Name and title or job description: Mike Krepfl, owner and president

Business name and location: AAA Pumping, Albuquerque, New Mexico

Services we offer: About 40% of our business is septic work. We pump septic tanks, grease traps and sand traps and do inspections for real estate transactions. The other 60% of our work is portable restroom rentals. Today we run about 30 trucks between the two divisions.

Age: 49

Years in the industry: I’m a third-generation owner of the company. My grandfather Carl Krepfl started the business out of his house in the 1950s, then my father Tip Krepfl took over. So I’ve been around it my whole life but didn’t go full time until 1996 after I graduated from New Mexico State University with a degree in business administration.

Association involvement: We’ve been members of the Professional Onsite Wastewater Reuse Association of New Mexico for about 20 years. Most of what I get out of it is the education and training that’s offered.

Biggest issue facing your association right now: The biggest challenge for us at the moment is increasing our membership. We need higher enrollment and getting more people onboard.

Our crew includes: My wife Shelley is our office manager. Our general manager is Raul Rivera. The three office dispatchers are Darla Romero, Amber Babecka and Candy Matthews. We have eight technicians on the septic side and about the same number for portable restrooms.

Typical day on the job: I wear many hats. I work with the managers and staff to ensure we’re operating efficiently. I’m also involved in the larger account sales calls. And for the last two years I’ve been doing a lot of recruiting, trying to find different ways of attracting qualified employees. It’s been tough. We’re doing everything we can think of — advertising, offering bonuses, different forms of compensation, providing newer equipment.

The job I’ll never forget: We had a project in northern New Mexico pumping a lagoon in a mine. It was very high elevation, up in the mountains. The trucks were a long distance away from the lagoon. It was very challenging. We had to use lots of hose and secondary pumps that were stationed periodically after so many feet of hose. We had to find a flat area above the lagoon and then run hoses down the hill. It was a lot of gallons. It took several weeks and is probably the most difficult pumping job we’ve ever done.

My favorite piece of equipment: We have a 1980 Mack dump truck that my dad used to drive before he retired in 2006. It has the original engine and transmission. We don’t use it daily but it’s still operational. We use it to haul dirt. I love that truck because of the value we got out of it compared to the newer trucks that are much more expensive and problematic and unreliable.

Most challenging site I’ve worked on: We used to install drainfields, some of which were on bedrock sites that would require blasting. Typically those were mountain sites with really bad soil or rock. We didn’t do the blasting ourselves but I used to wonder if the house was going to crack in half. After the blasting was done, we’d have to remove some of the rock and put sand in. Those projects were a nightmare.

Oops, I wish I could take this one back: Pumping car washes, sand traps or grease traps that haven’t been serviced regularly is always a bad situation. We show up and it’s just a solid tank of dirt or concrete grease. We’ve gotten to where we won’t even service those sites unless the owner has a contract with us to maintain it on a regular basis. Any time I do take one of those jobs for somebody for some reason it’s usually a nightmare and I end up regretting it.

The craziest question I’ve been asked by a customer: We had a woman call this past year wondering if we could pump out the water in her hot tub because her husband had died in it. We passed on that job.

If I could change one industry regulation, it would be: I think septic inspections should be done by a true impartial third party, not the company who’s going to do the repair work. In my mind, there’s a conflict of interest there.

Best piece of small business advice I’ve heard: The way we operate is we try to treat every customer like we’d want to be treated.

If I wasn’t working in the wastewater industry, I would: I’m interested in real estate and have been doing a little bit of flipping houses and apartment buildings — buying older units, fixing them up and selling them, particularly older apartment complexes. It’s been pretty interesting.

Crystal ball time – This is my outlook for the wastewater industry: The people in our industry need to realize that we are a very essential service. I think it’s starting to happen. We are a critical part of day-to-day life for people.

- Compiled by Betty Dageforde