Krumm Exteriors thriving in new Menomonie branch

Rachel Sankey

Staff

August 19, 2024

WEST CENTRAL WISCONSIN – Penny Austad said she never would have imagined becoming an owner of an exterior siding and roofing business.

But now, in 2024, Austad said she has been the owner of Krumm Exteriors for almost three years.

Since her time as owner, Austad said the company has nearly tripled its staff – from 15 to 42 – and recently celebrated the opening of a new branch in Menomonie.

Some background

Austad said Krumm Siding and Roofing was started by brothers Mike and Dwayne Krumm in 1997, and mostly worked in new construction in the beginning. 

“At some point, they moved more to a residential remodel/business structure,” she said. 

Some years later, Austad said Dwayne left the business, which left Mike and his wife, Cheryl, to run the business – which they did for “many years.”

“In 2015, they decided they either had to grow the company, or they had to be okay scaling back,” she said. 

A year before, in 2014, Austad said she had met Mike and Cheryl through some mutual friends and stayed in touch.

“Mike called me and said, ‘hey, I’m looking to grow my business… Can you come and talk to us about it?’” she said. 

Austad said that conversation led to her joining the Krumm Siding and Roofing team in July 2015.

“When we started (working together), it was Mike and Cheryl, two installers and one sub crew they worked with,” she said. “We spent a lot of time growing (the company).”

From 2015-20, Austad said the company saw “a lot of natural aggressive growth,” as well as growth in storm services.

By the end of 2020, she said Mike and Cheryl had approached her with their plans of retiring and “asked me if I ever thought about buying from them.”

“It was the furthest thing from my mind,” she said. “Never in a million years had I thought about it.”

At that time, Austad said she had just begun working on her real estate business.

Yet, she said she felt a pull toward taking over the business.

“I am a faithful person,” she said. “I pretty much said, ‘okay, this is the first step. If God opens up a path, there’s a yes. Then I’m going to go to the next step, and if God opens up the path to another yes, and another yes, then I know.’”

Austad said the yes’s kept coming. 

“In October 2021, Krumm Siding and Roofing was officially sold to me, and it became Krumm Exteriors,” she said. 

Growing even more

When Austad took over as owner, she said there were only 15 people on the team – that has changed quite a bit since then.

“In the last three years, we’ve had three major hail storms in our service area, and we grew (to keep up with demand),” she said. “We have 42 employees now. It’s been amazing.”

Part of that growth, Austad said, also came from making sure the entire team was working to the best of its ability.

“We worked on getting our processes down and getting good at them – and becoming more operationally excellent,” she said.

When she knew Krumm Exteriors would give its customers the best experience possible, Austad said next steps were made to open up a new branch in Menomonie – an idea she said has been in the works since 2022. 

“We had a strategy meeting in October 2022, and Roarke Langer – (our production manager at the time) – and Tim Elkin, our sales manager, brought up if we had thought about expanding to Menomonie,” she said. 

Austad said the Krumm team was getting a lot of calls from Menomonie already.

“There were a lot of people from Menomonie who were going with us and letting us know, ‘we’re going with you (because of) the customer experience, the customer service and your guarantees,’” she said. “We have a 10-year workmanship warranty, so if we do anything wrong workmanship-wise… we will take care of it. And we stick by that.”

Austad said the Menomonie branch (1700 Tainter St., Unit D) opened in April.

“It was because of (Langer and Elkin) that we could make a go of it,” she said. “I’m glad they could get everything together and we were able to get it to fruition.”

Austad said Langer serves as branch manager at the Menomonie location.

Services 

Whether a customer is working through the new Menomonie branch, the New Richmond branch or the Stillwater, Minnesota branch, Austad said all the same services are offered.

Essentially, Austad said Krumm takes care of the exterior, “while other people come in and take care of the interior.”

“We have enough talent here that we could move into inside (services), but we want to focus on being good at the exterior (work),” she said. 

Between Krumm Exteriors and Kangaroof – which Austad said is part of Krumm – the team offers roofing, siding, gutters, windows and deck services.

Through Kangaroof, Austad said Krumm can give the apples-to-apples guarantee.

“If you come in and tell us you have a bid that’s less than ours, we’ll compare apples to apples,” she said. “Are they giving you the same thing? The same guarantee? Are they doing all of that? And if they are, then we’ll match that price and beat it by $100.”

Austad said Krumm also offers a satisfaction guarantee.

“We have a full team of people here to help make your experience great,” she said.

Timing for projects, Austad said, varies depending on what services are being done.

For example, she said an asphalt roof will typically take a day, as well as gutters that are 150 feet or less.

“Our roofing crews are great,” she said. “They’ll go work from sunup to sundown so your roof is done… We get it’s an inconvenience, so we try to do it in one day.”

Siding, she said, can take a bit longer – anywhere between one to four weeks. 

The timing for deck construction, Austad said, is a little more varied.

“It depends on the project,” she said. “We’ve had decks go up in three days, and we’ve had decks take two weeks – it depends on what you’re looking for.”

Austad said weather is another variable to consider during a project – since the work happens outside. 

Krumm Exteriors also has a repair division, which Austad said comes with a straightforward pricing guide. 

“There are not a lot of contractors out there that will come and do repairs without having a minimum charge of $750 or $1,000…,” she said. “(Whereas) we can show that you need two vents, and it’s this much – it’s a level-two repair, (or) you need some areas caulked, it’s a level-one repair – it’s this much. Our customers seem to like that.”

Krumm Exteriors’ service areas in Wisconsin include Chippewa, Eau Claire, Polk, St. Croix, Pierce, Dunn and Barron counties. 

Customer experience is true north

During a weekly book club that Austad said she hosts with other members of Krumm, everyone was reading “Good to Great” by Jim Collins – which is about going from a good business to a great one.

The book, she said, invokes people to find out what their business is the best at.

Austad said making that decision about Krumm was a struggle.

“I’m like, ‘well, we’re good at what we do for installation, but… there’s also other people that are good, too,’” she said. 

Hallie Kaczmarski, Krumm’s assistant sales manager, told Austad, “well, what about customer experience?”

“(She said), ‘that’s what we’re the best at, and that’s what we can be the best at,’” she said. “I was like, ‘that is amazing.’ That’s been our true north since then. We’re going to be great because we give the best customer experience.”

‘We work to make things better’

As Austad and the rest of the Krumm team continue to look toward the future, she said they will continue to follow the company’s vision statement: “We work to make things better – improving our customer’s homes, improving our team’s lives and improving the communities we serve.”

“I could tell you employee goals, I could tell you revenue goals and things like that,” she said. “But at the end of the day, it’s (about) – are we (following our vision statement), and how many people can we have an impact on?” 

That, Austad said, is what the recent growth of the company – from the new branch to the increase in employees – is all about, “to be able to help people.”

“We do a lot,” she said. “We take 10% of our marketing budget and we put that aside for sponsorships, giving back to the community. We’re constantly wanting to make our communities better.”

At the end of the day, Austad said we all make a decision: “What can we do to make a difference?”

“That is direct from how I live my life,” she said. “I’m here to be of service.”

Over the last three years, the owner said she has put her “heart and soul” into the company, but said none of the growth Krumm has seen would have been possible without “the amazing team we have here.”

“There are not enough words for me to talk about that,” she said. “We’ve been blessed. We had to change a culture that was pretty toxic to a pretty phenomenal culture… I coach and lead – that’s the way I look at it. The team is what makes it happen.”

To learn more about Krumm Exteriors, visit krummexteriors.com.