d been up to, I’d mention the farm, and almost without fail, the next question was, “So… do you have eggs?”

We did. Fresh, pasture-raised eggs.

I brought some in. Just a dozen eggs in shades of green, blue, brown, and white, tucked into a cardboard carton, handed off to a developer after a meeting. Nothing fancy, just a neighborly gesture. But it lit something up. The next week, he asked if I had more. Another architect wanted some. Then an engineer. Before I knew it, I had a mental list of who needed eggs on what day of the week.

From there, the list grew. Eggs turned into tomatoes. Tomatoes turned into baskets of produce. Then came the milk. Then the beef. What started as a novelty became a rhythm. I was no longer just scheduling check-ins with clients. I was part of their kitchen table. I’d drop off a dozen eggs and later hear that their kids had scrambled them for breakfast. I’d leave a bag of tomatoes and get a text about the sauce their grandmother used to make. Suddenly, the conversations weren’t just about contracts or bids. They were about family, food, and tradition.

That’s when I realized something important: this was groundwork.

Groundwork is what you do before you build anything. On a construction site, it’s the foundation, the grading, the soil testing the hidden work that makes everything else possible. On a farm, it’s the planting, the tending, the unseen hours that lead to a harvest. And in relationships, groundwork is the small, consistent acts that take you from being a name in someone’s inbox to being someone they trust.

I didn’t set out to create a strategy. I just shared what my family was doing. But that became the seed of something deeper. My clients stopped being just clients. They became friends. In many cases, they became family.

These days, I still attend industry events. I still send the follow-up emails. I still keep my CRM up to date. But I’ve learned that the strongest connections don’t come from calendars or contact software. They come from showing people who you are and offering something real.

Not everyone has a farm. But everyone has something that shows who they are maybe it’s a hobby, or even a shared connection like being in the same fraternity or graduating from the same school. When you share that piece of yourself, you’re not just checking in. You’re putting down groundwork for a relationship that lasts.

Because in the end, whether you’re building a project, planting a field, or building trust with a client, the outcome is only as strong as the foundation you put down.

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