The Pumper Survey: We’ve Got the Answers

Surveys like this one can be enlightening for everyone in the industry. They provide a good snapshot of the robustness of a business sector at any given point in time.

Late in 2008, we teed up a simple survey designed to find out what issues are most important to pumping contractors. We introduced the Big 10 Pumper Survey in the magazine and posted it online at www.pumper.com. We asked readers to go online and answer the 10 questions.

I’m happy to report that 188 pumpers participated, and their answers are published here. If you took the time to respond, please know that your effort is appreciated. For those of you who had the best of intentions to join the survey but simply didn’t have the time, you’ll get another chance to share your input. Later this year, we’ll unveil the second Big 10 Pumper Survey. Our plan is to make this an annual project, so we can see how the industry changes and matures over the years.

We were pleased with the response rate for the first-time survey, though any survey-taker will tell you that bigger is always better. The accuracy of the results grows along with the number of responses. That said, I think the information presented here is a good measure of the pulse of liquid waste haulers across the United States and beyond.

STATE OF MIND

A number of responses came from Canada, mainly Ontario and British Columbia. If we gave an award to the pumper who traveled the farthest to provide a virtual response, it would go to a lone contractor from Australia.

Contributions came from all four corners of the U.S. Georgia won the prize for the most participation, with 15 pumpers answering the survey. New York was second with nine responses. Pennsylvania and Tennessee provided eight each. There were six responses from Michigan, Wisconsin and Ohio, and five each from Texas, Illinois, Alabama and California.

Outside the Lower 48, we also received responses from pumpers in Alaska and Hawaii.

CONCLUSIONS

I drew a few immediate conclusions from the survey responses, and they mainly served to reinforce assumptions I’ve made over the years talking to so many of you, either for stories or at the Pumper & Cleaner Environmental Expo. They are:

This is still predominantly an industry of small family businesses

I come from a background of farm families, and I often see a common thread between farming and pumping. The work is hard, the schedule is sun-up to sundown, dad is out slinging hose or riding the tractor while mom is inside keeping the books and answering the phone. Junior spends a fair amount of his childhood alongside dad in the cab of the truck, learning the business just like he learned to walk.

Of the pumpers surveyed, 51 percent said they had 1 to 3 employees, including themselves. More than three-quarters of the respondents had companies with 6 employees or less. I’ll bet the majority of those businesses are family run, many with an office in the home, and the employees are almost always two or three generations of the same family. One pumper anonymously joked that the fringe benefits he provides includes “bossing myself around.’’

The nature of these businesses is that the owner has to be an expert in a lot of areas, from maintaining and operating a vacuum truck to customer service and marketing, from turning a wrench to balancing the books.

It’s difficult for pumpers to offer a multitude of employee fringe benefits

The bulk of those surveyed pump less than 10,000 gallons of waste a day and operate with three or fewer trucks. And a majority of pumpers collect less than $225 for each residential pump-out they perform. Finding more customers and dealing with rising fuel and disposal costs are their biggest concerns. Put all those factors together and you can imagine how difficult it would be to offer costly employee benefits like health insurance and retirement programs.

Just over half of the responding companies offer paid vacations, the top fringe benefit listed at 54 percent. Holiday bonuses remain a popular benefit, given by 47 percent of the companies. Uniforms came in third, at 41 percent; health insurance was fourth, provided by about one-third of the companies.

Until the recession kicked in, I’d often heard that attracting and retaining employees was a huge challenge for pumping companies. Interestingly, 20 percent of the companies surveyed said they offered no employee benefits, which can’t help in building a stable workforce.

Employee benefits mentioned that weren’t on our list: birthdays off, cell phones, Sam’s Club memberships, midyear bonus, vacation bonus and permanent disability and life insurance.

Rising disposal fees and finding new customers are big challenges

In a climate of increased competition and economic recession, it’s no surprise that finding new customers was listed as a top concern for pumpers. The other major concern was rising disposal costs, presumably caused by rate increases at public treatment plants. The majority of contractors (70 percent) said they disposed of septage at public plants.

Fuel costs came in as a close third-place concern for pumpers, followed by keeping the existing customer base and retaining employees.

Elaborating on the single most important issue faced by pumpers, respondents zeroed in on government regulation and intervention or “interference’’ in their businesses. A few noted concerns over taxes and the economy. Some mentioned unscrupulous competitors. One said it’s difficult to find “good positive team players.’’

MENU OF SERVICES

In the category of other services provided, respondents added several diversity choices that weren’t listed on the survey, including confined space entry and camera work, full-service plumbing, hydroblasting and excavating, pit toilets and sumps, car wash pit and catch basin cleaning, home inspections, equipment rental, trenchless repairs, industrial and municipal tank cleaning, environmental cleanup and operating a disposal facility.

THE BOTTOM LINE

Surveys like this one can be enlightening for everyone in the industry. They provide a good snapshot of the robustness of a business sector at any given point in time; this go-around it’s a challenging economic period — to put it lightly — and answers might reflect a degree of pessimism felt by small business owners today.

But the value and quality of the Big 10 survey is up to you. We rely on your feedback to build on the quality of the next survey. If you have different questions you’d like us to ask, send them to me by e-mail at editor@pumper.com and we’ll add them to the list for consideration.

We also rely on you to participate in the survey. When we begin promoting the next survey, please take a moment to go online at www.pumper.com and make sure your voice is heard.



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