A Message from Founder & President
Forty years ago, I was driving through the streets of Hamilton with nothing but a trade, a work ethic, and the stubborn belief that if I kept showing up, someone would eventually give me a shot. I was knocking on doors for months before a single person said yes. There were no shortcuts, no investors, no safety net. Just early mornings, long days, and the quiet determination to outwork every obstacle that got in the way. A lot of people would have quit. Quitting never crossed my mind.
Riding along with me through all of it, barely tall enough to see out the window, was my son Zak. He didn’t know it then, but he was getting his first education in what this company would be built on.
When that first customer finally trusted me with their tarp, I treated it like it was the most important job in the world — because it was. That same standard never left. It became the culture. Every repair, every product, every customer interaction carried the same weight as that very first one. Quality, honesty, and service weren’t marketing words. They were the only tools I had, and I used them every single day.
That persistence grew into a one-bay shop on Lake Ave, then a 3-bay facility at 398 Kenora Ave in 2000 — a space I once drove through wondering how I’d ever fill it. Today it’s home to over 50 employees. From there we expanded to Detroit in 2005, then Gary, Indiana in 2015 and in January 2020 we built our Woodstock location from the ground up — a custom 14-bay facility right at the 401 and 403. Four locations across two countries, earned one job at a time. And the innovation hasn’t stopped — our Eagle Tarp System, developed right here, is now closing in on 1,000 units produced per year. Not bad for a guy who started with nothing but a work ethic and a willingness to keep driving.
None of this — not one bit of it — happens without the people.
To every employee who has ever worn a Verduyn Tarps shirt, past, present, and future: you are the company. You are the reason a customer who came to us ten years ago is still coming back today. The craftsmanship, the care, the willingness to go the extra mile on a repair or rush an order for someone who needed it yesterday — that’s not something I can manufacture. That comes from people who take pride in their work, and I have been fortunate beyond measure to have built a team, across all four locations, which does exactly that. From the shop floor to the front counter, thank you. This anniversary belongs to you as much as it does to me.
To the communities of Hamilton, Woodstock, Detroit, and Gary — thank you for welcoming us, supporting us, and giving us the privilege of being part of your local economies. These aren’t just places we do business. They are home. The trust those communities extended to a one-man operation, and then a small shop, and then a growing company, is something we have never taken for granted and never will.
And to the men and women of the trucking industry on both sides of the border — this one is personal.
You are who we wake up for. From the large fleet managers coordinating hundreds of trucks across North America, to the owner-operators running a single rig and betting everything on every load — we understand what’s at stake when a tarp fails or a system lets you down on the road. We have spent forty years making sure that doesn’t happen. The relationships we’ve built with carriers, dispatchers, fleet maintenance teams, and independent drivers aren’t just business relationships. They are partnerships. When you trust us with your equipment, you’re trusting us with your livelihood, and we have never once taken that lightly.
The flatdeck trucking industry is the backbone of the North American economy, and it has been the backbone of ours. We are proud to have grown alongside it — to have listened to what drivers and fleet managers needed, and to have developed products like the Eagle Tarp System in direct response to those conversations. That two-way relationship, the feedback loop between the people in the cab and the people in our shop, is what has kept us relevant, improving, and earning your business year after year.
As we mark this milestone, I’m proud to announce that Zak will be stepping up to lead Verduyn Tarps into its next chapter. He has been part of this company since before he could walk through the door on his own, and he has grown into exactly the kind of leader this company deserves — and that this industry deserves. The same values, the same work ethic, the same commitment to the people and communities we serve. The drive that built this place is in good hands.
Here’s to forty years of hard work, great people, and the best industry in the world to be a part of.
And here’s to the next forty.
Lloyd Verduyn
