How listings are selected
Companies are added by the directory, not by buying a position. These are the principles used when deciding what belongs in the directory and what a listing should contain.
Selection is editorial, not commercial
Most companies in the directory never asked to be listed and pay nothing. Paying for Directory Certified membership does not add a company to the directory, and declining it does not remove one.
Relevance to restoration services
The company works in restoration — water, fire and smoke, mold, sewage, storm damage, structural drying, cleanup and the reconstruction that follows. General trades that do not perform restoration work are out of scope.
Business identity and physical location
The business can be identified as a real operating company with a physical location it works from. A listing is tied to that location, which is why a company with several locations is listed once per location rather than once per city it markets to.
Time in business, where it can be established
Where a start year can be established from a public source or from the business itself, it is recorded and labelled. Where it cannot, it is left out rather than estimated.
Public reputation
Publicly visible reputation is considered as a whole — the review record on public platforms, and whether there is an unresolved pattern of serious complaints. Individual reviews are never edited, rewritten or averaged across unrelated sources.
Available credentials and certifications
Licensing, insurance and industry certifications are recorded when they are available, with a label showing whether the information was reported by the company or found in a public or issuing-body source.
Clear service information
The company states what it actually does and where it actually works. A defined, plausible service area matters more than a long list of cities the company could not realistically respond to.
Editorial quality and completeness
A page has to be useful to a property owner. A listing with nothing beyond a name is held back or kept minimal until there is enough confirmed information to be worth publishing.
What is not published
The directory does not publish its internal scoring model. Rating weights, the calculation behind Best in City, private evidence collected during research, and rankings that have not been published are all kept internal, so that no company can reverse-engineer or game a position. What is published is the outcome and the reasoning principles on this page.
Ordering of results
Within a location, Directory Certified locations are presented ahead of free listings because their information has been through editorial review and is kept under recurring freshness checks. That presentation rule is stated openly and is the only ordering effect membership has — it does not change what a company is allowed to claim on its page.
Removal and challenges
A listing is removed or held back when the business is no longer operating, cannot be contacted, is outside the directory's scope, or where published information cannot be substantiated. To challenge an inclusion, an exclusion or a detail, email corrections@therestorationdirectory.com.