S-5! Changed the Game and Continues to do so!

There was a time when metal roof manufacturers were totally against attaching anything to their standing seam roofs; everything from attaching snow guards to solar panels to satellite dishes was taboo in their eyes. The industry worked hard to create roofs without piercings of any kind. Then, after they put all that care into ensuring the roof was unpenetrated and completely sealed, other trade workers found a need to drill holes in these virgin roofs. It truly made no sense.

Enter Rob Haddock. Haddock worked in metal roofing as a contractor, a consultant and business owner constructing metal buildings and roofs all over the United States. He founded the Metal Roof Advisory Group, Ltd., and developed a reputation as a metal roofing expert. People sought his expertise to examine failed roofs and determine why they failed; he was a “roofing forensics expert.”

At the time, there were only two ways to attach ancillaries to the roof: either screw it or glue it. The screws put holes in the roof; holes leaked, and glue failed within a few years. After years of studying roofs and ascertaining what went wrong, the innovator in him thought about new possibilities. Haddock developed a third way. He invented a clamp that straddled the top of the seam and would hold rooftop accessories in place. The application to patent his invention was submitted in 1991; the patent was issued in 1992, and the rest is history. S-5! was founded.

Through strength testing and proof of manufacturability, Haddock thought he’d allow another company to bring the product to market, and he would move on to the next patent. However, after four different companies turned it down, claiming there was no market for it, Haddock realized he’d have to do it himself. 

Getting Started

How do you get started in this market where the very people who you want as customers for clamps are dead set against the very idea of mounting things to their roofs? In roofers’ minds, attaching anything to their standing seam roofs meant destroying the roofs. Haddock had to find a way to prove to them that this product was different; he had to show them they were opposed to attaching things to the roof because everyone had been doing it the wrong way, and now they could do it “the right way” without penetrating the roof or voiding the roof warranty.

He started out with testing. The interesting thing about developing a whole new way of doing something is that there is no testing protocol in place for it. So, Haddock developed one.

“I invented a test protocol to establish the clamp’s tensile strength,” Haddock said. “Anything fails at some point. You need to find the environmental forces, from wind, snow or seismic that makes it fail, then test and populate the system to resist those forces, so no failure ever occurs.” 

“Early on, it would have been great to do one test on one roof and be done. But there are different materials—aluminum, copper, zinc, steel and a variety of gauges and profiles, providing almost an infinite number of combinations, and we had to test our clamp on all of them to populate our load tables. That meant finding the failure load for each specific roof in each specific material and panel seam geometry,” Haddock added.

The International Code Council (ICC) has now accepted the testing protocol that Haddock first developed as the best way to test for failure load. His application engineering protocols were also approved by the council. 

The S-5! company tests and certifies products for water penetration and corrosion resistance to ASTM standards. The production facility is ISO 9001 certified and the International Code Council, Underwriters Laboratories, Factory Mutual and other certification organizations often drop in unannounced for quality assurance compliance checks. 

Once satisfied with test results, Haddock began presenting the clamp to contractors, giving them the opportunity to try it out. Once they tried it and saw that it left the roof undamaged, they were hooked. Initially, Petersen Aluminum and ATAS International were the first two distributors. Soon, LMCurbs joined the ranks. “All three are still on board after 33 years,” he says, “and we have many other channel partners that have carried our brand for more than 20 years.”

These clamps became an industry disruptor. “Disruptive innovations” are those that fundamentally change the way people think—and this innovation did just that. It was a game-changer because the industry that had made it taboo to mount anything to a metal roof now recognized it could be done without compromising the integrity of the roof. The company grew organically year-over-year as industry insiders spread the word.

Initially, out of necessity, Haddock and his team outsourced the manufacturing of their products, but over time, they became dissatisfied with the inconsistency of product quality delivered by the external manufacturers. In 2012, S-5! brought manufacturing in-house for better control. Since then, they have repeated that model (for the same reasons) for every function of the enterprise—from accounting to marketing to testing, engineering and R&D. “That’s how we achieve excellence in every area of the business,” said Haddock.

Today

While S-5! clamps first made non-penetrating, reliable snow guards possible, they also led the way for mounting roof lighting, solar modules, piping, conduits, satellite dishes, service walkways and more, as Haddock knew they would. The company’s customer base includes roof manufacturers, building contractors, roofing, solar and HVAC contractors, and producers of roof walkways and fall protection systems. 

With nearly 200 patents and more than 100 application-specific products, the company’s goal is to provide a way to attach anything a building owner could possibly want while preserving the integrity of their metal roof. The company has projects and more than 150 channel partners across the globe, with its clamps or brackets on more than 2.5 million metal roofs to date. S-5! products are on Apple, Google, NATO and IBM world headquarters, every Costco store worldwide and even the highest hotel in Sydney Harbor, Australia.

Employees are well-compensated. The company offers attractive benefits, and employees know that upward mobility is possible if they strive for it. Some people have worked there for 20-25 years and worked their way up to key positions. The team believes in giving back to the community, participating in charitable work, and The Haddock Family Foundation supports more than 20 global organizations and charities. 

Keys to Business Success

Haddock outlined what he believes to be the 5 keys to business success:

1. Be the BEST at what you do. 

2. Be transparent and fair in all your dealings. 

3. Create a culture of trust within and outside the organization. 

4. Give back to your staff, community and industry.

5. Build a team of professionals.

“A sixth (albeit a personal one) is to live by your faith in and guidance by something or someone greater than yourself,” said Haddock. “Let your actions and values be governed by that faith. For me that is the God of the universe.” 

He says, “Part of team building is acknowledging members and what they bring to the table, so if a team member knows more on a subject than you do, encourage him or her to share their knowledge with the team. Continue to educate team members, and you build a stronger team.”

Company Culture

Haddock believes that the greatest asset they have is their culture. The company is medium-sized, and they have chosen not to adopt big-company bureaucratic models, instead working and collaborating to treat vendors, coworkers and customers like they are all one big family.

“A mistake that many people make when they start their own enterprise,” Haddock said, “is thinking that they must start acting and talking in a different way. Leaders should be themselves; you can’t be one person at home and someone else when you walk in the door at work. Bring your values with you and that authenticity is what people will respond to.”

The company’s values are encapsulated in their tagline: The Right Way™; it doesn’t just refer to the best way to attach things to the roof; it’s also the rule of conduct for everything they do. That includes innovation, problem-solving, improving, contributing and educating teammates, serving customers and the industry. “Hold people accountable,” Haddock added, “yourself as well as teammates.”

An important part of the company culture is their innovative spirit; they have a dozen patents pending at any given time. 

“Don’t ever be satisfied with the status quo,” Haddock said. “Whatever your lot is…build on it! That is good advice for business, your plot of land, your family…wherever you are; make it better.”

Business Climate

Haddock said they are still seeing their business grow and are expanding their export markets, so they have to work harder at it than they have in the past couple of years. As for the future… “my crystal ball is busted.” He believes it is unpredictable, largely because of sociological, economic and geopolitical instabilities. However, he sees more and more designers and building owners opting for metal roofs.

“My generation (the Boomers),” Haddock said, “has learned that cheap isn’t necessarily smart in the long run, and so that aligns well with metal roofing. But who knows what will happen with future generations?”

He notes, though, that codes, standards and public policies seem more focused on sustainability, and he believes that is a continuing trend, so that bodes well for the future of metal construction, including siding and roofing.

Legacies

Haddock’s future plans are all about preserving his life’s work, his legacies of family, the business and charitable work. His three adult children work at the company, and he has grandchildren who may come on board. He is working to ensure that all his legacies can not only survive, but thrive, when he retires (which he acknowledges will not be soon).

Knowledge and history are important to preserve; Haddock is sharing what he has learned with the S-5! team and the 501(c)(3) family foundation he established 15 years ago, so they don’t have to learn everything the hard way. Always forward-thinking, he has a three-year strategic plan in place as well as a long-term plan to ensure that S-5! will continue to grow—innovating and manufacturing products to serve the global roofing industry the right way for a long time to come. MR