Service Area

We cover Duluth and the surrounding Twin Ports region, plus the communities south and west along the I-35 and Highway 2 corridors. Everything in that circle sits in IECC Climate Zone 7, which means the same R-value targets, the same moisture rules, and the same ice dam physics apply throughout.

Call (218) 514-6594 with your address, or check the list below first.

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Duluth

Our home market and the bulk of our work.

Duluth’s housing stock is what makes insulation work here different from most of the country. A large share of it predates 1940. The older hillside neighborhoods, Chester Park, East Hillside, Central Hillside, and Endion, are full of balloon framed houses where the wall cavities run uninterrupted from the basement to the attic. That single detail explains most of the drafts, most of the ice dams, and most of the heating bills people call us about.

Lakeside and the eastern neighborhoods have a mix of older homes and mid-century construction. The Woodland and Kenwood areas run heavily 1950s and 1960s, which usually means bath fans venting into the attic and settled fiberglass at about R-19. West Duluth, Morgan Park, and Gary New Duluth have their own patterns, including a lot of small older houses with unfinished basements where rim joist work is the highest value first job.

The other Duluth-specific factor is snow. Lake effect snow up the hillside means a lot of load sitting on roofs for a long time, and a long time is exactly what ice dams need.

Common calls from Duluth: ice dams at the eaves, cold second floor bedrooms, drafty hillside houses, unfinished basements with fiberglass falling out of the rim joists.

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Superior, Wisconsin

Ten minutes across the bridge, same climate, different code jurisdiction.

Superior sits in Climate Zone 7 the same as Duluth, so the R-value targets and the moisture behavior are identical. Wisconsin runs its own residential code and its own utility conservation program through Focus on Energy, so permitting and rebate paths are different. Focus on Energy is Wisconsin only and requires an account with a participating Wisconsin utility, which is why a Duluth address cannot use it and a Superior one can. Its standard rebates require a contractor registered with the program and an application postmarked within 60 days of installation, so check it before you start rather than after.

Superior’s housing has a lot in common with West Duluth: older, modest, well built, and never air sealed. Billings Park, the North End, and the older neighborhoods near the harbor all fit that description.

Common calls from Superior: rim joists, crawl spaces under additions, garage and shop insulation.

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Hermantown

Newer on average than Duluth, with a lot of construction from the 1980s forward and steady new building since.

That means a different problem set. Instead of balloon framing and knob and tube, Hermantown work is more often attics that were insulated to the code minimum of their era and are now short by today’s standard, plus new construction where we are working with a builder before drywall.

There is also a lot of rural acreage in and around Hermantown, which means a lot of pole barns and heated shops.

Common calls from Hermantown: new construction packages, attic top-offs to R-49 or R-60, pole barn and shop insulation.

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Proctor

Small, older, and hilly. Proctor’s housing is largely early to mid twentieth century, much of it built for railroad families, and it shares Duluth’s patterns: full basements, balloon or early platform framing, and attics that have never been sealed.

Proctor is close enough to Duluth that small jobs are practical here, which is not true everywhere in our service area.

Common calls from Proctor: attic air sealing and insulation, rim joists, older home retrofits.

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Cloquet, Esko, and Carlton County

South and west along I-35, roughly 25 minutes from Duluth.

Cloquet is a different housing story than Duluth. Most of the town burned in the 1918 fire and was rebuilt after, so the older stock is 1920s rather than 1890s, and there is significant post-war and later construction. Esko and the surrounding area have more rural property, more outbuildings, and more new construction on acreage.

Note that parts of Carlton County sit near the Zone 6 and Zone 7 boundary. If your project is being permitted, confirm the climate zone with the county or city building official, because it affects required R-values. We generally build to Zone 7 numbers regardless. The extra insulation is cheap and January is not.

Common calls from Cloquet and Esko: pole barns and shops, crawl spaces, new construction, cabins.

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Two Harbors

Up Highway 61, about 30 minutes from Duluth. This is the outer edge of our service area going up the shore.

Two Harbors is a working town with older housing and the same cold climate problems as Duluth, plus more wind exposure along the shore. There is also a share of seasonal property in and around town.

Seasonal buildings have their own considerations. A place heated hard for a weekend and then allowed to freeze for two weeks cycles through the dew point repeatedly, which is hard on assemblies and brutal on fiberglass. Closed cell handles it because it neither absorbs moisture nor settles.

Common calls from Two Harbors: attic air sealing and insulation, crawl spaces, garages and outbuildings, seasonal property retrofits.

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Also serving

Saginaw, Rice Lake, Duluth Township, Knife River, Canyon, Wrenshall, Carlton, Scanlon, Barnum, Moose Lake, Solon Springs, Poplar, and the surrounding rural areas.

Iron Range communities including Hibbing, Virginia, Eveleth, and Aurora on a job-size basis. A shop or a whole-house job out that way is usually worth the drive. A single rim joist usually is not. Worth asking before you plan around it.

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Not sure if you are in range?

Call (218) 514-6594 with the address and the project. If you think you are outside the area, say so anyway and let us weigh it. Distance here is a job-size question, not a hard line on a map.