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Friends, neighbors and
community working
together.....
By Roy Cooper - Owner -
Superior Windows & Doors
I
got the call from Rush Behnke of
Ark Built Homes on Wednesday
August 10th 2011.
"Can you keep a secret?", was his first question.
I asked a few technical questions and
deliberated, in my head, which
window would be perfect for this Extreme Home.
When I shared with Rush my thoughts he expressed disbelief
that I could provide such an awesome window.
Time to get to get to work.
Somehow I needed to get about 63 windows for FREE.
Rush mentioned that the Extreme Home
was also to be an attempt at building
a "Net Zero" home, one that uses 0 power, on average, through
out the year.
No doubt we were going to need a very
energy efficient window.
Energy Star was not good enough.
We needed something more.
We needed triple glazing.....
Now it's time to work the phones and make some magic.
Atrium Windows makes an
awesome triple glazed window that looks just like their
regular window. Cost effective and truly over the top
energy efficiency.
But by Aug 12th they were still not making me any promises to
provide us with 63 FREE windows.
 That
Sunday Aug 14th what seemed like indigestion
turned into triple-bypass open heart surgery for me.
I asked the surgeon to
postpone as I have an
Extreme Home to work on, but he didn't even respond.
When I regained
consciousness on Wednesday Aug 17th,
I got Atrium on the phone and "made the deal".
Just in case you don't know, every local company involved
donates their product and/or labor.
The only ones that DO MAKE MONEY are the production company,
the actors and ABC.
Why do I bring this up?
Because we had to fight to get Atrium Windows the recognition
they rightly deserved as well as our own. It was a nasty
negotiation considering the "we want to help a deserving
family" persona they put out there.
When all was said and
done, Atrium Windows got just enough recognition to meet LEGAL
requirements and Superior Windows
& Doors was not even mentioned.
On Thursday September 1st a Pep Rally took place
at the South Medford High School Gymnasium.
This was everyone's
first opportunity to find out
about the home and the show.
What we did not find
out was for WHOM we were going to build this home.
Over the next week there was lots of speculation.
But the next week also had local suppliers, like us, working hard to
pull together the details we would need in order to be ready to jump on
this project the moment we were given the word.
As word got out that
Superior Windows & Doors was going to provide the windows our
customers started calling us asking how they could get
involved. More and more calls every day.
What to do?
And then it came, on Wednesday September 7th, it was announced
that CJ and Lindsay McPhail were going to be the
recipients.....and ground breaking would start on Thursday September 8th.
CJ and Lindsay McPhail are founders of the Southern Oregon
chapter of
Sparrow Clubs, an organization that helps children
with medical issues by pairing them with schools that "adopt"
them. The McPhail's have three children, two of whom
have autism.
Jason Chipera, one of our sales reps, seeing the overwhelming
demand of our customers to help on the McPhail's Extreme Home
volunteered to coordinate their efforts.
He brought them all together for a meeting at our Ashland
showroom, had them arrange to
share tools and car pool to the jobsite and just generally
managed all the fine details
required to install 63 windows in one day.
When he found out that the exterior doors and trim were just
"dropped off"
at the site he took the reigns and coordinated their
installation too.
What an awesome dude!
On XXX the Xth of XXX the time had come for us to get to work.
Two dozen of the most
talented window and door installers in the Rogue Valley
descended on the Extreme Makeover project.
Although it had only
been 3 weeks since my surgery I had to make an appearance, put
in my two cents and give thanks to all of our customers that
volunteered.
Jason had it all well in
hand.
CASEY BRIGHT
KYLE TAYLOR
TODD CATROPA
PETER MCBENNETT
JASON EATON
MILO SHUBAT
UNDER CONSTRUCTION
MORE TO COME
Mike Murphy –
541-621-3175
Todd Catropa-541-621-0800 (Catropa’s
Construction)
Bob Gemaekled 541-535-6068/535-7723 (D.A.Boldt’s)
Peter McBennett
541-951-0007
(Siskiyou Skylights & McBennett Home Improvement)
Wayne Lee
541-821-0078
(Sturlee Construction)
Josh Barnes
541-210-1180
(Barnes Construction)
Jason Eaton
541-973-8889
(Conscious Construction - With Jay Sparks)
Fred Skaff-
541-621-9080
(Skaff Built Homes - With Luke Cutting)
Milo Shubat
541-621-9776
( Ashland
Design Solutions- Shubat Construction)
Kyle Taylor
541-621-8095
(Taylored Elements - with Dustin)
Jake Brown – (Jake Brown Construction)
Justin Sparks
541-471-2021
John Mitchell-Hooge
541-210-1640(Reliable Property Services)
Dan Wahpepah –
541-890-3529
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