Friday, June 22, 2012

Before and After Pictures


Have a look at some of our work in North York, Scarborough and the Toronto area.
A change of eavestrough and fascia colour can make a big change!

The old product removed.
Installing the new fascia.






Black roofs and white soffits. This homeowner decide to change to black for a change.


We removed the downpipe at the front center to another location for a cleaner look.



This house has undergone extensive renovation. The old soffit, fascia and eavestrough was white.


Once the old aluminum soffits were removed, the plywood could be removed for maximum ventilation into the attic.




New clay colored soffits, and eavestroughs have been installed to make a big difference. Along with a new dual black roof and other improvements like recessed LED potlights.



For a free quotation in the GTA visit our website www.eavestrough.ca



Thursday, June 21, 2012

Where The Heck Is North Shore From?

A little history of North Shore Eavestroughing: Hardly a week goes by with out someone asking "Where is the North Shore?" or "What North Shore are you from?". Everyone has there own idea and takes a guess.

About 17 years ago North Shore Eavestroughing was formed in a small town along the North Shore of Prince Edward Island called North Rustico. Hence the name North Shore Eavestroughing. After growing up with a family of self employed contractors it seemed natural to start up my own business in my late teens.

At our peak we had two crews and travelled all over PEI and were most likely PEI's largest eavestrough company.

A picture below of one of our units in PEI.




 It was always our priority and still is today to hire positive people that are focused on doing quality work and have a great attitude.




Even back then we stood out from the other companies because we insisted on spending the time to do the job properly and use a level to get the proper slopes on the eavestrough.




We had seamless eavestrough machines and ensured all our company members were properly outfitted in North Shore shirts/uniform just like today. A clean professional appearance was always important to us.




We operated a snow removal company in the winter. Occasional 70 cm storms with high winds happen there. Snow was as high as the tractors in the bad storms. Great experience for our commercial snow removal business that we operate today here in Toronto.





We stay connected to PEI with some waterfront rental cottages that we own and rent to people vacationing to PEI in the summer. Check out our website www.seawindsresort.com. Many people from the Ontario region stay with us at Seawinds Cottages. My wife Angela handles the bookings from Toronto and we have an amazing manager that takes excellent care of our guests and keeps the property in superb shape. We visit PEI three or four times a year.





Always curious what it would be like to work in the big city and with a little coaxing from some family that lived in Toronto we made the trek. With both Angela's and my business experience and our PEI values we were excited to start this new chapter. We had our first truck and trailer outfitted with our new Toronto telephone numbers before Angela and I made the trip to Toronto to expand our business in this big city. A few months later we returned to PEI to pick up our second truck and trailer and drove it to Toronto as well.




During our early work in Toronto we did a fair amount of new construction. We were quick to find out that quality is not often required or appreciated when doing new construction and we are all about quality...so we pursued residential work which is the focus of our work today. The picture below is of some of our earlier work in the GTA.




Below is a picture of our front office, show room and some of our fleet parked outside of our office.









We are proud to have been in business with the same name for over 17 years now! With hard work and our small town values of PEI has taken North Shore to the top in Toronto as well. The picture below is showing a wall in our office where we display our Awards, Certifications and Licenses. We won Homestars.com "Best Eavestrough Contractor" Awards for the city of Toronto for the years 2008, 2009 and most recently 2011.



We are thankful for all our happy customers who trusted us to complete their eaves work. Today we value each homeowner like we did back in PEI and this has been the secret to our success.

Visit our website at www.eavestrough.ca









Our "9 Things You Need To Know Before Hiring an Eavestrough Company" Report

We are glad to see that some of our reports that we have created have now gone mainstream!



Reports that we personally created back in 2004 and have posted and still do have posted as a special report on our website, have been copied, pasted and used by newly established Eavestrough companies. This is a good thing because its a sign of what we thought was important to the homeowner is now becoming a concern of other companies as well. This is a good thing in our opinion and all of those things are important and that it why we created the Report in the first place.

Our report called "9 Things You Need To Know Before Hiring An Eavestrough Company"  goes over the basics of hiring a contractor safely and properly.

Admittedly, when we first saw our report copied and pasted word for word on other companies websites and seeing them claiming it as their own, we were quite disappointed. Some companies have even gone so far to make videos out of it. With this being said it is great that the information is getting into the hands of Toronto homeowners none the less! Now that the information is being put out there by different companies, the important thing is to make sure that those companies can back it up. Any company can post this information and share it with homeowners but we know that some of them cannot back up those points in their own company.

As an extra precaution before hiring an Eavestrough contractor ensure that they can back up what the report goes over by providing Certificates of Liability Insurance and WSIB Certificate (Workplace Safety and Insurance) as every contractor will say they have them but it is better to actually see a current copy before you proceed with any work. WSIB clearance certificates can be requested and if the contractor is in good standing they (WSIB) will release a certificate for your project.

This is what our liability insurance looks like. Our insurance company releases a generic copy for the year of coverage.



If you are thinking of hiring an Eavestrough company you may wish to take a look at our Special Report that was created by us back in 2004 and can download from our website, Or, perhaps you have seen it already somewhere else...which is great! We also have lots of great information on our Blog posts and educational YouTube videos that you can link to from our website.

We would love for you to hire us however regardless of what company you decide to hire in our industry please make sure for your own protection that they can back up what they claim to be advocating and advertising.
 
For a free estimate in the Toronto area visit our website www.eavestough.ca or call our office at
(416) 615-0443 and we will be happy to speak with you and answer any questions that you may have.

Happy Eavestroughing!

Friday, June 15, 2012

Eavestrough Colour Selection

Many are often surprised to see just how many colours there are available for aluminum eavestrough and soffits. Colour selection is very important if you are trying to match up to existing trim or soffits on your home. Also having a wide color selection is essential when matching up to any new windows etc.

In our opinion, most of the suppliers quality in terms of paint finish are similar and we have never had a problem with any of the suppliers. All come with a standard 20 year prorated manufacturer's warranty against peeling etc.

Many colours will be very similar from one supplier to another.

Our primary aluminum supplier is Buchner Manufacturing with warehouses in Pefferlaw, Newmarket and Kingston. They are a favourite for companies that specialize in eavestroughs as they have a wide availability of colors, sizes of pipes and extra heavy, custom ordered soffits and eavestroughs. Their fan fold has 40 colours. All of their colors are considered a semi-gloss finish.

Their website is http://www.buchnermfg.com/

Aluminum Colour selection from Buchner manufacturing




Another quality supplier is O.A.M which also have 40 colors to pick from and are located in Mississauga, west of Toronto. The unique thing about them is they make an extra large 3 by 4 pipe in all of their colours where others make XL size pipe in just the more common colours. They have a combination of semi-gloss and flat colours.

Aluminum colour selection from O.A.M.






We have access to Gentek colours if needed and they are located in Scarborough and near the 401 and 400. They also have almost 40 colours. Gentek is a large company and also specialize in windows and doors etc. In our opinion, they do not cater to the eavestrough specialist as compared to the previous two suppliers. Mostly all flat in terms of gloss.
Their website is http://www.gentekinc.com/

Gentek aluminum colour selection





Another supplier called Royal Building Products is located at 400 and Hwy 7, north of Toronto. They have about 22 colours. A very large outfit which also specializes in windows and doors etc.
Colours are all flat in terms of gloss.
Their website is http://www.royalbuildingproducts.com/


Residential Royal aluminum colours


It's important to note that comparing the thickness of each of these fan folds will not give  an accurate representation of what thickness each company uses for eavestrough or soffits etc. Some companies make their fan folds out of thin metal and others out of thick.
Would you be interested in replacing your eavestroughs & downspouts? Perhaps you would like to know more about leafguard. If you have a home in North York, Scarborough or other area in or near Toronto, please get in touch. For a free estimate contact us at www.eavestrough.ca