Jay Jacoby - Fortify Building Solutions Introduction - PODCAST TRANSCRIPT

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

Intro: Welcome to Metal Cast, the podcast where we're turning up the heat on all things metal roofing. On this show, we'll explore the world of metal roofing, from its durability to design, expert insights and more. Join us as we bang out the details on the toughest roofs in the game. Get ready to unleash the power of metal roofing. 

Heidi Ellsworth: Hello and welcome to Metal Cast, from Metal Coffee Shop. My name is Heidi Ellsworth and we are here today to find out what is happening in the metal industry. And I have to tell you, big stuff. Growth, everyone is growing and the top manufacturers in the industry are making huge moves that are helping every single erector and contractor out there. And I'm talking about Cornerstone and I'm talking about the new brand Fortify, bringing Heritage Building Systems, Metal Depot and Reed's Metals together under the Fortify brand. We're curious, we knew it happened in 2024, what's going to happen in 2025? So we had our friend, Jay Jacoby, join us to give us all of the insights. Jay, welcome to the show. 

Jay Jacoby: Hi, thanks so much for having me. I'm excited to be here. 

Heidi Ellsworth: I tell you what, big stuff happening in the metal world, it is pretty exciting and of course Cornerstone is leading the way. Let's start out with an introduction. If you could introduce yourself, tell us what you do with the Fortify brand and  then we're going to kind of go into that big picture. So let's start with the introduction. 

Jay Jacoby: Yeah, I'm the director of sales for Fortify Building Solutions. So a big part of my job is supporting our sales team, supporting our branches to make sure that we're in the best possible position to service our customers when it comes to their metal building and metal roofing needs. 

Heidi Ellsworth: I love it. Okay, so Cornerstone, let's start there. Just give us a little bit of the big picture of who Cornerstone is for those few people who may not know. And then, let's start talking about the brands and the Fortify brand. 

Jay Jacoby: So Cornerstone Building Brands, when we say brands, we mean it, right? So there's a ton of different brands within the overall Cornerstone umbrella playing in multiple different sectors of the overall building materials business. So we have what we call our shelter business, which is what Fortify Building Solutions is a part of to where we're primarily doing metal roofing, metal buildings. And then we also have business units that are playing within the residential doors and window space and  then also the residential siding space. A lot of people may be very familiar with one of our residential brands, Ply Gem. If you go to the big box stores, you're going to see their products all over the place. 

Heidi Ellsworth: Yeah, you guys are all over the place. Speaking of which and  really to bring Heritage Metal Depots and Reed's Metals altogether under Fortify. Brilliant. I mean, great companies, so much strength. Can you talk a little bit about the synergy and kind of the powerhouse of those three brands coming together under Fortify? 

Jay Jacoby: Yeah, so when we look at Metal Depots, Heritage and Reeds, there was a ton of alignment across those businesses, both in product offering, but especially in the market that we were going to when we talk about the overall customer profile, primarily working with either end users to small and mid-sized contractors. Don't get me wrong. Every now and again we'd get in and we'd play with the big dogs and  rub elbows with those folks, but our bread and butter is end users, small to mid-sized contractors. So when we saw that opportunity for alignment and  what's really important in that space is a brand awareness. And when you're marketing three separate brands that are going after similar customers, it makes it a lot harder to really get that overall brand notoriety. So we wanted to unite and align across that, while maintaining what made each of those brands special and great. 

Jay Jacoby: So as we look at Metal Depots, first off, we see their overall retail branch footprint that they had, where folks can just walk in and touch, feel, see the products that we sell. They got three stores in the New Mexico area, three stores in the Houston area, couple in the Carolinas and  then went down in Louisiana. So they had that footprint, but then also they were directly tied in with one of our sister brands in Cornerstone and BCI. So being able to leverage just a wide array of panel profiles and products was really huge for them. 

Jay Jacoby: And then, we see Reed's Metals who is playing in a similar space. They also have retail branch locations across the greater Southeast. And in fact, we even opened up a couple of locations up in the Montana area. So we're truly shooting for nationwide, but similar products. But their customer service and differentiator is the speed to getting material out to their customers, with if it's a stock color, stock profile, we are able to turn material around with a same day, next day type of service for pickup and  within 72 hours for delivery, as long as we're within 150 mile radius for that type of timeline. 

Jay Jacoby: And then, our Heritage Building Systems group, it's a group with a long, long history of servicing the metal building industry. And so, being able to tap into them and they function more as a national sales center, where they get folks coming to our website calling in and  they're leveraging the overall Cornerstone national footprint to make us a nationwide brand, even if we don't have a local branch there with it. So really excited about bringing those together, taking what's good and making it to where we're the best possible business that we can be. 

Heidi Ellsworth: Yeah, that is great. And this is really about buying everything you need for a metal building, whether it's the metal building, the siding, the roofing, the accessories, the components, whatever you need, you're going to be able to supply through the Fortify brand. 

Jay Jacoby: Yeah. And you touched on components, right? And I think that one of the things in this industry that we can be really bad about is using words, nomenclature that our customers don't understand. They don't know an end user. When you say, "Oh, you want to buy some components." Well, what the heck does that mean, right? 

Heidi Ellsworth: That's true. Yes. 

Jay Jacoby: When we talk components, it's any individual part and piece that gets used to make a metal building, right? Metal building components are those individual parts and pieces. It can be the smallest of fasteners or screws, all the way up to full panels, rafter, the actual frames that are holding up our building and  everything in between is what we're providing there. So we got the full metal building packages and then also the individual parts and pieces that are not always necessarily going to be used on a metal building structure, as we talk about our metal roofing and siding offerings that are being used more and more in the residential space. 

Heidi Ellsworth: Right. I mean, when you think about how much residential metal roofing and siding is growing, that there just has to be an opportunity to get that and to have that great kind of partnership to be able to offer beautiful metal roofs on all types of structures. 

Jay Jacoby: No doubt about that. And for us, we have an unmatched profile offering, as we talk beautiful. If somebody goes, "If they like the look and feel of metal," we're going to be able to find something for them that they're going to like, whether it's profiles, colors, et cetera. 

Heidi Ellsworth: That is, I love it. So what some of the, let's talk a little bit as we're talking about metal buildings and everything that you're supplying, but let's talk just a little bit about some of the trends that we're seeing out there in the metal building industry, because a big part of the Fortify brand is you guys are at the forefront. You really are at the forefront of what's happening. So what are some of the things that you're seeing that contractors should be aware of? 

Jay Jacoby: Yeah. So the biggest thing that you should be aware of is making sure that you're working with a company that is helping to service your needs. One thing that we really pride on in our business when we talk metal buildings, that can mean a lot of different things. A customer, especially if we're dealing with one of our end users, they just know they like the look and feel and  performance of metal, but they don't actually necessarily understand what goes into making that building and what they need. So we have an unmatched offering when it comes to our metal buildings, anything from pole barns to cold form metal buildings, which is a very key trend that I'll talk on here just in a second, to rigid frame buildings. So the nice thing that we see about that is we're going to be able to offer something no matter what the customer's budget needs, design requirements are, so long as they're looking for a metal building. 

Jay Jacoby: So what we're not going to do is fit somebody into a square peg with a square peg, round hole. So on those cold form metal buildings, people are seeing them more and more. They're popping up here in the United States. In fact, the funny thing about that is it is so popular in Australia, you don't see that many rigid frame buildings down in Australia. They're cold form, which cold form, once again nomenclature that our customers don't always understand. What are we talking about here? So cold form is what we use to make our Gerts and purlins, which are key secondary structural members that are spanning across the frames to support our roofs, our wall panels and whatnot. So those are made out of cold form material. And when you talk cold form, it just means that it's material that gets formed and just normal temperatures, you don't have to get it hot, you don't have to weld it together or anything like that. 

Jay Jacoby: And so, by getting deeper purlins able to actually utilize that for the frames and gives you a nice array of offerings. And additionally, you can manufacture those types of buildings quite a bit more quickly than you can a rigid frame. So as we talk about the design, the size, the budget can be a really good opportunity for our customers to use. And then from overall trends, I mean, we're seeing it more and more. People like what you can see with a metal building, which is nice, big open floor concepts with the clear spans that metal can provide. You don't have to, for most buildings that folks are going to see, we can design them without having to have any sort of interior columns, which gives people the flexibility to do what they want in between. So a big buzzword that we've seen for a long time now is barndominiums and  barndominiums can mean a lot of things to a lot of different people. 

Jay Jacoby: They just see something that kind of has a little bit of a barn aesthetic. It has metal on it, so they think of it as being a metal building, but not all barndominiums are going to be a great fit for a metal building type of structure. If it's got a lot of bump outs, cut ups, things like that. It could be better used for actual wood frame construction, just with exterior metal wall and roofing panels that they're on it. But a key trend that we're seeing more and more and  we were talking about this earlier, shouses, that's kind of a new thing that we see. It's a combination of shops and houses. So people are going and taking their living quarters and their shops and  putting it all under one roof, so you can go and just walk through a door and  go and work on your cars, your tractors, your woodworking. And metal buildings are just such a good solution to that, because of those clear spans that we can provide and while also giving it nice architectural components, to where it still feels like a home, right? 

Heidi Ellsworth: Right, right. So I want to kind of drop back to, on the cold forming, that is being manufactured across the country for you. And so, really by using Heritage and having where you can call in and work with them on a national level, you can really start looking at these kind of cold-formed structures that in popularity are increasing. Sorry, I'm trying to put that out there, but talk to me about that. How is that working for builders across the country to get their hands on it and to get the training for it? 

Jay Jacoby: Yeah, the training is a big piece. They're with it. If you're in the construction industry, you're going to find that a lot of folks are of the if it ain't broke, don't fix it mentality. They like to stick what they know and hey, I've been doing this for decades and  so why would I change? But when you have the opportunity to find a differentiator that can better service the customers, that gives you that opportunity for growth. And on the cold form buildings, which we call Hypersteel, the cold form buildings present a huge opportunity. And our business has made a massive investment in the last couple of years to be able to bring that to market. As mentioned, the primary structural members for cold form buildings are purlins. So we have been aggressively investing in more purlin lines across our nationwide footprint to where, as you talk about full building packages, if you've got to ship it across the country, it's going to drive up costs. 

Jay Jacoby: So we want to be able to manufacture these types of products as close to our job sites as physically possible. And that's a huge differentiator from a cost standpoint, a speed standpoint. Not only speed from the original building delivery, but also in the event that something goes wrong. Let's face it, in the construction industry, all these buildings, your roofs, there are thousands of parts and pieces that go into it and something is going to go wrong, whether it's on our side, where a piece of material just doesn't make its way onto a truck or  you're at that job site and somebody backs a forklift into your building and  you need some more panels there with it, we're going to be able to get you resolved really, really quickly. 

Heidi Ellsworth: Wow, that is cool. And so, let's keep going down that path of really working with the contractors as they are looking at how they are delivering research, design, visualization, all of those kinds of things to their customers. How are they working with you and the Fortify brand to really be able to help not just take the leads, but to sell those leads and to get them what their customers want? 

Jay Jacoby: Yeah. So a big thing is growing that knowledge and training and  you'd asked on training just a little bit ago, we are able to offer that for our customers. One of the nice things about our branch locations is people can show up, be in person, they can touch, see, feel the material. We have oftentimes display buildings there, so folks can go and look at and  understand how are these different parts and pieces coming together and  then go through actual formal training sessions there with it, whether it's on the roofing or the building side. 

Jay Jacoby: And then, once again with that footprint that we have close proximity to our team members, we can go out there and be on the job site there with you to go and inspect the building if you're uncertain of how something is coming together and  really be there to help you out. So it's just really having those trusted advisors. There's so much that you can find nowadays on YouTube, but one of the problems with YouTube is maybe you got to watch a 30-minute video for a 30-second question. And so, by talking to a real live person, you can get to the facts of what you need a heck of a lot more quickly. 

Heidi Ellsworth: Yeah and  I think to your point as we talk about this, the relationship between a contractor and a manufacturer is so important and  this is a relationship business. That's all there is to it. So as you are working with your contractors across the country with those relationships, I love the fact, speed, being able to get them what they need, being able to help them with the design services that they're going out there. What are you hearing from your contractors about bringing all these brands together and what Heritage is offering them and  looking at their feedback on all these great new products that you're bringing out? 

Jay Jacoby: Yeah. So a big thing that we're hearing from the contractors, as we talk about the pandemic in 2020. It created a new normal that nobody really liked. There was historic material shortages that we saw across 2021 and 2022 that expanded lead times out for everybody, made it more likely that quality was down. More likely that material wasn't showing up on site and it was a new normal that nobody really liked. And so, we're trying to break out of that normal and  we want to show people that service is really important to us and we want to find quick resolution. And even if we don't know the answer right then and there, we're going to tell you when we're going to try and find it for you and  deliver it. A big thing that people talk about on time in full. And you think of on time in full of getting material on site, but I look at on time in full is just, I told you something and I did it on time when I said it and  I actually follow through on what you were expecting out of us. 

Jay Jacoby: So that's just that really big piece. And as you see it, as these products are growing in popularity and we have those small contractors oftentimes that are finding ways to really get a foothold in their markets, we're able to help them to find that, whether it's training, getting on our contractor list, where say an end user comes to us as compared to a contractor and they want to buy some of our material. They're like, "Great, I love this. This is the product that I want. Now how do I put it up?" 

Jay Jacoby: It's like, "Well, we have these contractors that we regularly work with. They do good work, they're expected to main different types of service standards." You will obviously always recommend a customer ultimately vet them themselves to ensure that they're going to get what they need, but we can at least feel good about, hey, they have experience doing this, whether it's our actual specific product, right? 

Heidi Ellsworth: Yeah. So important. And I love that combination between the consumers, the building owners, the homeowners and  then connecting them with your contractors, so that there's really that performance. I mean, it really closes that circle to make sure good quality products, on time products, in full. I love that. And then with contractors who are trained and understand how to bring that performance to the field and  to take care of their customers, it really makes for a win across the board for everybody. 

Jay Jacoby: Yeah, no doubt about that. And whether you're a new contractor or established contractor, we are always looking for more work. The second you get complacent is when you fall behind. And because of the work that we do to make sure that end users know about our business, that allows us to help our contractor customers, to be able to help them grow and find work and feed their families. I mean, ultimately at the end of the day, why are we all here? It's to feed our families and we're going to be able to help people do that. 

Heidi Ellsworth: I love it. I love it. So, okay, you have some new products coming out this year under the Fortify brand, you're looking at some new relationships. Give us a little bit of a sneak peek into some of the stuff that you're going to be seeing new this year. 

Jay Jacoby: So we obviously already touched on Hypersteel, which we brought out last year, but in construction, a product, I feel like it stays new for years until people fully know and see it and  whatnot. So we're really excited for the growth that we're going to see in 2025 with Hypersteel. One thing, as we talked earlier, Cornerstone building brands, we are always looking for ways to be able to differentiate and grow. And so, last year we actually bought a company, Mueller Inc. which is very similar to as we talked about, Metal Depots, Reed's, Heritage now becoming Fortify building solutions. And those synergies, Mueller is very similar as well in terms of the customer base, types of products and whatnot that they offer. And they have a really exciting product that they sell called ProVia, which is metal shingles that emulate other types of building products. As we talk about barrel tile roofs, slate roofs, I mean, it's crazy to me. 

Jay Jacoby: You go and see one of these buildings and it looks just like it, except it has the benefits and durability of metal while being lower weight, which reduces how much money you have to put into your overall structure and whatnot, which can be a cost savings for the customers. And then as we see, we have board and batten, which is a very popular wood profile that you see, but we can now do it with metal. So that's a new metal wall profile that we've put out there that we're really excited about. And then as well, not just products, but it's also just enhancements to what we already have. On the cold form buildings, we have a 3D visualizer on our website that customers can go and it gives them the flexibility to design for themselves and  go and play with it and see what they really like. 

Jay Jacoby: So that's for our cold form buildings. And we're hoping here in the next two to three months, we are very, very close to having a visualizer for our rigid frame buildings as well. And then, as we talk pole barns, we have a visualizer there for that, where you can literally look, feel, see what your customer or what your product is going to be able to look like. And we're really excited there with it, because nothing is more disappointing than to spend a lot of money on something and have it not turn out the way that you wanted. So the more that we can do to set our customers up for success, to know they're getting what they're asking for is huge. 

Heidi Ellsworth: Yeah, that's right. And I love all those things you're talking about. I love the board and batten. And I think we have to recognize too, with the amount of, from the metal building to the metal siding to the metal roofing, how important that is, this kind of type of construction, these types of products to the safety of our country and  to everyone's homes and businesses. We're just seeing it time and time again with the extreme weather that is going on, of how important to really be building long-term, sustainable buildings that can withstand fire, wind, hail, all of those types of things. And that's exactly where you're at. 

Jay Jacoby: Yeah, there's no doubt about that. I think we've all noticed a growing prevalence of extreme natural disasters. We're seeing more and more category four, category five hurricanes that are making landfall here in our communities. We're seeing more wildfires. I mean, what's been the big news the last couple of weeks? The wildfires literally right in Los Angeles, a big massive populated area. It's not just out in the wilderness. It's happening where people live and play. And so, to be able to offer a product that can offer people an enhanced level of protection. You can never be a hundred percent protected, but you want to do whatever you can to prepare yourselves and  protect you and your family, which as I already said, that's what we're all here for. A really cool thing that and  I say cool, so I need to be careful with the words that I use. 

Jay Jacoby: We never take any sort of pride in any type of natural disaster that we see, but what we do take pride in is the way in which that we can protect people. When the Maui wildfires that we saw a few years back, there was a picture that went viral of this house that was surrounded by utter devastation, just houses burned to the ground, trees, nothing there except for this one house. And what did that one house have going for it? It was a metal roof. And what protected them was these hot embers were getting blown in the wind. If you had a combustible material that was really easy to catch on fire, if that hot ember fell on it, it would light up really, really quickly. Metal is able to provide an extra level of protection. You got to get really, really hot to be able to burn through metal. 

Jay Jacoby: And so, instead of those embers doing that, they just kind of fizzled out. So that house was still there when everything else around it wasn't. And then, as you go and you look at metal from a hurricane and wind speed preparedness, where it's hurricane, tornadoes or just those crazy wind events that you see sometimes, we're able to handle really high wind uplifts. Every single metal building that we provide, we're making sure that we want to be able to design it to the element. And it's not just your typical scenarios. You want to do whatever you can to protect yourself in those worst case scenarios. As we saw, we have a location in Horseshoe Beach, Florida, which saw, I think it was Hurricane Milton was a hurricane that hit this year and just utter, utter, just catastrophe there, just buildings knocked down. But once again, we literally were able to go through those neighborhoods and point at pole barns that we put up. That was our pole barn that survived that storm, when nothing else around it did. 

Jay Jacoby: And when you're in the construction industry, as I'm sure you well know, you remember the buildings that you contributed to. My wife now when we're in the car, she makes sure that she puts on noise-canceling headphones, because we'll be driving down the interstate and I'm constantly just pointing out and saying, "Oh, we did that one, we did that." 

Jay Jacoby: And she's like, "All right, this was kind of cool when we first started dating, but I don't care anymore. I don't care." 

Heidi Ellsworth: Not anymore. 

Jay Jacoby: So I was like, "Well, I take pride in it and I'm going to keep doing it. So good thing we got you those nice AirPods." 

Heidi Ellsworth: I love it. We do that in our car all the time too. So I think that is awesome. Well, Jay, thank you so much. Last thing, how can contractors get ahold of you? How can they get started? 

Jay Jacoby: So the nice thing about us, we got options, right? So yeah, the easiest thing, the quickest thing right here, if you're listening right now, you can go visit us at FortifyBuildingSolutions.com and  then you can go look at our different locations that we have, either on that website or just look it up on Google and see what's closest there with it. We have an unmatched branch footprint. There's nobody that has as many locations as we have in this retail space here at Cornerstone Building Brands, whether it's us at Fortify Building Solutions or our sister brand, Mueller Inc. And so, there's a good chance that somebody within our business is going to be in your neighborhood and be able to help you out. And so, if you're the kind of person that hesitates to have to make a phone call or send in a lead submission form on a website, go to our branch, you will go and talk to a live person right then and there and  they're going to be really happy to be able to help you out. 

Jay Jacoby: And if you're in one of those circumstances where you're not, it's not feasible for you to be able to go and visit one of our branches, we do have that nationwide footprint that as being a part of a bigger company, Cornerstone Building Brands servicing all of North America. You can go to that website, get the phone number for our national sales center. And one thing that we really, really pride ourselves on, which we think a lot of people, it sounds so simple, it sounds so easy. Just communicate, just pick up the phone. But people are scared to do it sometimes. And that is the expectation out of our people. Tell people what you're going to do. As we talked about on time in full, it's not just product, it's just communication. And we're going to be there to help you out and lead you to success on your projects, whether you're an end user or a contractor. 

Heidi Ellsworth: I love it. I love it. And you can find all this information about Fortify and Cornerstone on both Roofers Coffee Shop and Metal Coffee Shop, find their directories, get the information, it's all right there, along with a lot of other articles about what's going on, new incentives and also the new brands. So Jay, thank you so much. 

Jay Jacoby: Yeah, no doubt. It was my pleasure. You have a good one, okay? 

Heidi Ellsworth: You too. Have a great one. And thank you all for listening. This has been great information. Please check it out. Check out the directories and check out all of our podcasts for Metal Cast under the read, listen, watch navigation of Metal Coffee Shop. Also, be sure to check your favorite podcast channel. Subscribe and set those notifications, so you don't miss a single episode. We'll be seeing you next time on Metal Cast. 

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