San Jose Awning, doing business as Visible Innovations Group, fabricated and installed this custom-designed, combined aluminum and Ipe wood trellis in Santa Clara, Calif., to emphasize the previously difficult-to-locate building entry for the nearly 100,000-square-foot office complex.

Michael “MJ” Yaholkovsky, President and CEO of San Jose Awning and Visible Innovations Group, entered the aluminum awning business in 2007.

While awnings have provided protection from the sun and rain since the times of ancient Egypt and the Roman Empire, Michael “MJ” Yaholkovsky, President and CEO of San Jose Awning and its subsidiary Visible Innovations Group, is looking toward the future. “The market for aluminum sunshades and awnings has been growing rapidly and projections show the trend to continue well into the next decade,” explains MJ.

San Jose Awning has been providing fabric awnings to the San Jose, Calif., marketplace since 1983, but in 2007 the company began to experiment with aluminum. “We saw the benefits of aluminum sunshades and awnings early, and we wanted to be a forerunner,” says MJ. Last year, Visible Innovations Group was officially established as a wholly owned subsidiary of San Jose Awning. Visible Innovations designs and fabricates architectural aluminum sunshades, louvers and landscape canopies. For companies in Northern California, Visible Innovations will also install their products on site with the impeccable attention to detail that serves as the hallmark of the company’s work.

There is still a place in the market for fabric awnings, particularly for historically significant buildings, strip malls, and single-family residences, but the production and benefits of aluminum products, cultivated in the aerospace industry and successfully applied to the auto manufacturing industry, have translated seamlessly to the construction industry—particularly the sunshade, awning and louver market.

Benefits of Aluminum-Driven Market Shift

A variety of factors, including environmental impact, maintenance, installation efficiencies and design trends, come into play when discussing the benefits of aluminum as a source material. In the past, fabric and steel were the most common choices used in the sunshade industry, but aluminum has provided an excellent opportunity to expand design capabilities while providing a low-maintenance, particularly hardy material.

Aluminum is inherently corrosive-resistant to normal atmospheric environments and can be produced with various finishes, and painted or chemically treated for highly corrosive environments. It’s also much lighter, making it easier and less expensive to transport and install. Large items that would need to be produced separately in steel and welded together and field-painted, can now be fabricated of aluminum, factory-finished in a controlled environment and shipped and assembled into one relatively lightweight piece.

The fabrication process allows for unique shapes and designs through extrusions. “The really fun part for me is that nearly anything an architect can imagine, we can design and produce,” says MJ. “We can achieve all sorts of shapes, and even invent new ones right here in our shop.”

Aluminum also qualifies for U.S. Green Building Council Leadership (USGBC) in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) points and is 75 percent reusable and recyclable. It’s extremely durable and requires very little maintenance. While a little more engineering is involved upfront, the payback is realized for years to come, as aluminum requires only inexpensive cleaning for upkeep.

Early Entry into Aluminum Market Provides Competitive Edge

With growing markets comes growing competition. Thanks to MJ’s foresight, his company has years of experience over newcomers to the field.

“We’ve learned the nuances of this business,” says MJ. “We attribute our success to three key factors—our detailed shop drawings, our embedded bracket systems and just-in-time manufacturing. San Jose Awning has given us a wealth of experience and knowledge that we’ve applied to the work we’re doing with Visible Innovations Group. We wouldn’t be able to design and install at the level we do if we hadn’t had such a breadth of knowledge to draw from.”

Visible Innovations has become known for its high-quality and very detailed drawings. “We take the architect’s concept and design the product to bring his or her vision to reality,” explains MJ. Drawings show the contractor exactly where and how the awning will align on the building, relative to its various architectural elements. “There is no question on how to install our awnings, nor are there typically changes needed in the field. For those reasons, contractors love our product and our drawings,” he adds. With offsite construction trends growing by leaps and bounds, Visible Innovations is ahead of the game by fabricating in its facility and bringing the finished product to the site for meticulous installation.

The unique designs also include the brackets—just two per each 24-foot frame section are required—that the contractor installs into the building structure during construction. The brackets are waterproofed as the building finishes are installed, leaving just the face of the brackets slightly projecting from the finished surfaces. The sunshade is delivered as one piece and easily bolted to the brackets. “In our experience, this creates the best watertight installation available,” MJ asserts.

Value engineering is the second key to success. The engineers at Visible Innovations look for ways to create the best functional design at the lowest long-term cost to the building owner, while meeting the important architectural elements that are critical to the design. This is where years of experience really come into play, balancing appearance, initial costs, installation and maintenance over the life of the product. “We’ve worked hard over the years to build strong, long-term relationships with many architects and engineers in the industry. They trust us and we don’t take that lightly,” adds MJ.

Just-in-time production is also key. While the brackets are installed early in the construction process, the sunshades are not fabricated until the building is essentially complete. The construction process inherently requires changes in the field as unforeseen conditions arise. Visible Innovations conducts a final site visit when the building finishes are complete to confirm elevations, bracket installation and various measurements before proceeding with production. Many times, minor adjustments to the design are made to accommodate changes that might have occurred since the original design to ensure the custom look, color and fit. “When we are contracted to provide sunshades and awnings, our goal is to have no punch list for the job,” says MJ.

“We saw the benefits of aluminum sunshades and awnings early, and we wanted to be a forerunner.” Michael “MJ” Yaholkovsky, President and CEO, San Jose Awning and Visible Innovations Group

The Staff Manages the Manager

Raised in Sacramento, Calif., MJ worked as a young man in several industries before he realized his true passion was in construction. Describing himself as a “detail guy,” MJ started as a general contractor, and eventually focused his talents on finish and cabinetry work. He became friends with the owner of San Jose Awning, as his cabinet shop was in the same complex. Before long he was helping install awnings, and later became a business partner and eventually bought the business outright. “I love to work with my hands, but I also enjoy problem solving and designing a solution,” says MJ. “I keep wanting to build bigger and better things, and San Jose Awning and Visible Innovations Group give me that opportunity.”

To help cultivate his management skills, MJ studied with The Aji Network over the course of 17 years. He also took accounting and drafting courses at local colleges. “Equally satisfying to designing and building solutions for construction issues is knowing that my business provides good jobs to my staff so they can support their families. I take pride in working with my team to develop their individual skill sets, and in providing opportunities for professional and personal growth,” MJ adds.

When describing his management style, MJ says he doesn’t manage people. He considers vendors his partners and he hires the best-qualified staff who also are extremely self-motivated. He provides them with direction and expects them to manage their work. “In fact,” he quips, “I think they manage me to get what they need to do their jobs.”

San Jose Awning and Visual Innovations Group together have 16 employees, seven of whom are cross-trained in fabrication and installation. The balance of the staff comprises the engineering, sales, estimating and administrative departments. The company operates a lean work force on four-day, 10-hour shifts to allow for travel time to project sites, with many weeks requiring overtime. By operating with a lean, flexible workforce, MJ is able to easily adapt to economic and market ups and downs without negatively impacting any of his employees.

Looking to the immediate future, MJ is planning to grow the company and add leadership positions along the way. In the longer term, MJ has his sights on expanding beyond the Northern California and San Francisco Bay areas, which will likely involve a future relationship with a contract shipping service. With his staff and partner vendors in place, his attention to detail, and a passion to build bigger and better things, MJ seems to have it made-in-the-shade when it comes to meeting the growing demand for aluminum sunshades, awnings and canopies.