If you’ve met RVI recently, it might be through a crew on a custom build somewhere in the Northwoods, or Sam Hartmann walking a builder through what a blower door test shows. What most people don’t know is how Sam got here, or what’s still driving him 26 years later.
Where It Started
Sam started working for his dad’s company, Mike Hartmann Construction, in 1997, building custom homes around the Northwoods. He worked his way from builder to foreman, learning the trade the way most people in this industry actually learn it: on the job, one house at a time.
In 2000, at 21 years old, Sam bought a small insulation subcontracting business. He wanted a snowmobile. He needed the money, so he took the work, insulating nights and weekends on top of building houses full-time with his dad.
But once he was in the field, he started noticing something. Most of the problems homeowners deal with later could be fixed from the start, if someone actually understood how a house was supposed to perform. That observation sent him into years of work with Focus on Energy, testing and re-testing homes on existing and new construction, learning what actually works in this climate.
The Pivot
Sam always figured he’d take over Mike Hartmann Construction and become a GC like his dad. He did take it over, in 2014. He learned a lot running it. But the building science side of insulation work had already pulled harder — it meant reaching and improving more homes than he ever could framing and finishing one house at a time. In 2017, Sam closed MHC’s doors for good to focus entirely on RVI. He hasn’t looked back.
That’s still the foundation of everything he does. Sam isn’t chasing net zero or passive house certifications. He calls it blue collar building science: doing the best possible job with what’s available at the local lumber yard. He’s not just talking theory. He knows what it takes to apply these techniques on a real job site, and how to teach someone else to do it right. It’s also why RVI built training content for On3 Learning Hub — the same instinct that pulled Sam away from framing houses one at a time is what’s behind reaching tradesmen beyond RVI’s own crew.
The Team Today
RVI is still family-owned by Sam and his wife Ashly. The crew around them has grown over the years. Terri and Jackie run the office, keeping estimates and scheduling on track. Jeremiah leads the crew as foreman. Steve, Bo, Jeff, and Blake are out in the field every day, applying what Sam’s spent over two decades figuring out.
RVI is a Focus on Energy Trade Ally and a trusted name with custom home builders and general contractors across the Northwoods.
Community, On the Job
Sam believes in supporting families: the ones on his crew, and the ones throughout the Northwoods. One place that shows up most clearly is RVI’s work with RHS and Habitat for Humanity.
RHS partners with Habitat for Humanity on their builds, and RVI handles the air sealing and insulation package on those homes. While that work is happening, Sam is on the job training the RHS students working alongside him — hands-on instruction on a real house, for a family who needs it.
Sam has also stayed close to the Headwaters Builders Association for years, serving on the HBA board. Ashly has spent over a decade as HBA state director and now serves as Wisconsin Builders Association Associate Vice President.
None of it is about winning business. It’s about staying invested in the trades and the community that built RVI in the first place.
Sharing What He Knows
Sam’s favorite part of the job isn’t the paperwork. It’s talking building science with other people who care about it as much as he does — dissecting code changes, arguing over the right way to handle a tricky assembly, figuring out what actually moves the needle on energy efficiency in this climate.
That’s part of why RVI shares what it learns: through the blog, through Facebook, and now through training content built for On3 Learning Hub to help tradesmen beyond RVI’s own crew. If Sam’s figured something out that makes a home perform better, he’d rather put it out there than keep it to himself.
Twenty-six years after a 21-year-old bought an insulation business for snowmobile money, Sam’s still on job sites across the Northwoods, still teaching, still trying to get it right. And he’s not doing it alone. Terri, Jackie, Jeremiah, Steve, Bo, Jeff, and Blake are right there with him.
That snowmobile? Sam still has it.
Questions about your home or your next build? Give RVI a call at (715) 420-0177.
