Chilliwack Business Excellence Employee of the Year Award Winner: * Shane Kutzer *

Chilliwack Mountain Log Homes Ltd. (dba Log Homes Canada) is a family business, established in 1999 by a father & son team (Keith and his wife Shelley, and son Colin and his wife Andrea) with an original goal of 3 to 5 homes per year and the rewards of being self-employed. However, things seemed to change.

By 2002, building 10 homes a year seemed like an appropriate new goal. Having made a good step into the US market we were also seeing the potential in foreign markets. In 2003, as new home sales continued to grow beyond our goals, we were the proud recipients of the New Exporter of the Year Award at the BC Export Awards. Our custom homes were now going to Israel, Germany, and Japan and we were on the verge of getting spread too thin.  We needed to expand our team to continue to offer superior service and to support our growing customer base.

In February of 2003 a young man named Shane Kutzer came to work for us. Previously having worked for 3 years in the log home industry, he quickly fit in and showed great talent and passion for building custom log homes. At the time he joined us at Log Homes Canada, he was also building custom wood furniture as a sideline, showing his commitment to long hours and hard work.

With our log home business demonstrating great growth potential, it was time to try and reach an even larger market share. While our Internet marketing proved to be very successful, we also decided to expand into the log home show circuits and even with over 20 seasonal employees at that time, it was quickly becoming an overwhelming task to manage for the father & son team alone!

A Washington state log home show that Keith was unable to attend became the proving ground, as Shane stepped in to assist in Keith's place.  Only hours into the opening day it was easy to see that Shane’s integrity, interaction and confident manner with potential customers just came naturally to him and, being a skilled log craftsman himself, his hands on product knowledge provided excellent direct answers to customer questions, right there on the trade floor.

Shane's abilities grew to include follow up and looking after future communications with those he met at the shows, and his commitments in doing so were rewarded with even more sales. His success prompted us to also add Internet lead follow-up to his plate which, with his persistence and sincere 'customer first' attitude, has also turned into more sales!

Back at the construction yard there was much evidence of Shane’s sales success. Many of the homes under construction were for his appreciative customers as he takes a personal interest in each one. Although Shane had moved into a sales position, it is still important to him to retain his artistry and craftsmanship so he continues to commit much of his free time (a scarce commodity) to hands on building.  Shane is a role model for the term "life long learner", always striving to improve building techniques, building smarter, better homes, while being there to support and best serve his customers.

In September 2004, Shane traveled to Denver Colorado to attend a home show, only 1 day after his wedding! Then about a month later he traveled to Tokyo, Japan for another show. On a stop-over on the way home from Japan, he met his new wife so they could finally get away for a honeymoon! That’s dedication beyond the call of duty (and a very understanding wife)!

In 2005 Shane and his wife decided to build their own log home here in Chilliwack and it’s now nearing completion. Although it will be their own personal residence, they’ve graciously offered to open their doors and showcase Shane’s craftsmanship to interested customers wishing to see his work first hand.

Shane’s hard work and commitment to our small, but growing family business (now 30+ employees) has been a welcome and rewarding experience for all those involved. It’s been said that if you want what others don’t have, you must be willing to do what others won’t do. Shane has done just that and at the age of only 28, he’s earned our very sincere respect and gratitude.

Photos of Shane's Custom Log Home are being showcased in our Virtual Tour