Who owns Window Universe Phoenix?

Dan Schweihs & Bianca Medrano founded Window Universe in 2008. The goal was to make the window industry easier to navigate with simple pricing, no pushy commission based salespeople and top quality results.

Introduction

Hello, I’m Dan Schweihs and I’ve been in the window business for over 20 years. I started in the management training program at Associated Materials back in 2004. At the time they owned several building product brands including Alside, Preservation, Alpine, Revere, Gentek, Ultraguard and more.

This management training program was designed by the CEO, a former GE executive, who wanted to build the next generation of leaders and wanted them to have exposure to all aspects of the company. This included manufacturing, distribution, sales and the corporate office.

After several years working all over the country I was promoted to a role where I dealt with some of the largest retail window companies in the area. I helped them with sales and product training and formed pretty close personal relationships the owners of several large retail window companies.

It quickly became clear that these companies were not offering the best possible experience for their customers. Their prices were high, their sales tactics were manipulative and the owners seemed perfectly happy with the situation. This seemed like an opportunity to me.

Window Universe was born

At the time, my now wife, Bianca was working on Wall Street after finishing graduate school in New York and that can be a grind. Her hours were long and the work was not enjoyable. We decided we should start a window company that sold windows the way we would want to buy windows. We thought we could do better than the competition.

It seemed to us that the window industry was living in the olden days. There’s basically no other product that you need to buy from a pushy in-home salesman who comes into your living room with mysterious prices and questionable claims. Customers clearly didn’t like it.

So, we took a gamble. In 2008 we risked everything to start Window Universe and the results have been incredible. We were the first, and only, employees. Bianca did the sales and I ran the office and managed the installations. It worked.

Success was certainly not guaranteed. As you may remember there was a housing crisis in 2008 and the building products industry was a little challenging. When I told my boss at Associated Materials that I was quitting to start my own business his immediate response was, “wow, I thought you were one of the smartest guys on the team, why would you quit a good secure job in the middle of this financial crisis?”

Our thinking was that if we could make the business work in 2008 things would only get better from there. And, that’s basically what happened. Over the next few years we were able to open a second and then a third location and things were moving along well.

TheWindowDog was formed

In 2014 I started TheWindowDog.com with a lot of content about the window industry. Frankly, I made that site for our employees more than our customers. At the time I was doing the sales training for our company. Teaching our new people about these products and about all of the competition was a bit of a chore and I was looking for a way to make that easier.

I thought I would just write out the information in a long form so our newer people could refer to it. I put it online so they could forward something I wrote to prospective customers and they could refer back to my info from wherever they were. It was a lot of long and detailed information and I really didn’t think customers would bother reading it so it didn’t matter if it was public.

I was wrong about that. The site quickly became a huge hit with customers. I wrote about the manipulative sales tactics that were being used every day. I wrote about how to understand window ratings, I wrote window reviews, and I tried to explain why we would offer some products and not others.

As we became one of the larger window companies in the country every manufacturer wanted us to carry their products. I didn’t think it would be helpful for us to throw 30 choices at a customer and tell them to pick one. Most people are not window experts. That’s our job.

I think we can provide more value to the customer when we evaluate the options available in the market and make a few recommendations. After all, we’ve been in this business a long time. At this point we’ve seen it all and we’re not likely to be fooled by a fancy sales pitch or a slick brochure.

In all my years in this business I’ve seen many manufacturers come and go. When a manufacturer vanishes their customers are left with no warranty, no access to replacement parts, no support at all. That’s not a great position to be in and I’ve seen it happen 1000 times. Even well regarded companies can be much riskier than people realize. That’s part of the value that our decades of experience can provide. We’ve never sold windows from a manufacturer that later went out of business. 100% of our customers have full access to their warranty.

Our track record of success in making quality recommendations is something I’m very proud of.

Local service

We have a local installation department ready to take care of our customers. There’s a warehouse, an installation manager, installation teams and a showroom.

The only thing we don’t have is commission based in-home salespeople. I’m certainly not anti-salesman. It can be a hard job and a valuable job too. But, in the home improvement industry it’s generally not a role that adds a lot of value, especially considering the cost.

Did you know that most retail window companies will pay 10-20% of the total contract as commission? That means if you order $15,000 worth of windows it’s possible that $1,500 – $3,000 of your money is going into the salesman’s pocket and not into quality products or service. That’s not a great value for the customer so we don’t do it. By saving that money we can spend more on quality and still provide a very competitive offering. This is much better for the customer. Your dollars are going towards quality products and service, not towards sales commissions. It just makes sense.

We send out quotes by email with no in-home salesman. Our prices are not a secret. You don’t need to measure anything and we’re available to answer all of your questions. We can also make unlimited revisions to your quote until we have all of the details just the way you want them.

If you’re ordering your windows with professional installation we’ll send out a local technician to take the exact measurements before the windows are custom made. This is a window installation expert, not a salesman. There is no 90 minute demonstration, no requirement that your spouse be present, no neighborhood discount, no secret pricing that keeps changing as long as you keep saying no.

Remember, the goal was to make the process as easy as possible not to charge you as much as possible. We’ll leave that to the other guys.

Then 2020 happened

COVID was an interesting time for home improvement companies. A lot of companies in this field are one bad month away from disaster. I saw that first hand back in the housing crisis of 2008.

Several large companies, including well regarded manufacturers just vanished back then. I would go by their office just to find the lights off, the door chained and nobody in sight.

After all that Bianca and I had gone through starting a growing a small business, all the sleepless nights, and weekends at the office I knew I was not going to end up like those guys. We’ve always been very financially conservative, knowing that a rainy day will come and we needed to be prepared.

In March and April of 2020 many retail window companies did fail, but we were in fine shape. Construction was deemed an essential activity in most states and spending on home improvement picked up. We were able to grow quite a bit during that time because we had the resources and scale that our competition did not. Our founding during the financial crisis of 2008 definitely helped us to be prepared for the COVID crisis of 2020.

How’s it going?

A few years ago we recieved an inquiry from the sister of the CEO of Associated Materials. Remember, this is the company I started out working for back in 2004. They’re a billion dollar company with operations all over the US and Canada and a 70+ year history in the building products industry. When the CEO’s sister needed windows he could have referred her to any of their thousands of customers. He referred her to us.

He knew that a lot of his big accounts are still not offering a very good experience to their customers. He’s the CEO of a huge manufacturing company in this field. His sister needs windows. She asks her brother who she should call to get windows. He sends her to Window Universe. This was such a compliment for me. After all of these years and all of the challenges of running and growing a small business this was proof that we had achieved what we set out to achieve.

We wanted to sell the windows the way we would like to buy windows. When the CEO of a large national manufacturer needs to refer a family member to someone he sends her to us. He knows that we’ll offer a great quality and a great value without over charging his sister or giving her a bunch of nonsense.

We did what we set out to do. Success.

Where are we in 2026?

At this point Window Universe is offering windows in over 40 markets across the country. We offer simple itemized pricing, no pressure sales, and a range of top quality choices with (or without) professional installation.

When our customers order their windows with installation our projects are installed by the manufacturer’s installation service. This is the best part about our installation offering. It eliminates the opportunity for finger pointing if any issue arises and it ensures a quality result. We can afford to offer this improved installation experience at very competitive prices because we’re not paying expensive sales commissions. Our business model allows us to offer a better value than the competition.

We absolutely have created the easiest way to order new windows and doors for your home.

How to get a quote

If you’re considering a window or door project we would love the opportunity to show you what we offer. All you need to do is provide some very basic info in the form below. We’ll email you product and pricing info including available upgrades, efficiency ratings and more.

You do not need to be an expert. If you’re unsure of anything just guess to get the process started. You’ll receive a confirmation email right away with more info and a personalized email from a real window expert soon after. You can reply to us with pictures of your project or questions or anything else. We will not pester you with phone calls (note we don’t even ask for your phone number on our form), but we are available for a call or an email anytime.

The terminology can sometimes be the trickiest part so feel free to send pictures of anything. The first step is to fill out the form below so you can see the pricing info and the whole system will start to make sense. It really is easy.

Then we can mail out color samples, we can help to clarify terms or explain options, we can schedule a visit to the local showroom. We can do about anything. Remember, we’ve worked with thousands of customers just like you and there is no question that we haven’t been asked 1000 times.

I’d like to personally invite you to fill out the form below so you can see how our system works. We look forward to the opportunity to show you how easy this can be.