Jason Reisman is the General Manager of Eustis Roofing in Tavares, Florida.
Like many roofing contractors in 2021, Eustis Roofing has faced a number of challenges related to supply shortages.
Fortunately, Reisman had the foresight to predict these shortages and combated the lack of supplies by purchasing many crucial materials in advance of the roofing season.
“We were buying semi-trucks full of vents, pipes, boots, shingles, and whatever else we could get our hands on to make sure that today we can still give homeowners a quality product,” Reisman says, adding that he has always bought supplies in advance, albeit to a lesser extent, simply because doing so is a great way for his roofing company to efficiently manage their time.
“We like to stock roofing supplies because we don’t want to be in the middle of a job and be unable to get a vent, shingle, or anything else that we might need. We want to make sure that we are taking every step we can to ensure that we’re not in that position.”
Considering that the roofing industry has already experienced a shortage in metal products, vents, and shingles in 2021, Reisman’s sound planning has already reaped enormous benefits.
With this in mind, Reisman’s penchant for success should come as no surprise.
As a third-generation roofing contractor, Reisman knows how to run a roofing business.
At the same time, you will never hear Reisman boast about his accomplishments or talk bad about other roofing contractors.
In fact, Eustis Roofing’s General Manager prefers to collaborate with his competitors.
“You can learn a lot from other roofers. We don’t all have to be enemies. We can work together,” Reisman says.
As a result, Reisman has added a few new wrinkles to his roofing repertoire.
He says that Chris Porosky, the owner of All Phase Construction USA and a Roofing Insights-endorsed contractor, impressed upon him the value of Conklin roofing systems.
In turn, Reisman was able to convince Porosky of the value that Equipters can have for a roofing company.
But perhaps Reisman’s biggest move to date was rebranding his company logo.
Reisman says that swapping the outdated Eustis Roofing logo for a more attractive logo presented a dilemma because he already had over a dozen company vehicles wrapped in the original insignia.
“When we went to rebrand Eustis Roofing, we already had fifteen company vehicles, so we had to go rip all those wraps off and rebrand them,” he says.
“It was a huge decision to make, but when we looked at our logo, we realized it was confusing for homeowners. The logo didn’t represent who we are, so we pivoted.”
Transforming Eustis Roofing’s logo required a significant financial investment, but these days the new logo has made Eustis Roofing more visible in their roofing market.
It even has brought in a sizable amount of new revenue.
Reisman says that since the new logo was implemented, Eustis Roofing has seen a 35% increase in sales.
But the innovation didn’t stop there.
In Florida, cleaning roofs can be a profitable venture.
For years, Reisman had seen how cleaning roofs helped other roofing companies make more money.
This inspired him to move Eustis Roofing toward becoming more multifaceted.
“There are a lot of companies out there who are helping homeowners and getting on roofs and cleaning those roofs. We wanted to be a part of that,” Reisman says, but he also knew that before Eustis Roofing could become more multidimensional, they had to develop an initiative beyond just maximizing profits.
In typical Reisman fashion, he discovered where other roofing companies who cleaned roofs were going wrong, and he moved to address those issues.
“You have some people who are cleaning roofs that aren’t roofers,” Reisman says. “These people don’t hold a roofing license and that creates a problem because that can void a homeowner’s warranty.”
“This is important because at Eustis Roofing, we want to save homeowners not only from bad roofers, but we also want to save homeowners from losing their warranties.”
Once Reisman began helping homeowners clean their roofs, he then was able to generate ancillary business because his cleaning crews could properly inspect roofs for preexisting damage.
“There is nobody more equipped to clean a roof than a roofer. We know the vulnerable areas of a roof and also we notice things that are going wrong with a roof and can fix them before they become problems,” Reisman explains.
As far as shingles are concerned, Reisman has settled on two brands that he feels offer homeowners the best protection against wind and rain.
“I love Atlas shingles because of what they bring to the table. I love going to their facilities and being able to see how they build their products,”
Reisman mentions.
In addition to the Atlas Pinnacle Pristine, Reisman is also a staunch supporter of CertainTeed shingles.
“One of my favorite shingles is the Pro shingle from CertainTeed. It’s a really good shingle. It has a lot of color to it,” he says.
It’s clear that Reisman is serious about how he runs his roofing business.
Still, Reisman’s aforementioned accomplishments don’t fully explain just how well he is able to operate a roofing company.
This is because on top of everything else, Eustis Roofing has their own tire shop, which saves them time and money because they have found a way to fix their company vehicles faster.
Consequently, Eustis Roofing’s sales reps and crews are able to get back on the road quicker and provide excellent customer service to homeowners.
“We go to work early in the roofing industry. We can’t wait on the rest of the industries to open up. We had to find a solution for how to quickly deal with flat tires, and now we have our own tire guy, tire machines, and balancers,” Reisman says, remarking on the necessity of his own tire shop because of how common flat tires are in the roofing industry.
“We have tires ready to go because in roofing we have 20,000 pounds of nails that fall off of roofs. When they puncture one of our tires, we have to fix that and keep our guys rolling so that we can get to other homeowners.”
But the ingenuity doesn’t stop there.
Reisman says that Eustis Roofing also has a mechanic shop that employs two certified mechanics, which means they never have to lose time waiting for another shop to fix their company vehicles.
“We did this because we didn’t want to wait for other mechanic shops to open up in the morning. We started our own mechanic shop across the street and over there we have two mechanics who are fixing our vehicles on a daily basis,” Reisman explains.
On top of all that, Eustis Roofing has also installed their own gas tanks onsite, which means every Monday morning their company vehicles are fueled and ready to go.
Having gas onsite also protects them from hurricanes that have historically resulted in fuel shortages across the state.
“In the Florida roofing market, whenever we have a hurricane, we can’t get gas. We wanted to be prepared the next time a hurricane occurred, and having fuel tanks onsite allows us to do that,” Reisman says with a smile.
Along with AVCO Roofing and Apple Roofing, Eustis Roofing has been nominated for Roofing Contractor of the Year.
The winner will be selected at the first annual Roofing Process Conference awards show this December 9-10 in Orlando, Florida.
This is the hottest roofing conference in the country, and you won’t want to miss any of the action!
To secure your spot at the Roofing Process Conference, buy your tickets today!
Early bird pricing runs through August 30th, with tickets starting as low as $599
