Celebrating Employees and Putting Customer Service First

By Colin Sheehan, RCS Reporter. 

Learn how this company built a thriving business through developing trust with customers and respecting their employees. 

Matrix Roof & Home Solutions is a local, family-owned, licensed, bonded and insured company providing roofing and home solutions to homeowners and commercial property managers in Vancouver, Portland and surrounding areas. Their crews of experienced technicians and construction specialists bring over 100 years of combined experience in roofing, insulation, weatherization, window and door replacement. Listen to the entire interview to hear why Matrix Roofing was selected by RoofersCoffeeShop® as the May Roofer of the Month. 

Wendy Marvin describes the founding of Matrix Roofing as both “brilliant and stupid.” She started the company with her now ex-husband in the middle of the recession, after working for Kaiser Hospitals for twenty years. 

“When we made this decision to change, my family thought that we lost our minds,” said Wendy. “They were like: ‘You are not being responsible parents, what are you thinking? You're walking away from all this.’”  

Now Wendy is the sole CEO and Owner of Matrix, which primarily works in the residential side of roofing. With over a decade of experience running the business behind her, Wendy is thankful she made the leap into the roofing industry.  

"I love working with homeowners," said Wendy. “It's just a really rewarding area to work. People get bids for roofs, and they don't know if it's supposed to cost them $5,000 or $15,000. You just try to empower them to make good decisions and then help them understand the process. It's a hidden thing that we do. We really try to be transparent about what we're doing.” 

Matrix has built their brand through their relationships with customers and providing support throughout their local community. Many employees at Matrix are involved on local boards and Matrix makes it a point to celebrate their employees' efforts for creating a more inclusive community. Wendy also takes pride in the company culture at Matrix, believing that inclusiveness is key to fighting an industry-wide worker shortage. 

“We've got a lot of people with diverse backgrounds, and we like to find ways to celebrate them,” said Wendy. “The days of somebody wanting to stick around with an employer that verbally abuses them or is rude or condescending [are over], you just have to be something different, [you have] to try to be a good company for somebody to work for.” 

In addition to celebrating their employees, Matrix also excels at customer service, which has helped establish the company as the residential roofing powerhouse it is today.  

“Everybody has a horror story about construction,” said Wendy. “It's about earning their trust and listening to what they're telling you. [Listening to customers] gives you the clues on how to fill their needs.” 

Listen to the entire podcast to hear more from Wendy and why Matrix Roofing & Home Solutions is RoofersCoffeeShop’s May Roofer of the Month.