Established in early 2010, LCP Roofing has grown from humble beginnings to a force to be reckoned with in the Gauteng truss fabricator and erector market. Today

the management of LCP Roofing, with SANS1900 (SATAS) accreditation to its name, and with industry leading equipment and a dedicated staff complement, is excited as to what the future holds.

“Our vision, to become the preferred roofing company in Gauteng and to grow a sustainable business whilst utilising industry-leading software and equipment to provide our clients and shareholders with added value and our staff with safe and secure employment, has become a reality,” says Andri Pretorius, Managing and Operational Director of the Pretoria East-based fabricator.

LCP Roofing specializes in residential and commercial timber roof structures with either concrete tile or metal sheet roof coverings. “The more complicated and difficult the structure, the more we rise to the challenge,” says Pretorius, adding, “No project is too large for us and we have completed a number of school projects, with the largest project thus far being a 17 000m2 school in Amsterdam, Mpumulanga. Other schools recently completed are 7 800m² in Benoni, 3 000m² in Witbank, 7 600m² in Hammanskraal and a re-roof of an old school building of 5 000m² in Breyton, also in Mpumulanga.”

“Let’s not forget our ‘bread and butter’ clients, though. They are our lifeblood and we are humbled by the loyal support we have received from them.

This is not without hard work, however, and our five client representatives ensure that our estimating department is fed with a constant stream of drawings for quotations,” continues Pretorius.

“A year ago we were quoting about 140 jobs a month, now it is not the exception when we top the 200 mark every month,” adds William Long, Senior Estimator.

SyStem & Software Support

Says Lyndsay Cotton, General Manager of LCP Roofing, "We could not have done it without support and assistance from our system and software supplier, International Truss Systems (ITS). We started with absolutely nothing. In 2010, we were a new business in a struggling economy and the banks were not interested in us. ITS have been at our side from the beginning and all our factory capital equipment purchases were facilitated by or through them."

factory

The production facility is, by South African standards, very well equipped and efficient. At peak times, the facility produces up to 1500m² daily and certainly has the capacity to produce the volumes demanded by larger projects.

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Leaders in Roof Truss Technology

AUGUST 2013

A Spida Machinery 2000 CNC saw, imported from New Zealand ensures that all timber is very accurately cut and ensures that the human error factor in length and angle measurements is completely eliminated.

“This machine is amazing,” says Pretorius. “When we started producing over 800m² a day we thought we needed a second unit. We then re-trained our operators and that made the difference and this unit now easily feeds both our framing tables.” Having said that, he adds that the company is looking at even better technology and a fully computerized linear saw is on the budget list for the future. “We are a progressive thinking team and we are going forward,” he adds.

The second best decision we ever made was to look at a better framing and press process. We spent months researching the subject and we even went as far as visiting suppliers and fabricators in the United Kingdom.

After that the decision was not a difficult one to make and the first of the two AV Birch presses arrived from the UK in October 2011. We thought we would keep our ‘old fashioned’ truss rollers as a back-up, but sold them two months later. They were just not going to fit in with our philosophy of creating a modern and quality-driven truss fabrication business.

Our second Birch Press arrived in January this year. The framing tables were too large and expensive to import, so we made them ourselves. The roller guides, rails, flip-over legs brackets, end stops, etc. were all designed in-house and cut on our own CNC plasma table and fabricated in our own facility. The table presented some special challenges and some of the manufacturer design features were changed and ‘improved’ upon.

The table is 43mm thick and consists of four layers of laminated material; firstly an imported birch-ply, then a marine ply filler layer, unistruts, another supawood filler and the final layer, which is a 10mm uPVC hard wearing and marking surface. Approximately 50 litres of high bond glue was applied and over 7000 screws and bolts of varying types and sizes were used in a 14.5m table. The jigging bobbins were also designed in-house and were locally extruded.

certification & GradinG

The staff at LCP Roofing proudly display not only the company and system logos on their clothing, stationery and vehicles, but also those of the Institute for Timber Construction (ITC-SA) fabricator and erector logos and even more importantly, the logo of the South African Technical Auditing Services (SATAS).

"I am proud to be associated with a company that is not only very professional in its approach to its systems and policies and which produces a quality product, but also gives us fantastic support," says Juane-Merie Westgate, one of the sales representatives at the company. "The SATAS SANS 1900 quality mark differentiates us above the rest and I can discuss projects with my clients with total confidence," she continues.

The ITC-SA audits its licensed fabricators for the awarding of certificates of competence for the design, manufacture, supply and erection of pre-fabricated nail plated timber trusses to the desired standards. LCP Roofing proudly displays its Fabricator and Erector certificates in its office, both A-graded.

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The South African Technical Auditing Services (SATAS) is accredited by South African National Accreditation Systems (SANAS) to certify manufacturers, producing products within the scope of accreditation, to the requirements of ISO Guide 65.

A Product Certification Logo was registered on the 17 December 2002 and within a short while, timber products bearing this logo appeared on the market. This logo has since become highly respected as a mark of distinguished quality.

“When I received the news on the 15 August 2011 that we had been granted permission to apply the SATAS logo to our product it was the happiest day of my life,” says Pretorius. “It was the culmination of a lot of hard work and of putting systems into place. I climbed onto my desk and danced a small jig,” he laughs.

upliftment & mentorShip

LCP Roofing, through financial assistance and mentorship, has developed two totally independent carpenter teams. Today these two sole proprietor business units have created employment for 16 individuals and have bought their own tools, equipment and vehicles. Its other regular sub-contractors have all placed their faith in a company that has given them sustainable and consistent employment.

LCP Roofing echoes the sentiment that empowerment comes through education and the company has developed and placed at its entire staff’s disposal a financial assistance scheme for study loans at bona fide educational institutions.

Training is a priority and LCP Roofing staff have been trained in modules of ITS software, ITC-SA intermediate Estimator and Designer courses, crane operator certificates, Applicad roof sheeting design software and Joomla & Wordpress for its website design and maintenance. Regular in-house factory training is also conducted, so as to ensure compliance with the various standards.

erection teamS

“Although we have good and reliable sub-contracted erection teams,” says Cotton, “it became necessary to develop and grow a fully equipped in-house multifunctional team as well. This has proved to be a huge success, especially since we are becoming more and more involved in very upmarket and exclusive exposed trusses. Our in-house team has a fully-equipped mobile workshop, which they tow behind their Sprinter bus to job sites.”

aGGreSSive marketinG campaiGn

An aggressive marketing campaign was launched in mid-2012 and has been hugely successful. The old adage, ‘A business without a sign is a sign of no business’ rings true. Two billboard campaigns were launched in 2013, a number of prominent publications, including an earlier issue of the SA Roofing magazine, featured LCP Roofing and the dedicated sales team have proved to have been the recipe for success with LCP Roofing almost doubling its turnover in the 2012/2013 financial year, despite a still very depressed economy.

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Andri Pretorius.

fleet manaGement

Pretorius manages the fleet of over 22 trucks, trailers, LDVs and cars and, to assist him, he uses plant maintenance software and an online fleet management system. Keeping track of a fleet all over Gauteng and beyond is no mean feat and the fleet management and tracking system, Fleet Care, supplied, installed and maintained by Sarel van der Walt of African Stuff, not only monitors all vehicle functions, it also allows him to dispatch any vehicle remotely to its delivery location or collection point by sending waypoints to the vehicle’s Garmin GPS unit.

In closing, Pretorius says that prospective clients can contact LCP Roofing through various methods, but the easiest is probably via its website, where all the relevant contact information has been published. “We look forward to meeting with them at our offices, where we can physically showcase our product and demonstrate their roof designs in 3D. There is always time for a cup of good coffee as well.”

for more information, contact:

(t) 012 811 0452(f) 012 811 0056(e) admin@lcproofing.co.za (w) www.lcproofing.co.za

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