At 38, Eli Wilson has been a plumber half his life.

And hes been a business owner for four months.

In November, Wilson launched Total Plumbing and got busy in a hurry.

We hit the ground running, he said last week. Weve been working eight, 10, 12 hours a day. I never expected it to grow this fast. There are three of us now, but I plan on hiring two more plumbers and two laborers.

Wilson said, Just being honest and fair and having good customer service will get you a lot of good word of mouth.

He said, My brother started Total Plumbing in Denver. He invited me to come out there and work with him to see if I liked it. I really liked the work and the money.

When he moved back to Owensboro, Wilson said, I worked for a large commercial plumbing company for 16 years.

But Im a single parent, he said. And I have a 13-year-old daughter and I wanted to spend more time with her. I was getting up at 5 a.m to go to work and not getting home until 5:30 or 6 p.m. My mother had to come to my house at 5:10 a.m. to help get my daughter off to school and then she had to go to her own job. I couldnt keep asking her to do that.

Another factor in starting his own business, Wilson said, was Kentucky got rid of the prevailing wage. I went from making $35 an hour to making $23 an hour when that happened. Then, the work exploded because the labor was cheaper. We did school after school after school.

He said, I wanted to make more money and I wanted to pick my kid up from school. So, on Nov. 4 or 5, I went into business for myself.

Theres a shortage of licensed plumbers today, he said.

There arent too many kids getting into it, Wilson said. Theyre going out and borrowing thousands of dollars to go to college. Theres a huge demand for tradesmen. The average age of plumbers in Texas is 58. In Kentucky, its been 54 to 56. Think what its going to be like in 10 years.

Total Plumbing, named in honor of his brothers Denver company, has landed several real estate companies as clients.

And Wilson is busy getting the Brew Bridge Brewery at 800 W. Second St. ready to open.

Hes installing a manufactured floor drain system and a new gas line in the kitchen.

The floor drain system, which Wilson said he designed, keeps him from having to individually vent each trench drain from the tanks.

That saves the customer a lot of money in labor, he said.

Kentucky, Florida and New York have the toughest plumbing codes in the country, Wilson said.

Its hard to find a good licensed plumber, he said. But we have a good plumbing community here. If I cant get to a customer, I ask someone else to handle it for me and they do the same for me.

More:
Plumb Busy: Total Plumbing hit the ground running - messenger-inquirer

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March 11, 2020 at 4:51 am by Mr HomeBuilder
Category: Plumber