TRANSCRIPT:
[00:00:00] Hi, and welcome to The Valorous Podcast, where we interview local businesses and find out how it is that they’ve built successful businesses in your area. So today I’m really blessed to be op have the opportunity to speak with Blaine, Kellermeier from Kellermeier, plumbing, Blaine, and I have known each other for a number of years and Blaine has built an amazing plumbing business.
And, uh, today he’s gonna share a little bit about that with us. So Blaine, thanks so much for joining us today. We’re really glad to have you. Hey, thanks for having me, Jonathan. I appreciate the opportunity to, to maybe help out help others with this. Absolutely. Well blame for those of us that don’t, or those that don’t know much about Keller Mera, plumbing.
Tell us just a little bit about your business, who you focus on and maybe a little bit about how you’ve grown over the years. Cause I know since I first met you, the, the business has really grown tremendously. So I started the business in, uh, [00:01:00] 1996. I was AUR or a master plumber for another company. And 96 was, uh, had an opportunity.
Start my own business and do that contractors work. And so we primarily did all new construction at that time, kept us extremely busy in the nineties. The economy was just booming. So we, 96 took off, started our business, got our business affairs in order and, uh, hit the road running very successful out of the gate because of the economy did very well.
And as we’ve transitioned, Through the years, we’ve now transitioned into more of a diversified company. So we do primarily, uh, service work, water, treatment, sewer, and drain cleaning, remodel, new construction. Currently I have a seven trucks on the road and a dozen employees. I’m very blessed to have every one of them.
They, uh, do a great job for me. And we’re [00:02:00] last year we celebrated 25 years in business. Oh, that’s fantastic. That’s fantastic. And I know what was it about four or five years ago that you guys built a brand new building and, and moved and, and it really expanded your operation. Was that that about the right timeframe there?
It that’s correct. Yes. About five years ago, we moved out of our backyard. We actually had a pole barn in an office in our backyard for 20 years and, uh, decided it was time to, uh, get into, get into a building where I could actually go home at. Instead of living, having my office in my backyard, it was one of the biggest things I had ever took out in my life.
I’ll be honest with you, but it was also one of the best things that ever happened to us as well. In five years, the, you know, the business has doubled in size. And so it’s been a, it’s been a fantastic journey going through that. So Blaine, talk to us a little bit, obviously a number of the people that are watching the podcast may be working from home, or certainly it’s become [00:03:00] even more popular through the whole COVID situation and all that.
What caused you to say, Hey, it’s it’s time to. You had a really nice pole barn office. I remember coming into your offices was the first time and they were really professional and set up. What caused you to say, Hey, I think we need to move out of the backyard and, and into another location. I’m, I’m guessing you don’t have a ton of walk-in traffic per se, based on your business.
So what caused you to make that decision? Uh, the biggest thing that caused us to do that was the fact is that we were running out of space. Um, at that time we only had three trucks on the road. And office space was reasonably small. And, um, so in order to keep things, uh, more business like, and make the, so that my neighbors and all didn’t have a whole bunch of commercial trucks in the backyard, uh, and respect for them.
And also it allowed also it was time for us to be able to have our home and not have trucks driving in all the time. [00:04:00] It was just, it was timing and it was just, we found a piece of land and I decided that we were gonna build a building and we did that. We had actually, uh, built it with extra space so that we could use it as some rental income as well or leasing space.
So that’s helped support the building along with us being that. That’s fantastic. And you mentioned your business is almost doubled since then. Do you think that had that. Obviously helped the rest of your team as well in, in leading that. And what other aspects maybe helped you think to double your business since that move?
No question, no question at all. It allowed us to become more diversified, have more space. And then, uh, the visibility of where we put it, where we built the building and here in Rockford, on Northland drive there’s at the time there was over 12,000 cars that drove by it, every. I, I don’t know what the current count is, but so the visibility was [00:05:00] huge.
I was doing business in my backyard for years and years, very active in my community. And I still had people say, oh, I didn’t. Where did you come from? So they didn’t recognize this because we weren’t visible. So it’s, there’s a lot to the fact that visibility is a huge part of being able to grow a business.
That fact, that was one of the things I was gonna. I know you’ve been for years involved in the community and the chamber and, and if I’m not even mistaken serving on the chamber board for a number of years, and it does sound like you did find people that even though you’d been in the community really in the community for 20 years, that still didn’t.
Necessarily know you were there or weren’t aware that you existed, but then did once you moved. So I always find that really intriguing that we can work in an area for a long time, especially as a local business, think that, wow, everybody must know who we are because we’ve been here for so long only to find out that not so simple, but that move made a huge difference in just visibility for your business in [00:06:00] general, it was a reality check, Jonathan.
Um, actually I didn’t realize. That, that was a part of it. And so branding has been very important to us. And so we’ve, we’ve created a brand and a name and a reputation, and it’s all come together as a package over the years, but definitely moving into a visible place was definitely a huge part of that.
Process. I really appreciate you sharing that. Blaine. Can you share with me over the years, obviously now you’ve had 25 years plus in business along the way. I know it’s not always roses. Can you think of a difficult experience that, uh, you’ve had to traverse either in building the business or, uh, in growing the business and maybe how did you overcome that?
As a business owner growing the business was, uh, a matter of being willing to become diversified for us. Probably the, one of the things that just happened for us was in the mid two [00:07:00] thousands, 2006, seven. Something told me that we needed to start diversifying a little bit. And so I started creating more of a service business and a little bit more economy approved.
People always need plumber, or they always need service work. Something’s always breaking D. And so we started buying vans instead of pickups and creating more of a, uh, service business of sewer drink. Cleaning was actually the first thing that we went into so that we could camera locating cleaning sewers, and then went on from there.
That was a blessing in disguise because when oh 8, 9, 10 hit the economy hit everybody really hard. We were diversify enough to make it through it and be actually profitable during that. Really good advice. And I think one thing that we often don’t always think about is we’re growing our businesses is how, how valuable it can be to think about in an economic downturn or in economic change.
[00:08:00] How do we set our businesses up to thrive in those scenarios? Cause I know that was good. Not only for the business but provided a lot of security for your team at that time too, which is, is really, I know important to you as well. Talk to me a little bit, just from a sales pitch perspective, apart from growing the business blame, what makes Kellermeier?
The, the plumber that I should come to when I need service? Why, I guess why Kellermeier over, you know, the other plumbers in the area? You know, I feel like we’re, we’re very transparent, uh, with our customers they’re get recommendations or that we wanna do this. We wanna do the job right. Or correctly sometimes.
People don’t want to do the right thing because of the cost and do understand that. But we don’t like to play that because that’s gonna in the long run that’s gonna hurt us. And the fact that they always forget that it was their decision to not do it the way it needed to be. So we’re not perfect in any imagination.
[00:09:00] We do make mistakes. It’s like everybody else, but we do our best to do the right thing by the customer and stand behind our work and what we do. I appreciate you sharing that. That makes me think. I think all of us, as, as business leaders run into situations, bla, when we know as based on experience and our professional experience, that there is a better way to do something than maybe what the client wants to invest in or the customer wants to spend.
How have you found it success in encouraging those customers? Especially with plumbing. When I can imagine there’s a, always the good, the better and the best, and maybe not the need to go to the best, but at least to get to the good, how have you helped your customers understand that, Hey, you need to trust us in this situation and spending a bit more money now is gonna save you money in the long run.
What have you found to be an effective way to encourage those clients to. Make the right choice versus necessarily the, the cheap choice. You know, again, I think it’s [00:10:00] the, the transparency explaining to them the effects of their, of that decision. And in the long run, if we haven’t be doing something that’s gonna be concealed, we can’t get too later behind walls.
Put the money there now and do it the right way. There you can always, you. Change out a faucet or do something decorate whatever later down the road and maybe save some money on the exterior, like fit faucets or something like that, but good infrastructure is important and do it right? So that, that this, we try to do our best to talk to people and the most degree and they’ll, they understand once it’s explained to them, we’re pretty, we’re very transparent on how we charge and that we explain to ’em that we all need to make money.
And we’re licensed tradesmen. So we’re just. Try to do the right thing for, by the customer. It sounds like a lot of focus if I’m hearing you right. Blaine on, on value. In other words, let’s not just focus on the cost today, but let’s [00:11:00] focus on the lifetime value, especially with the type of infrastructure that you’re typically installing.
I’m not gonna need a new water heater next year. If I buy one from you this year, assuming I buy the right one, it that’s gonna be a decade or multi-decade investment for me. So. That that value really has an opportunity to shine through. Yep, absolutely. I know there’s a lot of reasons that we, as business owners go into business and we start businesses other than just the profit motive.
Can you share with us a little bit, bla, other than obviously the desire to create a profitable business, which is certainly important. And I don’t want to take anything away from that, but what are some of the other reasons that you’re in business and that you’re in business for? I’ve always been an entrepreneur.
I’ve always loved my town and I wanted to just create my legacy for the future. And given back to the community, this has allowed me to do that. It allowed me to afford to do that. We have a dozen employees that they’re like [00:12:00] family. We take good care of them. We provide to them and, uh, they do a great job.
It’s a great team. So. That’s that’s what it’s about is it’s you’re right, Tom, Jonathan, it’s not really all about the money. It’s about the fact. You can help people and you can help your, your community. You led me into one of my next questions. I appreciate that. I hadn’t even told you where that we were going with this, but one of the issues I think we’re all struggling with right now in as business leaders is finding good team members.
It’s gotten a lot harder over the last couple years, and I know you’ve really created an amazing work environment at Kellermeier. Can you talk to me a little bit and share some of your tips for creating the best work environment for your team? What type of difference that has in helping you grow and, and keep your business functional?
Sure. We we’re super, uh, blessed to have, we have the new building. We maintain our image as a company. Lot guys drive really nice trucks, which back to image a little bit. We [00:13:00] have, they get washed every week on Saturdays and wax twice a year. People recognize that they say, man, I see your trucks everywhere on the road.
And I was been hearing that even when I only had two trucks on the road. So you keep ’em clean, leaking. Good. Leave a good image. And people notice that. But getting back to your, your regular or your question, Jonathan, they, sorry, lost it. No, that’s alright. Again, from an environment perspective, any tips on creating a, a great team environment for your.
Absolutely. So, uh, team environment, I treated ’em like treated everybody like a family. We all treat each other. Like we wanna be treated. They, we socialize together at times. We provide them a great workplace. We give them, I make sure that the family’s taken care of first with each, every one of them. It’s not just about, you know, us it’s about the whole team and we make sure that [00:14:00] everybody’s their needs are taken care of as well.
that’s a really excellent share. I, I appreciate that. And I know it’s, again, we mentioned so much more important nowadays or as important as ever, um, changing gears just a little bit, talking to maybe someone that’s beginning their entrepreneurial journey and starting a business bla with your experience.
Do you have a, a single piece of advice or a couple quick pieces of advice that you could give that startup entrepreneur in terms of business strategy or things that they should stay focused on to be successful and, and make it the 25 plus years that you have, which is in and of itself. That’s a, I gotta believe less than a 1% of businesses make it that far.
What advice would you give somebody new? The advice I would give somebody right out the gate is. To hire people that do what they do. Meaning the first person I hired was a CPA and he, he was, he gave us [00:15:00] direction on what we needed to do to, so that we were not surprised at the end of year with taxes and things like that.
So, you know, good CPA, good insurance people that are gonna be on your team. Take care of. And concentrated on doing what you do best and what got you to where you, you know, got your license and got you to where you, where you want to go and do. So. I always, I call it, surround yourself to the smart people and that’ll take you do the right thing and that’ll take you way further than trying to do it all because we can’t do it all.
So do what you do work really hard and, uh, surround yourself with smart people and, and, uh, take it in steps. First five years is the first goal make get through the first five years work really hard. And then the next goal nine was 10. And, and then from 10 to 20, I don’t really know what happened those years.
Cuz we just flew by it’s concentrate in small pieces [00:16:00] and accomplished what you want to do. And like I said, hire people, they have good people around. Really good advice. I appreciate that. So one of the other things we love to do is there’s always a, a behind the scenes aspect, all of our businesses, things that we run into that nobody thinks about as you think back.
And I know I’ve not prepped you for this question, but can you think of any bizarre experiences that you’ve had? I can only imagine in the plumbing industry, some of what those might have been, but any bizarre experiences that you could share with us and anything that might be interesting for the viewers and the listeners to.
Like, uh, like job site experiences, job. Yeah. Just, yeah. Yeah. Something work related. That was just, we’d never expect. But as a plumber, you run into things like this. And again, maybe there’s not, I didn’t prep you at all. So if nothing comes to mind, that’s fine. But I, the thing I can say is, is that I don’t think there’s anything really specific.
There’s a ton of things that we do that we run into, or that we see, or that. Get called [00:17:00] in to fix. And it’s pretty amazing how people will spend a lot of money, run to the hardware to fix something and then end up having to, you know, call somebody in to fix it after they get done. So some of the things that we take out to get brought back to the shop for that we throw away, we always said we should probably put that on a wall of shame, just jokingly, because it’s funny to see how somebody else.
Trying to make the repair. And so it’s very interesting, not nothing really in specific, but it’s just, it’s. We could probably write a book I, I can imagine I might have been one of those stories. I think one of the first times I, I got introduced to you guys from a service perspective that you came out to fix the underwater or under sync drain that I had attempted to repair.
And I’m sure that was good for a few laps for your service deck at the time. Cause that’s not the type of stuff. I know how to. But one, one [00:18:00] last question and we’d just love to ask a random question. Uh, I use a random question generator, so I didn’t pick anything out specifically here. Don’t know if it’ll apply at all or not, but Blaine, do you have any TV shows that you secretly enjoy that?
Maybe nobody, but you and your wife know you like to watch? I’m gonna say no for myself to be honest. I’m not a huge, uh, TV person. I’m not gonna say I don’t watch it, but I’m more of a, when I do finally sit down and relax at night, I’m more of a sit down with my iPad and research things and just slow my day down that way.
And TV’s on my wife’s watching that she’s got her favorite shows, but I just kind of always Googling or researching something that. Pops into my head. Just, I don’t know, just, that’s just kind of how I slow my data. Oh, I can appreciate it. I’m not dissimilar myself. We, we chuckle around the mask household because I tend to you grab my iPad, start doing a [00:19:00] Google search of something, anything along those lines.
And I’ll share, at least in my case, the one that’s surprised me the most is my wife’s been watching reruns over the love boat from back in the seventies and eighties. And I gotta admit, I enjoy . It’s been so long. It’s weird how that. Yeah. So, uh, one and I said one last and I, I lied to you. My producer just came up with a, a good question.
I want to ask as well as you’re working with the tools that you have and things like that could be plumbing related, just could be general tools related. Do you have a favorite brand or a favorite tool that you would recommend to others either in your industry or in similar industries that they consider?
I would say that in today’s market, the, probably the major brand that’s most of the guys are buying is Milwaukee tools. The thing that I’m transitioning from is that back when I started everything had a cord on it, they all laugh at me. and today, pretty much everything’s [00:20:00] cordless and it’s all you made.
It’s pretty amazing equipment. It’s been a difficult transition for me to change a little bit while I don’t tool. I don’t get to touch the tools much anymore. Making that transition to the cordless world was, was a big deal, but I’d say Milwaukee. Oh, absolutely. And I’m not a, a huge tool guy, so I don’t know.
But what makes mil just curious, what makes Milwaukee the popular brand? That it is any feedback on that? It’s the variety of different tools that are offered. It used to be just cordless drills or Zas. Now our expanding tools, pipe cutters, it’s endless drain thing equipment. So Milwaukee’s really, they’re really hitting the ground hard and running and trying to become one of the big tool providers for the trades in general, not just plumbing, you name it.
They probably make it. So it’s crazy how that’s. Uh, that’s a great share and I really appreciate that Blaine. Thank you again so much for your time today, to share with us [00:21:00] to share about what’s made you successful over the, the 20 plus years you’ve been in business. And let me encourage any of you. If you’re in the west Michigan marketplace and need a plumber Blaine and his team are absolutely fantastic.
And I know they serve with not only a lot of professionalism, but a lot of transparency and integrity as well. So, uh, I know my personal endorsement absolutely goes out to you guys, uh, for anything plumbing. Bla, any parting words you’d like to leave the entrepreneurs watching or anyone else, uh, watching any parting words you’d like to leave them with.
If I would always encourage, I’d love to, uh, mentor young business people and love to see ’em drive. So if you’re in my area or if you just wanna sit and chat over a cup of coffee, I always take time for you. Just, I love to help people to be successful in business, or at least share what I did. And hopefully it can help you.
Oh, that’s an incredibly generous offer. Uh, bla, thank you for that. And certainly very true. I know you’ve been, uh, able to share just some [00:22:00] amazing things with, even me as we’ve known each other over the last number of years on that journey. So, um, truly grateful for that grateful for your time today and, uh, wish you the best as the weather’s warming up.
Hopefully you get a chance to enjoy some of that. Absolutely. We’re this is our time of year we’re we’re looking forward to. You know, giving back outside and the daylight at night is awesome. So it is so awesome. Blaine. Thank you again. Have a wonderful day. Appreciate it, John. Thanks for your time. You too byebye.
