Catching Up at IRE After 20 Years

By Yvette Cruz. 

Metal-Era & Hickman have news to share about the latest trends and changes as they make an appearance at IRE. 

The International Roofing Expo (IRE) was a hit this year! Coming together, Karen Edwards of RoofersCoffeeShop® sits down with Brad Van Dam and Eric Duncan of Metal-Era & Hickman to discuss what’s been occurring with them over the last few years and the future projects they are working on.  

Brade, vice president of sales for Metal-Era and MTL Holdings, has been in roofing for over a decade. Eric is vice president of products and engineering services at MTL Holdings and celebrating almost twenty years in the industry. Being back at IRE for the first time in over twenty years, Metal-Era & Hickman had reserved a huge booth for their demos and presentations.  

Since their last IRE, Metal-Era & Hickman have merged with three more companies — MTL Holdings is the parent company of Metal-Era. According to Brad, “Hickman Edge Systems was acquired in 2021 and [Metal-Era] just purchased in September of 2022 Citadel Architectural Products. Three different brands all under one family and it’s been a great experience.” 

Eric comments, “Citadel is our first attempt of getting off the Roof Edge and giving our contactors the opportunity to provide wall solutions that will be integrated into our edge metal with both color alignment and also a continuous look that architects prefer.” 

Among other updates for the company, they are focusing on a new tool in an app called Falcon. It’s created by MTL Holdings and it’s the latest in technological advancements for contractors to use. It's designed to help measure more efficiently and accurately – so accurate that it can actually measure “down to the thousandths of the thousandths of an inch.” Metal-Era & Hickman are very excited about it and even demonstrated this at their IRE booth. Eric says, “The design of the tool has been a big investment. It’s been in the works for three years and we’re very excited we have a demo live right now.” 

Watch the IRE interview to learn more about what to expect from Metal-Era & Hickman this year.