Pella

Excellently. After nearly 2 months of research, followed by meetings with 4 top reknown window companies, (RBA, Anderson, Marvin, Pella) my wife and I completed the sales portion of our exhaustive search for replacement of some 90 windows- with a decision to purchase Pella architectural series windows, plus 3 doors.   Exhaustive is an understatement.  Because of the volume of windows, our investment matches or exceeds that volume in dollars.  We selected Pella window over the others, principally because of Pella’s salesman, Brett Hopkins. 

In my online research, I found too many conflicting opinions on all windows.  There wasn’t any “smoking gun” or significant differentiation that caused us to think “this is the window for us.”  In cases like this, now approaching 70, I tend to look to the particular sales representative to help influence the final decision.  I could list a number of “boy scout” type qualities that Brett possesses, but I want to speak to those that made the difference in making our final decision.

First and perhaps foremost was Brett’s low key, non-pushy deportment.  He was just assertive enough, but absent the “no-one’s windows can compare to the quality of ours” attitude that is never helpful, but pervasively used by all other salesmen.  His patience was refreshing, never appearing to be in any hurry, as if he might be thinking about his next appointment.  My wife and I had his total eye-contact focus, a practice less and less prevalent, especially in younger sales generation.  He was remarkably responsive to every question, both at our home as well as via email, when we required clarifications over this or that point.  Frankly, we put Brett through the ringer in terms of throwing him myriad possibilities, each of which required re-pricing and detailed conversations.  One Saturday, my wife and I visited your display store in McLean.  While the salesman there was competent, he had not spent time with us, didn’t know us.  After about 15 minutes, in walked Brett.  We were so impressed that he came into the office on a Saturday, and spent the next hour or so with him.  We were able to discover during that visit that we really preferred a series above what we thought we wanted, costing a bit more, but there was a measurable difference is appearance.
Last but not least, Brett came to the house with the measuring team who spent several hours here.  While the duo could have done what they needed to do without Brett, it was clear to me that his being here was essential, providing insights and in some cases decisions over issues we had already discussed.  We didn’t know in advance, but there were decisions that required our presence and input.  Brett’s presence made this all go very smoothly.
 Installation went smoothly. The install team was led by Robert, who commuted 2 hours daily from Pennsylvania. I was worried he might be too exhausted to be up to this very physical task. Not to worry, he showed up early and stayed until it became too dark to continue. There was much more to this job than I ever expected. We have a lot of large picture style windows and many with curved arcs that proved some challenges. I watched the team of five work with diligence and came to highly respect their work ethic and expertise. One aspect that particularly impressed me was the aluminum brick molding that surrounded each window. Typically, window installers use only box type brick molding because it is easy. I insisted on a decorative molding that only very few of even Pella installers are capable of doing. The difference in appearance is amazing. On the last day of installation, Robert arrived before 7AM, in the dark, and stayed until almost 8 PM, working under lights in order to complete the job on time. I have the utmost respect and admiration for the beautiful work the team did. It confirms what many have written and verbally shared: no matter how good the windows are, if improperly installed, the quality of the windows is meaningless. Now I have beautiful windows installed to perfection.