52 | Award-winning roofer’s skills top notch Top Notch Roofing Otago’s Nathan Leslie with the 2023 Metal Roofer of the Year award. CONTRACTING Top Notch Roofing Otago T T Hugh de Lacy Dunedin company Top Notch Roofing Otago’s dedication to quality has seen its founder and owner, Nathan Leslie, score repeated successes in industry competitions. Until they were suspended during the Covid pandemic, Mat Brough, in conjunction with Metal Roofing Manufacturers (MRM), ran the annual Roofing Games competition, where roofers from across the country compete for regional and national titles. Nathan enjoys these competitions because, “It’s a chance to showcase the high level of skills in the industry in a fun and competitive environment,” he says. Nathan won two regional titles in Otago in 2018 and 2019, then went on to win the South Island title in 2019 for his metal roofing skills. He was also a finalist in the Coloursteel Awards of both 2019 and 2021, and most recently won the Roofing Association of New Zealand’s (RANZ) Metal Roofer of the Year Award, cementing Top Notch Roofing Otago’s reputation as one of the leading specialist roofing companies for both metal roof and cladding installation. With a full-time staff of five, and wife Sarah in the office, Nathan runs the business from his Mosgiel home, attracting work from throughout the Otago region. The skills battle, held at the RANZ’s annual conference, sees two metal and two membrane roofers face off in a competition of skills. Their roofing model was a 2.5m-long module that took in all the tricky bits of roof installation, from dormer windows to stepdown barge-boards. Nathan competed against Ben Clisby from Protech Roofing, and both men showed outstanding craftsmanship in their trade, but Nathan came away with the win. “I wanted to be able to choose the projects I worked on and to give some of the trickier jobs a good go, and being my own boss gave me the freedom to do that.” Parameters in all three competitions are tight, and the focus is on attention to detail. “It’s great to see so many more individuals and companies enter these competitions, bringing innovations to the industry. “It really pushes us all to do our best and pay attention to the details of the craft,” Nathan says. He grew up on Catlins, Otago, farm and left school with the original intention of studying accountancy at university, but he found himself lured into roofing as a fill-in job, and liked it so much he made his career out of it. He completed a Metal Roofing and Cladding apprenticeship at the Auckland University of Technology in 1998 and has been in the business ever since, adding a Licensed Building Practitioner’s certificate to his qualifications, and becoming an RANZ member in 2023. He launched out on his own with Top Notch Roofing Otago four years ago after working for other companies in both the North and South Islands. “I wanted to be able to choose the projects I worked on and to give some of the trickier jobs a good go, and being my own boss gave me the freedom to do that,” Nathan says. The Otago roofing market went fairly quiet last year after the post-Covid rush, but Nathan says it’s on the rise now and his company has steady bookings coming in for a range of reroofs, leak-solving, new builds and cladding. Proud supplier of quality roofing products to Top Notch Roofing Dunedin | 03 488 2881 dunedin@freemanroofing.co.nz www.freemanroofing.co.nz 65 Main South Road, Green Island, Dunedin 9018 Call us on 03 477 1141 www.hallbros.co.nz CivilWorks • Sub-divisions Transport • Demolition Recycling • Siteworks 021 197 1679 blair@dhch.co.nz 94 Kaikorai Valley Road, Burnside Hiabs Cranes Transport Storage MPI Facility
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