A wonderful old school company, with people who genuinely care about listening to your needs for…read morecontracting and supplies. They are well-connected within the Lancaster business community, and Amish carpentry community, and they work with some amazing people. Our Amish contractor is who led us to them, and we are so grateful to have gotten to know Dave Walter, as well as to have worked with his architect, Paul, and Paul's assistant Alison.
Alison went over a zillion drafts with me to make our plans absolutely custom and perfect. She listened to what we wanted, and allowed us to be our strong-headed selves with our design ideas, as opposed to trying to push things we didn't want. (A prior architect we'd gotten a quote from--not from W&J--was super pushy, with ideas that had nothing to do with what we wanted.) Alison was respectful of our wishes, but did tactfully occasionally make suggestions, which we are grateful for, because they really helped. Awesome experience with them!
Dave Walter is a great person to work with as well. We completed a good amount of work with them, which we love, but have had a lull in our renovation plans. However, when we start up again, we will be right back on track with Dave and co.
I will add that we have worked with 2 other building supply companies closer to us, and neither of the other places had anywhere near the heart that this place does, nor were they willing to go the extra mile to the extent that W&J is. I think being in LanCo ("out in the country") does set a different pace for life, and helps people be more decent toward one another. I realize how quickly Lancaster is being built up, but I think it still has a noticeably less-citified energy than the counties of the Philly 'burbs (MontCo/ChesCo/Delco/BucksCo).
Experiences getting building supplies from Delaware County Supply were largely positive, however, they specialize in certain things (for example, crazy selection of wood trims, and exotic wood species) that seem to be the main focus, while W&J can pull tricks out of their hat for custom painting on siding, or directing you to metal roofers with awesome color options, that others cannot. It makes sense that a lot of the manufacturers for metal roofing (popular for barns and silos) are out in LanCo, and it makes sense that they would have formed their best relationships with a LanCo supplier, to whom they offer their best deals.
We also had an experience with J&L Building Supplies in Frazer (Malvern), which was pretty awful. While Delco Supply was a decent enough crowd, everyone we dealt with at J&L was miserable. We were actually warned by contractors that J&L is notorious for treating homeowners badly, in favor of contractors. This was absolutely the case at J&L, and is sometimes the case at Delco Supply, but it is never the case at Walter & Jackson. A very simple order, placed at J&L, took three weeks to get quoted, and then after calling three times over two more weeks to make payment, it further got delayed, and then cancelled on us, for no reason (but probably because we dared to ask why it was taking so long). Luckily, when we made the same order with W&J, it was significantly cheaper, and there were no delays or hassles from W&J. What's more? Instead of acting like he was doing us a favor to condescend to help us (like at J&L), Dave Walter was sincerely gracious and appreciative of our business.
Very positive experience with genuine caring people at W&J.
