One voice can start a movement

By Jesse Sanchez. 

Joel Stanley shares how Anchor Products is helping manufacturers support mental health awareness across the roofing industry. 

Mental health can be difficult to talk about in construction, but for Joel Stanley, the need to speak up became impossible to ignore. Joel, the founder of Anchor Products, joined McKay Daniels, CEO of the National Roofing Contractors Association (NRCA) and Lynsey Hull, CEO of Tyelus, for this episode of Roofing Road Trips® in a conversation about mental health, suicide prevention and the growing collaboration between NRCA and the Single Ply Roofing Industry (SPRI). Joel’s perspective offered a clear look at how one manufacturer’s concern for workers helped spark broader action. 

Anchor Products, a rooftop equipment attachment manufacturer, works closely with roofing manufacturers, contractors and industry partners, giving the company a direct view of how collaboration can support a safer, healthier industry. “We work with all the different roofing manufacturers on a daily basis,” Joel said. “And it's been fun to be involved with so many great contractors and great roofing manufacturers throughout our industry and really share our insights and learn from what other people are doing as well.” 

That collaborative mindset carried into Joel’s work with SPRI. He said Anchor Products has been heavily involved with the organization for years, with Anchor team members chairing several SPRI task forces. When mental health and suicide prevention came up as an urgent industry need, Joel saw a place where manufacturers could help extend the reach of existing efforts. 

After hearing NRCA CEO McKay Daniels speak about the impact of suicide in the roofing industry, Joel said the message stayed with him. It was not only the scale of the issue that moved him, but also his own family experience with suicidal ideation and mental health challenges. “How great would it be if we had an industry that cared about my kid,” Joel said, reflecting on what it would mean for every parent to know their child worked in an industry willing to care about them as a whole person. 

At a subsequent SPRI meeting, Joel stood and asked the organization to act. Joel reflected, “I stood up and I said I would like to start a task force that can address mental health and that we can look at what our industry can do, what the roofing manufacturers can do to help.” His goal was not to create a competing message or a separate campaign. Instead, Joel described a desire to work with NRCA, use existing resources, and find ways for manufacturers to help carry a unified message into the field. 

For Joel, that responsibility is shared across manufacturing, distribution, contracting, service and leadership. “We can't rely on somebody else to save my friend,” Joel said. “I actually have to do something myself.” That sense of care remains at the center of the effort. As Joel put it, “Everybody deserves to be cared for.” 

Learn more about Anchor Products and its involvement in industrywide efforts to support mental health in roofing!