Commercial Plumbing Company Success Story

KS Plumbing, Inc. Sacramento CA – Commercial Plumber Company Success Story

KS Plumbing, Inc. increased their gross income from $1.1 million in 2017 to $2.5 million in 1018 while working with PEAK Business Coaching.  The business owners were able to triple their own pay (it was way too low to start, and fair now).  They deserve huge acknowledgment for courageously taking on new initiatives and actions during this time.  Congratulations to their entire team!  I hope you enjoy learning some of the key factors in their success in this article.

Kate Weiland is one of the most intelligent and capable women I’ve ever met.  She’s also positive, friendly and a great wife and mom.  We met at the Folsom Business Network International [BNI] Folsom Business Partners chapter at Empire Ranch Golf.  She was representing and building her personal trainer/nutritionist business at the time.  Kenny Schrock was representing KS Plumbing, Inc. for the chapter.  Note* if you’re confused, it merits mentioning that Kate is Joe Weiland’s wife and Joe is the other owning partner of the plumbing company.  She was also helping support the company part-time since December 2013.  More on this soon.

Kate got to know me and the benefits of working with a business coach through our weekly BNI meetings and a couple of 1:1 meetings.  She was a strong proponent to Joe and Kenny for 6-8 months before they reluctantly agreed to “try” business coaching for one year.  When people ask me when they should start coaching, I simply ask … “when do you want the results?”  Many people don’t know what a business coach is, nor what’s in it for them.  The best way I can show this is through a sample coaching session, and I can always find at least $10,000 in additional profits in less than an hour for any business owner.

Before we started coaching, the leadership team was very slow in making decisions and implementing change.  One partner would be ready to go and the other would bring up fears and potential obstacles, and they would remain stuck.  They had been in business for 12 years and did have some incremental growth and worked very well as a team with a lot of mutual respect.  They were working too hard for decent money, but knew they could do much better financially and not have as much chaos, business, drama and stress.

The other major issue going on was that one partner was considering moving across the country with his family.  This created an unspoken uncertainty, stress and potential rift between the partners.  It’s very difficult to set goals, plan and implement growth with this situation.  Joe decided at that point that they could use some coaching.  He reasoned that it must be like golf or tennis … if you want to improve, a coach is a great idea!

It’s very helpful for a team like this to see the big picture and what’s possible from the outside perspective from a professional, experienced business coach.

The first thing that had to happen was for the leadership team to meet and discuss out loud the issue of one partner potentially moving.  They were good at discussing conflicts once they came up.  The entire team had to be 100% committed.  This was discussed and solved in the first two months of coaching.  Kate also joined the team full-time in December of 2016.  She was instrumental in an office CEO/CFO role.  She took care of the financials, bidding, pricing, hiring and managing office staff, working with the project manager/scheduler and much more.  She is committed to excellence, is visionary and has amazing attention to detail and ability to learn software/technical processes quickly.

I helped their team see the vision of being able to make millions in their company AND work less.  There were much needed improvements in their team/hiring practices as well as pricing/proposals, structure, organization, roles and responsibilities clarity, and their professional systems and documentation.  Their average contract went from $33K in 2017 to $41K in 2018 through margin research and by changing target market and tactics.  They acquired a new expansive office/warehouse space in 2018 as well.  It is centrally located for their clients, and allows for vastly improved synergy and communication with their team as well as a launching point for inventory and field operations.  Summit Business Marketing build a new responsive, modern, professional website for them with local SEO.

The quality of their team is greatly improved and they have less stress and worry about retaining their excellent high-quality work reputation.  They did this through vastly improved due-diligence and marketing.  They also documented and continuously improved their job descriptions, ads, interview questions, expectations, performance reviews and reward systems over the year we worked together.  They also created and revised training materials, safety training and joined the Open Shop Merit Shop Apprentice Organization which helps them meet prevailing wage, journeyman, and apprentice standards as well as finding great new talent.

They also were able to implement a 401K program, save money on taxes and improve retirement planning.

There were several other initiatives and improvements that occurred that year.  They hired and developed from within a full-time project manager/inventory expert and a full-time office assistant.  Joe and Kenny continued to work very well together leading field operations and plumbing team development.  Kenny acted as communication liaison between field operations and the central office.  With their long standing excellent reputation and contacts in the industry, they created 13 new working relationships with general contractors.

In their words, before they were in the business to make money and pay their bills.  Now they are creating a strong, leveraged business to leave to their children.  They are proud of what they accomplished and in the business.  They have built the business valuation incredibly through leverage and systems.  Congratulations again and thank you for the honor of being able to help.

Note*  I just got a 2018 update from the business owners.  Through their own amazing efforts and with the synergy of working with PEAK business coaching, they went from $1.1 million annual revenue to $2.6 million in one year!  The owners were paying themselves $25 an hour in 2017, and were able to pay themselves $80 an hour and they put all the additional income into tax saving retirement accounts!  Brilliant – huge congratulations to this amazing company.