The Solar Installation Group, SIG, is currently fundraising to travel to a third world country to install solar and provide access to clean drinking water and electricity.
SIG is owned by the Kerr family, and has been in Oakdale for over 40 years. It is a father and son business that includes the father Steve Kerr, and his three sons Paul, Jared, and Aaron. They started as general contractors and concrete contractors and in 2008, the family got into solar and started doing solar installations for a national company. In 2013, they decided to move back to their hometown of Oakdale and start their own solar installation group and started doing installs for other solar companies. In 2016, the company owners and other staff that began working for SIG began generating their own sales and started doing everything in house. SIG is now a standalone company from the sales process all the way through the installation.
This past November, SIG began a fundraiser called the Gift Power Program, which is a charitable arm of GoodLeap, a solar financing company. Gift Power takes an amount of money from each solar installation job and they donate it to a fund. Once the fund reaches the goal of $100,000, the SIG crew will be taking a trip to a third world country – currently looking at a few different options – and build a water purification plant that will be solar powered by the panels they will also install. This will give communities access to clean drinking water and new options for power.
The step by step process was explained as after the arrival, they will meet with the community in the villages and get to know them and how they work for the first couple of days. Over the following three days they begin the installation process, and when it is finished they plan to stay an extra couple days to not only make sure the system is working correctly, but also witness the impact the solar has begun to create.
“The biggest hurdle is going to be the fundraising,” SIG director of sales Josh Clark explained.
Their goal is to reach the total amount by next year, and a group of 10 employees for SIG will be going to do the install. The company currently has around $7,500 and said the fund is slowly growing. Along with taking a percentage from each solar install, they are also accepting donations at their local office at 1824 Ackley Circle in Oakdale.
“We took a hard look over the last six months and we focused on who and what we are as SIG in our core,” Clark stated. “Our core values are unity, integrity, and service.”
They got the idea to begin the fundraiser to go on the trip based on those core values.
“We just really looked at each other and asked ourselves how we could expand that into other organizations and give back. We just want to expand the whole program outward,” Clark explained.
After this fundraiser they hope to continue the effort and do more projects for those in need.
“We are a very Oakdale based company but we do expand over the valley and foothills for installs,” SIG vice president of sales Ryan Glaeser added in.
For more information on the fundraiser or solar itself, contact the office at 209-353-0631 or SIGadmin@sigsolarinstall.com.
