Reinventing Roof Coatings With Storm Breaker - PODCAST TRANSCRIPT

Editor's note: The following is the transcript of a live interview with Shane Millwood of BITEC. You can read the interview below or listen to the podcast.

Intro: Welcome to Roofing Road Trips, the podcast that takes you on a thrilling journey across the world of roofing. From fascinating interviews with roofing experts to on-the-road adventures, we'll uncover the stories, innovations and challenges that shape the rooftops over our heads. So fasten your seat belts and join us as we embark on this exciting roofing road trip.

Karen Edwards: Hello and welcome to another episode of Roofing Road Trips. I'm your host, Karen Edwards. And today we are welcoming Shane Millwood from Bi-Tec. Shane, welcome.

Shane Millwood: Good morning. How are you, Karen?

Karen Edwards: Good, good. I'm glad that you're here. Today we are going to be talking about the new StormBreaker brand, which is exciting for Bi-Tec.

Shane Millwood: Very exciting.

Karen Edwards: Yeah. Yeah. So before we dive into that, could you just introduce yourself to everyone and tell us what you do there?

Shane Millwood: I'm the sweeper. My name is Shane Millwood, I'm the VP of sales at Bi-Tec. I've spent 10 years in the commercial roofing manufacturing space. And before that, 20 years focusing on the commercial and industrial general contracting space. I lead the sales force. Really, I just serve them on a daily basis and they lead me. But we work hard to grow individuals and share quality products with the nation.

Karen Edwards: Nice, nice. Okay. So tell us a little bit about what the StormBreaker brand is.

Shane Millwood: StormBreaker is a fluid applied roof coating line of products designed to complement any existing roof membrane. StormBreaker came over in the merger with Viking Products Group. I'm sure you're going to have more questions, but ultimately, it is our complete coatings line for roofing membranes for extending lives of existing roofs.

Karen Edwards: Okay. So these are products that have been on the market and are known and loved and came into the family as part of Viking. And tell me the names that people would recognize. What type of coatings are they?

Shane Millwood: So StormBreaker, I may be jumping ahead a little bit here, Karen, but Bi-Tec had its own line of coatings and StormBreaker was the Viking Products Group line of coatings. Third and fourth quarter of last year, there was a consolidation, a merger. Bi-Tec acquired Viking Products Group. And with that, Bi-Tec ultimately ended up with two coating lines because they already had a coating line called Impersol, great coating line and Viking Products Group had StormBreaker coating line. And throughout 2024, we've worked hard to marry the products together. And ultimately, what we'll end up with is the best of both worlds complementing each other, but known as the StormBreaker coating line. And in that line, we have acrylics, we have SEBS, which is a rubberized coating line, we have high-solid silicone and we have urethanes.

Karen Edwards: So no matter what the need is, StormBreaker ultimately has a solution that's going to meet that need?

Shane Millwood: We can match one of our coating lines with any conditions as long as the roof membrane has real life left on it. And we are budget conscious by having, basically with all four of those coatings accessible, we can meet any budget that's required.

Karen Edwards: Okay. And that's always the question is how do you decide what the right solution is and what goes into that process?

Shane Millwood: Well, we do train our team extensively. And I think that the main things that jump out are what type of membrane are you putting what type of coating on? How much slope is built into the existing design, the original design of the roof? And then where are you at in the world? Are you in a hot humid climate? Are you in a hot dry climate? Are you in a cold humid climate? Are you in a cold, dry climate? And so we take all of that information or our team takes all of that information and does the best that they can at trying to educate our commercial roofing contractors on what would be best for particular jobs. At the same time, some contractors want to use a certain coating all the time and that's okay. Any of our coatings will fit most conditions, but if it will not fit, we will step in and say, "We don't think that's a good idea."

Karen Edwards: Yeah because like you said, some people, they have their favorite, that's their go-to, that's what they want to use and then others, times it might warrant a different solution. So that's good that you're there providing that information and that advice. What does it take to become an installer of StormBreaker coatings?

Shane Millwood: Great question. Currently, we have installers spread out across the nation. But what we generally like to see, and I can give you the Cliff notes version, but is a contractor that's got history, a contractor that's got the right insurances, a contractor that's got the right credit available to do the jobs. If we sell a 2,000 square job somewhere and there's a couple hundred thousand dollars worth of material on it, you got to have credit with somebody to get that material. You've got to have insurances and liabilities in excess of those projects. And you really need to have references of your history of doing coatings if you want to be a certified applicator in StormBreaker coatings. So we work with any and all contractors though, we're willing to train, we're willing to teach, we're willing to do job startups. We have a great technical team. And best thing is give us a call and let's see if we can get you certified.

Karen Edwards: Yeah. Are you seeing an increase in the number of contractors that are adding coating solutions to their offerings?

Shane Millwood: 100% I'm seeing an increase. There are still contractors that will not do coatings for sure, just that they don't want to get into that. It's a completely different side of the business than re-roofing or new roof installation, different equipment needs, different labor needs. So there are still some contractors that don't want to get into that line, but for the most part, I'm seeing an uptick. It's sometimes an easy segue from someone that's been in the residential market and wants to start in the commercial market but don't understand all the application methods of commercial roofing. They can start on some small projects and get versed on coatings and it's an easier segue than just ripping off a roof. We are seeing an uptick and our team is out every day knocking on doors to find those people.

Karen Edwards: So you're actively looking for contractors who may want to offer the StormBreaker brand?

Shane Millwood: Yes, ma'am.

Karen Edwards: Okay. And what does that look like? Is StormBreaker available across the US?

Shane Millwood: StormBreaker is available across the US. There may be territories currently where we don't have StormBreaker stocked, but if we have representation in that area or if you can get in touch with us, we can get the product to you.

Karen Edwards: Okay. And where is Bi-Tec located?

Shane Millwood: Bi-Tec is headquartered in Morrilton, Arkansas. [inaudible 00:08:21].

Karen Edwards: All right. Very centrally located, right?

Shane Millwood: Very centrally located. As a matter of fact, we had our whole team in Arkansas last week, our whole sales team, our whole sales support team and our whole technical management team to train on all things Bi-Tec. And blending of these two lines that we're talking about into one StormBreaker coatings line was a big part of that training.

Karen Edwards: Yeah. How do you see that positioning Bi-Tec in the industry having everything consolidated as the StormBreaker brand?

Shane Millwood: So Bi-Tec had an Impersol brand we talked about and when they acquired Viking Products Group or when we acquired Viking Products Group, we acquired the StormBreaker coding line as well. StormBreaker is more well known in the industry. StormBreaker has more certified contractors in the industry. Both great lines. So honestly, what we're doing is we're taking best of both worlds. So we've reformulated our acrylic lines. We've taken the SEBS lines from Impersol and moved them into our StormBreaker line. Same great quality products. We've paired that with our HP silicone lines that were already in StormBreaker and our urethane lines that were already in StormBreaker line.

And now we have one StormBreaker coating line with all the coatings accessible to all contractors.
And I think what that's doing for us is eliminating some confusion, number one, that there's not a couple of different lines inside the Bi-Tec brand, but more importantly is just mastering on quality. In 1986, that's the reason Bi-Tec was founded. Bruce Shealey saw a reduction in quality across manufacturing of modified bitumen products and said basically, "I'm not going to stand for this." And so he started Bi-Tec on quality and almost 40 years later, we still stand on quality. Quality products, quality people.

Karen Edwards: Yeah. Yeah. It's been great working with Bi-Tec over the last few years for me because I've seen so many changes and so much growth. And it's really exciting because you really rounded out your offerings and are really becoming that one manufacturer that can provide it all.

Shane Millwood: Okay. Yes, ma'am. We will never be all things to all people and we know that. But if we can be a trusted source for most things and build relationships based on our products and our people and our competitive pricing, then I think that we can be most things to most people.

Karen Edwards: Yeah, yeah. That's a good way to look at it because you can't be everything for everybody, but you can be most things to most people.

Shane Millwood: Yes.

Karen Edwards: I like that. So I want to talk a little bit more too, you said you were training last week. What does that look like? Are you learning about products and performance? Are you learning about installation? What specific things are they teaching the team?

Shane Millwood: It's really all-inclusive. We do classroom time and we do hands-on time. So in classroom time, we learn about products, performance of products. And this is strictly technical, we'll do a sales conference later, actually in the beginning of 2025, first quarter and we'll do more sales training there. But it's really all technical training. So we learn about the products and then we go out into our makeshift demonstration area and we get to work. We've got videos, I'm sure they'll be on our page or yours at some point.

Karen Edwards: Yeah.

Shane Millwood: And we've got our team screwing down roof insulation, screwing down cover board, torching modified membrane. We've got our team putting down coatings. We've got our team working with all of our repair products. So we do classroom training, we do on-hands or hands-on training. Then we go back and do some classroom training on more products and then we go out and do hands-on training. It was a fantastic week. It's a big group and it's growing.

Karen Edwards: Yeah, yeah.

Shane Millwood: So very exciting.

Karen Edwards: Yeah. I think it says a lot about a manufacturer that is willing to make that investment in their people and keep them knowledgeable and trained. Because taking your team for a week and getting them to the headquarters and spending all that time is a big investment and that says a lot. How often do you guys have these kinds of trainings?

Shane Millwood: Well, you said it best and that's the last thing I said to the team before we dismissed on Thursday evening, was that the investment, the commitment and the trust that the leaders of our organization and that's Joel Shealey, our president and David Allen, our CEO, have put into this team is second to none. It's just incredible. And to take all of our sales team at one time out of the field and put them in one location is expensive, not only in the fact of the folks coming in and doing all the training, but possibility of what we're missing for that week that we're all in Morrilton.

Karen Edwards: Yeah.

Shane Millwood: So we try to do that twice a year, once as technical and once as sales related. And our sales conference is coming up in January. And we also try to do it in a time of year where the roofing has not quit, but slowed down in some areas of the country.

Karen Edwards: Slowed, right. Yeah, it's starting to get cold. Finally colder here, I'm in the Northeast and we just want some rain up here. But yeah, no, that's cool that you make that investment in the people. And that really shows too, then when someone is talking to someone on your team, they've done it. They've had their hands on it, they understand it and they know how it works.

Shane Millwood: Our sales team is our greatest asset. These folks live all over the country. They all work remote. They come from different walks of life and they bring different gifts to the table. And call each other, they lean on each other. They have managers, they have a technical management team, they have me, but it's incredible to watch them communicate with each other and learn from each other. Even when we're in a place altogether to be taught, they're still leaning on each other.

Karen Edwards: Yeah. Yeah. Wow. So any exciting things coming down the line for Bi-Tec? Or maybe you don't want to say.

Shane Millwood: We do have an announcement. I'm not going to put it out today, but our goal is to have a rollout of something new to our team at IRE, which is coming up shortly.

Karen Edwards: Yeah. February, 2025, we'll be in San Antonio. So exciting. That's always the time when we get new products, new solutions, new performance. So we're going to have to pay attention and look for some announcements.

Shane Millwood: It's quite possible you'll get the scoop first.

Karen Edwards: Yeah because we usually have you guys on our soundstage at the show. Yeah, well, so yeah, follow us.

Shane Millwood: Even if we haven't announced it to the world, but it has been rolled out at IRE, I'm sure that you'll get the first interview with us and you'll be able to put it out first.

Karen Edwards: Excellent. Excellent. Well, yeah, it's really cool to see the way Bi-Tec really is transforming. And it seems like each year at IRE, there is something new. There was a single ply one year, there was the coatings and all this with Viking Products Group and it just keeps getting better. So I'm really excited to see what's coming around the corner.

Shane Millwood: There's a lot of great vision at Bi-Tec. And there's, again, great investment, great commitment, great trust. And for the contractors out there, Bi-Tec, for 40 years has had the same great products and invested in new great products. We have really, really great people and we have competitive pricing. If you can't find our products somewhere in your area, please call us and we will work on getting it in your area.

Karen Edwards: Yeah. Yeah, for sure. And Bi-Tec has a full directory on rooferscoffeeshop.com, so you can check them out there, their contact information is there or just Google Bi-Tec and they'll turn up in those search results. Well, Shane, thank you so much for being here today and talking with us about the StormBreaker line and what's happening at Bi-Tec. It's really exciting times. Thank you.

Shane Millwood: It's always a pleasure, Karen. So thank you for having me this morning and I look forward to seeing you guys probably at IRE.

Karen Edwards: Oh, for sure. Yeah. And thank you everybody out there for listening. We appreciate you tuning in and we hope to see you on a future episode of Roofing Road Trips. Bye-bye.

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