James Dabaldo, QuestMark Admin, Corporate Celebrated 36 years at CentiMark on February 17, 2022

Today is the third in our six part blog series featuring our memories from several of CentiMark’s longest term associates and a focus on the “Mark” that CentiMark and the Dunlap’s have contributed to the commercial roofing and flooring industries. We’re celebrating CentiMark’s 54th anniversary on April 19, 2022.

We celebrate all 3,500 of CentiMark, QuestMark and CentiMark Ltd associates throughout North America’s 95 office locations.

“We became a billion dollar corporation in December 2021! Thank you to all CentiMark associates past and present for all your hard work and dedication. Without you, we could not have achieved this milestone. I want to thank my son Tim Dunlap [President & CEO] for his leadership in steering this ship to one billion,” says Edward  B. Dunlap, Founder & Chairman. “My suggestion to you is always the same: Work Hard, Work Smart, Work Safely and Have Fun.” 

CentiMark is proud of our 3,500 associates throughout North America. We have 264 associates with 20+ years of experience at the company. Today, we want to thank and acknowledge those associates:

James Dabaldo, QuestMark Admin, Corporate

Celebrated 36 years at CentiMark on February 17,2022

If you know James Dabaldo, he is a storyteller, a jokester, a friend and a devoted father. He’s also a loyal CentiMark and QuestMark associate who has dedicated his work life to “whatever it takes” to get the job done. He takes great pride in his work and personal relationships with Ed Dunlap, Tim Dunlap and Steve Dunlap over the years.

Currently, James multi-tasks several jobs at QuestMark Corporate offices. He helps Lori Rossi, QuestMark Procurement Manager, when needed. He works with the QuestMark Sales Reps and their Demo/Tech persons by processing their Material Sales via Magento catalog. He also handles billing for QuestMark sales that were generated via the flooring catalog and Amazon. In addition, he creates bills, sends out SDS (Safety Data Sheets) sheets, credit card receipts and other tasks as required.

James' career path started in the Warehouse in Bethel Park, PA. He worked three days a week for two weeks and then became full time. Sam Stephan was the Warehouse Manager and taught him the business. “Sam would volunteer me and some other guys to work on flooring jobs on Friday night through the weekend after a 40 hour work week and we could pick up another 30 hours in overtime,” says James. “My next boss was Steve Dunlap [now President, National Polymers]. He was tough and all business. But he taught me about the company [then Consolidated Enterprise Incorporated] and the history of the businesses.” 

After Steve Dunlap moved to National Polymers, James was in charge of the Warehouse for the next 20 years. He was responsible for loading roofing and flooring jobs and keeping two trucks busy delivering the company's other supplies and products: glues, two piece metal edge, determination bar, cold patch, stop leak kits and small tools.

“Working in the Warehouse was my time with Mr. Dunlap,” says James. “He is and always was the best salesman ever at CentiMark. After he traveled, he would stop in the warehouse full of questions: ‘how much of this material do we have in stock? How long will it take to have three truck loads of roof coatings made for this material sale?’”  

“Mr. Dunlap was always easy for me to talk to,” adds James. “On weekdays, he always wore a suit and tie but when he came in to work on the weekends, he wore jeans. Ed Dunlap taught me so much about work and about life. He would say to me: ‘Sometime you cannot hit a home run, but it sure is nice to get up to the plate and try.’”

Working in the Warehouse, James credits Joe Scarmazzi for teaching him about roofing and Albert “Butch” Daugherty for teaching him about flooring. “Joe would have different suppliers come in with their products and do testing on different tapes, primers, adhesives, membranes, fasteners and other products and tools. Joe explained how and why we used specific products and how we would apply the products in different situations,” continues James. “It was an education that is second to none!”

“At that time, NPI (National Polymers Inc.) was located next to our Corporate offices. That’s where Butch taugh me flooring,” adds James. ”Butch would make and test new flooring products. He would bring them over to our warehouse. We would put the product down at the end of the day and run over them with a forklift until they were cured. We would try our best to destroy the test patch with spinning tires or dragging heavy skids with nails sticking out of the bottom boards. We had to know how the products would hold up to the competition. After lab testing and our efforts to destroy the products, we would market the product. That’s how I learned packaging sizes, colors specific to certain products and applications of each of the flooring systems that we sold.”

James enjoys so many aspects of his job: working with his co-workers at Corporate and in the field; helping new Tech Reps who are learning to enter new Materials sales orders in the system; working with customers who have purchased products or are about to purchase products to give them pointers on the applications. “When I see repeat orders, I know our customers liked the product and that it worked for them,” concludes James.

“CentiMark has come a long way since I started and we were not even selling $50 million,” remembers James. “Mr. Dunlap said: ‘If you sell $100 million, we’ll go to the Bahamas’...and we did! And what great memories those trips were!”

“If you are a new CentiMark associate, my advice is to work the best that you can and give 100% and you will be noticed and rewarded,” says James. “If you are up on the roof or on the floor, learn everything that you can. The company may roll the dice on you to take the next step. Take advantage of the 401k Plan and pay yourself first. Put a few more dollars away - and you’ll never miss it! One day you’ll be at the proverbial fork in the road…and the fork may say: ‘Stay as long as the Dunlap’s will have you!’”

Congratulations to Ed Dunlap,Tim Dunlap, James Dabaldo and all of CentiMark on our 54th Anniversary -  April 19, 2022.