Long-time Roofer Shares His Wisdom

By Alec Doniger. 

In a recent episode of Stories from the Roof, Ron Lloyd tells the story of starting his own company.

Ron Lloyd has been in roofing for close to 46 years. He started in Salt Lake City, Utah working for Bartile, a manufacturer and installer of roofing tile. After working for a few years, he started his own roofing company in Utah. He, along with other roofers he met throughout his career, put roofs on Mormon churches.  

His company expanded through the Midwest, the deep South and eventually Hawaii. During this time, his company evolved into Kokua Roofing in Kaila Kona. He moved to Hawaii after commuting back and forth for eight years. He has been living in Hawaii for 20 years, while his business partner, Max, and his son, Travis, run the operation in Utah. 

Before he became the expert he is today, he started out with no knowledge about roofing. He began learning about the trade through a retired Coast Guard veteran named Bruce. Once he started his own company, the people he hired along the way shared their own roofing knowledge. That’s how he learned to do single-ply and metal roofing. 

One of the most valuable lessons Ron has learned over the year is that “the customer needs to be happy at the end of the day.” He says, “I would rather they not pay me than they go away with a bad taste in their mouth.”  

Ron also has never stopped learning. He is part of the Western States Roofing Contractors Association, and even though he has the most experience out of all the people there, he still learns every time he goes to a meeting.  

When asked what the most important trait in an employee or co-worker is, Ron replies with, “honesty.” The colleagues who have been honest are the ones he’s worked with for the longest. An honest co-worker once changed his mind set with an honest piece of advice: “Always give back. You always need to give back because there’s always people that need your resource, your knowledge, your time, your compassion.” With these sentiments at the forefront of his mind, what he gives is what he receives tenfold.   

Listen to the full podcast to learn more about the career of Ron Lloyd. 

Learn more about Kokua Roofing in their RoofersCoffeeShop® Directory or visit kokuaroofing.com. 

About Alec 

Alec is a reporter for RoofersCoffeeShop, MetalCoffeeShop and AskARoofer. When he isn’t investigating the state of the roofing industry, you might find him playing drums with his bands in Denver.