Owners Michelle Snyder Kilday, Scott
Snyder, Ed Miller & David Pickett Have Grown Their Family Business to Over
$16 Million at a Strong Profitability Thanks to Their Relentless Commitment to
Improvement. Now, They’re Using Their Success to Give Back Even More to the
Jacksonville Community.
by Bob Houchin
Residents of Jacksonville, Florida, can’t help but notice this red-and-blue clad, caped crusader all around town. He makes appearances on TV, is splashed across countless service vans and trucks, and most notably is present at seemingly every charitable event imaginable. This masked superhero is, of course, known as Snyderman.
Since 1992, Snyderman has been the mascot of Snyder Heating & Air Conditioning. “When we first started talking about having a mascot, I thought it was a little hokey.” Ed Miller, president of Snyder, said honestly. “Looking back 27 years, I’m so glad we did it. It’s helped tremendously with branding. And people love it!”
Managing Snyderman’s time has become a demanding task, which has fallen upon the shoulders of Vice President of Public Relations Michelle Snyder Kilday. “He has a full schedule,” she said. “He does a lot of parties.” Children, in particular, are attracted to Snyderman—and for good reason. Where he goes, he’s sure to have a bounty of red-and-blue superhero capes to distribute.
“It took us a while to find the right type of cape,” Vice President Scott Snyder said and then burst into laughter. “The first few versions you had to tie. We didn’t want kids hurting themselves if their friends started tugging on them. We finally settled on one with Velcro. It’s been a hit.”
Ed, Michelle, Scott, and David Pickett make up the ownership team of Snyder today. Ask them about the company, and it’s Snyderman and their charitable endeavors they first mentioned. It’s also what they seemed deeply passionate about discussing.
“Lately, we’ve really focused on making our presence in low-income areas where we can bring families some pizza, hand out the capes, and the kids can see our superhero,” Michelle said. “If we can put a smile on kids’ faces, and let them have some fun, that’s what life is all about.”
Snyder Heating & Air Conditioning’s commitment to the city of Jacksonville has become even greater. The ownership group recently launched their own charity, Capes of Comfort. “We’re in over 500 homes a week. Our techs see stuff all the time—people who need help beyond their air conditioning. Maybe their roof is leaking. Maybe they just need a good meal. We’re going to raise money to support those less fortunate,” Ed said with conviction. “This community has given so much to us for so long. We feel like it’s our responsibility to give back.”
Snyder Heating & Air Conditioning has been open for 45 years. “We have customers who’ve been with us for more than 30 years. We have multiple generations who are customers of ours,” Ed said. The company hasn’t grown to more than $16 million in sales at a strong profitability because of a mascot or its community efforts. The business has become one of the largest in Jacksonville, if not the largest, thanks to a standard of excellence established by the company’s founders, and Scott and Michelle’s parents, Bob and Geral Snyder.
Innovators in HVAC
Bob Snyder started in the trades as a young man doing refrigeration, mostly servicing Slurpee machines for convenience stores like 7-Eleven. One of Bob’s customers took notice of his hustle and personality and suggested he go into business for himself. If he did, the store owner said he would give Bob his business. And so, Snyder Heating & Air Conditioning was born in 1973.
Bob’s now late son BJ started in the business in 1981. Scott joined a year later. Michelle waited until 2001. “It was BJ who introduced us to preventative maintenance,” Scott shared. “BJ left for a while and went to work for another company that showed him the opportunity in residential. He brought the concept back to us in 1987. He wanted us to try it. It grew from there.”
David, who serves as the vice president of operations, has been with the company for 32 years. Ed has been at Snyder 30 years. Their friendship with Scott as kids paved their way into the company. “Now, I consider them to be family,” Scott insisted. As a family, they lifted Snyder Heating & Air Conditioning to tremendous heights.
In those early days, these young men, along with Bob and his team, hustled for business. They handed out flyers at grocery stores, scrounging for leads. What money they made, they invested in advertising. The Snyder’s were among the first to sell maintenance contracts and were innovators in telemarketing in the HVAC industry.
“By following that Ron Smith model, we grew—and we grew fast. We jumped to $3 million then to $6 million and then we got to $10 million,” Ed explained. “But then we plateaued. We stayed at that 10-million mark for quite a while, which was okay.”
Ed might have said it was okay, but the tone in his voice told a much different story.
AirTime Reaches Out
Michelle, Scott, Ed, and David wanted more out of the business. Deep down, they knew Snyder could be more. They had the brand and the operational infrastructure. They had tremendous management working under them. Their team knew how to service and sell. Yet growth stagnated.
Then, along came a call from AirTime and Success Group International. The group invited them to a local Profit Day to learn about the program and its offerings. Ed agreed to attend. “It was 2014. We were looking for a silver bullet. We felt like we had the tiger by the tail—we just wanted little things we could add in,” Ed said. “That’s why we joined.”
“Really, we knew AirTime’s history and its place in the industry. And we wanted to compare their model to ours,” Ed continued. “We’ve been incredibly happy with our relationship.”
“When we go to Expos, we always get nuggets,” Scott added. “You always get at least one thing you want to run back to the business and work on. For guys who’ve been doing this a really long time at a high level, that’s valuable.”
Since joining AirTime five years ago, Snyder Heating & Air Conditioning’s sales have increased by at least a million dollars every year. It can be pointed to Michelle, Scott, Ed, and David making subtle, yet impactful tweaks to their already impressive operations.
The Call Center to Drive Snyder’s Growth
Over 20 people operate Snyder Heating & Air’s call center, not including management. When not taking inbound calls, these individuals make outbound calls. At no point do they long for something to do. The call center is tasked with keeping a full appointment log, and they almost always succeed in doing so given the company’s 9,500 Preferred Customer Care Plan members.
“Each person in our call center gets a book of leads for the month. So, whatever they closed that month in the previous year, that’s who they call. They start with the club members; then, they move to other past customers. We try to call everyone twice a year for their maintenance, and each person in the call center is expected to make 150 calls a day.”
“[SGI partner] CallSource has been hugely valuable for our call center,” Ed continued. “We can monitor their calls and their call counts. And they have some great training we use with our call center once a week, so they can get some coaching.”
Snyder’s call-center team members only sell its Preferred Customer Care Plans—never tune-ups exclusively. The base plan retails for $149; however, the call center pitches it for an enticing $45 to get people to enroll. A tune-up alone costs $89.50.
Last year, Snyder began offering auto renewals to their club program, and they implemented a scheduling software that allows plan members to book their next tune-up in six months with their tech. The program even calls or texts a reminder six days prior. Both changes were made with the intent of giving Snyder’s talented call center more time to concentrate on selling new club members, rather than always booking longtime satisfied customers.
“Our call center is incredible,” Ed beamed. “We believe in them, and these few changes we’ve made, it will drive our future growth. We’re excited.”
Build Relationships, Not Quick Sales
Beyond Snyderman, beyond the friendly call-center voices, homeowners have grown to know and love Snyder Heating & Air Conditioning thanks to the consistent, impeccable service delivered daily by its approximately 70 maintenance, service, and install technicians combined and its four comfort consultants.
On every call, homeowners can expect to receive a comprehensive evaluation of their system. They’ll be educated on its condition and be given options to make the best decision for them and their family. “We always will give a replacement option if the equipment is 10 years old and it’s going to cost them over $1,000 to repair. That’s sort of a rule we always abide by,” Ed said. “At that point, a replacement probably makes the most sense—but it’s their call.”
Snyder understands that the investment in a new system can be a challenge for some. They work with a local financing company. “We offer financing on every job, but we don’t get in the middle of it,” Ed said. “We pass it off to this company and they manage it,” Ed explained. Their financing partner always provides a bounty of options that best fits each customer’s circumstances, including facilitating home-equity loans or refinancing if need be.
Whether a new system is sold or not, Snyder stresses the importance of follow up. Unclosed bids are entered in the company’s software and closely monitored by management. Techs and comfort consultants are expected to stay in regular contact with those homeowners. Following maintenance and service calls, the company uses SGI partner pulseM, which allows customers to rate their experience and leave reviews on third-party sites. In the rare instance someone responds poorly, management receives notification on their cell phones, and they address the situation immediately.
“I think people do business with us for a lot of reasons. We’ve been in this community forever. Our building sits on a prime location that gets a lot of daily traffic. Everyone sees our trucks all over town, and we have a healthy marketing budget. We also offer the Daikin product that has a 12-year warranty,” Ed shared.
“I think we have the reputation we have because we are absolutely not high pressure,” Ed stressed. “We look to develop long-term relationships with customers, not quick sales. We’ve been successful with that mindset.”
Get the Right People on the Bus
Superior service can only be performed with the right people onboard. “That’s another thing that AirTime did, it helped us really focus on taking the time needed to recruit the right people,” Ed said. “You have to have the right people on the bus.”
“Yes, we have a much better, tighter process,” David echoed. “It starts the minute someone walks into this office to leave an application. Everybody better be out of their seat to greet them, including me. We want them to see we’re interested. We also want to get an early glimpse at their personality. For example, we ask about their current job. If they start complaining, it’s a no-go right away.”
The vetting process for any applicant typically takes three interviews by three different managers. The managers have a list of questions to ask that have been developed by Michelle. “We’ll start bringing up certain instances or situations they’ve found themselves in,” David explained. “Really, when you start talking to someone, you can get a vibe about them. After a few minutes, you know if this person is going to fit our culture or not and even worth a second interview.”
“We always like to ask people what motivates them,” Michelle added. “Some are driven by money. Others want more family time. Those are things that help us if we decide to hire that person.”
Snyder’s management team also understand that when they have the right person in front of them, they must sell the company. “We make sure they understand that we pay very well. We offer full benefits, vacation, and have a 401K. When they’re here for five years, we give them a free cruise,” David outlined. “We want to make sure they know the difference between working with us, and the other companies in our market. It makes a big difference.”
How to Hire A-Players
Snyder doesn’t lack for applicants, even though they never advertise openings. Their people are their best recruiters. “We always prefer to hire people green to the industry and then train them up,” David stated firmly. “It’s a lot easier to teach someone the Snyder way, rather than try and tell someone who’s been in the trade for 20 years how we expect things to be done. Those people are usually set in their ways.”
Sales and Marketing Manager Tim Wood takes his time to speak to students at a nearby technical school. As a result, he’s developed a relationship with the instructors. It’s not unusual for the best students to be referred to Snyder. “Those are our ideal candidates. They’ve spent money to gain some knowledge. Then, we can train them up even more,” Ed said.
“It’s because of our maintenance department that we can take on so many green people,” he continued. “In a month, with our training, we can have them strong enough technically to run basic maintenance calls. They’ll have a field supervisor coaching them through any questions they might still have.”
Not every maintenance technician is destined for service or install, and that’s okay. That’s a decision for each team member to make. Ideally, Snyder would love to see their maintenance techs want to take that next step. “We never push them. There’s no set timeline. We want them to tell us that they’re ready,” David said. “We want them to be motivated to make more and take more responsibility. We don’t believe you can push people into that.”
“I think we’ve done a really good job of hiring ‘A-players,’ and making sure we bring in only the cream of the crop,” Tim said proudly of his people.
Increased Structure Increases Retention
Hiring great people and keeping them engaged offers another challenge—and one that Michelle, Scott, Tim, and David recognized they needed to address. Technicians who are “A-players,” especially those you mold from the ground up, are valuable. Snyder wants to keep all their team members committed to the business. The only way to do so was to develop a visible pathway for them to grow.
For some time, Snyder has had two field supervisors for both its maintenance and service departments. These gentlemen work in the field, but they also take on the added responsibilities of training techs and being their resource. “Supervisors are incentivized to help others perform,” Ed explained.
AirTime showed Snyder the importance of having job descriptions, detailed responsibilities, and explicit production metrics. Michelle, Scott, Ed, and David realized it needed a bit more internal structure for everyone within the business. “We gave everybody levels within each department. Everybody has three steps to climb, whether it be techs, call-center people, accounting, warehouse, whatever,” Ed shared. “That way everyone can aspire to grow within the company.”
“An entry-level person will start at level one. But they’re going to want to move up, because as they do, they make more,” Ed continued. “We definitely believe by adding these levels we’ve really helped our employee retention. That’s so important in this business.”
Snyder Defines Its Values & Culture
The Snyder ownership team has incredibly aggressive growth goals for the future. The company is at $16 million in sales today, but within five years, they want to hit $30 million. To meet that marker, Michelle, Scott, Ed, and David must continue to refine, tweak, and adjust an already successful business.
“I think one of the biggest things our relationship with AirTime has made us consider is the value of culture. It sounds so cliché at first, but when we took the time to develop core values, you could see it make a difference in our company. You could see our people making an effort to live by them.”
“Really, it’s another way of bringing structure and order to your company,” Michelle emphasized. “They see what we expect from them, but they also see what they can expect from us.”
Michelle, Scott, Ed, and David met with their management team to discuss their core values. Using an easel, everyone wrote words they felt represented Snyder. They started with 20, whittled it down to 10, and finally ended with the acronym I-FUEL. “We felt the words integrity, friendly, understand the value of reputation, exceeding expectations, and loyalty best represented us,” Ed shared.
“Everybody has keychains and business cards with it,” Scott added. “When we have meetings, we ask people to stand up and recite it. We’ve truly made it a part of the business.”
In addition to defining their values, the Snyder ownership team has put an emphasis on personal development to boost company culture. “During the traditionally slower months, October to March, we’ve been giving everyone books to read. We’ve read Who Moved My Cheese, Energy Bus, we just read The Carpenter,” Ed explained. “Every two weeks, we have a little course and talk about the book. The field employees come in and discuss it in the morning; the office discusses it in the afternoon.”
Defining Snyder’s values, investing in personal development, it’s all part of a process to generate the next generation of leaders within the business. It’s those individuals who will provide the added push to this already successful company, so it may enter yet another phase of growth.
“More than just trying to grow the business, we feel like doing these things are important for the team we have here. We want our people to see that we care about them—and that we care about this community we call home,” Michelle said poignantly. “When you work for a place that cares, it makes going to work that much more fun. Then, the growth happens because you work with that much more purpose.”