Meet the Team - Hearthstone Chimney Co.

Meet the Lynchburg Team Behind Hearthstone Chimney Co.

Our Lynchburg crew isn’t a rotating cast of subcontractors. These are the same faces you’ll see in your driveway year after year, the ones who remember which neighborhood has the pre-1950 terra cotta flues and which developments put in zero-clearance units that need a different approach. What ties them together is simple: they treat your house like they’d treat their own mother’s. Russell Haines built this company on that idea in 1984, and it’s still the filter for everyone who wears our uniform.

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Our People

Russell Haines, Owner

Russell started Hearthstone Chimney Co. in 1984 with a used brush set and a 1978 Ford F-150 that leaked oil on every driveway in Campbell County. Forty-two years later, he’s still the one who answers the phone at odd hours when the answering service patches through a worried homeowner smelling smoke. He’s certified through the Chimney Safety Institute of America and holds a Virginia Class C contractor’s license, but he’ll tell you the credential that matters most is the one he earned the hard way: pulling a dead raccoon out of a Wyndhurst flue at 10 PM on Christmas Eve, then explaining to the family why their damper had been stuck open since October. Russell lives in Forest with his wife and two rescue hounds that have zero respect for his authority. He still drives a Ford, though it’s newer and doesn’t mark its territory on client pavement.

Marcus T., Lead Technician

Marcus has been with Hearthstone for eleven years, which in chimney years means he’s seen just about every configuration Lynchburg builders could dream up. He’s our go-to for the older homes in Diamond Hill and Rivermont, where the masonry work demands someone who can read a 1920s flue like a map. Marcus holds CSIA certification and specializes in Level-2 camera inspections, the kind that end with photos you can see and a plain-English verdict on whether that crack is cosmetic or a reason to stay out of the burning season. Off the clock, he restores vintage motorcycles in a garage that’s somehow more organized than our parts room. His wife claims the motorcycles get better maintenance than their lawn mower, and Marcus doesn’t argue the point.

Diane K., Senior Installer

Diane came to us from the HVAC trade eight years ago, bringing a rigging background that’s made her indispensable for liner pulls and crown rebuilds where you’re working at height with materials that don’t forgive a dropped corner. She’s factory-trained on DuraFlex and HeatShield systems, and she’s the reason we can offer the 90-Day Done Right Promise on liner work without flinching. Diane grew up in Madison Heights and still points out the house on Memorial Avenue where her grandfather’s chimney taught her that “good enough” and “watertight” are two different languages. She has a teenager who plays soccer for E.C. Glass and a garden that produces enough tomatoes to shame the farmers market. Her ladder knots are studied by the apprentices; her hot sauce recipe remains classified.

James R., Service Coordinator

James is the voice you’ll hear when you call (540) 328-6986, and he’s the reason that voice belongs to a live person 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. He’s been with Hearthstone for six years, starting as an apprentice technician before a knee injury moved him indoors. That field experience means he doesn’t just schedule appointments; he troubleshoots over the phone well enough to know whether you’re describing a draft issue or a bird that’s chosen the wrong Airbnb. James keeps the Lynchburg schedule running, coordinates with our parts suppliers, and maintains the photo archive from every inspection so we can track how a flue condition changes year to year. He lives in Timberlake, fishes the James River when it’s not too crowded, and maintains a spreadsheet ranking every biscuit in a thirty-mile radius. The ranking is controversial but well-documented.

Taylor B., Apprentice Technician

Taylor joined us in 2023 after completing the HVAC program at Central Virginia Community College and deciding that chimneys offered more variety than ductwork. They’re working through their CSIA certification under Marcus’s supervision, and they’ve already developed a specialty in gas fireplace service calls, the ones where the homeowner’s tried three YouTube fixes and the igniter is now in seven pieces. Taylor grew up in Boonsboro, knows the difference between a Lynchburg brick and a Petersburg brick by weight, and asks the kind of questions that remind Russell why he still enjoys this work. They have a rescue pit mix named Sparky, which Taylor acknowledges was a poor choice for a chimney professional but the dog came with the name and the paperwork was already filed.

One Standard, Every Job

The K.E.Y.S. code isn’t a poster in our break room. It’s the actual filter for who we hire and how they work. Krafted right, Every time, Your home first, Standing behind it. That means Diane won’t sign off on a liner installation until she’s checked every joint with a flashlight and her own two hands. It means Marcus explains what he’s seeing on the camera monitor before he tells you what it costs to fix. It means James doesn’t book a job for Tuesday if he knows our parts delivery runs Wednesday. And it means Russell still takes the call when something goes sideways, because the 90-Day Done Right Promise is in writing with no arguing, and the person who wrote it should be the one who honors it.

We’ve been in Lynchburg long enough to see competitors come and go, to watch the big national brands roll through with their seasonal hiring and their van-wrap marketing. We’re not interested in that model. The technician who sweeps your chimney this fall should be the same one who answers your question about the water stain you noticed in March. That’s how you build a company that plans to be in town in thirty more years. That’s how we act accordingly.

Written by Russell Haines, Owner at Hearthstone Chimney Co., serving Lynchburg since 1984.