Lighting the way with an award-winning upfit

Leading skylight company VELUX teamed with Mike Albert to create a mobile training unit and showroom that helps their customers boost their profits.

There’s always something appealing about a well-placed, beautiful skylight offering natural light and fresh air indoors. VELUX, the most popular skylight brand, relies on remodelers and roofers to accurately spec, sell, and install their high-quality products. This requires some in-depth customer training.

“Training is essential to our success, said Paul Johnson, Director of Installer Engagement at VELUX North America. “The more our customers know about our products and their benefits, the more likely they are to recommend them. Plus, our thorough training helps ensure they install the skylights correctly so the homeowner is delighted with the transformation.”

To extend the reach of its brick-and-mortar training facilities, VELUX decided to take its Pro Partner Academy on the road with mobile training units. The result was a one-of-a-kind, customized upfit recognized by Work Truck magazine as a 2025 Upfit Package of the Year.

We sat down with Paul to learn more about how their award-winning mobile showroom and training center came to be—and the positive impact it’s already having on their company.

Congrats on the impressive award, Paul. Can you first give us a high-level overview of your mobile units?

Sure. They’re high-roof Mercedes Sprinter vans with a 170” wheelbase. They’re retrofitted with recessed interior LED lighting, a 180-degree swivel display TV behind the front passenger seat, and a retractable awning to shade trainers and trainees when necessary. The centerpiece of the upfit is a custom, two-tiered racking system with three roof sections to allow hands-on installation for our skylights. The roof sections are custom attached to an extended sliding base. The whole van is wrapped in a high-quality, eye-catching wrap. We couldn’t be happier with how they’ve turned out.

How did you decide on the Mercedes Sprinter?

When you look at job sites, you see nice trucks and large wheels, so what we created fits into this environment and is relatable to our customers. We wanted them to take one look and say, “Wow, this is an edgy, cool company.” This is why we replaced the tires and wheels and made other adjustments to give it a more rugged, almost off-road look. When you complement all of that with the handsome wrap, it creates an elevated look. The tough, good looks of the van also help reinforce our products’ durability and beauty. In addition, the Mercedes Sprinter has an excellent reputation for longevity, helping us manage our total cost of ownership.

What was the inspiration for this unique solution?

We wanted to elevate our business in the United States and Canada and looked at ways to do things differently than we have historically. Hence, the idea of a mobile installation training van and academy training center was born. It’s a way to expand the reach and impact of our Pro Partner Academy beyond solely a physical location, allowing us to meet our pro partners where they want to be met. Going mobile enables us to build upon our image and gain more mindshare among our target audiences. The Academy is all about upskilling our pro partners and helping them appreciate how skylights can make their businesses more profitable.

So, how did you bring this idea to Mike Albert?

Mike Albert has been a longstanding, excellent partner for VELUX, helping us manage our nationwide fleet of 105 vehicles. When we decided to create a mobile training component, the first call we made was to Mike Albert. They asked a whole slew of probing questions that a standard upfit team wouldn’t. And that’s how our journey began, one that’s led to this beautiful solution.

Once the details were ironed out, how long did it take to complete the upfit?

It took about six to eight weeks, including the wrap, which alone takes 10 to 14 days. Plus, you have to order and modify parts. In this case, it wasn’t just a matter of bolting standard parts to the wall. The Mike Albert team actually fabricated the smart, custom rack system. So, all told, six to eight weeks for completion felt reasonable.

What sort of training can you conduct with the mobile units?

The mobile units give us a ton of flexibility. When we pull up to a field location or drive into a warehouse, we can set things up classroom-style. With our swing-out, 50-inch TV, we can display PowerPoint presentations and, of course, video.

The retractable awning shades people and prevents the sun from washing out the TV. With our custom rack system, we can provide hands-on training. Our core curriculum takes three to four hours, and this new setup makes that time fly by, given how comfortable and interactive the experience is.

When we don’t have training sessions scheduled, the vans don’t just sit still. We take them to large suppliers and do events to build awareness.

How have the mobile units impacted your business?

They’re building our business in a host of ways. For starters, it allows us to educate more roofers and remodelers on our products. It can be cost-prohibitive for some of our customers to send, say, the 12 people who actually install our products to one of our physical locations. With these new vans, we can bring the training to them and build greater comfort with, and confidence in, our products. The vans are smartly equipped for training and showcasing that their mere appearance helps reinforce the impact and beauty of our products.

In addition, as with any sales force, you only know so many people. The vehicle itself is so noticeable that we’re finding people who may already be using our products that we hadn’t been able to connect with, further cementing the relationship with them.

What we're trying to do is drive change and relevancy. Skylights are in about 12% of homes in this country. For a company like ours to grow, being the market leader that we are, we have to get more remodelers and roofers to embrace skylights as an excellent solution for their projects. If we can raise the percentage of homes that have skylights to, say, 15 or 20%, that's a massive growth trajectory for a company like ours.

What sort of feedback have you been receiving?

It's been amazing. Many of our customers are impressed with the investment we’ve made to train them and their teams. These mobile units of ours are helping move their businesses forward, and our customers are grateful for that. Our products and training elevate them over other contractors, which ultimately means more money in our customers’ pockets. We could h ave shaved $15,000 off this vehicle build, but it wouldn’t have been as impressive. By all early indications, these vans are impacting the market to an even greater degree than was expected.

How has Mike Albert been as a partner on this project?

Terrific. A concept is one thing, but making it a reality is another. We had a sketch sense of what we wanted to achieve, but the Mike Albert team challenged some of our ideas and brought some of their own to the table. This is just what a company wants from a partner: true collaboration.

I told Mike Albert’s upfit team that literally every time I came up with an idea, I was never told no, which was amazing. Instead, they told me, “Let's figure out a way to do this.” That’s why they should be very proud of our Upfit Package of the Year award; they had a big hand in it.

The Mike Albert team is focused, supportive, and responsive—more of what one wants in a partner.

What does the future look like for the mobile unit?

We’re just getting started; we have an expansion plan that runs through 2029. Ultimately, having about 28 of these units would give us pretty good saturation throughout the country. In addition, we intend to work with Mike Albert to continually find ways to enhance the unit, as continuous improvement matters to both of our companies. As this new program develops, we’ll examine all kinds of metrics, such as the frequency of training by companies and individuals and, of course, sales results. Plus, our future plans will be shaped by input from our excellent trainers, who use the unit day-in-and-day-out.

If you want to learn more about how a smart, well-designed upfit can improve your business, contact Mike Albert today. We would welcome the chance to design an award-winning upfit for you.