Pictured above, from left: Chris Nicholson, Leah Simmerman, Justin Buehler and Ed Tuchler.
Q&A with new owners of local design-build company
Text by Nancy Moseley
In January 2026, Leah Simmerman (Design Team Lead), Chris Nicholson (Director of Energy Check) and Justin Buehler (Director of Construction) took over Shelter Alternatives from Ed Tuchler. He purchased the business in 2005 after working several years as a supervisor and carpenter.
What prompted the purchase of Shelter Alternatives?
Ed Tuchler was approaching retirement and looking for a smooth transition to an ownership team that is aligned with his values of dedication to the environment, exceptional quality, trust, teamwork, client advocacy and community involvement. The three of us were drawn to Shelter by those values and, as long-time employees, we are best-positioned to continue upholding them and carrying on that legacy.
Why were you interested in taking ownership?
We love what Shelter Alternatives, founded in 1988, stands for, and we are driven to its success. Taking ownership was a way to ensure the business would continue to provide service and support to our community and employees. It also gives us the ability to make something great even better through continued refinement and the benefit of a team-based approach to management and ownership.
What do you plan to keep the same? What do you plan to change?
We are committed to maintaining the strong foundation Shelter Alternatives has created. Just like a home, continuing advancements in technology and processes can take a solid existing structure and improve its performance, comfort and efficiency. Today, that looks like embracing new technologies when they will improve our process and the return on investment for our clients and workforce. We also hope to invest more in expanding the Energy Check segment of our business which uses building science to assess and improve energy use, comfort and efficiency of existing homes.
Energy Check performs home performance assessments and recommends repairs that will improve comfort, reduce energy use, and improve indoor air quality. Energy Check then performs the repairs and upgrades with its in-house team. In a sense, they are the design-build team of home performance and efficiency. The goals of Energy Check deeply align with our own objectives of reducing impact and providing value to our clients. Getting the message out there about the work Energy Check is doing improving attics, basements and crawlspaces will help our business grow and achieve these broader goals.
What do you foresee being the biggest challenge?
There is some irony in that our biggest challenge may be the strength of our existing systems and processes. We use custom software packages which provide a level of detail that surpasses more widely available software on the market. The challenge is that these programs were developed in a time that pre-dates the recent and rapid acceleration of technology we are all experiencing. This puts us at an inflection point: Do we scale back our existing systems so they can integrate better with this developing ecosystem and accept that loss of detail, or do we sharpen our existing tools by developing our own native programs to serve as a thread to connect these programs that we feel bring great benefit to us and our clients? We don’t have an answer to that question while we thoroughly investigate all options.
What are you most excited about with this new endeavor?
We are excited about the people we serve! As a residential Design-Build-Remodel firm, people are at the core of everything we do. Our clients are wonderful, interesting and unique. Our trade contractors hold the same care for their teams as we do for our own. Our employees work tirelessly to provide successful outcomes on our projects. Those people and the relationships and the community they create drive us forward as owners and leaders.
This story appears in the November–December issue of New River Valley Magazine.
