The wood home industry on the Prairies seems to be trending toward a hybrid of conventional and timber home construction. Doucette mentions that clients are picking the elements they like best from conventional construction and combining it with timber components, resulting in truly unique structures. “Timber accentsandelementsworkedintoconventional construction — that’s becoming very popular. Say perhaps someone want’s a very special kitchen or living room with big timber beams. Or on the exterior, maybe arches and cosmetic timber accents on the house or around the landscape. We’re doing that and it’s becoming very popular here.” One thing that the numbers will demonstrate in the new home construction industry is that log and timber homes, while aesthetically beautiful, do not fit everyone’s taste or budget. However, Doucette assures that the company doesn’t really have to do much of a sell-job to clients that come to them with their home or cabin projects. By the time they get to Back Country for a consultation, they have generally all but decided on what they are in the market for, which is a unique unconventional home and Back Country is more than willing to make it happen. “The clients that come around are looking for something unique.”
“We are really only dealing with one per cent of the market,” Doucette points out. “But those people seem to have this ingrained idea, much as I did too, this romance or love affair with log structures. It’s something substantial. Something different… The clients that come around are looking for something unique.” Unique is theword. As unique as the customer’s fingerprints, one might say. Customers generally bring their ideas to the initial meeting and then a back-and-forth ensues until Back Country’s designer has whittled down the desires of the client and developed a working blueprint. This process enables clients to put their own one-of-a-kind twists on their homes. Doucette explains that, even with solid blueprints in hand, the final design is not set in stone until the final nail has been hammered. “The blueprints are still just the concept and the guideline. The house is always in flux until it’s finished. Changes along the way are par for the course.” Naturally, the attention that television networks are paying to log homes and the companies that build them (HGTV’s Timber Kings being one of the more popular of the sub-genre) shine a perceived spotlight onto builders like
“I thought about what I wanted to do in the future, and it wasn’t just constructing simple boxes.”
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NOVEMBER 2019 • SPOTLIGHT ON BUSINESS MAGAZINE
SPOTLIGHT ON BUSINESS MAGAZINE • NOVEMBER 2019
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