Midlakes Metal Sales

Enos Swarey opened Midlakes Metal Sales in 2011. He employed three people at the time. The business originally catered to both the Amish and Mennonite communities, as well as contractors, primarily selling metal roofing and supplies, lumber and trusses.

Today, the business is a limited liability company with 10 partners, said Christine Burke, who has been with Midlakes Metal Sales from the start and serves as its accountant. She said the company attracts “quite a few” general contractors from not just Seneca County, but also the nearby counties of Tompkins, Yates, Wayne and Ontario because of its prices and customer service.

However, with the recent addition of a hardware-store component, the business is now gearing itself to homeowners, too.

Midlakes Metal Sales assumed the inventory of the Ovid Hardware Store over the summer and expanded its lines, Burke said. It now offers plumbing, heating and electrical supplies in addition to the usual potpourri of hardware-store items.

A walk through the aisles leads shoppers from everything to paint, light bulbs and mailboxes to brooms, a full line of caulk, contractor nails and tarps. Midlakes Metal Sales also makes keys and mixes paint, stocks DeWalt and Bostich tools, and sells solar panels. Burke said the Amish rely on such panels and inverters to charge their batteries.

“Our store used to be huge, but now it’s filled,” Burke said. “We really need to expand it already.”

The store portion of the business is 2,400 square feet, with the two warehouse barns totaling 17,000 square feet.

Lumber — they have the pressure-treated and regular variety — and roofing supplies are housed in the warehouses, as are doors, windows, insulation, concrete mix and plywood, among other things.

Burke said she’s trying to get the word out to homeowners that the business is now selling hardware-store items.

Midlakes Metal Sales considers itself pole-barn specialists: Burke said customers can call in with the dimensions they desire, and Midlakes Metal Sales will build a corresponding materials package.

“For a pole barn we have everything,” she said.
Midlakes Metal Sales receives its steel roofing twice a week from Everlast Roofing.

Among Midlakes Metal Sales’ employees is a full-time driver who delivers products to customers.

Many people tell Burke they were unaware of the business, which is just two miles from the village of Ovid.

Midlakes Metal Sales traditionally holds open houses in April in concert with sales and discounts. It also hosts a contractor breakfast at that time where builders can come in and meet with product representatives to learn more about their offerings.