Raising the Standard
How two locals are raising the bar for roofing in Center Grove and beyond
If you’ve ever had a home project quoted on a carbon-copy sheet of paper, handwritten total at the bottom, a vague “we’ll fit you in next month,” and not much else, you’re not alone. For most homeowners, hiring a contractor feels like a gamble. Who’s actually licensed? Who’s going to communicate once the job starts? And who’s going to be around six months later if something goes wrong?
Cameron Blakely knows exactly how that feels. Not because someone told him, but because he lived it.
Before Raptor Roofing existed, Blakely, now 32, was working as a logistics broker at Fitzmark in Indianapolis. In that role, he managed time-sensitive, high-value freight for Fortune 500 companies, including Nike and HP. The standard operating procedures he built were eventually adopted company-wide and are still in use at Fitzmark today.
He was the firm’s top earner. It was a high-level customer service role, and he was great at it. But it wasn’t his. He couldn’t make the calls or shape the culture.
So on the side, he started buying, flipping, and even building properties around Indianapolis, including a home he built in downtown Greenwood. That’s where the frustration hit.
“Contractors wouldn’t follow through with what they said,” Blakely says. “The communication was poor. The craftsmanship was spotty at best. And I kept thinking, ‘There has to be room for somebody who actually does this the right way.’”
Around the same time, his old friend Patrick Kinney was having a similar realization from the other side of the industry. The two had been close since attending Baptist Academy together in Indianapolis.
After graduation, Kinney, now 34, moved to Fort Myers, Florida, where he became the right-hand man at a roofing company. He studied building codes alongside engineers, became skilled at navigating the insurance process, and developed a reputation for helping homeowners who had been wrongly denied claims get the full roof replacements they deserved. He was thriving and had become indispensable to the operation, but he missed Indiana. And like his friend, he wanted to take everything he’d learned and build something of his own.
Both of them had good jobs. Both were doing well. But both wanted something more. They wanted to be impactful.
One night during a visit to Florida, the two sat down at Swordfish Grill near Bradenton Beach and spent a few hours talking about what they actually wanted their lives to look like. It wasn’t a formal business meeting. It was two friends dreaming out loud over dinner. But by the end of the night, the idea had taken shape. They would start a roofing company back in Indiana, and they’d run it like they wished every contractor ran theirs.
“It was just a dream a little over five years ago,” Blakely says. “And now it’s the life we get to live every day. Within a few short years, we’ve been able to accomplish almost everything we talked about that night.”
That drive didn’t come from nowhere. Blakely grew up in Greenwood, the son of Bill Blakely, who has pastored Berean Baptist Church in Greenwood for 30 years and still leads the congregation to this day.
There was no family capital waiting to launch a business. Blakely and his wife Joy, who are coming up on 11 years of marriage, started with next to nothing. However, watching his dad stay committed to the same church and the same community for three decades taught Blakely something that shaped everything that came after. Integrity isn’t something you turn on when people are watching; it’s who you are all the time.
“My parents taught me to work hard, love people, and be the same person whether someone is watching or not,” he says. “That’s where my drive to do the right thing comes from. Not just the drive to be successful, but also the drive to do it with integrity.”
His wife never blinked when he told her he wanted to leave a steady paycheck to start a roofing company with his best friend.
“She just wants me to be happy,” he says. “There’s never been a doubt in her mind.”
In June 2021, Blakely and Kinney launched Raptor Roofing on the south side of Indianapolis. They bring different strengths to the table, but that’s what makes the partnership work. Where one struggles, the other picks it up. They complement each other in the way that the best partnerships do — not by thinking the same way but by filling in each other’s gaps.
Blakely brings urgency and vision and pushes to move quickly while Kinney brings thoughtfulness and perspective, making sure they’re moving in the right direction. Both of them share the same standard for how people should be treated, whether that’s a customer, an employee, or each other.
“Patrick is one of the most likable people I’ve ever met,” Blakely says. “He genuinely cares about people. He has a natural gift for conversation. We push each other and we balance each other out.”
That balance shows up in how they run jobs. Blakely’s years in logistics taught him what real customer service looks like at the highest level, and his experience flipping and building properties showed him just how far the contracting industry falls short of that standard. Those two things together shaped everything about how Raptor operates.
“Your home is one of the biggest investments you’ll ever make,” Kinney says. “You shouldn’t feel like you’re guessing what’s happening, what it costs, or who’s showing up.”
Raptor customers get a dedicated project manager, live updates during the job, and access to a digital portal with their documents, warranties, completion photos, and educational resources. When the work is done, they receive drone footage of their finished roof.
Raptor has even simplified the buying process itself. Using dedicated satellite technology and a straightforward over-the-phone system, customers can purchase a roof without anyone needing to step foot on their property.
“We say it all the time around the office,” Kinney says. “We want Raptor to be the easiest way to buy a roof in America. That’s what every decision comes back to.”
In addition, instead of the industry-standard five or ten-year warranty, Raptor backs their work with up to a 25-year workmanship warranty.
“A warranty isn’t just a line on paper,” Kinney says. “It’s a promise that if something isn’t right, we’ll come back and make it right.”
In Indiana, you don’t need a license to install a roof, which means there are people doing the work who probably shouldn’t be. Blakely and Kinney made a deliberate choice to go in the other direction. Their team is trained, certified, and properly insured. They’re active members of the Roofer & Solar Reform Alliance, a national community of contractors who hold each other to higher standards and work to protect homeowners from bad actors.
“We don’t outsource accountability,” Kinney says. “We set clear standards, we manage the job closely, and we document the work. If we want the industry to change, we have to actually be part of changing it.”
In less than five years, Raptor Roofing has collected more than 650 five-star Google reviews, making them one of the highest-rated roofing companies not just on the south side, but in all of Indiana. That’s not by accident.
“I always make it a point to reward great businesses with positive feedback, and Raptor Roofing truly deserved a solid review,” says customer Robert Ryan. “The entire experience was smooth, professional, and handled with real care from start to finish. Communication was clear, the work was done right, and the whole process felt reliable and stress-free.”
Inside the company, the same philosophy holds. Blakely and Kinney aren’t interested in hollow slogans about workplace culture. What they’ve built is a team grounded in mutual respect and real connection. At Raptor, the team knows one another personally, spends time together outside of work, and operates out of a 5,000-square-foot office with a golf simulator and a basketball hoop.
“Life is too short not to enjoy every single day,” Blakely says. “The place you work should be a place you actually want to be.”
Raptor Roofing is rooted in Center Grove but regularly takes on projects up to 50 miles outside of Indianapolis, with a second location recently opened in Carmel. Blakely attends Berean Baptist Church with Joy and their three children, Scarlett, Jackson, and Harrison, and stays active locally through partnerships with the Center Grove Athletic Booster Club and the Center Grove Bantam Football League. Kinney is equally invested in the community, and together they’re always looking for more ways to give back. They welcome anyone who knows of a great charitable organization in the area to reach out.
When asked what they want someone to take away from this story, the answer comes easy.
“We’ve built something people can look into and feel confident about,” Kinney says. “Our goal has always been to educate homeowners so they feel comfortable and informed. Do your research, read the reviews, and when the time comes, we want to be the name you already trust.”
When that time comes, they want the decision to feel easy. The kind of easy that comes from trust, proof, and a company that treats your home like it matters.
Raptor Roofing is located at 5145 S. Meridian St., Indianapolis, IN 46217. For more information, call 317-886-0696 or visit RaptorRoofing.com.
