Pressure Wash News Winter issue

contents
FEATURES
4 8
The Right
Ingredients:
Be it chimney cleaning or soft
wash, serial entrepreneur David
Jarett has the recipe for success.
100 Other Ways
to Advertise
Your Business:
Think outside the box to draw
attention to your service
12
Get to Know
Section 179 of
the IRS Tax Code:
Don’t leave money
on the table this year
14
Rebuilding Your
Rocket Ship:
Diagnosing and overcoming
small business stall-out
27
It’s a
Family
Affair:
Untangling the
complexities of a
family business
20
Having a Blast
By using around 10 percent of
the water that pressure washing
requires, ice blasting is just starting
to make waves in the industry
DEPARTMENTS
3 Editor’s Letter:
Failure is not necessarily
a negative
18 Industry Dirt:
A look around the cleaning
equipment world for news
and notes of interest
Vol. 2, No. 1, Winter 2020
Pressure Wash News is published 4
times per year and is independently
owned by Jackson Vahaly.
Publisher: Jackson Vahaly
Editor: Drew Ruble
Design: Katy Barrett-Alley
All inquiries should be directed to:
Pressure Wash News, 110 Childs Ln. Franklin, TN 37067 | jacksonv@pressurewashnews.com
Copyright © 2020 2 Dollar Enterprises/Pressure Wash News. All Rights Reserved.
2 | PRESSURE WASH NEWS | VOL. 2, NO. 1 | WINTER 2020

EDITOR’S
NOTE
Failure is not
Necessarily a Negative
Remember the Budweiser commercial
that caused an uproar following the
2016 presidential election?
Not long after President Donald
Trump first introduced his proposed ban
on travelers from seven Muslim-majority
countries, the beer giant unveiled a Super
Bowl ad profiling the difficult journey
that immigrant co-founder Adolphus
Busch made in 1857 from Hamburg,
Germany to St. Louis, Missouri in his
quest to establish the now-famous brand.
In the 60-second commercial, Busch
encounters not just physical difficulty on
his journey to meet Budweiser co-founder
Eberhard Anheuser and discuss the product’s
launch; he also encounters significant
anti-German immigrant hostility
along the way.
While a convincing portrait of
the adversity Busch faced to follow his
dream, the timing of the commercial
arguably created less inspiration than it
did controversy. Calls for a boycott of the
great American beer were fierce among
incensed Trump supporters.
To me, it’s a shame that the commercial’s
message of perseverance got overshadowed
by the politics of the moment.
Because to me, the story serves as a great
lesson for the very “middle America” the
beer commercial targets.
In life, adversity is the norm. Nothing
worth doing ever comes about without
obstacles along the way. But like Busch,
you have to see the adversity you face
in pursuit of your dreams as the fuel to
accelerate the growth you seek.
Start today to view adversity not as a
Winner, winner, chicken dinner: Hail the winners of Flight 2 in the annual CETA/PWNA golf scramble, held this year in Charleston, South Carolina,
location of the joint annual conference held by the two associations. From left to right is Greg Rossmann, midwestern regional manager for Cat Pumps in
Minneapolis, MN; yours truly, Drew Ruble, editor of Pressure Wash News in Franklin, TN; Al Bonifas, owner of All Spray Ltd. Pressure Cleaning
Equipment Pumps and Supplies in Swanton, OH; and Mike Turner, president at Etowah Chemical Sales & Service in Gadsden, AL. Atta boys!
negative but as a means to accelerate
growth. You have to fundamentally
learn and believe that a bump in the
road, a lost sale, a project gone sideways,
is not a catastrophic event but rather
is evidence that you are just that much
closer to dialing in the right solution and
achieving your goal.
That has to be your mindset if you are
going to be successful in business. You’ve
got to flip the script.
When you feel that adversity coming
on, don’t ask ‘why is this happening?’
Instead ask ‘what is this trying to teach
me?’ That’s the mindset you need. You
have to run towards your struggle, not
run away from the conflict.
Here’s a boxing metaphor that’s
helpful when facing adversity. Boxers are
taught to “lean into a punch” instead of
veering away from it because you actually
give your opponent more power by trying
to avert an incoming blow. That’s contrary
to what you might think instinctively; but
the concept equally applies in dealing
with everyday business struggles.
Don’t wish it was easier, wish you were
better. Don’t wish for less problems, wish
for more skill. Don’t wish for less challenges,
wish for more wisdom. Use your
adversity to accelerate your growth.
Drew Ruble
drewruble@gmail.com
VOL. 2, NO. 1 | WINTER 2020 | PRESSURE WASH NEWS | 3

The Right
Ingredients
Be it chimney
cleaning or soft wash,
serial entrepreneur David Jarett
has the recipe for success
BY DREW RUBLE
Ask David Jarett to explain his rapid
success in the soft wash industry and he
might begin by telling you the history of
the famous Italian dish, penna alla vodka.
The first use of vodka in a pasta dish
is attested on 1974, when the famous
Italian actor Ugo Tognazzi published
the cookbook L’Abbuffone, which included
his recipe for pasta all’infuriata (furious
pasta), described as a sort of pasta all’arrabbiata,
made with ½ kg of penne, ½
kg of fresh peeled tomatoes, a shot of
vodka, chili pepper, oil, garlic, and bay
leaves. Vodka is thought to release certain
flavors from the tomato that would
otherwise be inaccessible.
Since then, however, there have been
multiple claims to the invention of the
dish. For instance, according to Pasquale
Bruno Jr., author of The Ultimate Pasta
Cookbook, penne alla vodka was invented
at Dante, a restaurant in Bologna, Italy.
In the 1980s, another recipe based
on penne and vodka, called Penne alla
moscovita (penne on Moscow style),
but made with smoked salmon, cream
and caviar (or variant with cream and
shrimps), became very popular.
Regardless of origin, research in the
U.S. has shown that penne alla vodka
has become, over time, the second most
sought after pasta dish in search engines,
behind only pasta alla Bolognese.
But what does all this have to do with
pressure washing?
THE MAN WITH
THE GOLDEN TOUCH
Jarett launched his Long Island-based
soft wash company, Gulf2Bay Soft Wash,
just two years ago. He now operates four
trucks. In his first season, the company
generated around $300,000 in revenue.
Last year, it generated just shy of
$800,000.
This coming Spring, Jarett expects
the company to grow to become a $1.2-
to-$1.3 million business.
“Soft wash is an industry that was
born and bred in Florida and now it’s
coming up the East Coast,” Jarett said.
“I attribute my success to sales and marketing.
It’s not the actual product itself. I
mean, don’t get me wrong, the product
is an amazing product. People are very
attracted to a non-destructive way of
cleaning, which is how we capitalize on
selling the soft wash.
“But we’ve been able to take the soft
washing and market it correctly up here
in the Northeast. It’s huge because it’s almost
like a restaurant that has a brand
new dish out that nobody has ever heard
of. It’s like penne alla vodka, which was
introduced in the 70s. People in the Italian
world weren’t quite sure what it really
was. But pretty soon everybody had
it and some people started dressing it up
with a little prosciutto or peas in it, some
people started adding a little mozzarella
to it, some people threw in a little Cabernet
to it during the cooking process. So,
they started putting their own spin into
it, which is something I’d like to think
that we’re doing right now in Long Island
with soft wash, even though we’re a
brand new company.”
Novelty or not, Gulf2Bay Soft Wash
hit the ground running. Or perhaps better
stated, flying.
continued ...
4 | PRESSURE WASH NEWS | VOL. 2, NO. 1 | WINTER 2020

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PROFILE OF
DAVID JARRET
“We went zero to 500 miles per
that it’s a numbers game, meaning that
“Gulf-to-Bay is in my backyard.
hour,” Jarett said. “It was literally
seven days a week from the day we
launched.”
Not surprisingly, Gulf2Bay is not
Jarett’s first entrepreneurial rodeo. Several
years ago, he took a small startup
chimney cleaning business and transformed
it into a seven-figure business
employing 43 people. Today his North
if you contact a thousand customers
you’ll get ten, so contact ten thousand
customers and you’ll get a hundred,
that was my program.
“So, it was all about that ‘churn
and burn’ style back there in the boiler
room. But we did it more from a professional
standpoint with a solid product
in chimney and gutter service, not a
My employees don’t go out of state.
And we’ve been able to educate
the consumer up here that this is a
Florida-based industry but we have
different strains of mold, mildew,
and bacteria that we are now experiencing
up here in the Northeast
and through soft wash we are able
to sanitize and clean those surfaces
Not
surprisingly,
Gulf2Bay is
not Jarett’s first
entrepreneurial
rodeo.
American Chimney and Gutter Corp.
services seven states.
He built his enormous chimney
cleaning business on a staple of the
marketing industry -- cold calling.
“I decided to really, really invest into
cold calling, specifically telemarketing,
and having a little bit of prior knowledge
at call centers specific to the stock
and bond era back in the 90s and early
2000s in Manhattan, known as a boiler
room, that helped,” he said. “Knowing
that boiler room atmosphere and hitting
the phones hard and heavy, and
knowing that the results will pan out,
scam like they do with blue chip stocks
in pump-and-dump style.”
Not surprisingly, Jarett envisioned
using the same approach to expand his
new soft wash venture.
“I had such great success with
the chimney industry that I thought
I would be able to use the auto dialer
in the same context,” he said. “But,
to date, I’ve still never even gotten to
that point because I haven’t needed to.
The soft wash business has been so successful
and grown so rapidly on its own
that I haven’t even used my chimney
business footprint.”
correctly; but more importantly, not
just treating the surface with pressure
cleaning where it comes back
the following year, but to do it once
effectively. We explain that it is like
with a weed. When you pull out the
weed with the root system, it doesn’t
come back. That’s the whole concept.
So, I haven’t even gotten to
that point of telemarketing yet.”
Several years ago,
he took a small
startup chimney
cleaning business
and transformed it
into a seven-figure
business employing
43 people.
Today his North
American Chimney
and Gutter Corp.
services seven states.
6 | PRESSURE WASH NEWS | VOL. 2, NO. 1 | WINTER 2020

PROFILE OF
DAVID JARRET
THE FUTURE
IS SO BRIGHT
What’s next on the horizon for Jarett?
His father lives in Naples, so one
day he says he would like to relocate to
warmer weather and open the “gulf ” office.
But he knows down in Florida that
running a soft wash operation is a completely
different beast.
“Up here, you’re not competing
against everybody you can imagine,” he
said. “Soft wash down there is prevalent,
everybody knows what it is, and the pricing
is a fraction of what it is up here.”
As a unique product on Long Island,
Jarett says he might get $0.35 a square
foot, whereas in areas like Florida, operators
might be getting seven or eight
cents a square foot.
“Plus, you’re competing against five
or six guys for the same job there,” he
said.
Which isn’t to say that competition
isn’t growing in his Long Island market.
“I probably saw 20 new startups just
this year,” he said. “Now soft wash is
starting to become more and more popular
-- and that’s just a year later. I can’t
even imagine what it’s going to be like
next year.
“But I don’t look at the other companies
as competition. I have a great
product to offer. More importantly, I
have built a solid brand that is already
established. I can point to hundreds of
reviews on my website and they’re all five
stars across the board.”
Jarett has also been recently approached
by a couple of potential capital
partners who have been investing in
other cleaning companies across the U.S.
“They came out in May 2019 because
they had heard about me,” Jarett
said. “They called me up out of the blue
and said they knew I was doing some
pretty good things in the industry and
wanted to come and take a look.
“They ended up spending three days
here and said it was a tremendous market
and a tremendous business plan behind
it. So, they in turn asked me if I’d
be interested in expanding with them.
“I said if you are really interested in
getting something going, I’m not looking
for investors on Long Island, but what
I would be interested in and willing to
do is kick open the door in upstate New
York and Connecticut. So that’s on the
drawing board. Right now, we’re going
back and forth on a plan, we’ve worked
out a budget, worked out some demographics,
and now we’re trying to look
for some space commercial space. That’s
next in line.”
Such money lenders are always on
the look-out for a rock-solid operator
with a successful track record to invest
in. Or someone who has created, in food
parlance, the next penne alla vodka. No
wonder they have Jarett in their sights.
The POWER of :
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• CETA Annual Convention with Tradeshow to socialize, learn and stay informed.
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• Access to leasing programs with discounted rates.
• Access to discounted shipping rates.
• Networking potential.
• CETA newsletter - Access and ability to contribute.
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• Annually revised strategic plans.
• Annual Trade Show meetings.
• Special Member alerts via website postings, email or letters.
• Personal phone or written correspondence as requested to
the CETA office.
This is your Industry CETA is working for.
Help support it by becoming
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Not a CETA Member, but want to be?
Contact the CETA Office today at 800-441-0111, or visit ceta.org for a Member Application!
www.ceta.org | 800-441-0111 | info@ceta.org
VOL. 2, NO. 1 | WINTER 2020 | PRESSURE WASH NEWS | 7

Other Ways
to Advertise
100 Your Business
Think outside the box to draw attention to your service
1. Back-of-the-receipt ad $$
2. Sponsor a little league
team $$
3. Place a mini billboard ad in
a local ball park, ice skating/
hockey rink $$$
4. Diner placemat ad $$
5. Sponsor a local news
segment or weather report
$$$
6. Post a deal in a Valpak/local
coupon booklet $$
7. Sponsor a local event/fair or
have a booth $$1/2
8. Theatre/concert playbill ad $$
9. Place a float in a
local parade $$
10. Car window decal ad $$
11. Ad on a city bus $$$
12. Mail out postcards $$
13. Radio spot $$$
14. Send press releases to local
newspapers/TV stations $
15. Sponsor a local show $$$
$ = Free or Cheap
$$ = Won’t break the bank, worth a try
$$$ = Somewhat pricey
$$$$ = Expensive
16. Participate in local charity
event and hand out freebies
featuring company name $$
17. Set up a Facebook
company page $
18. Donate a service package to
a charity event auction $$$
19. Have family, friends and
employees wear company
t-shirts $$
20. Sponsor a golf hole at the
local golf course $$
21. Place ad on golf scorecard $$
22. Place billboard at AA
baseball field $$
23. Advertise on your local NPR
station during a service
industry talk show $$$
24. Host a city-wide “Who
Has the Dirtiest House
Competition” $$
25. Make coasters with your
company information and
hand out to local bars $$
26. Advertise in college
newspapers $$
continued ...
BY DEBRA GORGOS
For those of you looking to attract
new customers (and who isn’t doing
that???), here are 100 different ways to
advertise your business.
The ideas range from free (Facebook
page, Yelp profile) to crazy expensive
(rent a banner-carrying airplane!).
We also offer up tips on how to retain
already-serviced customers. But, be
careful, because for every Geico Gecko
there’s a Quiznos Spongmonkey, so
make sure to talk your ideas out with
a well-rounded panel of people and
check over everything again and again
for grammatical errors and wording
that could cost you millions (see sidebar
titled “Millions almost lost…”).
Here we go!
HOW DO FACEBOOK
ADS WORK?
According to the 2016 WordStream
article, Does Facebook Advertising Work?,
Facebook is one of the most viable and
reliable forms of advertising.
“Facebook is also still crushing it in
terms of user engagement,” the article
states. “According to data from Pew Research
Center, 70% of U.S. Facebook
users access the site daily, of which 43%
do so multiple times per day. In addition,
82% of the highly coveted 18-29
year-old demographic are among the
most actively engaged Facebook users.”
And, according to Facebook, “When
you run a Facebook Ad, you choose the
audiences that see it by location, age,
interests and more. With Facebook Ads,
you choose the type of people you want
to reach and we deliver your ads to them.
This makes your ads more relevant for
the people who see them and brings you
real results.”
BILLBOARDS ARE
STILL EFFECTIVE
Even though this form of marketing
has been around for over 100
years, they are still an effective way to
advertise.
According to an Arbitron case study:
✔ About two-thirds of travelers have
seen a billboard advertisement in
the past month and more than
4 out of 10 have viewed a digital
billboard.
✔ More than 8 out of 10 billboard
viewers, “make a point to look at
the advertising message at least
some of the time; nearly half look
at the billboard ad each time or
almost each time they noticed one.”
Along with billboards, it seems
continued ...
8 | PRESSURE WASH NEWS | VOL. 2, NO. 1 | WINTER 2020

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100 OTHER WAYS
TO ADVERTISE
27. Advertise in alternative
newspapers $$
28. Hang up flyers on bulletin
boards and lobby areas at
places like grocery stores
and auto repair shops that
allow it $
29. Verizon Wireless has a
rewards program where you
use your points for local
businesses $$$
30. “Cart-vertising”
(place ad in a grocery
store shopping cart) $$$
31. Place an ad on a
park bench $$$
32. Host a show on your local
Public Access TV channel $
33. Advertise at a local stock
car racecourse $$$
34. Host a YouTube Channel $
35. Give out matchbooks
with your company name
to cigar lounges $$
36. Place a car wrap on
your own car $$$
37. Place an ad on a movie
screen which shows ads
before the movie starts $$
38. Hand out giveaways after
each job that others will
ee: (Umbrellas, calendars,
hats, shirts, bags, coolers,
beach towels) $$$
39. Sponsor a bowling league $$
40. Give customers a 10%
discount if they refer a
new customer $$$
41. Give a free service on the
customer’s birthday $$-$$$
42. Leave behind a branded
car air freshener with
your company info $$
43. Drop off business pamphlets/
business cards at business
park lobbies $
44. Post advice/answer
questions/comment on
local blogs and include a
flashy business card in your
signature $
45. Advertise in a weekly
newspaper $$
46. Send out a newsletter to
customers $
47. Buy an ad in high school
yearbooks or at football
fields $$
48. AAA magazine ad $$$
49. Cable station ads
on the music stations
50. Hire an enthusiastic sign
holder to stand at busy
intersection $$
51. Hire a person to dress
up as a mascot $$$
52. Church program ad $$
53. host a popular food
truck on your property $
54. Groupon $$$
55. LivingSocial $$$
56. Set up your LinkedIn
business profile $
57. Google Adwords $$$
58. YouTube ad $$$
59. Set up your Yelp profile $
60. Start an Instagram account
and showcase top jobs $
61. Airplane banner ad $$$$
62. Entertainment
book coupon $$$
63. Nighttime logo project similar
to the Batman signal $$$$
64. Join your local chamber
of commerce $
as if modern billboards and smaller
forms of messaging are also being noticed.
According to the Arbitron study,
“Three-quarters of total U.S. adults
have noticed advertising on static billboards,
digital billboards, sides of public
buses, bus shelters, taxi cabs, commuter
rails, subways or any street level advertising
such as kiosks or newspaper stands
in the past month; viewership among
travelers is 84%.”
MILLIONS ALMOST
LOST DUE TO
MARKETING GIMMICK
In 1999, Casa Sanchez, a Mexican
food chain in and throughout San Francisco,
almost lost millions of dollars after
it launched a “get a tattoo of our logo
and get free food for life” campaign.
Co-owner Martha Sanchez told the
San Francisco Chronicle that she didn’t
think anyone would go through with
it. But then, as people starting coming
in baring tattoos of their logo, Sanchez
took out a calculator and soon realized
that if 40 people were given a free $8
lunch every day for the next 50 years, it
would cost them $5.8 million.
The restaurant chain then quickly
changed the deal and capped it off at
10 people. The promotion was re-introduced
in 2010, but it was tweaked so that
the restaurant only gave away one free
meal per day to someone who dons the
tattoo, and only if it was a certain size
and the person was interviewed carefully
and approved by Martha herself.
PUT A MASK
ON THAT MASCOT!
Mascots have been around since the
mid-1800s, according to the International
University Sports Federation.
Taken from the French word, “mascotte,”
which means lucky charm, the
United States started incorporating
mascots into their sporting arena.
As for some of the worst mascots
of all time, not including ones from
the Olympics which brought us such
doozies as Wenlock and Mandeville
(London 2012) and Neve and Gliz (Turin
2006), the mute Burger King man
seems to be included in most lists founds
on the Internet. Why? Because he is just
plain creepy.
In fact, according to a Time magazine
article titled, Top 10 Creepiest
Product Mascots, “It took Burger King
seven years to realize people found its
creepy, plastic-faced King mascot unappetizing.
The royal representative
has starred in the fast-food company’s
commercials since 2004, doing
things like stalking people outside their
homes and scaring young women.”
What’s the lesson here? If you’re
going to design a mascot, make sure
it talks, doesn’t sneak into peoples’
homes, and doesn’t scare people.
As for the best and most recognizable
mascots, Ranker, in an article
titled “The Most Memorable Advertising
Mascots of All Time,” listed the
following as top five mascots:
✔ Tony the Tiger
✔ The Pillsbury Doughboy
✔ The Energizer Bunny
✔ Mr. Clean
✔ The Geico Gecko
WHAT’S THE DEAL
WITH GROUPON AND
LIVINGSOCIAL?
Consumers sure do love Groupon
and LivingSocial, which attract millions
of users every day. But for business
owners, it is another story.
The problem is that while the dealof-the-day
websites offer up a great
deal to customers on a well-designed
platform, the business owners end up
taking a huge hit. With markdowns
generally in the 50 percent range,
Groupon and LivingSocial also get a
slice of the pie, leaving business owners
with little profit.
10 | PRESSURE WASH NEWS | VOL. 2, NO. 1 | WINTER 2020

100 OTHER WAYS
TO ADVERTISE
But, if they play their cards right,
they can hopefully turn the deal into a
regular customer-merchant relationship.
Some of the pros of using Groupon
and LivingSocial are that the sites are
visited by millions of people daily—
that means a business, looking to be noticed,
will get noticed along with a link
to a website, a phone number, and a
nice description of the business and the
services offered. Also, there is little to
do after a deal is posted, besides being
aware of how to scan a voucher and
track any of the fine print in the offer.
Both Groupon and LivingSocial
offer businesses access to a Merchant
Center, an online management program
which tracks redemptions and
buyer demographics, and allows access
to all customer comments.
As for the cons, some buyers view
businesses on Groupon and Living-
Social as ones that are “hurting” and
also some users are one-time customers
hopping from business to business with
coupons in hand. Also, such deals can
hurt your reputation with your loyal
and regular customers.
HELLO, FRIENDS!
Social media is still going strong
and from Facebook to Twitter to Instagram
to Snapchat, it seems as if people
still like sharing their lives, their reviews
and their daily errands with others.
On a global scale, according to their
respective websites, 1.65 billion users are
on Facebook, over 500 million are on
Instagram, and more than 310 million
are using Twitter on a monthly basis.
As for businesses, Forbes recently
announced that 50 million businesses
had Facebook profiles, and more than
2.5 billion comments are made on business
Facebook pages each month. Those
comments, good and bad, can be used to
a business’s benefit. Whether it is thanking
a user’s patronage, apologizing for
an error, or simply using the feedback as
a chance to tweak and/or keep certain
businesses practices, it’s all helpful.
A Business News Daily story once stated,
“Social media networks are fantastic
resources for businesses of all sizes looking
to promote their brands online. The
platforms themselves are free to use, and
they also have paid advertising options
specifically for brands that want to reach
even more new audiences.”
Also, people are still “checking into”
places on Facebook or tweeting about
a visit. These check-ins and tweets can
help to gain new customers who trust
those people and value their opinions.
But take note, you have to set up your
Facebook profile so that customers can
check in.
To do this, Facebook lists the following
steps:
✔ Make sure “Local Businesses” is
chosen for your page’s category
✔ Click About below your page’s
cover photo
✔ Click Page Info in the left column
✔ Click to edit and add your address
and click Save Changes
✔ A map will then appear in the Address
section Click to edit it again
and below the map, click to check
the box next to Show map and
check-ins on the Page
✔ Click Save Changes
SECRETS TO A GOOD
NEWSPAPER AD
It is commonsense that a good
ad has to have good grammar and a
phone number, website, and address
listed. But, what else does it need?
Here are some suggestions:
✔ write an attention-grabbing
headline
✔ promote a great deal
✔ use a clean and readable font
✔ do not make it too wordy and keep
your message simple and understandable
65. Host a fun block party
with a bounce house and
free food $$$$
66. Taxicab ad $$$
67. Join a welcome wagon
committee and put
pamphlet and business
card in welcome package $
68. Set up over-the-top
holiday decorations $$$$
69. Attend Networking events $
70. Set up your Google
business/Google Maps
profile $
71. Offer free consultations $$$
72. Look into Schema.org n/a
73. Place your business in
the Yellow pages $$$
74. Sponsor a local racecar
driver $$$$
75. Attend local auto shows and
other leisure events $$
76. Try a SCAN ad
77. Form a team and participate
in a bike-a-thon or walka-thon
and wear company
shirts and hats $$$
78. Set up a scholarship for a
student who works for you
or an employee’s child
and your company will be
announced at the school’s
scholarship award ceremony
and in the program $$$
79. Ask popular local bloggers to
talk about your business $
80. Offer up free advice on
Google+ and Yahoo and
on message boards where
people are asking pressure
wash-specific questions $
81. Set up your social media
presence and claim your
name on knowem.com $
82. Do a link exchange with
complementary businesses $
83. Have your business listed
as a POI in GPS (try
mapreporter.navteq.com) $$$
84. Become an expert source
for journalists using HARO
(Help A Reporter Out) $
85. PPC – Pay-per-click
(PPC) advertising $$$
86. Set up inflatable dancers on
your property or properties
where and while you are
working $$$
87. Mobile apps ad $$$
88. Set up a website (make sure
it is mobile optimized) $
89. Set up a Twitter profile $
90. Start a blog $
91. Establish an email list which
automatically sends out
reminders, holiday greetings,
birthday discounts…etc. $
92. List your business on Yahoo
Local and Bing Local $
93. Rent a billboard $$$$
94. Set up a Google+ profile $
95. Place a Facebook ad $$$
96. Give out free services to
local veterans, firefighters,
etc. $$$
97. Hot air balloon $$$$
98. Be on the show
Competition Ready $$
99. Adopt a highway $$$
100. Establish your business
on Foursquare and
Facebook Check-In $
VOL. 2, NO. 1 | WINTER 2020 | PRESSURE WASH NEWS | 11

Get to Know
Section 179
Don’t leave money on the table this year.
Utilize Section 179 of the IRS Tax Code
to help maximize your profitability.
It’s easier than you may think.
BY BRYAN CROCKETT
As a successful small business owner,
you are already familiar with one of the
fundamental truths of all business success:
cash flow is the lifeblood of your
business.
As your cash flow increases, your
business has a greater chance of weathering
periods of economic uncertainty
and strategic challenges.
While there are numerous methods
you implement every day to help you
increase your cash flow, one path that
sometimes is under-utilized is that of reducing
your taxable income.
Knowing that small to medium business
owners play a key role in our economy,
the IRS created Section 179 of the
U.S. Tax Code. Section 179 gives businesses
like yours a tool to decrease your
taxable income, which in turn increases
your cash flow.
SO, WHAT IS SECTION 179?
Section 179 is a provision in the tax
code that business owners can take advantage
of to reduce their businesses taxable
income.
Under the rules of IRS Code Section
179, a business can write off up to 100%
of its equipment and vehicle purchases
in the year of acquisition rather than depreciate
the new assets over its useful life.
So, for example, if a business purchased
$50,000 of business equipment
in a certain year, and if that business depreciated
the equipment using a straight
line method over five years, that business
would deduct $10,000 from their taxable
income each year, for five years. However,
under Section 179, that business
could depreciate the entire $50,000 in
the year of purchase, thereby greatly accelerating
the tax deduction.
The bottom line is, Section 179 is an
effective tool in reducing your business’
taxable income, which translates into increased
cash flow.
HOW DO YOU MAXIMIZE
SECTION 179?
One of the key elements of Section
179 – and one of its most powerful features
– is that it allows you to take this
full depreciate regardless of whether you
paid cash for your equipment, or if you
financed the equipment.
This creates a very interesting advantage
when you combine Section 179 with
appropriately-structured financing: you
can deduct the full amount of the equipment
and/or vehicles this year without
paying the full amount this year.
Many business owners who take advantage
of this powerful combination
find that the amount they saved in taxes
actually exceeds their finance payments,
making this a very effective tool to increase
your business’ cash flow.
ARE THERE ANY
RESTRICTIONS?
The equipment purchased must be
used at least 50% for business purposes
and must be purchased and placed into
service in the year of the deduction.
For most taxpayers, that would mean
that December 31 is a key date for tax
planning. In addition, the amount that
can be deducted from your taxable income
is limited to $1 million.
Finally – and we can’t stress this
enough – partner with your tax professional
and your business accountant to
take full advantage of section 179 for your
specific business needs and applications.
The combination of you, an experienced
tax professional, and a skilled business accountant
make an excellent team.
DON’T DELAY.
Because of the stipulations of Section
179 discussed in this article, we have seen
situations where people wait too long to
start planning for their deductions, and
lose out on the chance to take advantage
of this powerful tool.
Before the year closes, now is the time
to take advantage of the Section 179 deduction.
Maximize your cash flow by
claiming your full deductions, and put
that money directly back into your business.
As long as your purchases qualify
for the Section 179 deductions, taking
advantage of this incredible tax code
should be one of the easiest decisions
you make this year.
After all, maximizing profitability is
not a one-answer solution.
Editor’s Note: Crockett is national account manager for Aztec Financial, which specializes in financing options, Equipment Credit Line programs, and other benefits
of financing for pressure washers, as well as tax write-offs specific to the industry.
12 | PRESSURE WASH NEWS | VOL. 2, NO. 1 | WINTER 2020

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Rebuilding
Your
Rocket
Ship
Diagnosing & overcoming
small business stall-out
BY DREW RUBLE
While starting a pressure wash business
is relatively easy, maintaining sustained,
manageable growth is not.
One of the most difficult transitions
to make is going from a so-called “stage
one” company to a “stage two” company
(often defined as surpassing seven figures
in revenue).
But even if your business isn’t quite at
those levels yet, growth at any stage can
sometimes stall out. Symptoms might
include that a company’s sales growth
slows to less than 1% per year for two
years or more, declines for two years or
more, or “ping-pongs” back and forth
for several years.
What causes it? And how to you overcome
stall?
THE DOCTOR IS IN
According to small business consultant
Chuck Violand, who specializes in
helping owners of restoration and cleaning
companies build profitable businesses,
you’re going to have to be willing
to look honestly at your business – and
yourself -- if you wish to overcome stall.
Stated bluntly, Violand says many
times stall occurs because the owner of
the company “has lost the competitive
edge that helped get the company off the
ground and running in the first place,
or because they are still performing job
functions of owners of smaller companies
and not adapting to the growing
needs of their businesses.”
When most pressure wash entrepreneurs
started their business, they were
probably a solo operator or maybe had
one or two people working for them.
They had almost maniacal control of
their employees and of their business
assets. They were adequately qualified
to run the business. And frankly, if they
weren’t making money early in the life
cycle of their business then they perhaps
had no business being a small business
owner in the first place.
Their competitive edge in the marketplace
as a small operator like this was
likely that they offered “high service and
low rates,” according to Violand. And
who provided that high service and low
wages? You did!
“You would do any job, anywhere, any
site, anytime, just pay me,” Violand said.
You were what Violand calls a heroic
manager. All decisions went through
you. And you liked that. But eventually
you realized that you were not going to
grow your business operating that way.
FROM HERO TO ZERO
So, you branched out and expanded.
Now, as the business grew even more, it
began to stretch out and pick up speed.
Your business assets and employee base
each grew, but it’s quite likely that your
overall profitability went down both as a
whole number and as a percentage as the
business.
Whereas when you were doing a
continued ...
Editor’s note: Violand founded Violand Management Associates in 1987. As an author and popular keynote speaker, he is a respected authority on entrepreneurial small businesses, having
spent 32 years as both a business consultant and executive coach. Violand is a regular contributor to trade journals and newsletters, and is the author of the popular weekly leadership
series Monday Morning Notes. Violand led classes on small business success at the 2019 conference of the Pressure Washers of North America (PWNA) annual conference in Charleston,
South Carolina. This article was pulled from Violand’s comments made during a session at that conference.
14 | PRESSURE WASH NEWS | VOL. 2, NO. 1 | WINTER 2020

REBUILDING
YOUR
ROCKET SHIP
quarter of a million dollars in revenue
possibly even your comfort zone.
self as the owner so that you consistently
that uncomfortable energy to overcome
and you were doing most of the work
“Your guts feel the same way you felt
become more competent and confident?’
second stage stall.
yourself you had a monstrous bottom
when you were a kid riding a bike down
According to Violand, there is a
So how do you do it? How do we now
line, now, even though the business has
a hill and you’re going faster than you’ve
direct correlation between a failure to
grow ourselves and get out of our com-
grown exponentially, you may have
ever gone and you realize you could get
grow as a business owner and a business
fort zone in a manner that will enable us
found that your personal income hasn’t
hurt. It’s the same thing with our busi-
stalling. As just one example, consider
to fight back against stage two stall?
changed. (Ideally, your time has changed,
nesses. You’re feeling out of control.”
that when your employees -- who look
First, we have to identify the bad hab-
since now you’re not the one responsible
But somewhere along the line, nor-
to you for leadership and management
its CEOs develop that leads to a lack of
for everything. You’ve essentially given
mally between $500,000 and $1 million
-- see you ‘falling behind the curve,’ it
personal growth and dooms a business to
up a little bit of margin for the privilege
in revenue, the business begins to stall.
doesn’t take long for them to read the
second stage stall. Then we need to rem-
of having people help you and having a
Why? And what do you need to do to
handwriting on the wall and decide that
edy whichever of these CEO attributes
business that is sustainable without you
re-start your rocket ship? What’s missing
your place of business is likely a dead
must be corrected in order for our busi-
end for them, professionally speaking.
ness to thrive again under our executive
Violand says we prefer to think that our
leadership.
-- the payoff for trade-off you made.)
At this stage of the business, “bullets
are flying,” Violand says. You’re moving
so fast that you’re really just trying
to keep the business running and in motion.
A lot of times, you don’t even realize
what’s going on behind the scenes at
your own company.
“People are now performing jobs in
your company that you have little idea
how to do yourself,” Violand says. “The
company has outgrown you and has
probably also outgrown your skillset and
People are now
performing jobs
in your company
that you have
little idea how
to do yourself ...
The company has
outgrown you and
has probably
also outgrown
your skillset
Chuck Violand
that will get you to the next level?
IT’S ABOUT YOU!
Violand says if you are going to continue
to grow your business from this critical
juncture, you are going to have to face the
fact that you too must continue to grow
and mature personally and professionally.
According to Violand, it won’t be
enough that you know how to define the
outcomes for your business, or that you
know how to develop a team. The question
becomes ‘do you know how to grow your-
best employees go elsewhere because of
money when in fact it is often because
they see greater opportunity (and/or stability)
elsewhere.
Simply stated, you need to progress
and improve yourself as your business
expands and grows. However, the
thought of having to improve yourself
in an effort to grow your company may
make some business owners feel suddenly
uncomfortable. They are used to seeing
themselves as that original heroic manager
and would much prefer to explain
business stall as operational in nature or
the fault of employees or market forces.
Feeling uncomfortable about personal
change is normal. It’s also not the end
of the world.
Violand says to think about when
you first launched your company. Were
you comfortable then? Of course not!
You were uncomfortable! And, lest you
forget, you must have also been uncomfortable
doing whatever it was you were
doing before launching your business
-- otherwise you wouldn’t have become
an entrepreneur in the first place. It’s the
very reason you decided to take the small
business plunge! Back then you were
willing to accept the risk of going in to
business for yourself when you weighed
that against your discomfort level. Violand
says you now have to re-channel
THE FOUR
EXECUTIVE SINS
Violand has identified four phenomenon
that can occur to executives and which
result in stage two stall for their businesses.
All, he says, are self-inflicted. They are:
loss of focus; checking out; arrested professional
growth; and swollen ego.
What follows is an explanation of each
presented largely in Violand’s own words.
LOSS OF FOCUS
What’s really going on inside of your
head when a business is experiencing
rapid growth? It is hard to stay focused
when there’s so much going on. You’re
mainly trying to keep everything together
and keep the wheels on the wagon. With
so much going on, it becomes harder and
harder to maintain a focus on one thing,
so loss of focus happens organically.
Running a business is exhausting
both physically and mentally. You have
to recognize this and recognize when
that becomes a cause for loss of focus
leading to Stage 2 stall. An example
would be misalignment of staff. So much
is going on and it is moving so fast that
you fail to see that you don’t have people
doing what they should be doing, or too
many people doing one job. Such a lack
16 | PRESSURE WASH NEWS | VOL. 2, NO. 1 | WINTER 2020

REBUILDING
YOUR
ROCKET SHIP
of clear direction causes stall.
demanded of them.
deliver results, when push comes to shove,
fected, everyone around you knows bet-
How do you fix it? If you’re struggling
We respond by beginning to engage
it’s easy for us to back away from making
ter. We put our companies and ourselves
with feeling pulled in so many mental di-
in inconsequential activities, those we’re
the tough calls that need to be made when
at great risk when making decisions that
rections or feeling no sense of direction,
either familiar with or comfortable doing
our expectations aren’t met. Instead,
are distorted by our egos rather than
stop what you are doing and write down
but that have little impact on the perfor-
we’re tempted by, and oftentimes accept,
based on informed data.
your plan (or go back and re-visit it if
mance of our companies. We take on
mediocre performance because the alter-
Too many times, business owners still
you’ve already written it). Write it down!
these activities either because we don’t
native is more undesirable than the lack
go through the motions of asking peo-
Then start to communicate it on a reg-
know what we’re supposed to be doing
of performance: we’d have to re-engage
ple for their opinions; but everyone has
ular basis. Be like a parrot in your busi-
with our time, or because we don’t want
with our companies.
learned to recognize this for what it real-
ness. Don’t pontificate, communicate
through your actions. Live your plan.
So, for instance, if you say in your
business plan that you want to shrink
accounts receivable from 60 days down
to 45 but then continue to take on customers
whom you know (and your employees
know) are not going to pay on
time, well, you might be keeping the guys
busy, but you are acting out of alignment
with your plan and what you are trying
to achieve with your business. It’s time
to make a tough call. That’s living your
plan. Have regular accountability meetings
with your people, go over the plan
(again), and let them see the progress
that both they are making and you are
making to realize it.
CHECKING OUT
Checking out is what happens when a
business owner mentally disengages from
his business. It is one of the surest ways
to experience stall or decline in a company.
So, if we know this to be the case,
why do so many entrepreneurs put their
companies and their own futures at risk
by checking out?
Sometimes, as our businesses grow,
we aren’t sure what we’re supposed to be
doing. We were fine when our companies
were smaller and our time was spent
on jobs we understood or were trained
to perform. However, as our companies
grow, it’s not uncommon for them to
outgrow the owner/CEO’s comfort zone
to the point where many mentally check
out of the responsibilities and decisions
to do the things we know we should.
Sometimes we check out because
we get bored. Many entrepreneurs are,
by nature, high-energy, easily-distracted
people who are constantly searching for
the next thing to keep their adrenalin
rush going. It’s easy for the excitement
of their new venture to wear off and for
them to become bored, which leads to
an overwhelming urge to find something
new that rekindles their passion.
Finally, we check out when we “go
Hollywood,” referring to our pursuit of
the trappings of success rather than success
itself.
Lee Iacocca, former chairman of
Chrysler Corporation, accomplished
what many consider to be one of the
greatest turnarounds in business history
when he led Chrysler back from the
brink of bankruptcy in 1979.
Iacocca graced the cover of Time
magazine not once but twice, then pitched
margarine, and was even considered as
a candidate for President of the United
States. You may remember that it didn’t
take long before we were once again reading
about Chrysler’s financial woes, which
led Dr. Dieter Zetsche, one of Iacocca’s
successors, to later remark, “Every time
we get successful, we get stupid.”
When we check out of our companies,
we weaken our decision-making mechanisms
and our willingness to confront the
tough issues that present themselves every
day in our businesses. While we may assign
responsibilities to others within our
companies to perform certain tasks and to
ARRESTED
PROFESSIONAL GROWTH
As was stated earlier, if we don’t work
to stay on top of our game, there’s always
someone faster, better, cheaper, or just
plain hungrier who’s eager to take our
place. It should come as no surprise that
failing to continue personal development
as leaders can cause a business to stall.
When things are going well in our
companies, it’s easy to convince ourselves
that we have all the answers and
don’t need to continue growing as leaders.
Rather than exploring new ideas,
investigating promising markets for our
services, or driving more efficient ways to
deliver our services, we play the mental
equivalent of computer solitaire.
We keep playing the same game over
and over and settle for an occasional
win. When this happens, it doesn’t take
long for competitors, market changes,
or technological advances to catch up
and send our companies into stall. But
arrested professional growth is avoidable.
Surrounding ourselves with competent
people who are motivated and capable
of challenging us is a great first step.
SWOLLEN EGO
Making decisions while under the
influence of a swollen ego is like getting
behind the wheel of a car when you’re
drunk: your reasoning is clouded.
While you may have convinced yourself
that your decisions aren’t being af-
ly is: a thinly veiled attempt to have them
nod their approval as they rubber-stamp
the decisions we’ve already made.
How can you break free of a swollen
ego and regain proper perspective on
yourself and your business? Try serving
on a local board filled with other accomplished
people that is doing good work
in your community. You’ll soon learn
you’re not the only cock of the walk and
get your ego in check.
Or perhaps good medicine would be
working in a soup kitchen this weekend.
Volunteer in an effort to ground yourself.
PARTING THOUGHTS
As Violand says, feeling like you have
to increase your top-line to be successful
is a “Wall Street myth.” You don’t have
to be big to be successful. You define
that yourself. It’s a choice.
That said, if you are vying to grow
your business into a stage 2 business,
the key is to improve yourself. And that
starts with recognizing the four executive
symptoms that lead to stall.
“Just surviving is not a strategic
plan,” Violand summed up. “You were
the first hire. You hired yourself. And so,
as we grow the business, you are still the
one that must grow to fulfill the three
primary duties of the CEO – namely to
chart the course, build a team, and track
performance.”
Sustained personal growth, it turns out,
is actually the fuel your business runs on.
VOL. 2, NO. 1 | WINTER 2020 | PRESSURE WASH NEWS | 17

INDUSTRY
DIRT
A look around the cleaning equipment
world for news and notes of interest
Send your company news and press releases to drewruble@gmail.com
New website unveiled
by Kleen-Rite
CETA/PWNA co-conference
set for Nevada in 2020
Columbia, PA-based Kleen-Rite Corp.
announced the launch of its improved
e-commerce website in December 2019.
The property, kleen-ritecorp.com, includes
new and redesigned features to
optimize the user experience, save time
shopping, and place orders quickly.
Web pages will load faster than before
on all devices.
“Our customers want shopping to
be quick and easy,” stated Kleen-Rite
vice president Keith Lutz. “The new
site will have industry leading speed
and be easier than ever to use. Whether
you’re at your desk or on your phone,
we want the customer experience to be
exceptional.”
Customers can now log in to their
accounts on phones using a thumbprint
or facial recognition. Once logged in,
it’s easy to create a “favorites” list of
products, and move some or all products
into the shopping cart with a click
of a button once ready to buy.
Adding personal information, order
notes, and PO #s into the shopping
cart is easier than before for a streamlined
checkout process. The improved
“order summary” section comprehensively
breaks down costs before buying.
Be sure to sign up for the new
Kleen-Rite Rewards Club to earn rewards
points on every purchase, and
redeem points for Kleen Kash discounts
and free shipping offers.
Again in 2020, the Cleaning
Equipment Trade Association
(CETA) and the Power
Washers of North America
(PWNA) will co-locate their
annual meeting.
In 2020, the co-location
will happen October 22-25
in “the biggest little city in
America,” Reno, Nevada.
The 2020 event will represent
the third straight year the two organizations
will co-locate their annual meetings.
Both CETA and PWNA share a
common goal of promoting the industry,
and moving it forward. Co-located
shows allow members of both associations
greater networking opportunities
and business opportunities. Bringing
together manufacturers, distributors,
and contractors at a single venue has
proven to be an incredible catalyst for
advancing the entire industry.
PowerClean 2020 will feature the
industry’s leading exhibitors, equipment
training, seminars, networking,
and fun. While both associations will
remain independent and have events on
their own, CETA and PWNA feel that
these two great associations can combine
efforts to work towards a common
goal: Two Teams. One Vision. Advancing
the industry forward.
Hydra-Flex Announces New Line of Jetting Nozzles
Minneapolis-St. Paul, MN-based Hydra-Flex,
Inc., manufacturer of innovative
fluid handling equipment, announced
the worldwide release of a new
line of nozzles designed specifically for
jetting applications – the Reaper Rotating
Jetting Nozzle, in the fall of 2019.
With its improved impingement and
stream quality, these nozzles allow the
operator to complete the job, on average,
two times faster than with competitor
nozzles.
Designed for durability, these
heavy-duty nozzles are constructed with
stainless steel housings and tungsten carbide
wear nozzle tips and seats to withstand
harsh environments and provide
longer life than ceramic nozzles.
The Reaper’s rotating front jet is a
zero-degree, straight water stream that
blasts at up to 4000 PSI while rotating
at an optimal speed to form a 24 or
30-degree cone of coverage. Optimized
stream quality results in greater impingement,
allowing you to use one tool for
various applications (cutting, cleaning,
removal, etc.). Reaper’s four rear jets
create a 20-degree angle for maximum
thrusting power.
“We are very excited to bring our rotating
nozzle technology to the jetting industry,”
stated Mike Tonies, director of
industrial sales at Hydra-Flex. “A great
deal of time and energy was put into
working with contractors
to understand how
to design an innovative
tool to improve their
everyday work in the
field. After considerable
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Hydra-Flex, Inc. was founded in
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wash industry, including chemical dispensing
systems and high-pressure nozzles.
Building on that expertise,
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industrial
cleaning, and jetting.
Due to these innovations and rapid
growth, Hydra-Flex has earned spots
on the 2014-2019 Inc. 5000 lists, 2015-
2019 Fast 50, named a Top Inventor by
Twin Cities Business, and has won Best
in Class and Best New Product Design in
the Minnesota Manufacturing Awards.
18 | PRESSURE WASH NEWS | VOL. 2, NO. 1 | WINTER 2020

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Having
a Blast
By using around 10 percent of the
water that pressure washing requires,
ice blasting is just starting to make
waves in the industry
BY DREW RUBLE
Ice blasting is a method of industrial cleaning that uses a
continuous supply of compressed air to convey and accelerate
suspended ice particles to high speeds.
The ice particles are ejected from a nozzle toward the surface
to be cleaned. The ice particles impact the contaminant
covering the surface, breaking it apart and knocking it off.
Ice blasting uses significantly less water than pressure
washing (around 10% of the water).
It is also often used in areas where water is scarce, since it
requires much less water than pressure washing.
LEADING THE CHARGE
The Coulson Group is a family
owned and operated group of companies
that began in 1960 with forestry,
eventually expanding into aviation and
lumber manufacturing in the late 80s.
In 2012, the Coulson IceBlast team
began revolutionizing ice blasting technology.
In 2017 the Coulson Ice Blast
team came out with the IceStorm90, an
innovative portable wet ice blasting machine.
The IceStorm90 utilizes no environmentally
harmful abrasives, as well as
using no expensive blasting media such
as dry ice and sand.
Coulson Ice Blast is currently the
only company to manufacture ice blasting
equipment.
HOW IT WORKS
Ice cubes, made with any standard
ice cube machine or purchased in bags,
can be loaded into the IceStorm90. The
machine has a crusher mechanism inside
it, which crushes these ice cubes into
smaller ice particles, suitable for blasting
(the particles are around the size of a
grain of rice).
The ice particles drop into a rotary
airlock, which transfers them into a
high pressure air-stream. The ice particles
become suspended in the air-stream
and are conveyed through a blast hose
towards a nozzle. The air accelerates
through the nozzle and the suspended
ice particles are accelerated along with
it. The ice particles are then ejected out
the end of the nozzle towards the surface
to be cleaned.
The operator holds onto the nozzle
and controls whether the machine is
blasting or not by operating a trigger.
Like all blasting equipment, the IceStorm90
requires a continuous supply of
compressed air from a compressor.
The IceStorm90’s operating pressure
range is from 80-200 PSI. It can blast at
0-5 pounds of ice per minute.
Using a solid particle instead of a liquid
particle creates more collision force,
which gives the operator the ability to
clean with less energy. Essentially, a solid
particle has more mass, so the collision
that is created is higher in power, allowing
an operator to clean more.
Chris Wyatt, writing for the Daimer
Industries blog, once wrote about four
advantages of ice blasting over water.
First, the operator doesn’t have to
wait for electrical parts and generators to
dry out before using them again.
Next, removing radioactive and other
contaminated materials does not require
large containers to remove contaminated
water.
Third, mold and mildew removal is
more complete because there is no moisture
left behind.
And last, the machine also works underwater
-- ice particles are solid -- so
operators (divers) can actually clean barnacles
without taking a boat out of the
water. As a result, cleaning boat hulls is
20 | PRESSURE WASH NEWS | VOL. 2, NO. 1 | WINTER 2020

quicker and also more complete because
ice blasting discourages algae, sea slime
and mussels from reattaching.
Wyatt concluded, “From food service
cleaning to industrial equipment maintenance,
there are many different types of
machines and tools used to tackle these
tough tasks. Water blasting, steam cleaning
and sand blasting are all good ways
both commercial and industrial companies
use to clean their property and
equipment. These days, however, there’s
an even better way to get the job done.
Using a dry ice blasting machine works
better in many instances, does so more
safely than other types of machines and
costs less to operate.”
THE HISTORY
The first ice blasting patent was filed
in 1952, as a “means and methods for
cleaning and polishing automobiles” (US
patent 2699403).
In 1959, Unilever filed a patent for using
ice blasting to remove meat from bone.
The first company to attempt to
commercialize ice blasting technology
was Universal Ice Blast Inc., established
in the early 1990s based on a grant from
the Navy, who were interested in using
the technology to clean inside ship engine
rooms and other such enclosed
spaces on marine vessels.
The machines created by Universal
Ice Blast made ice continuously. When
a supply of water and electricity where
connected into the machine, a cold drum
would rotate continuously through a
bath of water. A thin sheet of ice would
form on the drum before hitting a blade,
which would shatter the ice sheet into
small flakes. These flakes would then be
sucked up into a fast-moving air-stream
and ejected out of a nozzle.
The machines made by Universal Ice
Blast used a “two-hose” system. Twohose
blasting systems use separate hoses
for air and for the ice. The air hose
is pressurized and ends in a converging-diverging
nozzle. The air accelerates
through the nozzle and reaches supersonic
speeds.
As the air becomes supersonic, its
pressure drops drastically, creating a suction
effect. This acts to suck the ice up
through a second hose, which is connected
into the air-stream after the converging-diverging
nozzle.
The ice is sucked up through the
hose and merges with the supersonic airstream,
which acts to accelerate it. The
mixture of ice and air is then ejected out
of the end of the nozzle.
Two-hose systems cannot accelerate
the ice particles to very high speeds
since the ice is not in contact with the
fast-moving air for very long and the suction
system results in large losses in air
velocity. In comparison, “one-hose” systems,
where the blast media is combined
with the air before the converging-diverging
nozzle, tends to be much more
powerful and reliable.
Enter Coulson.
Universal Ice Blast was purchased in
2012 by the Coulson Group of Companies.
Coulson wanted tech to clean
its airplanes but then started working to
reduce size of machines to make them
commercially viable even at the individual
commercial cleaning level.
In 2015, the company was rebranded
as Coulson Ice Blast. Coulson Ice
Blast redesigned the technology, focusing
around the more powerful and reliable
one-hose system. The IceStorm90 was
the first one-hose ice blasting machine.
The IceStorm90 is significantly more
compact than previous ice blasting machines.
The one-hose system also makes
it very reliable and much more powerful.
Ice cubes can be pre-made and brought
to the worksite, or they can be produced
continuously by ice cube machines.
Coulson now sells the IceStorm90 and
the IceStorm90+. The IceStorm90+ is capable
of blasting with either ice or dry ice.
TO PRESSURE
WASHING AND BEYOND…
This last factoid is important, and,
possibly, transformative.
Wyatt well describes how a dry ice
machine works on the same principle as
a sandblaster. However, instead of shooting
sand particles out of a nozzle with
pressurized air, the ice blaster forces tiny
dry ice pellets out under pressure instead.
When these particles of dry ice hit the
surface they are cleaning, they cause the
top layer of coating to shrink, which creates
cracks in the surface layer. The pellets
then come in contact with the warmer
surface below and absorb the heat. This
heat absorption causes the pellets of dry
ice to turn back into carbon dioxide gas,
which expands, causing the outer coating
to loosen and break free.
As Wyatt says, ice blasting, then, is
a great sand blaster alternative because
it is non-abrasive. Because the dry ice
particles turn back into a gas instantaneously
upon impact, the cleaning method
causes no damage to the hard surface
being blasted.
This fact alone makes ice blasting
machines usable for more industrial and
commercial cleaning applications than
just sand blasting. In many cases where
sand blasting or ice blasting could be
used, ice blasting could in fact provide a
better result faster.
TURNING THE TIDE
A lot of research and development
has been put into this new technology to
enable it to possibly knock down some
big, established industries. Only time will
tell how successful that push might be.
Skepticism in matters of innovation
like these are certainly understandable
and often even sensible. However, in cases
such as these, oftentimes, human nature
is to tend to be resistant to change when
in fact there is no reason to be. Or, at the
least, greater investigation is required.
People often talk about a lack innovation
in the pressure wash industry. If
nothing else, Coulson is certainly pushing
the envelope with their new technology.
The water consumption issue alone
– perhaps the greatest threat to the industry
in general – merits and full and
complete look by the industry.
VOL. 2, NO. 1 | WINTER 2020 | PRESSURE WASH NEWS | 21

It’s I a
Family
Affair
Untangling the complexities
of a family business
BY DREW RUBLE
Marriage isn’t easy. Neither is raising
kids. And we all know entrepreneurship
isn’t a simple task.
Combining the three is most certainly
not easy, but it often works out quite
well. Pressure Wash News recently sat
down with four prominent families operating
in the pressure wash industry to
glean some advice for our readers about
how to navigate their own family business
pitfalls.
22 | PRESSURE WASH NEWS | VOL. 2, NO. 1 | WINTER 2020

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IT’S A
FAMILY
AFFAIR
Here were our participants:
✔ Vickie Eubanks, co-owner with
husband Ty and sons Connor
and Tanner of South Shore
Building Services in Commerce,
CA;
✔ Erik Wasel of Averus Fire
Services (which specializes in
kitchen exhaust hood cleaning
business) in Gurnee, IL. Wasel
operates the business with his
with wife, June, daughter Meagan
Bunch, son-in-law Daniel
Bunch, and son Ryan Wasel;
✔ Marie Reinsel, co-owner with
husband, Andy, of A2Z Pressure
Washing in Bellevue, OH;
✔ and AC Lockyer, who owns Soft-
Wash Systems in Sanford, FL with
his wife Karen and son, AJ.
VICKIE EUBANKS
“We are celebrating our 40-year anniversary
in business. We are in the range
of $5 to $10 million. We always thought
we would sell our business one day; but
our sons, Conner and Tanner, went to
school, graduated with their business
degrees, and, to our surprise, both really
wanted to come in to the company. We
changed our whole strategy from selling
to succession planning.
“For the last four years, we’ve been
very deliberate about succession planning.
We hired a coach to help us figure
it out, and read a lot of books while our
sons were learning the trade. For three
summers in college, both of them did the
actual field work. Since they graduated,
they have since been learning everything
Ty and Vickie Eubanks, with son, Connor, owners (with their other son, Tanner, not pictured) of South
Shore Building Services in Commerce, CA
from HR to the accounting side of the
business to managing our crews, safety
training, and customer service and sales.
“My husband Ty and I have very diverse
skills and interests. What has been
great is that I kind of have my part to
do in the business and my husband does
his part. He focuses on operations while
I do marketing. That’s my baby. Never
the two shall meet. That’s when we work
our best.
“We actually have two offices. Two
separate buildings. We in marketing and
client service are actually in one building
and they in operations are in another
building. But on the finances of the company,
we work together through strategic
planning. We’ve always worked together
on that piece.
“Now that there’s four of us, we are
truly a family business right now. One of
the benefits I see is it’s great to share our
values and actually they have become
even more clear and well-communicated
to our customers and employees since
our sons joined the business.
“We’re in the Los Angeles market. It’s
very competitive, and very corporate. We
do only commercial work. Previously, we
didn’t want to project our company as a
‘mom and pop’ shop; so, we have marketed
differently throughout the years. A
lot of people didn’t even know we were
married! Once we became a certain size,
then we felt more comfortable with us
being a husband-and-wife team because
we already had established a corporate
image. But now that we’ve got both the
boys along with us, we are marketing
ourselves as a family-owned business to
these big companies like CB Richard Ellis
and they are eating it up! They love
working with a family business! So, we’re
really proud of working together as a
family and it turns out our customers
love it too. They love that they are working
with the owner’s son on something.
Conner just closed the Getty Museum,
which is three guys full time every day of
the year. That’s a big project!
“Here are a couple things that keep
our family moving forward and focused.
One is that we all pick a business book
to read each month or maybe every two
months and we’re all reading the same
business book together. That’s really
helped us get cohesive on ideas for the
company. I suggest Profit First and Traction
for starters. Then we get together
once a month and we discuss the book
and some of the ideas in it. That’s where
we kind of do our strategic planning.
So once a month it’s a family meeting,
a business meeting, but it’s more about
the values of the company and not so
much about what’s going on day-to-day
in the business. It’s built around reading
a book. I think it just sets you in a positive
mindset, a creative mindset.
continued ...
VOL. 2, NO. 1 | WINTER 2020 | PRESSURE WASH NEWS | 25

IT’S A
FAMILY
AFFAIR
“It doesn’t have to exclusively be
family doing this. You can or should be
doing the same thing with your managers.
Have a book club, read the book,
and get together and talk about it.
“Then once a month, the four of
us always have our financial meeting
together. Ty and I could do it ourselves
but, number one, the boys need
to learn the financials of the company,
and, number two, the meetings are
important to make better decisions
in the areas they are responsible for
based upon the financials of the company.
So together we do our financial
meeting monthly.
“Then, once a year, we do strategy
planning where we actually go somewhere,
stay in a hotel, and we do strategy
planning for the five-year-plan and then
we get down to next year. We will include
our financial goals for the next year but
also select maybe five major priorities
and goals that we want to accomplish
next year. Things like updating your
handbook or hiring new people. Things
that the company needs to accomplish in
the next year. All this keep us on track
and keeps us in sync to move the company
forward.”
ERIK WASEL
“We started in 2012. I had big projects
immediately that had to be successful.
So, my thought was to lean on people
you know and trust in a grassroots situation.
So that’s where the family aspect
came in.
“My daughter, Meagan, worked for
me part-time at the time doing scheduling
and other things. Then, slowly,
my wife came into the business on HR
and marketing. We went from $300,000
to $1.5 million in six months. That’s a
big jump in a very short period. Pretty
quickly we had a dozen trucks on the
road.
Erik and June Wasel with daughter, Meagan Bunch, son-in-law Daniel Bunch (black shirt), and son, Ryan
Wasel (red shirt) of Averus Fire Services in Gurnee, IL
“I like working with family members
and people I can trust. To me, if you
hire an employee, they’re like a renter.
They are not putting in the same effort
as someone who’s got ownership in the
business like family does.
“So now I have my daughter working
for me full-time. She’s the anchor.
She’s the key employee for me. My wife
is now 24/7. My son does all our purchasing
and procurement. And my sonin-law
is now my scheduling supervisor,
who manages a bunch of people in the
office. We went full in on the family style
business! In truth, I tend to be harder on
them because you also don’t have to worry
about the labor laws! (laughs in jest)
“I have 48 other employees. I’ve got
some non-family members who I trust in
key positions that I know have my back.
I find that priceless. When you have a
family business and employ non-family
members, you have to keep the example
set pretty even with how you handle
non-family and family members. I sometimes
struggle with that but it is a key to
running a successful family business. You
have to be ready and willing to discipline
your family employee equally.
“Having worked in the corporate
world myself, I know a lot of employees
don’t like to work for family-owned businesses
because they feel like they have
no opportunity for advancement. As a
result, I kind of go out of my way with
people that I really see talent in, supervisor-level
people, to make them feel like
family. They get the same kind of opportunities,
promotions, and perks that the
key family members have. Because I’ve
personally been that guy who seemed
like I was passed over for a great opportunity
because the boss’ son had come up
for it. Keep that in mind with your staff
so they don’t feel left out just because
they’re not family.
“If my wife wants to talk to me about
the business on the bed pillow, no, I’m
ready to get some sleep. I’ve had an 18-
hour day.
“I actually argue more with my
daughter, who is the office manager.
And, a lot of times, at a certain point,
we’re like ‘let’s stick a pin in it and we will
come back to it.’
“I’m in the field and they’re in the
office, so we actually do get a lot of
separation from each other. Believe it
or not, we all also vacation together, so
we’re actually a lot closer than you might
think. My kids will tell you that most of
continued ...
26 | PRESSURE WASH NEWS | VOL. 2, NO. 1 | WINTER 2020

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to take your business to the next level

IT’S A
FAMILY
AFFAIR
their friends don’t do anything with
their parents at their ages now. But
we vacation together, and even when
we’re at home, we spend a lot of time
together. It’s actually kept us a much
tighter unit. It’s much better than
when I was still working in the corporate
world where I was on the west
coast all the time.”
MARIE REINSEL
“This was a second career for me.
We started this business in 2012. It is
a trick to work together. I was a CFO
in my previous job. I was in charge all
the time. So, working with my husband
was hard. I think the first time
he told me to stop talking to him like
he was one of my employees, that was
eye-opening.
“The first couple years were rough.
He comes in my lanes or sandboxes.
He tends to come in my lane a lot! I’m
not out in the field, so I’m seldom in his
lane. I do all the finance, so he comes in
my lane all the time. I used to take way
more offense to it because I know my
job and I know how to do my job and
previously I wasn’t questioned so much,
particularly on a day-to-day basis. So,
it’s taken a lot for me to learn how to
have those conversations.
“I know some families who run small
businesses have issues. They fight all the
time and can’t have a conversation. To
deal with that, we kind of state upfront
that we are either in ‘husband-wife
mode’ or in ‘business mode.’ Because we
find that when you’re at the dinner table
or when you’re doing laundry or when
Marie and Andy Reinsel, owners A2Z Pressure Washing in Bellevue, OH
you’re lying in bed and one of us brings and my mother will tell you that they
up the business, that tends to clash. He’s never fought. They kept it in. As husband
like ‘are you kidding me?’ Instead, get and wife, we fight a little differently than
your kids out of the house, get in business we fight as business partners. If he and I
mode, and have a scheduled meeting, an disagree on business, you can’t take that
employee meeting, to talk business. home, that’s just a business decision. I’m
“I can transition very quickly from head of finance, he’s the head of sales
husband-wife mode to business mode. and running the business, and you’ve got
My husband doesn’t transition as fast as to agree to disagree sometimes. But that’s
I do. If he’s in husband mode and I bring got to stay in the ‘nine-to-five.’ Not that
up business, the conversation generally anyone in the pressure wash business is
doesn’t go very well. And if he’s in business
mode and I’m in wife mode, same “You can be a family-owned business;
working nine-to-five.
kind of butting heads. But if I say ‘let’s but you cannot run like a family-owned
sit down, I’ve got an hour’s worth of stuff business. You have to run like a corporate
business. You can have that as your
we need to talk about,’ and we schedule
it, we seldom fight when we’re both in advertising hook and certainly people
business mode.
like working with the owner’s son, etc.;
“I remember before Andy and I got but you damn well better be run like a
married, my grandmother told me ‘learn corporate business because when you’re
how to fight.’ My parents got divorced running big accounts, clients expect you
to act like it.
“In a family business, you have to be
really honest too. I’ve seen a couple businesses
where the son is the operations
guy and he’s just not very good at it. If
you were in another business, you would
fire your son. It’s hard if you are the
owner or partners because you have to
be honest with yourself. If your kid is not
the right fit then you’ve got to re-assess
and hire for the right fit for the business
-- not because it’s your son.
“That’s also when you started losing
good employees. When your employees
are telling you that your son is an idiot
and you’re still keeping your son there,
well, that’s when you need to take a step
back and make sure you get the right
person in that job.”
continued ...
28 | PRESSURE WASH NEWS | VOL. 2, NO. 1 | WINTER 2020

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IT’S A
FAMILY
AFFAIR
AC LOCKYER
“Businesses don’t ruin families and
families don’t run businesses. Don’t
use that as a crutch. When people misbehave,
people misbehave.
“Secondly, as a family business,
don’t fall into the pitfall of creating
jobs just to create jobs for family
members. Every job description on
your org chart should be a position
that would exist whether it was a family
member filling it or not. So, if you
fire your brother-in-law or your son or
daughter, it’s a real position, because
you really do have to replace them.
Everybody working in the business
should have purpose. We shouldn’t
just be filling a business with job descriptions
to accommodate family.
“Live by that premise. Then if you
get a chance to bless a friend or a family
member with a good job, I think it’s an
honor. I think it’s an extra jewel in your
crown and I think it’s an honorable thing
to do.
“We recently hired our pastor of 29
years. You want to talk about hiring family!
“Know that you’re not just doing
business with people; you’re doing life
with people.
“We’ve been in business since 1991.
My wife, Karen, was my first assistant
tech. Three months later, she was telling
me how the bleach smell was making
her sick. Well, it wasn’t the bleach, she
had morning sickness. So, she wasn’t assistant
tech for much longer. After that,
she’s always handled the money. And I’ve
always been the marketing guy.
“Our son, AJ, just finished college in
AC Lockyer with wife Karen and son, AJ, of SoftWash Systems in Sanford, FL
May 2019. I had a rough business relationship
with my dad. But I’ve had a
lot of leadership coaching and training
through the years and I learned how to
take ownership of my own actions and
reactions to people. That allowed me to
look at my son and say to him ‘if you
want to come into the business, honestly,
we could really use you.’ He’s got a business
and marketing degree and I’m trying
to pull myself out of the day-to-day
business more and more and become essentially
the ‘vision’ officer. I really need
someone to take over the marketing, take
over the trade shows, and all the travel.
So, it’s a blessing.
THE TAKEAWAY
A lot of family-owned businesses fail
because family members can’t get along
(or don’t learn to get along).
A lot of couples think about going in
to this business together but aren’t sure
if they are a good mix to make it work.
Being successful as a family business
often requires re-negotiating your relationship
as a couple or a parent/child.
In the end, the experts we talked to
felt strongly that despite the hurdles,
operating a family business can actually
lead to stronger family bonds, as well as
better bottom lines.
They also affirmed that family businesses
most often drive families together,
not apart.
Operated the right way, they say
running a family business can be a great
experience and the most fulfilling of professional
endeavors.
Editor’s note: this article is comprised of
comments made during a session at the 2019
conference of the Pressure Washers of North
America (PWNA) annual conference in
Charleston, South Carolina.
continued ...
30 | PRESSURE WASH NEWS | VOL. 2, NO. 1 | WINTER 2020

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