Pella entry door

Home Channel News, Feb 7, 2000

To provide what it calls a "total fenestration package," Pella Corporation recently debuted its first-ever line of entry doors. Pella's entry doors come in steel and fiberglass models and a variety of glass, hardware and height options.

The doors, which Pella expects to reach the market by April, will be produced solely in its factories and not at remanufacturing facilities run by local lumberyards or specialty distributors.

Named simply the Pella Entry Door Systems, the new line gives the Pella, Iowa-based manufacturer something it has been working toward for several years now -- a presence in each of the four main fenestration subcategories: windows, entry doors, patio doors and skylights.

"Our strategic goal was to become a total fenestration company," explained Jerry Dow, Pella's senior marketing manager. "It's what our builder customers have wanted. They want to make one phone call to one salesperson at one company and bid out all the fenestration products."

While the package concept is being more heavily marketed to the professionals, it also has selling points for the homeowner. The new doors are covered with the same paints as Pella's windows, patio doors and skylights --meaning an exact match is possible. Usually, when a homeowner mixes and matches windows, patio doors and entry doors, there is a strong chance that manufacturer A's sandstone is a shade darker or lighter than manufacturer B's sandstone.

Dow said the new entry door line was not a result of Pella's 1999 acquisition of Pease Industries, an Ohio-based door manufacturer, but rather internal growth. At the time of the acquisition, Dow noted, Pella was already in the process of developing its own door systems.