This isn’t a corporate story. It’s a family one.
And like most good family stories, it involves hard work, hard times and a standard that never gets compromised.
It started in 1965 with a young Seabee who didn’t cut corners.
My dad held me in this photo about two months before he shipped out to Vietnam. He came home disabled, built a career in the window and siding business and brought me into that world at the early age 12.
My dad had zero tolerance for bad workmanship. Not as a policy. As a character trait. You either did it right or you did it again. There was no third option.
I didn’t know it then but that standard would follow me through my Army career, my move to Chicago afterwards, back to Ann Arbor Michigan, through the crash of 2008 when I lost everything, and all the way to Dallas-Fort Worth Texas where ProTex Remodeling was born.
That standard is about the only thing I’ve never lost.
The Army taught me discipline.Â
It also taught me that rank doesn’t equal competence.
I enlisted the summer of 11th grade and shipped out right after graduating from Plymouth Salem High School in 1983. I went airborne, then special forces selection and various other specialized trainings. I served under some legends and great leaders. At one point I served under a colonel named Hugh Shelton — who later became Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
What the Army gave me wasn’t just discipline and teamwork. It gave me the ability to spot the difference between someone who knows what they’re doing and someone who just thinks that they do.
That skill has been worth more to me in this industry than any certification I’ve ever earned. There are a lot of people in the DFW contractor market who sound confident.Â
Confidence without competence is the most expensive thing a homeowner can buy.
Twenty five years of learning every corner of this industry — the right way and the wrong way.
After the Army came Chicago. My dad and I opened Vinyl One — a small window manufacturing plant. That’s where I met Heidi. My son Aaron was born at that time. Later, we moved back to Michigan as new parents and Jordan was born. That’s when I spent years working for my dad at Affordable Window and Siding Corp in Ann Arbor, as well as some other large home improvement companies.
I learned everything during this time. Sales, installation, service and most of all, customer relationships. I learned what a perfect installation looks like and how a bad installation costs everyone involved.
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Then 2008 happened……..
I lost almost everything. The house, the job, the money and even my self respect, it was all gone. When I say I lost almost everything, I mean almost everything. There are not many feelings worse than starting over at 43 years old with nothing except what you know how to do.
So the family and I moved to the great state of Texas.