Robert Boykin takes center stage

By Emma Peterson. 

Learn how Robert found his path into the roofing industry and what he's learned along the way. 

Here at The Coffee Shops™, we love putting the spotlight on people in roofing. Whether they work as an installer, manager or in another sector of the industry, we are honored to share their stories and successes. Recently, Robert Boykin, the CORE quality production manager for Tremco WTI, stopped by to tell us his story. 

Robert’s journey in roofing started in 2014 as a field technician. From there, he worked up to lead inspector and eventually, in 2022, he transitioned into his current position. In his eight years working in the field, Robert has seen his fair share of roofs. He shared, “I've inspected thousands [of roofs]. I’ve seen a lot of roofs, probably seen more built-up than anything else, whether they're mod bit or simple built-up with aggregate. I've also seen a lot of metal, shingle, tile, single ply, EPDM, TPO— pretty much any type of roof you can think of.” 

When we asked him about where these roofs are, what types of buildings he worked on, Robert shared that a lot of them are schools. “I would generalize that 50-70% of the roofs have been schools, and that's including colleges and universities. We work with some pretty large school districts, Baltimore County, Charleston County. And we've I think we just picked up Florida State University,” he shared. The remaining 30-50% of the roofs are often institutions like hospitals.  

With both schools and medical institutions being so critical to communities’ day-to-day operations, Robert has learned first-hand the importance and power of roof inspections and maintenance. He explained, “If schools and hospitals are not maintaining their roofs, then they're having potential issues which would involve leaks, and leaks involve shutting down certain rooms which involve moving students and patients around, which disrupts a whole day or week or however long it takes to get a company in there to do any type of maintenance, and inspections helps avoid these potential shutdowns.” In addition to avoiding catastrophic failures, regular inspections and maintenance like Robert performed helps extend the roof's lifespan, saving the building owners money over time. 

Now, in his current role, Robert uses the knowledge he gained from his years on the roof to help ensure that production at Tremco WTI operates smoothly and with the high-quality results that makes them a trusted partner for construction professionals all over the industry. He told us that working with Tremco WTI has been a great experience, sharing, “It's been an exciting 10 years for me. I really like the fact that I can move into different positions and learn the different things that I need to learn to grow with the company.”