Selling

Grumpy

That's completely untrue. CertainTeed WAS honoring their warranty (at least in my area I never heard of a single person saying they got turned down). The lawyers saw an opportunity to get rich and people decided after the fact that they didn't like receiving a pro-rated material settlement. Well that's any shingle warranty I have ever read... so it's not that they weren't honoring their warranty, it's that people are greedy and should have read their warranty document before buying the shingles.



I do agree that the installation is also the focus of my approach, but at the end of the day a certain segment of the market buys warrantys. Just stand at the check out line and count how many people say "yes" to the question "would you like the extended serivce warranty?". Why push away that segment if they are willing to spend more money to get it, sell it! I don't understand why so many roofers have such a resistance to selling the warranty, it's completely il-logical to me. It seems to me to be a pride factor, an "I'm better than the manufacturer, so screw their warranty!!!" kind of thing.

For me it's an upsell, it's a revenue stream, it's a profit center. I'm goign to do the same great job either way, but if spending a few extra bucks on the warranty buys the customer peace of mind, who am I to stand in their way? I'm no genius, but I am smart enough to recognize that some consumers DO buy warranty's, it seems to be the popular thing in this country to pay extra for a warranty/insurance policy. so why should I buck the system and go against the grain if it'lll make my customers happy and put a few bucks in my pocket at the same time? I just don't get it.


By adding a simple few line option to my proposal upgrading the roof system to the certainted integrity roof system and 5 star warranty, approximately 20% of my customers have bought the upgrade. I can't say if the upgrade and warranty was the reason they hired me or not, but I can say people do buy the warranty.

red_cedar

I suppose due to that it was a settlement, there may be no real addmission of guilt and they may have only settled due to the cost of litigation.
It may be that every homeowner with a prematurely failed roof and asking for compensation is in fact just greedy.
The supply house info, I was told by the branch manager. The supply house chain is extermly large.

I just know that when things start to go wrong with a product that I sold under the pretext of lasting, my feeling towards that product changes.

Again with regard to the 5 star. Sell them the warranty and dont look back and move on seems to be the feeling. After all it is by all accounts not your warranty but the manufacturers warranty. The sales person is just the one in the home trying to gain the homeowners trust and upselling a warranty that may not have merit, for the manufacturer.

Slyfox

I don't understand how you can upgrade from a 30 yr system too a life time and not increase the cost of labor?
They are more labor intense, so your giving away free labor?

Grumpy is right about Certainteed trying to settle claims 'atleast in my area',
they would send a letter 'admitting not guilt/responsibilty', but,
with that letter there would be a check for $x.00 that covered the 'original' cost of materials.
They did exactly what their warranty dictated.
The problem was, they were not selling a good shingle that encountered an error in the manufacturing process, they were selling five (5) lines of shingles that had a design glitch and continued selling them from the mid 80's too the early 2000's and that's why the class action lawsuit arose.

(They did away with four lines of those shingles and revamped one, in today's market they are as safe a purchase as any.)

As far as Extended Warranties go, there all ole tinman sales tactics with a modern twist. If your ok with that, hey, it's legal.

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red_cedar

It could be that the supply house was talking in general terms. It could have meant that the claims were not being paid " to the consumers liking ".

My understanding with courts in general, 'if a claim ( lawsuit ) has no merit, like a couple here have suggested with the Certainteed lawsuit and Certainteed paid up per the warranty, there would have been no case. The court decides if the suit has merit based on arguements from both sides. If there was nothing to the claim then the suit would not have been allowed to go forward and a settlement would not have even been in the cards.

Slyfox

Agreed, what gave the case merit was the fact they 'Certainteed' continued selling the shangles even after they were found to have design flaws 'poor fillers' and the large number of home owners who felt they deserved more than what the warranty stated due to the above stated fact.

Trust me I'm not showing loyalty or attempting to defend or down talk Certainteed, just sharing the info as I know it.

I think the best brand of shingles installed are the ones that were installed by a roofer/s that new how to install them to last.
They all have the ability to do last if they are installed properly and maintained afterwards (gutters, walls and valleys cleaned regularly).

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Jason@API

I'm no roofer, but the concept works the same for painters.

I offer Better and Best only. (Super Paint/Duration by Sherwin Williams or Ben/Aura by Benjamin Moore)

Most jobs I bid are with the Best product only. Sometimes I give quotes for both (situational). I never only do bids with the "better" product. I like my service to be inline with my product of choice. The best service with the best product. There's more pride in your work when there is GREAT product to work with. I'm not saying that inferior products cause anyone to drop their service quality, it's what the product looks like when your done. Does it look high end or does it look mediocre? It really can be a perception issue. For example; I hate puting a 15yr warranted paint on an exterior of a home. As much as I hate to say it, I don't walk away from the job with excitement about advertising this home for future work. The quality we put into painting remains the same but the quality of the product can reduce the momentum of business. If the product is the best then there seems to be a better moral about the project, and the outcome with the HO and the job will continue to give momentum to your success.

anyways... that's just my 2 cents.

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Grumpy

I do not find it to be a tin man tactic unless you are forcing it down the customer's throat. My customers make their own decisions, and like I said it's an option.

at the end of the day the extended warranty's are nothing more than an insurance policy. Everyone here has insurance of one form or another... what's wrong with taking a policy on your roof?

But our opinions aside. That's not the point if I like it or not. I never buy the extended service warranty on anything. On the flip side my wife buys them for damned near everything. PEOPLE BUY WARRANTYS. Like it or not, it's true. It doesn't matter what you or I think, only what our customers think.

I see no reason to refuse something my customers may want. If they want the upgraded warranty it's there as an option. If they don't want it, who cares, it's an option, just cross it off the paper, they don't have to buy it.

furthermore, at the end of the day Certainteed is not the only manufacturer promoting extended warrantys. Why do you think that is? BECAUSE PEOPLE BUY WARRANTYS! This isn't about certainteed at all, although it turned into it. It's about providing options for your customer. The original poster asked about good better best. I promote the certainteed 5 star as my "best", or as my proposal reads "Safest". You could just as easily promote the GAF or OC if you don't like CT, the idea is the same: Give them a reason to spend/invest more in their roof.

jimAKAblue

Generally speaking, it is almost always a good thing to offer choices in a sales situation. For sure, it will always give you a strong alternative closing attempt, i.e., "Mr Jones, would you prefer that I install your roof with the 25 year roof, or the 30 year roof?".

arc

I think it is a must in our competative market!

American Roofing Company
205 Evergreen St.
Rome GA 30161
1-800-385-0781