The Domino Sugar Factory is 162 feet tall, 103 years old, and live the entire time anyone works on it. Ryan Godwin walked through what traditional access would take: booms, scaffolding, or rope access, with a boom tall enough to reach the top running $5,000 to $6,000 a week to rent, and this job likely needing two of them since there aren't many that size in the country and sourcing one is its own logistics problem. Lift rental alone would run around $50,000. The full traditional job would take 12 to 13 people over roughly a month to a month and a half.

Softwash chemistry was a deliberate choice on top of that. At 103 years old, the building's brick, mortar, and window sills couldn't take a high-pressure approach, so the crew uses a standard bleach-based softwash mix instead, tuned with a few of their own additions, care of the facility as much as the cleaning itself.

The drone job runs with about six people on site instead of 12 to 13: two visual observers, a pump operator, and the pilot, more hands than Godwin's typical crew of one pilot and one VO, because a site this size and this active needs the extra eyes. What was originally planned as two to two-and-a-half weeks, weather permitting, is on pace to be cut roughly in half, saving the customer around $50,000 on top of the schedule. And because the factory keeps running the whole time, the crew can move out of workers' way quickly instead of shutting down production the way a lift setup would require.

"It's truly a challenge every time. That's the hard part. That's the part that keeps drawing you back, is a challenge every time you step up to the plate."

— Ryan Godwin

"This building's 103 years old, so that's why we chose softwash. We're not ripping apart brick or mortar or window sills. It was just care of the facility."

— Ryan Godwin