All South Supply: First of its kind in Houma

Brad Matherne saw an opening, so he took it.

The general manager of the new concrete accessories and supply store at 310 Venture Blvd. in Houma, All South Supply, opened the business in January because there was nothing else like it in the area.

All South Supply sells items related to concrete and paving. The 5,000-square-foot store specializes in offering rebar, concrete parking bumpers, and metal keyways, which are the joints connecting the sections, or blocks, in parking lots.

“We sell everything for the concrete except for the concrete itself,” Matherne said.

“It’s a kind of specialty (business),” he said. “Not just anyone comes in to buy keyways.”

Before Matherne opened the business, residents of the Houma area had to go to New Orleans and Baton Rouge to find the kinds of items stocked by All South. Local lumberyards also do not carry goods offered by All South, Matherne said.

Other items on sale in the new store include tiewire for bundling rebar, geotextile underlayment, concrete catch basins, tools for finishing concrete, smooth rebar dowels, and supports for rebar and wire mesh.

The underlayment is a fabric placed in concrete to keep limestone from pushing down on the mud. Finishing tools include trowels for smoothing wet concrete. Dowels tie metal keyways together.

For any item needing modification, All South prefabricates everything in its shop. The store does no on-site fabrication for customers.

“We deliver the items cut,” Matherne said. If needed, All South will include drawings and diagrams for the customer.

As an example, for one of All South’s concrete catch basins, the store prefabricates the pieces in shop, and the customer assembles the basin in the yard.

The store also does customized rebar cutting.

All South purchases roughly half its stock of items directly from manufacturers, and the other half from wholesalers.

However, the store buys larger goods, like rebar and metal keyways, strictly from manufacturers.

Matherne said his business’ prices, which are negotiable, are competitive with local lumberyards, and with the big suppliers in Baton Rouge and New Orleans.

He said he is trying to spread the word that All South is offering commodities, which are new to the Houma area.

“We’re just starting out,” he said. “We’re trying to get sales going.”

The store’s customers are individuals, as well as businesses. “We sell to anybody who shows up,” he said.

Mostly, though, Matherne wants to relay the message that All South “is the first like this in the Houma area.”

Staff photo by SOPHIA RUFFIN * Tri-Parish Times * All South Supply of Houma, a new business to the Tri-parish area, supplies local businesses with concrete and paving accessories. General Manager Brad Matherne is pictured unloading parking bumper stock.