Dan Walrack explains why roofing sales are shifting from insurance-focused to retail-focused in 2026. Most reps default to insurance claims because it's easiest, but homeowners now expect them to understand deductibles, cosmetic endorsements, and financing. The key is presenting out-of-pocket costs upfront and positioning yourself as an advisor, not a salesman.
Dan, what do you see changing in 2026 and how are you adapting?
I see a lot. There's been a lot of things changing the last year or so. I mean, a lot of what I'm seeing changing is, you know, we used to always take those jobs when I first started off. We used to always take every job I'd get to. I'd take that retail job and I'd try to push it to the insurance side of it because that was always the easy way out. You know, it was always easy to get the insurance company out there to get it taken care of, you know, on the roof and things like that. Now, there's a huge flip of where I'm taking a lot of the insurance jobs and you've got to push it retail. You have to understand the retail game out here and you have to understand how to sell retail to work in the insurance industry, to be honest with you, because the way deductibles are, the way ACV policies are, matching endorsements, uh, cosmetic endorsements, things like that. There's so much for a sales rep to understand and have to learn and educate themselves that selling on the retail side of it I feel is going to be more and more prominent than selling on the insurance side of it.
Circling back to the retail, you said that salespeople need to learn how to sell retail in a storm environment. Why do you think that's been so challenging for many companies and many salespeople to start doing?
Well, training's a huge thing. I mean, a lot of people, their sales reps are so consistent and so focused on training them in the insurance, especially in the insurance markets. I mean, You've done this, Adam. We've gone enough around the nation, enough where, you know, different areas are retail-based, different areas are insurance-based and things like that. And in the insurance side of it, they strictly want their sales reps to learn just to go out and sell, right? Well, the problem is that is sales reps— I say it all the time— sales reps are lazy. They're going to find the easiest way out to get a check in their pocket. And instead of actually focused on taking care of a homeowner, They tease me at the office or company I'm at that if they hand me a lead, it's a lady wants 2 downspouts, right? And then all of a sudden I turn into a $30,000 job. Well, it's not effective. I'm not— I'm going around the homeowner and what I'm doing is I'm talking about their downspouts that they need, but I'm listening to my homeowner and understanding there's other issues around her house that I can fix. Just got to listen to her. I mean, I've gone numerous times where I've put on new siding, I've done roofs, I've done on, on a, on an easy little lead. And it's a matter of listening to your homeowner and closing it down. And like you said earlier, offering a solution. Yeah, I mean, it's out there. You just got to do it. And to answer your question on why I think it's most difficult, I think it's most difficult because we're not educating the sales reps enough on the retail side of it. And I think there's different avenues people can take to learn that, and they need to. And especially if I have an insurance job, I mean, how many times we see this now where you have a I'm going to use— you have a claim, right? And 10 years or older, it's an ACV policy. And it's how you pitch that, how you sell it to the homeowner and how you handle that objection. So I tell every time I've got a claim that's 15, 20-year-old shingle, I tell my homeowner, listen, I said, this is a policy that you paid for. It's a $25,000, $30,000 roof. Would you be okay paying 50% of this roof? Because that's what they're going to pay. And I ask them before it even goes into that. If they say, yep, that's what we're looking for. Now, when they get that $15,000 out-of-pocket they have to pay, it's not a surprise to them. They know that. Where a lot of people are getting in trouble where they're doing just insurance claim and they're not telling the homeowner about it. Next thing you know, the homeowners get their insurance paperwork, their statement of loss, and it's a $30,000 claim. And they're, you know, nonrecoverable depreciation, $15,000. And then you spring it on them like, well, now you have to pay your $15,000. Boom. What do you think they're going to do? They're going to do two things. One, they're going to shop you out now because now it's not recoverable. Or number two is they're going to just— you just flabbergasted them and now they're just going to shut that door and they're like, I don't have $15,000 to pay. Whereas if you brought that out in the forefront, say, hey, listen, if I were to knock on your door and tell you I'm going to put a brand new roof on for 50% of what your roof actually costs, would you do it? Well, 80% of people say, hell yeah, they do it. Well, now at least they know. Now you're not springing it on them. And now they at least can, in their mind, they can justify, okay, well, he did, he did exactly what he said he was going to do. He got me 60% of my roof covered. Yeah, I have to pay the other 40%.
And especially pairing that with affordable payment options, i.e., financing options as well to anchor to the $15,000 and then say, and you bring it back down and say for $150 a month you get—
Yeah, exactly. And that, and that, I mean, that's a whole conversation itself that you can go into, but Yes, you anchor that with your financing and things like that where it makes it manageable for them or where they can eat it and chew it and understand it, right? As opposed to boom, it's approved, now you gotta pay 15 grand.
What?
What?
Yeah, I don't know about you, but I think that a lot of challenge for sales reps is when, I'll call it the gold rush days where there were $250, $500 deductibles, $1,000, like if there was a $2,000—
$50, $100.
Yeah. Right. Like you showed up and you just kind of explained the process and now the amount of objections and having to get— in sales, you want to get ahead of the objections because people, no one likes surprises and it's not, this is not manipulation. This is just good communication. You wouldn't go to your, if you and your wife were on a budget and then you said, let's go out to dinner and you take her to the most expensive steakhouse in town. She'd be shocked. But if you wanted to take her on a date and said, hey, this place is a little bit more than our budget, but don't worry, I've been saving up for it and I want to give you an incredible experience. Now she's gonna relax into the experience, be like, oh, I like the, the concern that I would have about the cost of the bill is now gone. And I know that was a, a completely silly analogy that had nothing to do with roofing, but I love the, I'm trying to highlight Dan, what I see as the lessons for the salesperson watching, be like, okay, That's the fundamental shift in my communication style, is to be an advisor, a consultant, and share— give the bad news, but then make the bad news the good news. And if you can keep that loop going— bad news, but I can make it good news. Bad news, I can make it good news.
You're going to be great. That's the moral of Go Beyond the Hustle, right? The whole— the whole point of Go Beyond the Hustle is pursuing your homeowner's best interests, not pursuing your best interests. And how do you pursue their best interests? You handle those objections before they even become an objection. People ask me all the time why I do my inspections when I do my walk around with my homeowner around the exterior of the house. I do my walk around the exterior of that house with my homeowner not only to make them feel comfortable with me as the person that's going to be doing the work, but that gives me an undivided minutes of attention where I'm handling every objection that they could think of before it becomes an objection walking around that house. So by the time I get to that fourth corner of that house, what they're going to say is What's the next step? Because that's when they feel 100% comfortable with you, the person that's doing the work.
Yeah, beautiful.
