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CANADIAN INDUSTRY ONLINE - AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2012
I
N THE LATE
1970
s
,
Canadian
households were just beginning
to take advantage of basement space as
usable space—recognizing that finish-
ing a basement could add room for
family growth and value to their
homes.
With this shift in the way families
used their homes came a few challeng-
es. One of the biggest was the tenden-
cy of concrete basement walls to crack,
and households began dealing with
inevitable water damage that comes
with a leaky basement.
After several years in the con-
struction industry, Bill Cole came up
with a solution for the problems so
many new basement-users were fac-
ing. Cole began to specialize in con-
crete repair and water control, using
commercial and industrial-strength
concrete repair products in residential
applications.
As one can imagine, it took some
time to perfect the right solution for a
very stressful problem facing home-
owners—but Cole and the original
PERMACRETE® team knew that suc-
cess was on the horizon and their en-
trepreneurial spirit forged on.
THE PRODUCT AND ITS
DEVELOPMENT
Cole’s son, Danny Cole, cur-
rent VP at the company now known
“
What we came up
with was a proprietary
product after years of
product development
and travel and trials”
PERMA-DRY
as PERMA-DRY® says that his father
realized after years of trying different
concrete repair and injection strate-
gies that he needed to come up with a
“
more permanent solution.”
“
Unfortunately, although a crack
injected with our epoxy injection sys-
tem was stronger than the concrete
wall around it, our repairs worked but
parallel cracking occurred adjacent to
the original cracks because there was
no room for the concrete to move and
shift.” The company endeavoured to
find a product that they could develop
for all applications that would seal
the leak permanently but be flexible
enough to withstand movement in the
wall so it wouldn’t permit more paral-
lel cracking in foundations.
Eventually, with great ingenu-
ity and the help of chemists and engi-
neers, Bill Cole perfected his PERMA-
SEAL® Flexible Resins which utilized
THERMO-JET® Technology.
After a few years lending his ex-
perience to Nova Scotian customers
needing repairs, Cole was recognized
as an expert. However, he wasn’t the
only person interested in being an ex-
pert in the area of concrete restoration.
Cole was approached by several
contracting companies to use his re-
pair system. In 1990, he decided to test
consumer response and distribution
feasibility by licensing two dealer-
ships: one in Cape Breton and one in
Truro, Nova Scotia. “As a result of the
success of both territories within their
first year of business, the company de-
cided to offer this formula for success
to other quality conscious individuals
through a franchising system,” com-
pany records say. The company, whose
franchises are now branded PERMA-
DRY®, has many franchised locations
throughout North America.
