About seventy miles south of Cleveland lies Holmes County and Mt. Hope, Ohio, a picturesque farming community steeped in Amish tradition. There's a hardware store, a post office, an auction barn, a handful of neatly kept homes, thousands of acres of rolling farmland, and one world-class garage door and opener company.

Since its inception in 1954, Wayne-Dalton has become known as a company with innovative ideas which far exceed industry standards. Often, Wayne-Dalton is the only source for the latest garage door and garage door opener features. Because the company has always maintained a staunch commitment to developing innovative new products, Wayne-Dalton is now a world leader in the garage door and garage door opener industry.

Wayne-Dalton History

1954

Wayne-Dalton's 1954 Factory Emanuel Mullet purchases a small garage door business from Ervin Hostetler in Mt. Eaton, Ohio. Ervin became involved in garage doors by inventing a wooden door that folded horizontally to store itself overhead. Emanuel moves the operation into a small, existing plant in nearby Mt. Hope.

1956

Wayne Door, as it was then known, assembles wood residential doors using sections manufactured in Wisconsin.

1959

The fast growing company builds it first production building in Mt. Hope.

1962

Advertisement Wayne Door begins to manufacture the sections in addition to assembling them. The work force totals eight and is all Amish.

1963

Our first independent distributors are established.

1965

Emanuel Mullet's son, Willis, becomes president of the company.

1967

Flush Doors 1967 Wood flush doors are added to the product line. The move helps expand the company into the Cleveland and Columbus markets. At this point, Wayne Door owns one semi and one straight truck!

1973

As company president, Willis starts a new plant, Dalton International, to produce commercial wood and steel doors. The plant is located in Dalton, Ohio, twenty minutes north of Mt. Hope.

1978

Wayne Door builds a new plant in Mt. Hope to develop an energy efficient, insulated garage door. This would be the major investment that would propel the company to where it is today. Its production line is the birthplace of the technology for our insulated thermal doors. The idea for an energy efficient garage door comes from the oil embargo and energy crunch of 1973. The production line is nicknamed VAII.

1981

The new VAII production line begins manufacturing Thermowayne insulated residential doors and Thermospan insulated commercial doors. With its unique built-in struts and thermal break features, there are no other doors on the market like them.

1982

Wayne Door in Mt. Hope and Dalton International are merged to create the Wayne-Dalton Corp.with Willis Mullet as Chairman of the Board.Willis lays the groundwork for our growth strategies.

1983

The company acquires North American Door in Lindenhurst, New York and Crawford Door Products in Century, Florida. North American produces rolling steel doors and security grilles. Crawford manufactures commercial and residential sectional doors.

1985

A new plant is built in Pensacola, Florida to produce the new Foamcore insulated steel garage door. Using technology gained from the Thermowayne™ and Thermospan® doors, it is developed to capture a different market segment. Foamcore becomes the largest individual brand name garage door sold in the U.S. today.

At the same time, the company's R&D staff is expanded and relocated to the Pensacola facility.

Wayne-Dalton acquires Door Systems, Inc., of Marietta, Georgia. They are a major producer of mini storage doors.

1988

Door Systems is relocated to Dalton, Ohio. It later is moved to its present facility in Trail, ten minutes from Mt. Hope.

1989

Thomas "Bert" Bennett III joins the company as President.

Glass City Springs of Toledo, Ohio, is merged into Wayne-Dalton.

1990

Wayne-Dalton acquires the Kinnear Division of Harsco corporation and Kinnear Canada LTD. Kinnear manufactures sectional and rolling steel doors and has a strong West Coast and Canadian presence in both manufacturing and distribution.

1991

A new foam line is built at Mt. Hope with advanced computer systems and a faster line speed. It becomes known as the Wayne Foam Line.

The Pensacola facility is doubled in size to handle the rapid growth of Foamcore garage doors.

1992

Corporate Offices 1992 A new 50,000-square-foot Corporate Headquarters is completed in Mt. Hope, 200 yards away from the original spot where Emanuel had first begun making doors. It is fabricated using building panels run off the Mt. Hope foam lines. The building itself wins a statewide architectural award for its design and how well it was integrated into the rural countryside.

Plycraft Plastics in Conneaut, Ohio is acquired to produce plastic window frames for the new StyleLine™ window options and other components.

1994

A revolutionary torsion spring system is introduced to the marketplace. The TorqueMaster™ has great appeal to safety conscious retail consumers by using a completely new design that places the normally exposed springs into an enclosed metal tube. The springs are wound by a drill so that no danger is encountered in winding them.

Wayne-Dalton embarks on a national advertising campaign featuring a well-known celebrity. Richard Karn, who plays Al on the enormously successful television program, Home Improvement, is signed to a multi-year contract as international product spokesperson.

Challenger, a manufacturer of motorized openers located in New Jersey, is acquired. This is part of the strategy to offer a complete garage door system, including door and opener.

Frantz Building Products, based in Sterling, Illinois, is purchased. Frantz is a manufacturer of sectional doors and has a strong retail presence throughout the Midwest. This helps Wayne-Dalton advance further into the ever growing retail markets, especially furnish and install programs.

1995

Major expansions completed at Mt. Hope and Pensacola facilities. Square footage for all plants is over 2,000,000.

After four years of research, the new pinch-resistant doors are test run on manufacturing lines at Pensacola and Mt. Hope. The new pinch resistant design helps prevent homeowners from accidentally getting fingers caught between the sections of a closing door. Combined with the Torquemaster™ counterbalance system, it is now the safest garage door system ever made.

1996

The first doors with the pinch resistant design are sold on the open market.

Wayne-Dalton receives Ohio's "E" Award for Excellence in Exporting. The award acknowledges Wayne-Dalton's growing export business. Only 35 other companies received the award, including Babcock & Wilcox and the Chrysler Toledo assembly plant.

1998

Wayne-Dalton receives the Consumer Product Safety Commission's coveted Chairman's Commendation for "significant contributions to consumer product safety." It is the only garage door manufacturer ever to receive the honor.

The Thermowayne II™ is introduced to the public. This door, with an increased R-value and pinch resistant design, continues to display Wayne-Dalton's commitment to safety.

1999

Wayne-Dalton unveils the revolutionary DoorMaster™ opener. This opener requires no photo eyes when installed with a pinch resistant door; no bulky opener rails, and even a pet-opening button. When combined with a Wayne-Dalton pinch resistant door, it is the first and only opener and door combination to earn the University Laboratories Listing Mark.

2000

Carriage House Doors Wayne-Dalton embarks on a new endeavor with the introduction of the elegant Carriage House door. Carriage House doors provide customers with the look of high-end wood garage doors with the convenience and practicality of sectional door design.

The web site expands to offer customers a Design Center that allows them to see various types of door styles on a home. The Dealer Locator is also unveiled, which allows web visitors to find an authorized dealer in their area.

2001

Wayne Dalton's Door & Systems Division introduces the TensionPro™ Adjustable Spring Device for roll-up counter shutters, mini roll-up doors and roll-up steel doors. This device allows owners to adjust the tension on a door with a simple twist of the wrist.

2002

Wayne-Dalton revolutionizes the market by introducing the innovative new idrive garage door opener. idrive replaces old chain and screw drive garage door openers with a compact and powerful motor that mounts on the wall directly over the door. The numerous benefits of idrive include its compact design, no rotating chains or belts, and no photo eyes when its installed with a pinch resistant door.

Wayne-Dalton presents homeowners an opportunity to break out of garage door boredom with a newly expanded line of 7100 series Carriage House Doors that are positioned at more affordable prices. All 7100 series doors feature kiln-dried Hemlock stile and rail frame with mortise and tenon construction. In addition, the doors feature a variety of hemlock trim patterns in vertical and raised panels, along with true divided window patterns in either square or arched design.

2003

The Torsion idrive residential garage door opener is added to the Wayne-Dalton line-up. This allows the opener to be offered with doors equipped with standard torsion springs. It also provides homeowners with an additional option for their existing doors that utilize torsion springs in which the door is not ready to be replaced, but the homeowner wants the features and benefits that idrive offers.

2004

The Wayne-Dalton Door Selection Center In 2004 Wayne-Dalton introduced the Door Selection Center (DSC) on its web site. DSC allows homeowners and builders to see what a home would look like with a Wayne-Dalton garage door in a variety of designs, colors and accents. Homeowners that visited a participating dealer could use a digital picture of their own garage to see exactly what each of the multitude of doors to choose from would actually look like on the structure.

2005

Wayne-Dalton 9700 Garage Doors - Steel Carriage House Doors

In 2005, Wayne-Dalton Model 9700 designer doors were introduced. These doors offered completely new options for homeowners and builders who had become tired of the standard raised panel garage door. The doors looked strikingly similar to wood Carriage House doors, yet offered the durability of steel, high insulation value, and safety with it pinch resistant design.

Radiance windows, employing the newest technology from the 3M™ Company, also became available. Radiance windows use optically enhanced film to create a prismatic effect in a much more cost-effective way than true beveled glass.

2006

Now in 2006, Wayne-Dalton has rolled out the industry’s first fiberglass clad garage door which offers a deep, rich wood look without the high cost and maintenance hassles of real wood.

The revolutionary Model 9800 fiberglass skin is created through a patented manufacturing process developed in conjunction with Therma-Tru which is then combined with an underlying polyurethane insulated steel door to maximize insulation value, strength, and pinch resistant safety.

Wayne-Dalton also introduced windload-rated doors during this timeframe on its most popular models, including the 9100 and 9700 doors. Engineered to protect homes in areas prone to hurricanes, tornadoes and severe storms, the doors meet Florida Building Code, International Code Council and Texas Department of Insurance, and Dade County PSF requirements.