About
Garden State Sealing has been a trusted name and partner to the property management community since 1983. In September of 2022, we became Garden State Pavement Solutions. Our new name more accurately depicts who we have become and better emphasizes the strength of our core capabilities.
Our advanced, in-depth property evaluation tools, pavement rating system, and project charter methodology will help property managers effectively budget and plan for current and annual new construction, reconstruction and maintenance. We believe it is important to build trust with our customers through transparency and deed. We A.I.M. for good.
History
Garden State Sealing was established in the summer of 1983. Upon graduating High School, I started a handyman business and one of my services was sealing driveways. At the same time, I was starting my business, I was also enrolled at Mercer County Community College. After one year of College, I decided to transfer to Ohio State University where I obtained a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Administration, specializing in Production and Operations Management. During the 4 years at Ohio State, I spent each summer knocking on doors selling sealcoat. Most of this work was residential, however I did land the occasional office building or strip mall. These were hard trying summers because my parents did not have the means to help pay for college. In the end, I never took a student loan and paid for my own college tuition by sealcoating driveways. This was and still may be an accomplishment I am most proud of.
After graduating college in 1988, my longtime friend Rich Manners, who just graduated from Monmouth University, asked me if I was interested in buying houses with him. Next thing I know we purchased 3 houses on the same street and our real estate business was off and running. Our early purchases were focused in the Trenton area where we built up a portfolio of 15 rental units. In a short period of time, we started purchasing homes in other towns in New Jersey such as Long Branch, Belmar, New Brunswick, Red Bank and Hamilton.
Soon after starting Felman Investments, our real estate business, I asked Rich if he wanted to be partners in my Garden State Sealing business. I felt guilty leaving work early to seal driveways and not working on the houses over the weekend because I had sealcoating work scheduled.
Rich loved the idea, and now I had a partner who was a born salesman and someone who had big ideas on how to increase revenue by focusing on commercial work. We expanded our services to include crack repair, power washing and patching. After 15 years of running both the real estate business and the asphalt maintenance business, we decided to focus our attention on the asphalt maintenance business.
Rich and I grew Garden State Sealing to 30 plus employees and now offer more services including but not limited to, milling and paving, excavation work, mastic installation, corrosion inhibitor, asphalt rejuvenator and winter services. We also started another company called Garden State Concrete. This company offers 4 Volume Metric Mixing Trucks. These trucks manufacture concrete for the customer at the work site. Our customers love this product because the concrete is mixed fresh on site, and it is metered so there is no waste.
Garden State Sealing has recently gone through a rebranding and is now called Garden State Pavement Solutions.
