Colorado-based S-5!® has taken the metal roofing attachment solution industry from a business to a science.
As a worldwide manufacturer and distributor of standing seam metal roofing attachment solutions, S-5!®’s product is the most efficient, user friendly, and secure roofing attachment solution available to the market. Seeing potential for its products in the Canadian marketplace, S-5!® expanded into Ontario. Today, S-5!® Canada serves as the supplier for its distribution network across Canada. Though the Ontario Feed-In Tariff (FIT) program was the main reason for the expansion into Canada, S-5!®’s snow retention products, ColorGard® and SnoRail™ and SnoFence™ products remain the top product line.
“We are the Canadian presence of the U.S. company. We manufacture, supply, and warehouse the S-5!® product line for all of Canada,” Dave Kowch, Sales Manager with S-5!® Canada, told The American Business Journal.
Canadian Marketplace
By leveraging a name brand already well established within the metal roofing industry, S-5!® Canada came into being a year-and-a-half ago. S-5!® Canada recognized the vast opportunities that existed within the Canadian metal roofing sector. The first task was to develop a successful distribution network within Ontario, and then to place distribution locations in key areas where metal roofing has been well established as well as areas where metal roofing is growing in popularity.
Offering a wide range of standing seam metal roofing attachment solutions such snow retention, solar attachments as well as signage, HVAC support, satellite dishes, and piping conduit, S-5!® Canada now distributes across Western Canada, with two sites in Ontario, and another in the Canadian Maritimes.
Selling clamps, training distributors, and collaborating with architects and engineers across the Canadian market has made S-5!® Canada the leading supplier of attachment solutions within the metal roofing industry. The company prides itself in offering high quality clamps and accessories that can be directly attached to standing seam metal roofing without damaging the material.
“When the patented set screw engages the metal seam and is torqued as per specifications, the set screw will dimple the metal seam without damaging the paint or any protective coating. This is accomplished via a small cavity in the clamp wall on the opposite side of the seam from the set screw,” Kowch explained.
S-5!® and S-5!® Canada are not the only organizations who advise against the use of cup point screws and instead support the use of round point screws.
According to the Metal Building Manufacturers Association, “Any attendant set screws that secure the clamp to the seam should have a rounded point (not a cup point) so that gouging, or breaching of the metallic coating is avoided.”
The Metal Construction Association says, “Some products utilize ‘cup point’ set screws that may tear the seam material under load or sever and abrade panel coatings leading to premature corrosion. Others use round tipped setscrews and are preferred.”
Unique to the design of the S-5!® roof clamp is that it attaches to essentially any standing seam metal roofing profile with industry-leading clamping strength.
S-5!® also commissioned independent, third party A2LA certified test labs to conduct accelerated corrosion and weathering tests to prove that the S-5!® attachment method caused no premature corrosion of the panel material. In the end, the real proof is in 20 years of successful installations on more than 1.2 million roofs, and endorsements by every major manufacturer of metal roofing not only in North America, but the entire world. S-5!® clamps have even been selected for use in life-safety applications on the new NATO World Headquarters in Brussels, Belgium, and are endorsed by the inventor of Galvalume® himself.
Because of extensive testing to ensure a high quality product, S-5!® Canada has pushed itself ahead of the competition, continuing to stand behind its product with a 25-year limited manufacturer’s warranty. S-5!® Canada’s well tested and guaranteed products allows the consumer, architect, or engineer to feel comfortable with S-5!® Canada’s range of metal roofing attachment solutions.
In order for S-5!® Canada to meet the Domestic Content requirements under the FIT Program, S-5!® Canada selected an Ajax, Ont.-based manufacturer. E.J.
Industries. Today, Ajax also serves as the company’s Canadian base, allowing for ease of access to its manufacturer.
Unique Design
The S-5!® metal roofing clamp brand name is now seen as common place across Canada, with architects, engineers, and roofers calling for this industry product of choice for the project at hand.
“We’ve grown our snow retention product lineup to the point where our distributors in Western Canada are calling us almost every day for this products because people are realizing how well it works,” Kowch said. “Engineers and architects are also realizing that this is a great product. Metal roof manufacturers are telling the engineers and architects to use S-5!® clamps on their roofs. While there are other clamps on the market, ours is unique in its design and its patent. There isn’t a reason why anyone wouldn’t use our clamps.”
S-5!® has seen the demand for metal roofing in Canada grow which has increased the demand for its products. Companies are realizing the benefits of metal roofing over the long-term and as such want a product that will not damage their investment. In the past six or seven months, the company’s Western Canadian distributors have called to replenish its stock with S-5! ® snow retention products, as these are being specified more often either by architects, roofing consultants or the metal roofing manufacturer themselves. The S-5!® ColorGard® snow retention system was chosen for the International Ice Rink at Canada’s Olympic Park in Calgary, the Redvers Health Centre Roof Addition in Saskatchewan, and Fanshawe Pioneer Village in London, Ont., just to name a few. Based upon feedback from its distributors across Canada, S-5!® Canada has supplied over 25,000 lineal feet of snow retention products in 2012 while its solar attachment solutions have been used to secure over five megawatts of solar power in Ontario. That is over 127,000 attachment points to standing seam metal roofs without any holes, or damage to the roof.
S-5!® Canada continues to grow its presence in the Canadian marketplace and is emerging as the go-to industry favourite for metal roofing attachment solutions. As Kowch concluded, “I would like to thank our distributors, Wallace Construction, Essex Energy, Classic Roofing Systems, All the Best Sales and Marketing, Bird Stairs and Future Energy Resources Inc. for helping us grow S-5!® Canada.
“Not only we have been able to get into the Canadian market and develop an awareness toward our brand by educating people about the advantage of our products, but also by our distributors who believe in our products. This is why we are quickly becoming one the country’s trusted metal roofing attachment solution providers.”