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Wheeler Electric from Idaho:
If It’s Got Wires, They’ll Estimate It – And Do It
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When John Richard (“Dick”) Wheeler founded his electrical contracting company in 1962, perhaps he didn’t think about 2012. But his business philosophies were transmitted to his children. One was, basically: “We’re in Idaho Falls. We can’t afford to look away from any particular kind of electrical work.”
Perhaps another thing he didn’t speculate about was Wheeler’s national standing. Based on 2010 sales, Engineering News-Record ranked the company as Number 567 on its list of the Top 600 Specialty Contractors (includes electrical, mechanical, roofing, plumbing, and other types of contractors). That probably puts Wheeler among the top 150 electrical contractors, in terms of sales – out of perhaps 70,000 nationwide.
Today, Wheeler Electric does all kinds of work – from 15 kV cable terminations to fiber optic installation, and just about any voltage or type of work that falls in between. Another legacy from the founder is that today, with perhaps 80-plus employees (a dozen in the office), there are four Wheeler children and three of Dick’s grandchildren at work in the company.
How does this union electrical contractor compete in what, in 2011, is a difficult environment for most? VP Jeff Wheeler explained that the company loves to do design-build work, and to come back and provide more services to existing clients. “But we live in a part of the world where there are not a lot of people, and not a lot of customers,” he said. “We will try to take advantage of competitive bid opportunities – and right now that’s most of what we do.”
Even Wheeler’s one large steady customer, the Idaho National Laboratory (a unit of the U.S. Dept. of Energy), must, by law, seek competitive bids for every job. “We probably have 25 people working out there right now,” Jeff said. “That’s a good number for us, based on the history, but we always have a presence there. It’s working at the Lab that has involved us in a lot of new types of work, such as fiber optics.”
Note that the electrical business in Idaho is not necessarily like that elsewhere. The Lab is far from Wheeler’s backyard – a 60-mile one-way drive from company HQ. Wheeler Electric will also travel elsewhere for other good opportunities!
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Amazing Mix Of People |
All those Wheelers include President Doug (like Jeff, one of Dick’s sons), Diane Roberts and Peggy Parker (daughters, who work on accounting and payroll), and grandsons Josh (service manager/corporate secretary), Jeremy (now a journeyman), and Cody (in the estimating department).
However, they obviously are not the whole story. In terms of people (as well as types of work), Wheeler Electric pursues what you might call a wonderful mix. On the one hand, Jeff said, there are at least 15 employees who have been with the company for 20 years.
“And we have maybe 25 more who have been here at least 10 years,” he added. “That’s a lot of the reason we’re successful – our people know how we operate, and they make our company go. That’s why we really don’t like to see people retire.”
On the other hand, according to Josh, perhaps 15 of the 70 field workers Wheeler now employs are . . . apprentices. So the company’s people mix ranges from those with lots of experience and savvy to electricians-in-training who are, literally, “wet behind the ears.”
“We pride ourselves on using apprentices, and training them well,” explained Josh. “Of course, that helps keep our labor cost down. But we are fortunate that our journeymen have demonstrated their willingness to help these new people in the training effort.”
Another angle of employing so many apprentices, of course, is that Wheeler Electric is helping to shape the future of electrical construction in the Idaho Falls area. This is completely within character, as the company philosophy is to give back to the industry via active participation.
Just words? Not here. Doug Wheeler, president, chairs the local NECA-IBEW apprenticeship committee. Josh participates in the joint Labor-Management Cooperation Committee. And Jeff, the governor of NECA’s Idaho Chapter, also serves the industry by sitting on the state electrical board.
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Bidding As A Necessity |
When you live and die by the competitive bid, your estimating system will be a key. Dick Wheeler, the company founder, was also the company’s first estimator. When the enterprise grew so that he needed to do many other things, Dick hired Keith Brown – who was working, at the time, at INL.
“Keith loved the McCormick system, even back in those days – when it worked on DOS,” Jeff Wheeler remembered. “He understood computers. He always attended the McCormick Systems User’s Conferences.”
However, there came a time for Brown to retire. And that happened at about the same time that McCormick moved from DOS to Windows.
Jeff Wheeler was moved in to do the estimating at around 1998. “When I came to help Keith, one of the first things he said to me was, ‘I just came back from a McCormick conference, and they just came out with the Windows version. I think this is where estimating is going . . . You [Jeff] need to go to McCormick’s training class and figure out how to use the Windows version, because I can’t teach you that.”
As a “short-timer,” Brown didn’t want to spend precious time learning the Windows system. He continued to estimate using the DOS-based system; Jeff learned to estimate using Windows. In the interim, with the help of the people at McCormick, Wheeler Electric’s database was converted – so Brown could use the same database in his estimating that Jeff used in his work.
Now, with Josh running the Service work, he’s added use of On-Screen TakeOff (and the proprietary McCormick interface) to his estimating. “I’m using it pretty extensively, and have been for about a solid year,” he said. “I’m trying to estimate everything that comes into my office with On-Screen TakeOff.”
McCormick gets plenty of credit from the Wheelers for what they are able to do in submitting bids for a wide range of electrical and related work, and winning some of them. “You have to see it from our point-of-view,” Jeff Wheeler said.
“As of right now, McCormick has basically trained all of our estimators. The company helped us with that database conversion years ago. And right up to today, I personally find the technical support really incredible. They’ve never, ever left us hanging. They always answer every question we have. They’ll do whatever we need them to do."
“And even when whatever our problem is appears to be someone else’s fault, they don’t shift blame or walk away.”
Beyond that, Cody Wheeler (who is, like Jeremy, Jeff’s son) is working these days to further customize the database. “He’s updating the database with additional items and assemblies,” said Josh. “And there’s more. He’s basically making sure that, as an estimating group working together, we’re as dialed-in as we possible can be.”
Certainly, were your company in the business of winning jobs via competitive bid in a difficult 2011 environment, you’d put a premium on the care and feeding of that database. Jeff Wheeler put the role of computerized estimating at his family’s company in perspective:
“Our ability to use the system, and the McCormick database – and our efforts to customize the system, which is fairly easy, to fit our company profile – definitely helps us compete in these markets.”
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Mark Your Calendar: 2012 Users Conference |
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May 2-5 are the dates for the 2012 McCormick Systems Users’ Conference. It’s a special event for us (and, we hope, for you) – our 30th conference.
To make it memorable for all of us, we’ll have it at the Talking Stick Resort (Scottsdale AZ) – which is only two years old. Yes, it has a golf course on the property. And it’s a four-diamond resort, an “exalted” rating according to this March press release.
Too upscale to be affordable? Not at all – the rates we’ve negotiated are right in line with what McCormick customers have worked with in previous years.
Please put this on your calendar; details (including your U.C. agenda) will be coming to you soon. See the registration form below. If you have questions, please ask! |
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 What's In The Media: |
Software Offered For Fast, Proven
Plumbing & Mechanical Estimating
McCormick Systems, which has provided estimating software to electrical contractors since 1979, has taken a step in a new direction – offering its mature, sophisticated-but-simple system to plumbing & mechanical contractors.
The major difference: This system comes with a discrete database customized for plumbing & mechanical estimating, developed and fabricated in consultation with plumbing and mechanical contractors who have worked with McCormick over the years.
Contractors (and their estimators) who regularly bid on or negotiate for plumbing & mechanical projects can now select from a variety of options. McCormick offers software tailored for smaller companies up to sophisticated, networked systems.
Additionally, the company offers add-on such as CAD Estimating, a unique interface with OnScreen Take-Off software, a time-and-material billing system, and more.
“When we promote our products to the electrical field, we talk about the need for speed in estimating, especially these days,” President Todd McCormick said. “Our company was founded by my dad, who was an electrical contractor. So the focus, from Day One, has been on improving estimating productivity. “
“Our customers also tell us that our system is adaptable to their needs. They also say that our customer support is the best they’ve ever seen. “
“We intend to maintain these attributes, and enhance our reputation, in our continued work with plumbing & mechanical contractors and estimators.”
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For Your 2011 Calendar |
BICSI Fall, September 18-22, 2011
Booth 204, Las Vegas, NV
See www.bicsi.org for more information
PHCC Connect 2011, September 21-24, 2011
Booth 205, Minneapolis, MN
See www.phccweb.org for more information
IEC Convention and Expo
October 11-14, 2011
Booth 109, Louisville, KV
See www.ieci.org for more information
NECA
October 22-25, 2011
Booth 705, San Diego, CA
See www.necaconvention.org for more information
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Electricity Bills To Rise By 40% to 60%? |
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That’s what American Electric Power said recently, according to a blog called EconMatters.
Utility giant American Electric Power (AEP) sent shock wave last week by suggesting consumers could see their electricity bills jump an estimated 40-60% in the next few years. AEP is one of the country’s largest investor-owned utilities, serving parts of 11 states with more than 5 million customers.
As part of the company’s plan to comply with new regulations, AEP said it would cost $6-8 billion in capital investments over the next decade to retire and retrofit its coal fired power plants to meet regulations that start taking effect in 2014. And that’s when the utility rate increases are expected to begin to appear.
For those who serve electricity users in AEP’s service area, it’s time to crank up the return-on-investment numbers in those existing lighting retrofit proposals!!!
For more, see the original (6/11/11) Chicago Tribune article on AEP.
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| Germany, Seattle, The Sun – And Jobs |
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The company has estimated that communities across the U.S. could generate 107,000 jobs by enacting favorable incentives for the solar industry. The states with the most to gain, according to that analysis, include Texas, Florida, Virginia, Missouri, Georgia, Washington, Tennessee, South Carolina, Louisiana, and Michigan.
“There is a staggering opportunity to create jobs,” Llorens said, noting that Germany gets less sun than Seattle, but has one solar industry job for every 1,000 people — far more than in the U.S.
. . . from this article on The Daily Green — find it at the very end.
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| ‘Electriconomy’ |
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| Thanks to a $1.4 billion loan from the U.S. Department of Energy, Nissan is building a new battery plant in Smyrna, Tenn., and retooling its existing Smyrna facility to enable production of up to 200,000 EV battery packs and 150,000 Leafs annually. The shift to Smyrna will create up to 1,300 U.S. jobs when the plants are running at full capacity. |
The goal of the EV Project is to install nearly 15,000 electric-vehicle charging stations (such as this one) in 18 U.S. cities.
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A 1,900-word Industry Weekarticle — Sowing the Seeds of the ‘Electriconomy’ — is about the electric vehicle industry.
ALL OF THIS IS LEADING TO A GIGANTIC HOWEVER: The stimulus-generated investment in the electric vehicle industry MAY — that’s a big IF — prove to be a very good thing, a very smart thing, a very important thing.
. . . of course, it can also blow up. But from that 1900-word IW opus, check out this quote from Mike Rowand of Duke Energy:
“Most people don’ t realize the amount of effort that’s going on just below the surface within not just the utility industry but the automotive industry, the battery industry and the infrastructure companies,” Rowand says. “The amount of collaboration across industries is unlike anything I’ ve seen in the 26 years I’ ve been in the electric-utility business. It’s refreshing and a fun thing to be involved with.”
This guy is NOT a member of the Obama Administration. And — in my close watching of what is going on in the EV biz — he’s right.
. . . that still doesn’t mean something GREAT will happen. There are a lot of reasons I would hedge a bet on the future of the EV. BUT: The government has stimulated this.
If it doesn’t work, there will be a zillion reasons why it won’t.
If it does work, we should remember to give Obama (and Energy Secretary Chu) one heck of a lot of credit.
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Take Your Pills!!! – For Older Folks |
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Connected World magazine’s July/Aug issue featured the GlowCap by Vitality.
It is a wireless device that acts as a nightlight but also signals with light when it’s time to take a medication. It pulses orange if your meds need to be taken, and it sends data up to the Internet through a secure service . . .
. . . The pulse pattern started off subtly, and gets more intense if you haven’t opened the cap [on your medication]. It also plays ringtones in the second hour if you haven’t paid attention to it . . . every five minutes, it escalates.”
What happens if you continue to ignore the damn thing?
the system sends them a text message or calls their home phone and asks them why they’re not taking their medication today. At that point they can express that they need a refill, in which case we connect them to the pharmacy . . .
More, if you want it: There’s a video on the company’s website.
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