Roseburg Business Uses Concrete to Help the World Have Fun

It was quite the audacious idea that Lem James decided on back in August of 2010. To take a ping pong table that normally weighs 200 lbs and build a 2,000 lb version out of concrete. On top of that, the table would cost several thousand dollars and he had no customers lined up. Lem was convinced that the idea was solid and people would buy the higher quality tables if they saw them. “I've always had a great time playing Table Tennis and I knew I wanted to play at the park and outside. I knew once we made it in concrete it would be far better quality than anything else that was available.” James said. So, on a hot day in late August of 2010, Lem James and Billie Maddux (who’s now the production manager) got to work on building the first concrete ping pong table from Lem’s carport in Roseburg. A week later and the table was finished. Now they needed to find a buyer for it. So Lem built a website and put up a Facebook page and shared pictures of the newly built concrete pingpong table. Kendra Pettengill helped James with marketing. Together they emailed potential customers, and even donated a table to a local charity Relay for Life. They took the table to multiple events including a charity golf tournament and the Cancer Center. One night they brought it to the UCC track for an event and played pingpong all night. At each event they took pictures of the table being enjoyed and shared those pictures on their website. About a year after the first table was built, a customer in British Columbia in Canada placed an order. They wanted two tables! A week later, another order came in for a table and the business has been growing ever since. The business has now expanded to offer concrete foosball tables, corn hole, chess tables and a brand new 4 quadrant ping pong table. Customers have purchased concrete recreational products from the company from 48 different states in the US and several countries all over the world. The business now has 10 local employees. The success has James happy, but much of that is because he knows that his products bring people together. “Our purpose is to help people have fun. It's a win for everyone.” James said. The entire operation was a pleasure for me to see. The concrete tables they build are beautiful and really fun to use. It’s inspiring to see someone execute a plan to build a product here in Douglas County that serves a market with customers all over the world. If Lem and company can build these tables out of concrete and ship them all over the world, what else could be built in Douglas County? It will be exciting to see in the years to come! To see their concrete ping pong tables as well as other products, check out their website: https://www.concretetabletennis.com/