What is it with plumbers?

In reply to docwyte :

Stuff I have to buy takes money away from the stuff I want to buy.  

Sucks.

Also, my business is stuff you have to buy.

Sucks.

A bit late to the party here, I had to look up the info on the hot water tank at home for insurance. Plumber installed a 40 gallon US tank (gas) total installed was $1600 can. Including taxes.

SVreX (Forum Supporter) said:

Question...

Would you rather install 20 water heaters per year for $5000 each, or make the same amount of money and get to install 67 water heaters per year at $1500??

Even if he loses 50% of the jobs he bids on, he is still way ahead of the game.

I think the guy is pretty smart.  

I thought the smart guy took more jobs, built his business, and now he collects a paycheck and answers the phone as other guys install the water heaters for him.

In reply to z31maniac :

Not worth the headache, according to old timers I've known locally. Either they themselves are terrible managers, or the people they hire are useless lumps that think because the boss isn't around they can cut corners to pad their checks.

It's REALLY difficult finding competent employees these days, especially in the trades.

What I've seen becoming the death knell is competent people getting in with regional companies that only care about their own bottom line. It sucks the give a E36 M3 right out of the employees. You're getting $24/hour doing all the work while the company gets $200+ and forces you to cut corners, leave jobs unfinished, or sell garbage to hookup on maintenance contracts, then hearing about how their isn't money for a raise or better benefits or even time for vacation while bosses buy new 6 figure personal vehicles and vacation homes.

In reply to z31maniac :

sometimes it's way easier to price your work at the high end and do less jobs alone than it is to find someone who can work for you and do it correctly so you don't have to go back and fix their work and look like an idiot to your customer.  Not everyone wants to be the big guy with 20 vans going out every morning.  That's 20 separate headaches 

In reply to z31maniac :

Definitely not the way it works in plumbing.

The only competent tradesmen you will find to do the labor will get their license and steal your customers if you try that.  I've seen it dozens of times.

Plumbing companies generally have owner/operators in the field.  Or the large franchises are essentially drain cleaning services.  

But if it did work, he'd still be smart to answer the phone taking only the $5000 water heater jobs and have people install them for him.  Why should he work 3X as hard selling jobs?  And maintaining the volume is next to impossible during the down times.

It's a lesson I never learned.  My business didn't make it.

In reply to docwyte :

I'm amazed you didn't do those yourself. Surely just a time availability issue?
 

Patrick (Forum Supporter) said:

In reply to z31maniac :

sometimes it's way easier to price your work at the high end and do less jobs alone than it is to find someone who can work for you and do it correctly so you don't have to go back and fix their work and look like an idiot to your customer.  Not everyone wants to be the big guy with 20 vans going out every morning.  That's 20 separate headaches 

 

Good friend of mine is a plumber. In 2007 he had twenty employees. Has runs a crew of three today including himself not because of bad business practices, bad economy or bad fortune but by choice. Still charges top dollar every day - but he just turned fifty and his body is destroyed. 
 

Is it feasible to be a one man gang in the trades?

In reply to OHSCrifle :

It's not easy, we're moving away from anything requiring more than one person due to my body being wasted and we saw a poorly/un filled niche in the market that allows me to use $100 of materials and a couple hours max to return $500.  I've done plenty alone over the years and it gets harder every year.  With the exception of a couple jobs that were already under contract i'm done with big long jobs that kill me.  When i do the new thing I can have one bag with my supplies, one with my tools, and go wherever in my car.   No big truck, no big trailer, no $10k in tools.  
 

My mom and I  started a remodeling business in 2001.  We never looked back at working for shiny happy people.  Occasionally there were shiny happy person customers along the way but they're easier to fix than an shiny happy person boss.  I'm turning 40 in a few weeks, i'm toast.  If i keep up the last 25 years much longer I won't be able to walk let alone build cars or race.  We're in demand and I have an excellent reputation, but I just can't do it anymore.  Years of waking up in pain and pills to be able to function are no way to live.  Think about that next time you bitch about how much someone in a skilled trade with heavy materials and hours of crawling, crouching, or kneeling is charging you for something you don't want to or don't have the skills to do yourself

In reply to OHSCrifle :

I'm definitely not doing a water heater, already had back surgery once and I'm not going thru that again if I can help it.  No way I was going to hump the new water heater down into my basement and pull the old one up.  Plus I have no truck to go get a water heater and dispose of the old one.

The garbage disposal I can totally do myself but I figured it was a $2-300 job and just for expediency sake have a plumber do it.  For $700 I was going to do it myself for sure.

In reply to docwyte :

I think if you order from Lowes, they will treat it like an appliance delivery.  Send 2 guys and a hand truck, haul off your old appliance.

It would be worth asking.

OHSCrifle said:

Is it feasible to be a one man gang in the trades?

 

Yes, but that's not the sweet spot.

The sweet spot is probably a crew of 3-5.  That means you don't have top sell too hard, you have someone to do the grunt work (like jackhammering a floor for plumbing work), you can cover a medium large job, and you can potentially man 2 jobs at once when needed.

In reply to SVreX (Forum Supporter) :

I'll look into it for next time, although I'll probably just have Lowes/Home Depot install it.  It worked out well this time...

RevRico said:

In reply to z31maniac :

Not worth the headache, according to old timers I've known locally. Either they themselves are terrible managers, or the people they hire are useless lumps that think because the boss isn't around they can cut corners to pad their checks.

It's REALLY difficult finding competent employees these days, especially in the trades.

What I've seen becoming the death knell is competent people getting in with regional companies that only care about their own bottom line. It sucks the give a E36 M3 right out of the employees. You're getting $24/hour doing all the work while the company gets $200+ and forces you to cut corners, leave jobs unfinished, or sell garbage to hookup on maintenance contracts, then hearing about how their isn't money for a raise or better benefits or even time for vacation while bosses buy new 6 figure personal vehicles and vacation homes.

That hourly rate is paying for the vehicle, tools, commercial insurance, any benefits, payroll taxes, etc.

A typical office employee's actual cost to a business is typically 1.5-2x hourly rate. I can only imagine how much more it is when the company is also paying for the vehicle, maintenance, gas, tools, etc.

OHSCrifle said:

In reply to docwyte :

I'm amazed you didn't do those yourself. Surely just a time availability issue?
 

 

Patrick (Forum Supporter) said:

In reply to z31maniac :

sometimes it's way easier to price your work at the high end and do less jobs alone than it is to find someone who can work for you and do it correctly so you don't have to go back and fix their work and look like an idiot to your customer.  Not everyone wants to be the big guy with 20 vans going out every morning.  That's 20 separate headaches 

 

Good friend of mine is a plumber. In 2007 he had twenty employees. Has runs a crew of three today including himself not because of bad business practices, bad economy or bad fortune but by choice. Still charges top dollar every day - but he just turned fifty and his body is destroyed. 
 

Is it feasible to be a one man gang in the trades?

 

 

Years ago I started a business with my dad doing primarily concrete. After years of working for absolute berkeleywits we learned that a crew of 3-4 was the perfect niche. We only hired people that we trust and keep them around. One guy we've worked with for 23 years.

The overhead is less and we are ridiculously busy.

Patrick (Forum Supporter) said:

In reply to OHSCrifle :

It's not easy, we're moving away from anything requiring more than one person due to my body being wasted and we saw a poorly/un filled niche in the market that allows me to use $100 of materials and a couple hours max to return $500.  I've done plenty alone over the years and it gets harder every year.  With the exception of a couple jobs that were already under contract i'm done with big long jobs that kill me.  When i do the new thing I can have one bag with my supplies, one with my tools, and go wherever in my car.   No big truck, no big trailer, no $10k in tools.  
 

My mom and I  started a remodeling business in 2001.  We never looked back at working for shiny happy people.  Occasionally there were shiny happy person customers along the way but they're easier to fix than an shiny happy person boss.  I'm turning 40 in a few weeks, i'm toast.  If i keep up the last 25 years much longer I won't be able to walk let alone build cars or race.  We're in demand and I have an excellent reputation, but I just can't do it anymore.  Years of waking up in pain and pills to be able to function are no way to live.  Think about that next time you bitch about how much someone in a skilled trade with heavy materials and hours of crawling, crouching, or kneeling is charging you for something you don't want to or don't have the skills to do yourself

This!

The longer I live the more I realize that time is the most precious commodity. You can always get more money, you can never get any more time alive.

I've slowed down considerably as I get closer to 40 because I don't want to be crippled in my old age. I shoot for 3 day weeks and have bumped my rate up a lot. I was worried it wouldn't work but apparently I need to charge more so people don't want me to work 24/7.

Yep that all makes sense. My buddy's three man crew is exactly as described by SVreX. One young apprentice + two very experienced guys. He even tosses "quick money" work to the other two to do independently so they can make extra money and not be tempted to go off on their own. Win-win. 
 

Pat- I'm very curious what you do that you described above. I see you post bathroom pictures. Are you rebuilding leaky shower floors or something?

docwyte said:

In reply to OHSCrifle :

I'm definitely not doing a water heater, already had back surgery once and I'm not going thru that again if I can help it.  No way I was going to hump the new water heater down into my basement and pull the old one up.  Plus I have no truck to go get a water heater and dispose of the old one.

The garbage disposal I can totally do myself but I figured it was a $2-300 job and just for expediency sake have a plumber do it.  For $700 I was going to do it myself for sure.

Definitely hear you there. I just found it ironic given all the mechanical work you've documented on the cars!

Streetwiseguy said:

In reply to docwyte :

Stuff I have to buy takes money away from the stuff I want to buy.  

Sucks.

Also, my business is stuff you have to buy.

Sucks.

Yes, but my business also tries to be as efficient as possible to make our product available to everyone. If someone doesn't use our product, or we screw something up in delivering it to them, we don't charge them for our time in fixing it. It'd be sweet if I could charge my company, and by extension my customers, based on my desire to work 3 days a week and retire early. I'm sure ya'll would be pissed when your natural gas prices, electricity, or any other utility was twice as expensive. We've got a captured market as well, but you know, they regulate us so we're not dicks. 

How does Lowes or Home Depot handle issues with installs? 

Like, if they messed something up, will they send the installer out to fix it no cost the customer? 

In reply to pheller :

Yeah, except no plumber can possibly have the goal you do of making their product available to everyone. 
 

It only takes a few customers to keep a business alive if the profit margins are good. 

In reply to pheller :

Generally speaking, reputable contractors fix their errors at no cost to the customer. (and don't have thousands of customers to spread the cost across).  Many states require 1 year warranties. 
 

I'm gonna challenge you on the issue of fixing screwups for free. No one working for your company works for free. It's not even legal. Your good customers pay for the cost of errors and inefficiencies in the overhead component of their power bill. 

pheller said:

Streetwiseguy said:

In reply to docwyte :

Stuff I have to buy takes money away from the stuff I want to buy.  

Sucks.

Also, my business is stuff you have to buy.

Sucks.

Yes, but my business also tries to be as efficient as possible to make our product available to everyone. If someone doesn't use our product, or we screw something up in delivering it to them, we don't charge them for our time in fixing it. It'd be sweet if I could charge my company, and by extension my customers, based on my desire to work 3 days a week and retire early. I'm sure ya'll would be pissed when your natural gas prices, electricity, or any other utility was twice as expensive. We've got a captured market as well, but you know, they regulate us so we're not dicks. 

 

I assume the 3 day weeks thing is towards me.

I'm not being a dick by wanting to do 3 day weeks, they have the option of not hiring me. I don't really seek out work, it's all people chasing me down. It's not a captive market

The problem is I'm far better than the competition, this isn't a brag.....they are that bad, and even with inflating my price I'm still not the most expensive. It's a great niche to be in as a small company

In reply to Antihero (Forum Supporter) :

No, pheller was talking about himself, not you.  He has been a long term advocate of increased vacation time and shorter work weeks. 

SVreX (Forum Supporter) said:

In reply to Antihero (Forum Supporter) :

No, pheller was talking about himself, not you.  He has been a long term advocate of increased vacation time and shorter work weeks. 

I'm with him, but I wouldn't even mind still doing 40 hours, let me do it 3-4 days per week instead. 

I was incredibly productive when working for a large defense company when I had the 4-10 work week. I was up super early worked a 5am-3pm shift Tues-Friday. An extra day during the week to get stuff done around the house, take a long weekend, or veg out. And still had time in the afternoons on the days I did work to run errands like going to the doctor, bank etc. 

SVreX (Forum Supporter) said:

In reply to Antihero (Forum Supporter) :

No, pheller was talking about himself, not you.  He has been a long term advocate of increased vacation time and shorter work weeks. 

Ok, good to know.