As Ontarians, everyone knows about the cold hard winters that come with the region. Snow, slush, ice, sleet, the whole nine yards. Everyone knows the feeling of waking up on a Sunday morning, only to look out of the window to see a foot of snow on the ground, when the forecast only called for a few inches. That’s when the call to a snow removal company is thought of, and sometimes taken. The company comes in, does their magic and within one to two hours, a freshly cleaned driveway or parking lot, but what do these companies deal with on a daily basis? What happens when they get their first call of the day, and suit up?
Mathew Granger, Owner of Grangers Yard and Snow, is a seasoned veteran when it comes to snow removal. When snowfall first hits, Mathew knows that his services are going to be needed. “Anyone in the snow removal world is always kind of prepared for anything. I mean, like the weather, we always check our weather apps and things like that. And our alarms are set every hour at night. And sometimes it’s hard to base your decision off that weather app because it’s never usually right like it was wasn’t the other night. It called for I think, three centimeters, four centimeters and we ended up getting close to a foot of snow. So I think I think you’re always prepared for the unknown, I guess.” Granger told us what went through his mind the night before the big snowfall that hit the region within the last week.
With lots of people being surprised with the amount of snow, many were hesitant to clean it off themselves. “It’s very simple. I mean, we have to obviously treat our contractual clients with priority service and then outside of that, we can we can kind of dispatch our trucks out to help those that kind of need that one time service. You just have to be ready to take those calls when something like that happens and and try to service the clients as best you can.” Granger holds his clients and reputation to a high standard, making sure that he gives all of his clients the best service he can provide.
Along with starting out early, workers never know how much they have to clean the night before. “You know what, it kind of all varies to be honest with you. I mean like we could have a, you know, a two inch to three inch snowfall which would take our crew anywhere from six to eight hours roughly to clean and then we get something like we did the other night, where we’re out for 12 plus hours and it’s it’s all over the place. It’s so hit or miss and it’s really hard to say an average time and anyone in that in this industry would will know that. That it’s really hard to judge that average time out.” Granger gave his thoughts when asked about the typical hours of a snow removal worker and how long a job usually will take.
JetBlue Ice Melter
With cleaning up fallen snow, or ice. A plan of attack is always key. Granger told XFM News that he recommends, “A premium service for our residential clients which offers a salt application prior to and after the snow has been cleared. We use a product call JetBlue, it’s an ice melting agent which assists in breaking down snow accumulations and the possibility of ice formation.” A nice way to do it at home is just to clean the snow off regularly with a shovel or snow blower, and then to salt the surface and put down some JetBlue if you can find it in stores.
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