JediCat, Thank you for posting this question. I work for Clopay and shared your question with our engineers, product development team, and customer service group to find out why a dealer would have given you this information. Clopay's Canyon Ridge Collection was engineered especially for the harsh climate conditions you are describing. The door is constructed of a durable, low-maintenance polymer that will not warp, crack, shrink, or rot, like natural wood can due to exposure. It features Clopay's Intellicore insulation technology and has a 20.4 R-value for year-round comfort. We test all Clopay garage doors in a thermal chamber (oven / freezer) to gauge their performance in extreme temperatures. Doors are cycle tested at temperatures ranging from -20 to +180 degrees Fahrenheit and back multiple times to ensure performance. Since 1996, Clopay is the only residential garage door brand to earn the Good Housekeeping Seal for all of our garage doors, including the Canyon Ridge Collection. The Seal offers homeowners like yourself additional protection beyond Clopay's manufacturer warranty. If the product is found to be defective within two years of the date of purchase, Good Housekeeping will replace it or refund the purchase price. The Good Housekeeping Research Institute conducts its own independent testing of our doors to make sure each one meets their stringent standards in addition to our own. We are glad to hear that you like the Canyon Ridge design and hope you will select it for your home. If you have additional questions, please contact us at 800-225-6729. If the dealer has concerns, please encourage him to contact us or his account manager so we can address them. Below is a link to a video that shows the rigorous temperature and strength testing performed on all of our Intellicore garage doors. Also, so you are aware, Clopay also offers the Canyon Ridge Ultra-Grain Series carriage house door, which has an insulated steel base garage door with Ultra-Grain stain finish (the same as the Gallery Collection) and Clear Cypress composite overlays. Many design options are available with or without windows. We hope this information is helpful in your decision-making process. Here is a link that might be useful: Clopay Garage Door Testing Videos This post was edited by Mischel on Mon, Sep 29, 14 at 15:18

I have used their garage doors with success but I don't have any experience with their entry doors. They produce a solid garage door so that would lead me to believe that they can make a solid entry door but I would not base a decision on that empirical data on their garage doors.

I insulated my garage door myself after I moved in back in the 90's in a effort to help reduced the heat a little bit. The garage is west facing in Phoenix. HD carried 2' x 4' styrofoam sheets that fit perfectly into the door cavities. The end result, I didn't notice much, if any, difference before and after. In fact it probably hurt the night time temps since the heat couldn't get out as easily through the steel door. The average temp in the garage in the summer at 4:30am when I go to work is still around 100℉. Thinking about it now it didn't make much sense to insulate the door since none of the rest of the garage is insulated. But putting in the white sheets made the garage noticeably brighter at night with the lights on so all was not lost. If I had it to do over again I would just paint the inside of the door white. chisue - In my neighborhood probably at probably close to 1 out of 3 homes use the garage for storage and park their cars in the driveway. These are smaller (<1500 ft²), but cheaper houses. It has more to do with the fact that almost none of the houses here have basements to fill up with stuff so they fill up the garage instead. I never really understood this but their are a ton of people that do it.

Thanks everyone for your patience with me! I really don't have a knack for colours! It seems like people are pivoting towards a white garage door (and garage door trim) and then having colour in the front door and shutters. FYI, here's a close-up of my brick. I'm not a huge fan of my brick colour (it does have a sandy-pink type colour in it) but it's what I have to work with :P Brick Close-up in Sunlight So if I go with white, how about some of the options below (assuming that the garage trim will be cladded in matching white aluminum)? Clopay has "Standard White" and "Glacier White (High Contrast)" but they both look identical in the simulator. In person, I'm sure that "Glacier White" is a more brilliant white, so "Standard White" is probably my best option. Clopay -- Classic Steel (Premium) -- Standard White -- Long with Rectangular Grilles Window Clopay -- Gallery Collection -- Standard White -- Long with Rectangular Grilles Window Clopay -- Coachman Design12 -- White on White -- Rectangular Grilles Window Clopay -- Classic Steel (Premium) -- Glacier White (High Contrast) -- Long with Rectangular Grilles Window Clopay -- Gallery Collection -- Glacier White (High Contrast) -- Long with Rectangular Grilles Window Thanks!