At Roofing Annex we’re looking to help our clients with the trickiest part of a new roof project – selecting the right style and color in particular. Currently, we’re showcasing the various lines of GAF shingles for homeowners to compare and get to know. In addition, residents in our hubs, the suburbs of Cincinnati/Dayton and Chicago, can request an at home consultation where our pros bring out samples and will even drive the homeowner to local homes that have the shingle they’re interested in. This has been our philosophy for real world examples vs. stale indoor showrooms with false lighting and one huge missing factor, the house in question. Many shingle manufactures have made virtual remodelers that take an uploaded home photo and allow you to apply various shingles but you’re still just looking at a small cartoonish picture.
We think the way we handle shingle selecting is great! Between our online swatches and our physical swatches accompanied by a roofing pro at your door is superior. The reason for this article is to ask you, our audience – what would you like to see online to make a better virtual showroom?
Roofing Annex wants to help more people looking for answers than those it serves in towns like Mason, Liberty Township, and West Chester, Ohio – we want to have a tool that helps everyone.
Our Best Ideas for a Better Virtual Shingle Showroom
If you think any of the following ideas is good or you have an idea you’d like to share – PLEASE let us know in the comment section below.
1 – Our leading Idea – Color Swatch Harmonizing
The idea here is to let our website visitors select from product lines and colors of shingles to see how they work with approximations of their home’s exterior color. Artist, fashion designers, home décor pros and the like will use color swatches to get the right perspective. Minimizing colors along with harmonizing color tones is a big part of this and there are rules to follow but the homeowner’s eye should be left to decide rather than a few algorithms. The idea here is that you’re really seeing your color combination without distractions.
Here’s an idea of what this might look like:
2 –Directions to Real Sample Roofs
Upon request Roofing Annex can send you map linked addresses to homes in your neighborhood that have the same or similar shingle to those you’re interested in (from those you’ve seen on our website). The beauty of this is you may find homes locally that have similar design features (brickwork, copper flashings, color tones, etc.). Why? There’s nothing like the real thing! Our extensive database of replaced roofs can really help you find what works! The pitfall here is that it’s localized to areas that we’ve done the most work. For Ohio that’s West Chester, Montgomery, Mason, Harrison, Hamilton, Indian Hill, Loveland, Maineville, Dayton, Madeira, Cincinnati, Middletown, Delhi, Milford, Lebanon, Sharonville, and neighboring towns. In Illinois we serve, Lake Zurich, all 5 Barrington communities, Lake Forest, Batavia, Kildeer, Long Grove, Deer Park, and more.
This idea is as simple as filling out a form on our website asking for name, email, address, and shingle collection & color choices. The form would piggy back on the current GAF Shingle Showroom.
3 –Order an HD Shingle Booklet
Real shingle samples are attached to boards that stay with the salesmen. What if we produced our own HD booklet per shingle series and sent them to homeowners. Each page would be a swatch bigger than the real thing! Printed matte they could go outside without glare too! So maybe we charge a fee for those outside of our markets. This is an easy an unobtrusive solution that again only requires a simple online form.
As a GAF Master Elite® contractor, we are huge fans of GAF but we know that their brochures alone won’t work for this purpose due to size and gloss.
What do you think? Got a better idea? We’d love to hear it. Comment below:
