Built By Pottsy LLC celebrates 15 year anniversary

By Thomas Clapper

CCM Reporter

Built By Pottsy LLC is celebrating its 15th year of operation on April 9 after building over 15,000 flowers. 

“Honestly it feels pretty good to be doing this for 15 years,” said Aaron “Pottsy” Potts. “I never thought I would be 53 years old building metal flowers. It is cool my daughter Elizabeth is going to be 20 in May. She grew up seeing this all from the start. Her end goal is to be a part of the business and grow it in different directions after college. I did not push her into it, she wants to do this on her own and that is really awesome to me.”

Pottsy explained he puts serial numbers on the big projects and with the 15,000th he plans on making a large sunflower bush that will have 15 sunflower heads on it to mark each year.

The company grows more each year, but the current economy is felt by Pottsy. 

“I understand this is a luxury item and people don’t need metal flowers,” said Pottsy. “But we are still doing well enough, and I expect it to pick up when the economy comes around.”

He still sees an out of state license plate at the shop at least once a week.

Every item is built at the shop but powder coated and sandblasted elsewhere at BJ Meyer’s shop. 

“BJ is my right-hand man,” said Pottsy. “I call the main four of us the core four who belongs to me Pottsy, BJ Meyer, Joe Wittensoldner and Michael Bledsoe. But I have many other invaluable helpers like my father, Julia Bober and BJ’s younger brother Dusty Meyer. It has been nice seeing them grow over the years.”

Pottsy said the idea to do this started with his mother. He had a mechanical engineering background and loved playing with metal. He started out as a machinist and attended Buckeye Career Center.

His mother visited him one day with a home and garden magazine and the landscaping had animals made out of car parts. She asked if he could make one and he made her a bird. After this he made metal flowers for his mother and grandmother. 

“That was how it started and they drew interest from others,” said Pottsy. “I made some more stuff and took it to the Hartville Flea Market and ended up selling $400 worth of items. I realized there was a potential business there.”

He said the first year he painted the flowers then decided to look into powder coating and met Meyer.

“I literally started selling them out in my yard with a for sale sign,” said Pottsy. “We were open just on Fridays and then opened on Thursdays, too. We went to a website to sell smaller items. It is something my daughter can expand on. We would like to grow the business a little more and acquire some property when the time is right.”

Pottsy gets his plier parts for his designs from scrapped parts at Channellock, Inc. in Pennsylvania. 

“We have a great working relationship with Channellock, Inc. and they are a good family run business,” said Pottsy. “I have a crate there where they deposit scrap pliers and I pick it up and switch it out when it is full. In a normal year we used 8-10,000 pounds of just plier parts for our products.”

Products include flowers, hummingbirds, butterflies, dragonflies, crabs, fish, turtles and more. See www.builtbypottsy.com for an online selection. 

Built By Pottsy, LLC is located at 4291 Waynesburg Rd. NW, Carrollton. Hours are Thursdays 2 p.m.-6 p.m. and Fridays 10 a.m. -4 p.m. It is shut down over July. Pottsy can be reached at 330-415-4132.