“We’re in survival mode,” says Gene Enyart, reflecting not just on the hurricane protection industry, but also on the greater economic environment across most of the United States. His assessment takes into consideration the banking/home loan industry, the general mood of many people and homebuilding in Florida, where he is president of Signature Storm Protection, Inc., Boca Raton.

That’s a tough assessment, but Enyart is straightforward and realistic. “It’s going to be tough,” he admits. “With the economy, people are worried about spending the money. They’re more worried about gas prices. They’re trying to get by one more season as long as there isn’t a storm.”

Unlike most homeowners, however, Enyart can take a longer view. He started Signature Storm Protection in 1995, which gives him enough perspective to know the current situation won’t last. “The industry will come around,” he says. “People will not stop building, and people remodel their homes.”

Enyart believes insurance companies are doing a lot, by mandating hurricane protection for coverage, to even out the seasonal ups and downs of the business. He also knows that once building gets going again, it’s a year-round thing in Florida.

It’s also likely to help the industry as a whole that many other areas (Texas, Louisiana, North Carolina, South Carolina) are following Florida’s lead in incorporating hurricane protection into building codes.

Enyart also knows firsthand that efforts by organizations such as the International Hurricane Protection Association (IHPA) have made many more homeowners aware of the need for protection. “You just never know. Why take a chance? Hurricane protection is an insurance policy to protect your family and protect your home. That’s really what it comes down to. You have insurance on your car, on your boat, on your jewelry . . . This is just another type of insurance that will protect your valuable assets.”

TOUGH DECISION
Things weren’t always tough, of course. In fact, Enyart got off to a pretty quick start after some 15 years working for a company that supplied roll shutter products, motorized roll shutters, accordions and sunshades. He started there doing installations, got good at that, and then moved inside the shop to run some crews until he did just about everything at the company. Enyart got the job right after college with the intention of working there for short time until he got “a real job.” Now it’s 2008, “and I haven’t got a real job yet,” he laughs.

Things started changing for Enyart around 1993 when he was put in charge of checking out what was going on at the testing labs. There he saw a lot of steel shutters coming in and asked what it was all about. He learned about the new Florida building codes and that every home would need hurricane protection and that steel shutters were the least expensive way for the builders to provide it and still pass codes.

“I said, ‘Wow, that sounds pretty good!’” Enyart recalls. “I went back to my boss and said this is happening and I think we should look at this. I think we need to get into this. He said no.”

Enyart couldn’t get out of his mind the fact that hurricane protection would be required. “Every new home has to have shutters,” he told his boss. “They’re going to have them whether we give it to them or not, so why don’t we offer them?”

Still the answer was no, and it wasn’t long before Enyart left the company. He got his license and decided to try it on his own.

That was a tough decision: He quit his job, his company vehicle was gone so he didn’t have a truck, but he had a wife and two kids. “I have no money, I have no job. Somehow I got a pickup truck and got in with a manufacturing company. That’s pretty much where it got started,” he says.

“Fortunately,” Enyart adds, “I got in with a very good, well-known builder, Minto Communities.” He began with just installing panels and soon added a few other builders. Working the homebuilding market was easier then: As he drove around, Enyart would get the phone numbers off trucks, call them up and ask if they had a shutter supplier yet. If not, he would put in a bid. Although builders most often were looking for the lowest bid, they also could offer an economy of scale and momentum through volume and consistent size openings to overcome single-digit profit margins.

Today, Signature Storm Protection specializes in the manufacturing, installation and maintenance of residential and commercial storm protection. It serves communities from the Florida Keys to Vero Beach offering panels, accordions, roll shutters and Bahama and colonial shutters and impact windows and doors. Perhaps most important of all, it is licensed, insured and experienced.

While working mostly with homebuilders on new construction, Signature Storm Protection also supplies some dealers through the manufacturing side of business. Enyart admits that remodeling has helped keep business going these days. “If someone wants to put a family room on, for example, they have to have code-approved hurricane protection on glass doors and windows.”

This is the type of work Signature Storm Protection can provide to small builders and remodelers and while at it suggest that since the homeowners need to have hurricane protection for the addition, why not upgrade the rest of the house?

“The good news about working with builders [in Florida] is that when they are going, it’s year-round. For people who do just retail shutters, they’re basically a seasonal business,” Enyart says.

SUPPORTING THE INDUSTRY
Groups such as IHPA have done much to increase public awareness about hurricanes and the need to protect buildings with code-approved products. The general public has to understand it can’t wait until hurricane season is here or a hurricane is coming. “It’s too late then. It takes time to get the materials,” Enyart says.

“I’m very supportive of what the IHPA is doing and trying to accomplish. The board members—the officers, especially—just put in a tremendous amount of time trying to get this done.”

Enyart’s involvement with IHPA dates back to the association’s beginnings. He was an original board member (see HP, Winter 2002, page 14) and remains on the board today. One of his main interests in joining IHPA then is one that remains important to Enyart today: installation.

“To me, all things being equal, all hurricane protection that has product approval will work. It comes down to the installation. You have to determine the correct fastener, the correct fastener placing, the correct thickness of material for the pressures the building calls for . . . There are still too many people throwing things up with whatever they have. I just think that someday it’s going to come back and bite us.”

Early on Enyart worked hard with several other IHPA members on a training manual for installation. “It was a great thing,” he says. The problem was, in order to be effective, installers had to take the class that was being organized along with the manual. At the time, however, many companies were not interested in taking the time and making the investment to take the class.

To be fair, this was a hectic time for the industry. New state building codes were being worked out in Florida and in 2004 four hurricanes swept across the state. “Back then we were slammed. Nobody was going to take a two or three week course to learn how to install,” says Enyart.

While a concern for the industry, Enyart has installation under his control at Signature Storm Protection. The company uses its own trained installers rather than contract out that work. It can mean more overhead for the company that way, but as Enyart points out, “It’s my reputation [at stake].”

It’s also an important point for the homebuilders that Enyart works with. They know that Signature Storm Protection employees will be there when they say they will be there and do the job right.