Evans Glass is a scam. Just last month it settled with the attorney general for $85,000 to avoid losing a deceptive practices lawsuit.
http://www.atg.wa.gov/pressrelease.aspx?id=23814
The two absentee owners Larry Breuer and Paul are nothing more than extremely rich conmen. The upper management - Matt Flath and Tim McFarlane - are completely corrupt professional liars. I worked as a salesman there for almost a year and quit when I found out that basically everything I had been trained to tell people was either a gross exaggeration, a half-truth, or a blatent lie. Hopefully I can begin to repent of my sins with a confession. Let's start from the beginning of the pitch on page 1 of the Evans Glass pitchbook...
Lie #1: Evans Glass is a 33 year old company. Truth: Evans is only 12 years old. The name was purchased from a different company that was established in 1976, but Evans did not grow from that company in any way shape or form.
Lie #2: Evans Glass does not use subcontractors. All installers are W-2 employees of Evans Glass. These installers do nothing other than install windows for Evans Glass. Truth: Evans really only has 2 departments: sales and marketing. Everything else is outsourced. Evans uses the same subcontractors to install their windows that many other window companies in the area use. They are not even under an exclusive contract with Evans.
Lie #3: Evans Glass manufactures the Eurocraft window. Truth: The "Eurocraft Window" is manufactured by VPI in Washington and LBL in Oregan. Evans Glass is just a reseller of the VPI window which it marks up by a factor of 10x to 15x and tries to convince people is an original product.
Half-Truth #4: Evans Glass has a patent on the "Eurocraft" brand. You can't get it from anyone else. Truth: VPI added a few useless bells and whistles to the generic VPI window and agreed to only sell those particular useless features to Evans Glass. These useless features are... 1. A 6-inch long piece of aluminum in the header of the window that Evans claims is a non-conductive titanium I-beam to prevent "header sag" and prevent the glass from breaking under intense pressure. In actuality, this useless piece of aluminum serves no purpose other than to justify the ridiculously inflated price Evans is charging. Aluminum naturally contains trace amounts of titanium.
Lie #4: ThermalpermE is patented to Evans Glass and all other UV glass treatments (LowE or Pyrolytic LowE) will either wear off or will not be evenly distributed. Truth: ThermalpermE is just a name Evans Glass made up for Solarban XL, which is becoming standard in most windows. Solarban XL is also permanent and evenly distributed. Evans Glass just wants to make consumers think they can't get Solarban XL from any other source.
Lie #5: Inside the panes is a blend of inert Krypton/Argon gases providing a superior level of energy efficiency. Having a blend of Krypton/Argon is better than having just pure Argon (which is the industry standard). Truth: The gas inside the Eurocraft is almost pure Argon, they just inject a tiny amount of Krypton into the glass pack at the factory which serves no purpose other than to trick people into buying the Eurocraft at severely inflated prices. The krypton does not improve the energy efficiency of the window.
Lie #6: The black mold growing on your old window panes is toxic stachybotrys which can kill you or lead to serious health problems. Truth: The mold growing out of your sheetrock can kill you, but the mold which grows on window panes is not stachybotrys and is not dangerous. Stachybotrys requires cellulose to grow, which is found in sheetrock paper. Stachybotrys will not grow on windows.
Lie #7: After billions of dollars of research, Evans Glass was chosen by several major organizations (Atofina a division of TotalFina, PP&G, and VPI) to be the subject of product testing and to conduct a residential energy efficiency study. This was after finding a very low rate of customer dissatisfaction and product defects. Truth: No major organization has ever partnered with Evans. These pages of the pitchbook are completely fabricated and examples of blatantly fraudulent marketing materials.
Lie #8: Evans Glass was given the "2009 Best Choice Award" by Builder/Architect magazine. Truth: More fraudulent marketing materials. Builder/Architect magazine is just a Eurocraft advertisement that Evans Glass created and tried to pass off as a 3rd party publication.
Lie #9: The Window Shopping article from a 3rd party newspaper entitled "Buying the wrong windows for your home could leave your pocketbook in the cold" suggests you look for metal reinforcement in the header of your window, allerguard weatherstripping with microban, and a window you can paint. Truth: This is yet another piece of fraudulent literature that Evans created and is trying to pass off as a 3rd party resource. The suggestions are meant to drive consumers toward the useless features that Evans claims makes its product unique.
Lie #10: The Eurocraft is made of uPVCp (unplasticized poly vinyl chloride which is paintable) and contains 100% virgin acryllic material mixed with vinyl. It is not made out of plastic, which has a high rate of expansion and contraction which leads to seal failure within a short period of time.
Truth: First of all, acryllic is a polymer which means it's plastic, and second VPI refuses to confirm that the window they manufacture contains any acryllic at all. I have reason to believe that the Eurocraft is made out some kind of lower grade plastic mixed with vinyl.
Lie #11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17: The discounts, price drops, yard signs, and phone calls to manager asking for discounts during close are rehearsed and intended to make the customer feel he is getting a bargain and the windows normally sell for much more. What Evans calls "House Cost" is not even close to the cost of doing business, it's still drastically inflated, although reps are instructed to start 2.2x house cost and drop to house cost over the course of the close. If Evans does not make the sale on the first visit, it will send out a rehash rep who is trained to tell the customer he represents the factory or the commercial division and is armed with commercial pricing - another 10-20% drop below house cost - when in fact Evans has no commercial division because their proposals are only found acceptable by ill-informed residential property owners.
Truth: The window you are buying is generic and was purchased for a couple hundred (if that) dollars from a major window manufacturer and is being sold to you for thousands of dollars under the brand "Eurocraft". You are not getting a good deal, you are being screwed.
Furthermore, the LeafX gutter system that Evans claims it has exclusive distributorship of in the NorthWest is almost identical to LeafGuard, LeafFree, and various other gutter systems being sold by many other home improvement companies in the Northwest. However while most companies are charging $20 or less per linear foot, Evans is charging $28.50 or more per linear foot.
Well, the lies don't stop there because the whole company is saturated with them, but that's all I can think of at the moment. Most of the sales reps are not aware that everything they've been trained to say inside the house is false and misleading, but the owners know it, upper management knows it, and VPI knows it. While I was at Evans I earned less than $20,000 for 10 months of work and was considered one of the better salemen. Evans tells you it's a job with 6 figure income potential, but only one rep might hit that this year, and he admits that Evans is feeding him the best leads. The head of marketing, Mike Chaholsky, has admitted that marketing "feeds the reps that are on fire", and everyone else gets whatever is left. Those reps being fed are made out as role models for the reps who are not being fed. Working at Evans is not worth it, and will not make you a lot of money unless you earn the blessing of marketing.