Indoor Comfort Specialists

Trinity Maintenance Solutions
Written by Robert Hoshowsky

Trinity Maintenance Solutions Ltd. has helped countless customers across Atlantic Canada by providing unique and highly efficient energy efficiency services and solutions since 2006. The company is known for its professional, reasonably-priced services and friendly customer service and serves a range of clients in residential, industrial and commercial sectors.
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The company provides customers with a range of proven and highly effective energy and money-saving solutions. Focusing on green products that are better for the environment, it helps clients to stay warm, save money and reduce their carbon footprint.

Trinity Maintenance Solutions’ services include home and commercial insulation, electrical consumption monitors, commercial energy audits, a range of insulations (spray foam, blown cellulose, foundation, wall), thermal barriers, waterproofing, thermal imaging, fire barriers and fire stopping. At Trinity, all products and services are engineered for quality and functionality, helping clients to stay warm, save money and reduce their carbon footprint.

As part of the Trinity Energy Group of companies that includes Trinity Inspection Services, Trinity Distributors and Energytite Insulators Inc., Trinity Maintenance Solutions continues to grow and is eyeing expansion into Newfoundland.

The company takes pride in providing customers with products and solutions to not only help them lower their heating and cooling energy bills, but improve indoor air quality and comfort while protecting the environment. For President Dwaine MacDonald, the creation of Trinity was a natural extension of many years of industry experience.

Before incorporating Trinity on October 10, 2006, MacDonald spent several years working for a family industrial services company owned by his uncle, where he took on tasks such as asbestos abatement, industrial cleaning and industrial insulating of boilers and piping. Tragically, his uncle was diagnosed with cancer when Dwaine was just eighteen.

“The last year of his life, he took me around with him, and I spent a lot of time estimating and looking at jobs and looking after things for him,” he says. “So when he passed, my aunt and I looked after the company.”

Dwaine helped run the business for the next five years, using the knowledge he had learned from his late uncle before the company was sold by his aunt.

After leaving to pursue new ventures, he was asked by the new owners to return, which he did for six years. “I told them right from the get-go that I was not somebody who is going to work for somebody else,” he says. “I knew I was going to own my own business.”

MacDonald was approached by two friends who had existing businesses and who were looking for a company to handle labour support for them, and Trinity Maintenance was created. The company name came about as a representation of MacDonald and his business partners coming together and the Trinity name meaning “three-in-one”. Another friend, Rodney Misener, who grew up in the same community as MacDonald joined when the business started.

From only three employees at the beginning, Trinity Maintenance Solutions has grown to seventy-five full-time staff and four locations. It serves all of Atlantic Canada from its head office in Stellarton, Nova Scotia and branches in Bedford, Kentville and Moncton, New Brunswick.

Using his knowledge of the industrial services business, MacDonald was able to secure work quickly for the new company. By 2008, he began expanding into other work for Trinity, namely insulation.

“I always did insulating, so I started looking more at the energy market and how to properly insulate commercial and residential buildings,” says MacDonald. Exterior walls, attics, basements, rooms above garages and gaps around doors and windows are prone to losing warm air in winter.

Believing spray foam was the way of the future because of its superiority over other insulating products due to its air tightness, he soon purchased his first spray foam truck. Soon, MacDonald saw an advertisement calling for tenders for what is today known as Efficiency Nova Scotia. The program assists residents of the province with improving energy efficiency at home and work and aids through a variety of means, from retiring old inefficient appliances to home energy assessments, product installation, green heat and home energy reports. The company successfully secured the tender to insulate fifty homes under the Low Income Homeowner Service (LIHS) and has continued to grow with Efficiency Nova Scotia ever since, saving approximately 25,000 homeowners $16 million in annual energy savings and 800,000 tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions.

In November 2014, the company began a new chapter in its history when MacDonald became sole owner after buying out the other two partners.

One of the best ways to achieve efficient insulation is through the use of spray foam, and Trinity has dedicated itself to keeping abreast of the latest developments in the industry. The company is part of the Canadian Urethane Foam Contractors Association (CUFCA) which specializes in spray-applied polyurethane foam insulation. The organization champions the polyurethane foam industry, sustains high standards and encourages ongoing professional development. In addition, MacDonald is vice president of the organization and sits on the national board. Along with CUFCA, Trinity also holds membership with other professional groups, including the Canadian Home Builder’s Association, the Construction Association of Nova Scotia, the Nova Scotia Construction Safety Association and the Nova Scotia Home Builder’s Association.

Spray foam solutions are superior to traditional insulation products and methods in several ways. Spray foam doesn’t contribute to mould like some older insulation types; it fights air leaks around doors and windows, sealing these areas to reduce costly heat loss and prevent airborne pollutants and pollen from coming into structures.

“One big aspect of spray foam it is that it is an air barrier,” says MacDonald. “We know now in the industry that airtightness of the building envelope is extremely important. You can have all kinds of insulation in your building, but if it’s not airtight and working properly, it might be costing you a lot of money because of that air infiltration from outside.”

Since spray foam acts as an air barrier, it enables buildings to be extremely airtight, which is an asset. “A lot of people have the misconception that they build buildings too tight these days, and that’s not true. You want your building as tight as possible so you can control the atmosphere inside with air exchangers and things like that to make sure it is balanced properly.”

The team at Trinity has invested considerable time in hosting discussions and attending seminars with building inspectors, architects and engineers to educate the industry on the positive benefits of spray foam and how it helps to buildings run much more efficiently with heat in winter and air conditioning in the summer.

Company President MacDonald admits that some of his passion comes from frustration with how newer structures are constructed, with a focus on cost rather than quality. “I was really getting frustrated watching the market and seeing how some of these commercial buildings were being built.” He notes that many properties lack proper building envelope techniques.

“A lot of people are just chasing the lowest cost at the time of building. But if we can go in there and educate them that, if they spend a little bit more money right now on the envelope of the building, the little bit of extra investment is going to save them year after year on operational costs. If you design a good system and a good envelope, it is going to be a much cheaper operation for you to run, and you will definitely get back the money you invested in it because you are saving on heating and cooling costs, as well as the benefits for the environment.”

In addition to working on energy efficiency for new and older structures, Trinity is focusing a considerable part of its efforts on fireproofing and fire stopping methods. It has been examining new products and the proper way to fireproof commercial buildings. “It’s life-saving, so it’s important some of these old buildings get caught up to the times and that they are actually safe for people to work in,” comments MacDonald.

Trinity Maintenance Solutions has won awards for its work including the 2014 Bright Business Partnership Award from Efficiency Nova Scotia, which recognized the company for its ‘outstanding delivery of energy efficiency solutions, services or education,’ as well as being awarded the Pictou County Chamber of Commerce Large Business of the Year in 2013.

Trinity Maintenance Solutions continues to provide superior customer service, the best available products and free estimates. “We take extreme pride in our work and stand behind our work,” says MacDonald of Trinity. “We are trying to better the industry with professional work aspects and also being able to offer them the best products and how to help them design and build their buildings, so they work as a system. You can’t just look at insulation as one thing anymore; you have to look at the whole building envelope. Insulate it properly, air seal it properly, waterproof it properly, fireproof it properly and then help them to balance the air flow inside.”

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