On a good day, it can take Mike Holmes three hours to get in and out of Home Depot. It's the lineups that stall him. Although, they're not at the cash register, or the customer-service counter. Instead the lineups are for his attention -- fans wanting to shake the hand and chat with the star of the wildly popular television show Holmes on Homes.
Holmes is one of Canada's quickest-rising celebrities and the front man of a home-renovation business that's on the verge of becoming an empire: He's expanding into magazines, cartoons and, perhaps most ambitiously, Holmes-approved houses.
Just over two years ago, he was a general contractor with his own business in the Toronto area, quietly going about the business of building additions and renovations. Now he's a bona fide television juggernaut who can't even go into his old stomping grounds without creating a scene.
During a stroll around a west-end Home Depot, an employee named Pat literally runs up to him and exclaims, "I've watched your show forever! I've wanted to meet you for so long, I can't believe you're here!"
Holmes flashes a smile brighter than a fresh coat of primer and engages Pat in a short conversation.
"Sometimes I go into a Home Depot and stand there for three hours because one person to the next has stopped me every time I turn around," he says.
His show's vice-president of production, Pete Kettlewell (a trusted adviser Holmes calls "my right-hand man") puts it this way: "We've stopped letting him go because we can't afford the downtime in shooting."
It is that kind of fan interaction that won Holmes the 2005 Gemini award for viewers' choice television personality, an honour he snatched away from Ben Mulroney.
Outside near the parking lot, a fellow named Dan Schmidt stops Holmes to discuss the pros and cons of using a camera to scope drains. Then he wants an autograph -- "for my wife" -- but can't find paper or a pen. (Holmes asks for a page from my notebook and signs it "Keep smiling.")
"I like his anger when he sees something wrong," Schmidt says, explaining why he likes the show.
For two years and five seasons, the premise of Holmes on Homes has remained devilishly simple: The burly contractor and his crew ride into a construction project gone wrong and rescue the distraught homeowner from emotional and financial ruin.
Along the way, the 43-year-old father of three gets angry. Very angry. Don Cherry-angry. He starts punching drywall, ripping down walls and yelling about the injustice of a world where ne'er-do-well contractors can make off with thousands of dollars, leaving dangerously shoddy work as their only calling card.
Then he sets about the task of, as he so often says, "making sure it's done right."
This usually involves untold amounts of something called "vapour barrier," special-thickness screws, spray foam, custom-fitted tiles, new drywall and a host of other construction do-dads.
One by one, to the camera, Holmes unravels the mysteries of what should lie behind the walls of your house.
"When I'm upset, I'm upset for a reason," Holmes says. "I can't act. I'm not an actor."
Therein lies part of the appeal of Holmes, a rough and tough grizzly-bear contractor whose teddy-bear side manages to shine through on screen. "I'm not a bear, I'm a pussycat -- I really am," he says.
After his show premiered two years ago on Canada's Home and Garden Television, Holmes noticed the newfound attention.
"It was immediate -- I have to say, within three months of it airing, one out of 10 people knew who I was," he says. "Now it has to be nine out of 10. It's just ridiculous."
Recognizing Holmes is a relatively easy task, given that he marches around in the same trademark overalls he has worn on countless episodes. His big arms, short yellow hair and bright gold chain are easy targets to spot.
His website, http://www.holmesonhomes.com, is flooded with help questions and proposals from his female fans. (Sorry -- he may be divorced, but he's seeing someone.) He can't escape the attention, even in a washroom -- some guys even ask for a handshake while he's at the urinal, he says. Holmes calls that "bizarre" and "surreal."
At a recent charity appearance on Canada Day in Winnipeg, Holmes drew 1,000 people, despite a downpour.
Holmes on Homes has been the No. 1 show on HGTV since the summer of 2004, and Holmes is by far their biggest star.
Parent company Alliance Atlantis Communications doesn't release viewership numbers, but one recent estimate says Holmes pulls in 400,000 viewers compared to an HGTV average range of 30,000 to 40,000. That's close to the nationwide television audience for a Canadian Football League game.
It's a lot of attention for a man from humble upbringings in what he calls a "tough area" of town near Broadview Avenue and Queen Street in Toronto.
Holmes describes his father, Jim, as a "jack of all trades, a master of none, but he had a heart. I think that's what makes the difference if anybody has integrity on anything they do they are going to do it well."
A plumber, but later an engineer at General Motors, Holmes's father fed his son's interest in construction. By the time young Mike was 5, he was building three-bedroom tree houses all over the family property. At 6, he had rewired the family home. At 13, he was taking over general contracting jobs for his father. And by 21, he was running a company, Tri-Win General Contracting, and had 13 employees working underneath him.
"Imagine at 21-years-old I was going to get a card that said The Screw-Up Fixer, but only in much harsher words," he says. "I meant it, because I was already tired of going to people's houses and saying, 'Who did this, who the hell did you hire?' I was fixing every day in and day out. Ironically 20 years later, I'm on TV doing it full time."
Holmes went on to run his own contracting company, which still exists although he no longer takes clients personally. He was doing some odd guest appearances and behind-the-scenes carpentry for HGTV shows when he met then-HGTV executive Michael Quast. Quast asked Holmes to build him a house, and in the process the contractor pitched the idea of a television show that educated the viewer on how to spot a shady contractor. "He jumped out of his chair and said, 'I love it. I want a pilot right now. And you have to do it.' "
Holmes didn't want to. And he said so. But Quast insisted, and now the reluctant television star is basking in his success.
However, success does have its drawbacks, and he admits his free time is now next to zero. From a wake-up call around 6 a.m., out to a job site, he doesn't return home until after 10 p.m. While his truck is filled with reggae dance CDs, he has little time or energy to hit the clubs in the evening. His favourite TV show is Canadian Idol and he manages to find some time to catch it.
Now that he's at a high point in his popularity, Holmes is no dummy. "Now is the time to act," he says.
By next year, he'll have even more work. Holmes will be editor of his own glossy magazine, producing a children's cartoon show called Mighty Mike Holmes, penning two books (one for homeowners, one for up-and-coming contractors), and helming a charitable foundation and churning out the past four seasons of his show on DVD.
The cartoon, "part Mighty Mouse, part Popeye, part Batman and Robin," will focus on educating children about construction safety.
"I'm hoping so much it really encourages kids to be the next generation of great contractors, something Canada needs very much," Holmes says. "I can't believe how many children watch my show . . . with this cartoon they won't even know it but they'll be learning something."
One project close to his heart is the foundation he's starting to benefit homeowners who have lost everything after a battle with a dishonest contractor. "I can't help everyone, I try, but I'm not superman," he says. "This will help a lot of people."
Holmes is also drawing up plans to start building Mike Holmes-approved houses, with 10-year warranties, in locations across the country. He doesn't spill the details for fear of copycats, but adds, "People go by what they see, they're dictated by what they know. You will know everything about these houses. They will come with a DVD, they will come with blueprints of what's behind the walls."
The plan for Holmes-approved houses is "the final step," he says. He just signed a three-year contract extension with HGTV, but he says when that's done it will likely be the end of his show.
In the meantime, there are plans to spin him into guest roles on other programs and other networks such as National Geographic. Holmes on Homes will crack the U.S. market in September.
Off-camera and behind-the-scenes, Holmes has cobbled together a core group of about 25 trusted advisers to help steer his expansion plans. He admits it has taken a while to gather a group of people he can trust around him to help execute his vision. In February, he plans on taking his first vacation in three years. He'll be headed to Hawaii with his children, Amanda, 20, Sherry, 18, and Michael Jr., 16.
With any luck, Holmes will get some quality time on a beach without interruptions. But he's not complaining about the success, or the attention.
"Sometimes it can get overwhelming, but normally it doesn't," he says. "Especially in Canada everyone is good people."
Those good people are building his empire.
"Some people might think it's cocky, but I'm just confident in my abilities. I've said it for years: Martha Stewart look out."