Building Owners Guide to FM Tested Products

Understand the FM approval process and how these products, once approved, are the gold standard for your next roofing project. 

As a building owner, it’s important to choose the right products for your next roofing project. Understanding how roofing products are tested and what the process is for getting approval is valuable to the health and longevity of your roof. Western Colloid's Greg Hlavaty and Hal Leland talk about system approvals during a recent episode of Understanding Roof Restoration (URR). 

Founded in 1835, Factory Mutual Global (FM) is one of the largest insurance carriers in the world. Hal describes Western Colloid’s experience getting their products and systems FM tested and approved, stating that the whole process is very thorough.  

“It says a lot about your company and the commitment to having that FM approvals mark on your product,” Hal shares. “If your product has an FM-approved mark, that means it's been through the certification testing process to verify its functioning as intended.” 

Prior to FM, testing roofs for insurance purposes hadn’t been done as robustly. And now, the FM diamond mark on a product means that it has been thoroughly tested. “The fact that you pass an FM standard is the gold standard. That means these guys have done the most, the longest,” Greg shares 

The testing process isn’t just done once, instead, approved products will be tested quarterly to ensure the products are being produced to the same FM standard. According to Greg, "We have inspectors at our plants for FM and UL and ICC-ES, but especially FM, quarterly to make sure we're making the exact same products. They take tests of the products just to make sure the formulas are the same... Everything is rigorously followed up on quarterly.” 

Learn more from Hal and Greg about FM tested products and other product approvals in the Understanding Roof Restoration Podcast episode.