Mastering Retail Roofing Strategies

He's also doing some really interesting things that a lot of roofers are not doing exceptionally well . He has a very unique approach to retail sales , even though he's in the Texas market .

He also has some things he's doing with a call center that are unusual in a really good way , and so it's just been really cool to watch you grow your company , and so we'll get into some of that stuff . But before we do that , just give people a little bit of background , like who are you and how did you get into roofing ?

And I was helping a painter at the time , a custom painter and we would just paint like mansions , right , like million dollar homes . And my friend was asking me why are you doing that for somebody else ? Why don't you do it for yourself ? You know you get in front of custom builders , you build a relationship , you get jobs from them .

Why don't you do it for yourself ? And I'm like I don't know how to paint , you know I can't do that kind of work . And he's like well , no , I know roofing , so we can get a roofing company started and then just see how it goes . It didn't take much , you know .

I want to say maybe like a month after that we were already getting everything going and , uh , well , slowly , you know , I just started learning what everything was . I didn't know , like the parts of the roof , I didn't know anything whatsoever . And he has another business .

So I want to say maybe like a year in , he had to step away to focus more on that other business , and so I really , really had to had to learn everything . That's how it all got started .

He's uh , well , he doesn't live here in houston but , uh , he's still involved with with the business , maybe not day-to-day , but he comes by maybe , uh , every month , every other month , you know something like that um , on calls , you know he still helps with the team and everything , so he's still involved nice .

That's one of the goals for this year to this year to tap into commercial a little bit more . We , for the first three years , we were mostly retail . I want to say 95% of our volume was retail , until I didn't understand anything about insurance . I didn't know how to work , I didn't know how to communicate with adjusters , any of that .

But I realized I was leaving a lot of money on the table . So I was like you know what ? It's time to learn , it's time to adapt . So , yeah , we started doing insurance in 2000 . At the end of 2023 , 2024 , we went pretty heavy in insurance . So now and I don't like it to be honest I freaking hate insurance . Work man , it's a total nightmare .

So this year I want to have like a 50-50 split . I don't want to rely on insurance . If it was up to me , I would just do 100 retail , but I don't want to , you know , just so here's .

So how did you get started into retail ? And then you know why did you stick with that ?

And so when I hear we do roofing , now like this is what we're into , what do I do ? Well , I got to go sell a roof , right . So I will talk to people like hey , it looks like you need a roof , I can finance it , let's do it . You know , like that's pretty much how you get started .

I didn't understand the insurance world , right , and the storm chasing and none of that . And just , I looked into it a little bit and it seems so complicated and I didn't want to wait to learn at all . But I was like you know what , let me just go this route where people pay cash , they finance whatever .

And if it was insurance , I would just go meet with the fuel adjuster and if it gets approved , great . And if it doesn't , it doesn't right . Then I finance it , and if it gets approved , I just wait to collect the check . I wouldn't communicate with the carrier at all .

What close rate are you going for Stuff like that ?

It's not like oh yeah , this is the shingle and this is the prize . What do you want to do ? No , it's not like that . So we explain what the tariff looks like .

We explain why removing the other label is important , why inspecting the decking is important , why the different shingles are important , what impact resistance means , what the hip and ridge , why the starter is important , what the drippage does . We go into a lot of detail because nobody else is doing that . That's how we build value right . So we still on retail .

We still hit the margins that we hit on insurance . So we don't sacrifice money when we go retail , which is something that I hear a lot with other contractors . That was because I have to go really low . I have to compete with Chuck in a truck . It's like why Are you , Chuck , in a truck ? Why are you lowering yourself to that level .

Why are you competing with that guy ? Like ? You guys are not on the same playing field , Like ? Why do that to yourself ? Well , it's because the homeowner just wants the cheapest . Do they Like ? Do they understand what they're getting with that Like ? You need to educate them and explain why your price is higher . What does that mean ?

That means that I'm going to answer the phone when something goes wrong . That means that you can find me on Google . That means that you can find me in the Chamber of Commerce . You can find me on Directory . You can find me on NRCA . Can you find Chuck in a truck somewhere else ? Or is it just his cell phone number ?

And if he changes his number , you'll never hear from him again . You know , these are the risks that you take . Where does chuck get his material ? Does he have any warranties , like all these things that homeowners don't understand . These homeowners they're not experts in roofing , right ?

It's , uh , really easy for us to forget what people don't know , right , like you , you roofing , you know what everything is and you just assume that people maybe not know as much as you do , but that have a basic understanding of what you're doing and they don't . So that's our main approach is educating the

homeowner and when they say , that's so good . Yeah , no , go ahead homeowner , and when they say , well , I still want to collect more estimates , oh , that is great . Please do that . Way you can see why we are better than everybody else , right ?

So we just blow it out of the water with a presentation , because we know that nobody else is going to explain it the way that we do , and we prep them all right . So make sure that you ask , can ask them this , this and this what kind of shingle are they using ? How are they installing it ? Are they going to clean up afterwards ? Do they have this ?

Do they have that ? Make sure that you ask these questions , okay , okay , they call us later . They're like well , you were the most expensive of them all , but I want to go with you . Why ? Because they feel safe with us , right ?

You guys are even bringing like a miniature version of a roof system and you're showing them this is the shingles , this is the underlayment , this is the decking , here's some things you need to look for .

And you're bringing this educational approach to the point to where , when they do talk to someone else , you guys are coming out of the gate so strong as experts . When they talk to somebody else , there's no way they're going to go with them . And I think about that with anything .

I mean like I think about when I threw my back out doing jujitsu about 10 years ago and I was really getting into it , loved it , but my back pain started ratcheting up and my back started getting more and more stiff and then it got so bad to where I couldn't even get out of bed one day , and it's like dang , I guess I need to chill out on the jujitsu

and it just got worse from there to the point to where I couldn't walk . I laid on my back for about a week and then went to go see a neurosurgeon and took they took x-rays and did all that stuff . And she's like , well , you've got two options . You can either cut off the you know your disc is herniated . You've got it . Your disc is protruding .

That's why you're feeling all this sciatic nerve pain going down the left leg and it feels like somebody's poking you with a hot iron . That's nerve pain . And I'm like , okay , what do we do ? Because I'm walking around like a zombie , like I can't function anymore . My , I can't even drive my car . My wife has to drive me somewhere .

It takes me five minutes to just get in in the car . So she's like you can cut off the protruded part of the disc or just leave it alone . It's not going to get any worse . And this is a woman who's been through a lot of school I mean to be a neurosurgeon the amount of years in school after medical school .

I was just like so disappointed by her analysis and her recommendation . So I started looking around online and I find this chiropractor that specializes in herniated discs and does this thing called decompression therapy . So I go to see this guy . His whole approach was , just like you're saying , extremely educational . He asked me , I was there for an hour .

He asked me a ton of questions and then he started telling me here's our process . We're going to take x-rays of your neck , your back , we're going to do alignment , we're going to weigh you on a scale that weighs your right foot , your left foot , all these other things .

And then here's my approach and he's like , and I'm going to tell you right out of the gate , I am not the cheapest . He said my services are pretty expensive and it's not going to be covered by insurance . Insurance companies aren't up to date on the best treatments , he's like . But I'll let me show you this .

He handed me a binder , this thick of customer testimonials handwritten , and I'm just reading person after person going . I couldn't walk . I went to see this doctor and after two months I was completely back to normal . Just after one after another , after another . So I've been sold through education and sold on testimonials .

And , man , I started going to see this guy three times a week and within two months my life was totally back to normal Zero back pain . It was done .

But I went with the most expensive option I could find it was like $3,000 out of pocket for two months of therapy , but it changed , it saved my life and so I talked to people , I talked to people , I , I talked to other roofing members in our in the limitless group about this and they'll get in these issues of well , how do you sell against price ?

And it's like man , you should never get in a price war . You should totally be selling on value and educating the homeowner to the point . Like I know your presentation presentation . Once they see your presentation at texas stag , anybody else who comes to present , it's going to be like black and white versus color tv .

So it's gonna look it's the homeowners and like , uh , like you know , 10 minutes in they're gonna be like I don't know yeah , exactly that's .

And with a heavy membership group in Texas , most of the guys in our group are doing almost 100% storm restoration work , and so what would you say to guys that are listening to this what are the pros and cons of just doing retail or just doing storm ?

It's not about over-promising and then not being able to deliver right . That would be the number one thing that you can deliver on the value that you're promising , right , and then having the confidence that your service , your product , is that good , like that you don't have to worry about oh man .

Well , I'm telling them this , but what if it doesn't go like that ? Right ? What if we have issues ? What if they have problems ? What if ? No ?

Like you need to have the confidence , because otherwise , how can you present a number that is going to be higher than everybody else more than likely if they're trying to show up on price , like most people do and be able to give them that number and be like yeah , that's what this is , and this is the reason why , instead of like oh man , yeah , well , yeah ,

man is $3,000 more , you know . Like that's not confident at all , it's just having the confidence and the pros , I would say no cash flow issues . You finish the job , you get paid period On to the next one . You don't have to request recoverable depreciation supplements , none of that . You finish the job , you get paid period .

Like the workflow , the life of a project , you know , on retail is probably about a week with us , from the moment that we sign it to the moment that we deliver the warranty certificates . But if we compare it with insurance , we still have claims that we signed back in July that don't have approval yet , you know . So that's the difference .

That's why I love retail . Everybody loves cash and you know cash is king , right ? Without cash flow , there's nothing . So the con I would say you have to be able to replicate yourself , right ? You got to have a mini-me that can present the same way that you do , that has the same confidence that you do , that has the same knowledge that you do .

So that takes a little bit of time . You can't just hire someone and be like , okay , go knock doors and you're going to tell them that the insurance is going to take care of it . They just have to pay their deductible and that's it .

No , it's a lot different because with insurance , technically , as long as nobody is waiving deductibles , my cost is going to be the same , right ? It doesn't mean if you go with me , you go with Chuck . When you go with my competitor , you're just paying your deductible , those $5,000 , that's how much you're going to pay .

It's just about who's going to do the better job , right , but on retail , no , it's a whole other skill set . You need to be able to read them , you need to be able to educate them , have the patience to answer questions and actually have the knowledge to break down the process and every material that is going to be on the roof .

So I don't I don't want to say that it's a con , but it's something that is going to take more time and effort . That's why it took us so long to put a sales team together yeah , I know , I look at that I .

I mean , I'm in Dallas and the whole sales process in Dallas for most roofing companies is well , I'll tell you what . Let's do an inspection of your roof . Yeah , it looks like it's pretty damaged .

You may want to file a claim , know , and that's it and it's like you know , you're , like you said , your deductible and and it is the issue um , of course , most deductibles have gone up to two percent or more at this time now , but back then they were almost all of them were one percent and but even then you can finance the , the deductible if you need to

. So what would you ? So why aren't more roofing companies

selling retail ? I mean , to me it's a no-brainer , it's like don't be a one-trick pony , don't just focus on insurance claims . Have an actual sales process and system and sell value with retail and get paid , like you said , cash . You've got to have cash . So why don't more guys do it ?

So you can only imagine , right , so it's a lot easier to close , right , it's a lot easier to sell In retail . I think it's just more complicated and most of the guys try to compete on price . You know just what we were talking about a minute ago .

And that's not the point , because then you're pretty much enabling truck in a truck , like by competing with those prices you make it normal . So we go to an appointment and so they have an estimate for $8,000 , another one for $9,000 . They have one for $12,000 , and let's say that we're at $13,000 , right ?

So if everybody's trying to compete with Chuck , what is the homeowner going to think ? Well , that is the normal price , that's how much my roof should be .

But if we all legitimate roofing companies have our prices aligned same as insurance , and we say , no , your roof is going to be $13,000 , $12,000 , and the chug shows up with an $8,000 estimate , then no homeowner is going to see that as a red flag . They're going to be like wait , wait a minute , what do you mean ? It's $8,000 ? What's up with that ?

And then we can be like , well , yeah , exactly , don't you think that's a little weird ? I mean , what do you think is going to put on your roof ? But if we all try to match those prices with better quality material , with better workmanship , with actual warranties , insured , with workers' comp and all these things , it doesn't make sense .

I think we just need to come together and put a stop to the low prices . With the low margins . There's no way to run a business . That's why , if you tell me , if I do insurance , I have a 50% profit margin , but if I do retail , I have a 20% profit margin , I'm going to do insurance all day , right .

But if we all get together and we're all doing the same margins on retail yeah , of course Then the whole industry is going to shift Right .

But you guys have , yeah , it's easy to sell a roof , but then , like you said , all the back and forth with with adjusters and carriers and waiting on checks it's just brutal sometimes . But I want to get into what you guys are doing for lead generation , because who cares if you can't sell , if you're not bringing in leads ?

And you've done something very unusual and unique there . But before we get into that , you're the company owner . You're growing a growing company . You've built a strong team . You're doing stuff with us to improve . So I know you're going to be one of these roofing owners and leaders that's going to have a great company . Like you're getting into some EOS .

You're getting into Culture Index , you're getting into , you know , mastermind . Like you're doing everything you can to go to the next level and remove the limits on your leadership and on your success . So , at this stage , though , what keeps you up at night ? Like what are those 1 am or 2 am issues that you wake up and you just that's it .

You start thinking about that issue with your company .

I don't know how other people do it the same way that it's confusing or odd for other contractors that we just do retail or that we like retail more . It blows my mind how contractors deal with this BS , you know , with the adjusters and all that . It's just a freaking nightmare , to be honest .

That is over 60 days and it's like wow and you just feel like our hands are tied right , Like we are doing everything by the book , but the adjuster is just like playing games , right . So I guess that would be the thing that it's one of the biggest challenges right now .

I mean , are you guys working with a supplementing company or are you trying to get somebody in-house trained ? How are you dealing with that ?

I don't know why , but most of our volume was Allstate . So , yeah , most claims ended up tied up with Public Adjuster . I want to say right now we have about 35 claims with attorney . So yeah , so yeah , whether we have a PA or we handle the claim with a supplement company , the recovery still takes forever , no matter what .

So we're playing with different ideas and today , during the call with Steve , um , I picked this brain . I was like , hey , well , what if we do this ? What do we do that ? Well , yeah , that's a great idea . That won't work . Don't waste your time . I'm like , okay , cool . So yeah , we , we learned a lot on that call that's great .

So let's get into what you're doing to generate leads and I mean , I was picking your brain on this yesterday because you're doing something that really could apply to any , I don't care what kind of business you have roofing , hvac , plumbing , healthcare this could apply . So how are you guys generating leads ? Because most guys are spending money on Google ads .

What are you doing ? That's different .

Wow .

So we have a 68% show rate on the appointments that we book from the call center , which is crazy . So , out of the actual , presentations .

And so I would go sell and then night I would put the estimates together , you know . So I barely slept . So like , this is not going to work . I can't scale like this , right . So then I looked into getting VAs and then , just being in that world , right , I realized that a lot of them had a cold calling experience and I'm like tell me more about that .

How does that work ? Yeah , you know the telemarketers and like all the calls that we get . I started looking into it more and there's a lot of industries that do really well with cold callings and I'm like , man , really , maybe it's worth a shot . Let's see how this goes . I hired quite a few agents to call and it didn't go that well .

I tried , it failed , I pretty much gave up on it and then I was like you know what ? No , if other people are having success with it , there's a way . I just got to find it , I just got to figure this out . I will try it again . Some did good , some didn't .

It took a lot of trial and error , a lot of money that was spent until I found a couple agents that were performing great One of them . So I remember the last well , not the last , but when I hired these three agents , there was two that had a lot of experience in , one that barely had any experience cold calling , and I'm like you know what ?

That's the guy that's not going to make it Like , that's probably the one that we're going to get rid of and I'm going to keep the other two . The opposite happened . So this guy's work ethic and , plus , he's very coachable . So I would listen to the calls , I would review the calls and I'd be like , okay , this is where it went wrong .

Like they told you this and you said this , or you didn't know how to answer this . So next time say this right , okay , okay , okay . So I could see how he was improving and improving and improving . And then I was like , all right time to get the next one . But instead of hiring one that had experience , we hired one with no cold calling experience .

So like , all right , let's train them from scratch so they don't bring any bad habits any you know . So that was the second one . I'm like , all right , let's do it again , let's get the third one .

And then that one guy , the one that had the least amount of experience , is now the one running the call center , like he's the manager call center , but he's the manager . So it's just about having the patience to coach them , and you got to keep an eye on them and make sure that they know what they're doing , that they have the knowledge .

So now we have a system put together that is kind of like plug and play we hire someone , we put them through the training process . It takes a week . We just hired two new agents two weeks ago . Their first week , first day . They made two appointments each With no cold calling experience . We pay them $3 an hour , plus bonuses .

So my cost on the call center is $5,000 each month . And that's with how many people , that is , with six people .

If it's not for them , because it's not going to be for everybody , then we let them go and just get another one .

You're looking at $90,000 in revenue with a $5,000 investment .

And , by the way , for those of you listening to this , uh , we have a special programs we have as a group purchasing organization .

We have group discounts on everything from shingles to marketing and lead gen , and sales gadget is one of our marketing and lead gen partners , and we actually personally use them , and so does luis at texas stag , I know you guys are just getting started with them .

So it's probably too soon to kind of report on customer testimonial , but , um , we've been very happy , very happy . So so you've got this call center rocking and rolling and you have these , these agents that you get , that you train , and everything . Is there a specific country that you try to work with when it comes to vas ? Uh ?

All the agents that are cold calling are in Venezuela , every single one .

And maybe it's been the stuff we've already talked about , but like what's been one of the biggest game changers for you as a business owner to help you get to where you want to go with your business as a business owner , to help you get to where you want to go with your business .

Because , as a business owner , you know when you're like a one-man show to make that transition into all right now I need to hire staff . Can I afford that staff ? And I had to train that staff . But if I don't hire that staff , I can't grow because I'm doing everything by myself .

But if I don't hire that staff , I can't grow because I'm doing everything by myself . So it's a scary step , right , especially when you haven't done it before . So when you hire a VA that you can pay I don't know if you have a Filipino that can work full-time for $300 , $400 a month

I mean , come on , because you're not going to find someone in the States that can do it for that much , that's willing to do it for that much , right ? So that is a huge stepping stone to help you get to the next level . That was the plan .

But now everything is ran by VAs in our company , you know , except sales right , like obviously we need someone to go get on the roofs and everything . But we have a total of , I want to say about 13 , 14 VAs .

You know , because we're in the growing stages so we're not at a point that , all right , we're saving money that is going to go into profits , like no , we're not there yet , but it's what is allowing us to .

You know , we have an office , we have , you know , uh , we have three trucks , we have all these things , and that is what's allowed us , because can you imagine having 14 people here in the States on payroll Dude ? That would be insane payroll , you know .

You're not going out and buying yourself a , a brand new truck and a lake house , you're putting money back in the homeowner away , not just as decent , I mean something that blows them away to where , when somebody else comes along , you're glad that they do , because there's no way they can compete with your approach . And number two , consider using VAs .

And if you guys want to interact more with Luis , we have a member community and you can join the conversation . You can ask him well , what about this , what about that , how do I do this ? And you can hear from other members . We have a few different members in our group that are using VAs on another level , kind of like you are Luis .

But , man , before we end this discussion , if you could give the other company owners one parting piece of advice based on what you've learned so far , what would it be ?

No , and it's not even you know because we're in this podcast , right , even if I was somewhere else , if you are new to the industry , if you're barely getting your roofing company started , if I had been part of a group like Limitless when I got started with roofing , we would be at another level right now Because I didn't know what I was doing .

I didn't know if I could reach out to it . I didn't know who to reach out to . I didn't know anybody else in roofing . If I could reach out to it , I didn't know who to reach out to . I didn't know anybody else in roofing . And then Facebook . I mean , it's mostly haters , you know .

So just being part of a community like this and people that are willing to help , willing and able to help , it's huge man . It's a huge advantage , especially when you're new , because you don't know what's what . You don't know left from right , up from down .

So just having other business owners that have been through all this BS before that can guide you and tell you what to do , what not to do , how to do it , so you don't have to learn the hard way , that is just the biggest advantage that you can have as a new roofing business owner .

We go to suppliers and vendors , we negotiate group deals , discounts , programs and we pass that along to our members and it's free to join . It's kind of like Costco you join , you save , and it's that simple . At the time of the recording of this podcast , there's not even a fee to join . We're probably going to change that pretty soon .

Just because psychologically , I think people think , oh , it's free , it must be some kind of a scam . So it's like , okay , well , we'll charge people . If it gives people more peace of mind , it's free to join .

But then , if you want it , that's to get all the buying power , the discounts programs with Beacon , srs , our fleet program with discount tires , our discounts on general liability insurance and everything in between . But if you want to join the community and network and share best practices with guys like Luis and other members , that is a paid experience .

But we want to make sure the ROI is solid .

Going back to what Luis said , it's not free , but we think that if you invest in yourself and invest your company , it could be the biggest turning point in your journey , because you can finally ask questions and get feedback on your pressing challenges and grow your company with a team of owners and not make those decisions on your own . I really think that's .

The biggest challenge to any business owner is isolation . I mean , we're surrounding ourselves with wise counsel and I think , my gosh , how did we make it this far without this counsel we just received this week ? You know , it's just . You just don't know what you don't know as a business owner .

So anyway , man , I really appreciate that , luis , and thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule to be on the show . For those of you listening , I just want to challenge you get into some retail get into some VAs , you'll be glad you did .