Brinkman Construction Standardizes Early Payments Across 63% of Sub Spend

Industry
Construction, General Contractor

Regions
Mountain

ERP
CMiC

Annual Revenue
$130M

The Problem

Before adopting Earlytrade, Brinkman Construction occasionally offered early payments to subcontractors, but the process was difficult to manage. These arrangements were often coordinated directly by members of the construction operations team rather than through a formalized program.

According to CFO Dave Maddocks, the process lacked structure and oversight. “Some early payments were already happening within our organization and it was very informal,” he explained. In some cases, early payments were extended without consistent criteria or centralized visibility.

Without a standardized process or solution in place, early payments “just led to a lot of headaches for our accounting team.”

At the same time, Brinkman was beginning to build excess cash and saw early payments as an opportunity to deploy it more strategically. The returns available through early payment discounts were often more attractive than traditional cash management options like money market accounts. However, the company lacked a scalable way to administer an early payment program across its subcontractor network and fully capture those opportunities.

The Solution

When Dave first heard the Earlytrade concept, the appeal was immediate. “I thought it was a really novel idea,” he said, pointing to the sophistication of the model. Brinkman could continue paying subs from their own accounts via their existing payment process, just earlier in exchange for a discount.

Instead of relying on informal arrangements with a handful of subcontractors, Brinkman could extend the opportunity to a wider group – without asking them to sacrifice control over participation or discount rates. “Earlytrade was a way to offer early payment to as many subs as we wanted to include, in a really simple manner.”

Those inclusion controls were key for Dave. “It really becomes an issue of just making sure you're not allowing any high-risk subcontractors to be bidding for early payment,” he said. Earlytrade enables Brinkman to manage this with a simple on/off toggle that determines which subs, projects, and owners are eligible for early payment.

From a financial perspective, “The financial return just made sense — a 2% discount return on early payments easily outperformed what we could get from short-term investments like money market accounts.”

The Results

With Earlytrade, Brinkman transformed early payments from an informal process to a structured program with 63% of their open invoices registered on the platform and positioned to generate early payment discounts — driving significant returns for the company.

Contrary to common assumptions about why subs use early payments, Brinkman’s success is fueled steadily by their top subcontractors. Their most consistent discounters are strong partners and high performers who leverage early payments to enable their own discounting programs, not small companies in dire financial situations.

The program has also reduced administrative friction for the accounting team by replacing ad hoc requests with a consistent, automated workflow, improving visibility and control across the organization. As a result, Brinkman can more confidently scale early payments while maintaining alignment with their financial and risk management priorities.