Someone emailed me the other day and said, “I have a job that might be a good one for winter when you guys are slow.”

I was stunned. Some people get slow in winter?!

Well, I suppose there might be one or two jobs that would go better if we saved them until spring. But a slowdown?

I know some installers who have self-imposed downtime in the winter because they take off on snowmobiles and don’t come back until spring. I know other installers who plain have better sense than me, so they have a self-imposed slow season so they can keep their equipment inside and not fight the elements. 

For those of us who want to keep going because we don’t have a snowmobile, or because you have built the company to the size that has to keep income generating year-round, what are some of the best ways to stay busy and profitable in the winter months?

Important but not overtly profitable

One of the many things that some installers do in winter is all of the upkeep, repairs and painting on their trucks and equipment they never could get to because of how busy the rest of the year is. Clean out, organize and stock the work vans — there never seems to be enough hours in the day to do the basics in summer.

I like taking advantage of winter to really maximize our safety training, and other types of training where we bring in a third party for a large portion or all of a day. 

In winters we tend to bring in at least two different heavy-hitter safety presenters. One typically specializes in DOT, CDL, truck related safety and regulations. The other discusses general safety training: hazard communication / employee right to know, trench safety, first aid, PPE.

I’ve had a local truck training company come and teach load securement. After a half-day class the guys were tested (hands on, chains and trailers) and received certifications that our insurance company was really impressed with. 

I bring in the vendors we buy our tools from to give us safety classes on saws, drills, sewer machines, PPE and other things that you typically think, ‘aw, we don’t need safety training on those hand tools’ — but you do. 

This is the time to do the core training, such as the six-hour class on trench safety/competent person or the six-hour class on confined-space entry. You’ll never find time in the summer for six-hour classes.

Vacations

Nudge employees to take their vacations in the winter. There are unique ways to incentivize taking vacations between certain dates. Count each vacation hour used during a preset time (January through March?) as only half the time actually used (or some other percentage). This increases their available vacation hours, but is profitable to you in that it guides them to take vacations at the time that is best for your company.

Marketing

Winter is a great time to ramp up your marketing. If you have handouts or mailers to get out, do it in winter. Set up a booth at a home show. Winter is the perfect time to maximize your marketing campaign because you won’t have time in the summer.

Do you have a customer incentive program? We do customer incentive items in winter. We clean filters and do other minor scheduled checkups and maintenance items on systems on our timeframe: winter. One of the things we offer all customers is a complete walk-through and training on their system. Winter is a great time to spend time training the customer, as long as being out in the snow for a bit doesn’t bother them.

More profitable use of winter hours

Some onsite installers add plows to their trucks and plow and salt in the winter. Thawing frozen pipes is another main staple of winter work.

Do you perform evaluations of existing systems for home sales? Home sales stay pretty strong right through winter. Home sale evaluations are an excellent way to generate income in winter. Home sale evaluations also lead to repairs that need to be completed prior to closing. 

This is where having a sewer camera and offering sewer cleaning really pays off. Most sewer camera work is performed in the warmth of a person’s basement. Do you also have a sewer machine or jetter? The one-two punch of a good sewer camera and a way to unclog a sewer line is a great way to add profitable hours to your winters. In the other seasons, this adds to your bottom line as well. Now combine this with trenchless sewer lining and you can really keep crews busy and accounts receivable happy.

Obviously the inground systems you have on the schedule, if deep enough, are not affected (depending on frost depth). A lot of inground systems are installed in winter depending on their depth.

One of the most profitable things we do during the winter is install mound systems. In the fall before the rains set in or before the frost, we will go from mound site to mound site and pre-plow and pre-sand our mound systems. Then in winter, they are no longer weather sensitive and can be finished. This one tip has kept some of our winters busy straight through just finishing the mounds that were pre-plowed and pre-sanded.

Winter does not have to mean a down time. A lot can be accomplished in winter that there never seems to be time for during the summer. I hope some of these ideas add to your bottom line.

---

About the author
Todd Stair is vice president of Herr Construction, Inc., with 34 years’ experience designing, installing, repairing, replacing and evaluating septic and mound systems in southeast Wisconsin. He is the author of The Book on Septics and Mounds and a former president of the Wisconsin Onsite Water Recycling Association.