Roberts Brothers Painting: Family owned and operated for over 8 decades

SHELBY, Ohio — What started as a simple painting business run out of Carl Haverfield’s home has since become an ever-evolving operation–Roberts Brothers Painting. The business is now owned by Haverfield’s great-grandson, Dirk Roberts.

Dirk took over the family business earlier this year after his father and former owner, Dave Roberts, retired.

“The transition has been pretty easy,” Dirk said, adding, “I’d like to be able to grow the business. We would actually like at least one more full-time guy to come in with us.”

The crew currently consists of Dirk, Dave and lead foreman Joe Crose, who’s been with the company for the last 18 years.

Dave co-owned the family business with his brothers Denny and Duane Roberts, and their father and former owner, Woody Roberts, worked for the three of them when he retired. 

“It’s funny how things change,” Dave said. “We didn’t want Dirk climbing our 40-foot ladders when he was young. Now it’s reversed. They won’t let me climb the tall ladders, so it’s interesting for me to watch what we did with him he’s doing to me now. It’s kind of neat.”

Located at 52 Mohican Street in Shelby, Roberts Brothers Painting has been family owned and operated for 81 years. They have expanded their services over the years so that the business now caters to exterior, interior, residential and commercial projects.

“Our niche is residential repaints,” Dirk said.

He said they serve primarily Richland County but will go about an hour outside the area for various projects.

“Over the years, because of our name and because we’ve been around so long, we’ve built a really good client base. Most of our work is done through word-of-mouth,” said Dirk.

He said business hasn’t changed so much in terms of procedure; rather, it’s changed more drastically with regard to technology. For instance, because of technology, they can communicate with their customers via text message and can use GPS to help with finding their customers’ locations.

They’ve seen some changes to their equipment, too. “We went basically from rollers to the airless sprayers and the HVLP (high volume low pressure) guns,” Dirk said.

His grandpa Woody had painted with brushes only for years. “He’d use six-inch brushes, since rollers really weren’t around then,” said Dirk.

Dirk remembers when he first started painting and that he held a limited role for the first few years.

“The first thing I was allowed to do was paint closets,” he said. “Dad told me I could learn to paint by painting closets, so now I refer to myself as the best closet painter in the world because that’s all I did for about two years.”

His 17-year-old son, Jordan Roberts, has worked at the family business for the last couple summers. “For Jordan, if this is something that he decides to do that would be great, but I would like to see him finish high school and further his education, and then if he still decides after that that this is something he wants to do, he’ll have that opportunity,” said Dirk.

Dirk said that working for the family business wasn’t on his radar when he was younger.

“I just thought it was something I would do until I figured out what I wanted to do, but then as I got more into the business end of it, I saw that the potential and opportunities were there,” he said.

For Crose, working at Roberts Brothers Painting was intended to be a three-month gig. “But then it turned into 18 years,” he said.

Though he’s not a blood relative of the Roberts, he calls them his family.

“We spend as much time together as we do with our families,” Dirk said. “We’ve all just learned to work together.”

He added, “None of us really work for the other one; we all work together. And everybody’s input is important.”

“None of us really work for the other one; we all work together. And everybody’s input is important,” said Dirk Roberts.