Ideal Door
President Patricia asked if I would give a short vocational talk about Ideal Door. The idea for my company began in 1985 when the multinational door company where I was employed began making major changes. Several co-workers and myself could see that our jobs were going to eliminated. Instead of looking for employment at another door company, four of us decided to start Ideal Door. In July 1986, we started Ideal Door. We worked out of my basement, Kathy did our bookkeeping and myself & my 3 partners started knocking on doors getting our name out there. Over the years, 4 partners became 2 partners.
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Our business increased after the first year and we needed a warehouse, so we rented a strata unit in Tilbury. As the years went by, our business changed and we now service and repair all types of commercial & industrial doors. We also manufacture security parkade gates out of our Tilbury shop. As we expanded, we needed more space, so we purchased the adjacent unit to our rental unit. Then we eventually bought our rental unit. We have seen our business change to more of an electronic troubleshooting type of service as almost everyone uses motor operators on commercial and industrial doors now. Our employees attend BCIT for motor operator control courses as well as factory training from our motor operator suppliers. The job my service techs do today is completely different than the job I used to do back in the 70’s and 80’s. The typical door I used to repair was a sectional overhead or rolling door with a chain hoist. Now my techs will repair high speed roll up doors that open and close at 5’ per second, doors that have very high tech controls.
Our business is really family & friend oriented. My partner Harry has his son and his brother working for us. I have my wife Kathy, daughter Crystal & Jen, and my son Steve working for us. I also have my brother in law working as a welder/fabricator and my nephew works as a service technician. One of my best friends sons is our newest service technician. We have 4 other current employees who are not related & all 4 of them do an excellent job.
Harry and myself operate Ideal Door on the same principals as Rotary. And back in 1986, I never knew anything about Rotary. We treat our employees and our customers fairly and with honesty, we offer reliable quality service at a competitive rate and we have been able to build a company that people can count on.
I am fortunate that I have a daughter who is active in my business & we are currently working on a succession plan. Crystal already runs Ideal Door & eventually, she will be the sole owner. It has now been just over 28 years, & I still enjoy the daily challenges. There is always something new and different every day.