BAVCO Doing One Thing…
Very, Very Well
“It’s better to do one thing well than 10 things with mediocrity.”
Doing One thing Very, Very Well
Someone once said “it’s better to do one thing well than 10 things with mediocrity. The folks at BAVCO live by that credo. You see, BAVCO’s sole focus is on backflow prevention assemblies (BPA) and the specialized contractors that test and repair those BPA. And that is something they do very, very well. Stocking parts, complete new assemblies and packaging those with a healthy dose of knowledge and expertise, all aimed at serving their customers, is BAVCO’s business.
Since BPA were developed in the mid 1900’s and widely deployed after the second world war (see the History of Backflow Prevention Assemblies at the bottom of this page), around 3,000 different models by many different manufacturers have hit the market. A few of the early companies are still manufacturing devices today while others have gone by the wayside as new manufacturers came on the scene. The challenge for contractors who certify and repair BPA is to quickly and easily find parts for any one of the thousands of models still in manufacture today. That’s where BAVCO comes in; BAVCO stocks every part for every BPA in service today.
BAVCO stocks every part for every BPA in service today.
Quickly Supplying Even Hard to Find Parts
A recent visit to BAVCO’s headquarters in Long Beach, CA provided SouthernPHC Magazine the opportunity to see the operation firsthand.
BAVCO receives, picks and ships every one of approximately 160 orders everyday if the order is received by 3pm. That goes for any state in the union. BAVCO fills orders for the west coast directly out their Long Beach headquarters and from San Antonio TX or Charlotte NC for points east. For any area, parts orders placed by 3 pm are delivered to the contractor’s business in one or two days, Monday-Friday.
What this means for the contractor is that he or she can have a single source for any part for any serviceable backflow prevention assembly regardless of when it was manufactured or who the manufacturer is as long as it is still currently being made by the original manufacturer (OEM). Jim Purzycki is quick to point out that if a contractor gets called out to service a BPA that was manufactured in 1948 then it’s possible he won’t have the part…nor will anyone…but he has made a point of trying to keep that situation from ever occurring.
Case in point, when manufacturers have gone out of business, BAVCO has deliberately purchased all remaining parts inventory before that manufacturer closed their doors. “I have many, many parts in our inventory that I know I will never sell,” says Purzycki, “but, there’s always that chance one of my customers may need one of those obscure parts and I don’t want to disappoint them.”
Indeed, walking through BAVCO’s warehouse Jim points to a number of large pallets of parts that will likely never be sold. It would be expected that when an order does finally come in for some obscure part from a long-ago forgotten brand, BAVCO would markup the sales price of that impossible-to-find part to make up for the cost of holding that part in inventory for, potentially, decades. “No,” says Purzycki, “we sell an obscure, rare part out the door for the same price it was when it came in the door… no matter how long we’ve had it.” “I remember how unhappy it made me when a supplier did that to me (marked up a hard-to-get part) when I was an active plumber (Purzycki still maintains his plumbing license) and I’m not going to do that to my customer.”
“I have many, many parts in our inventory that I know I will never sell, but there’s always that chance one of my customers may need one of those obscure parts and I don’t want to disappoint them. We sell an obscure, rare part for the same price it was when it came in, no matter how long we’ve had it.”
Becoming Backflow Experts
That point brings us to how BAVCO got started in the first place. Purzycki’s dad offered BPA testing and repair as one of the services of his Plumbing contracting company, Louis Niez Plumbing, which he established in 1952 after moving to Los Angeles from Michigan. Young Purzycki dug ditches and the such for his dad (he calls it “indentured servitude” that comes with a family business) and by the 1960’s, as his dad’s company branched into a the new field of backflow prevention assembly testing and repair, he was tasked with tearing down and rebuilding the assemblies his dad would bring back from the field. Young Purzycki earned his keep that way but also learned enough about BPA to pass the certification examine at age 17 …at a time when the minimum age in CA was 18.
Before long, the Purzyckis gained a reputation for fixing the assemblies and friends and friendly competitors would call to ask for a part or an entire kit which they would sell them. Young Purzycki appealed to his dad to begin stocking parts, which typically would take 2-3 weeks for delivery, in order to better serve his customers and his competitor friends to reduce the amount of time required to fix the assemblies. His dad agreed and that segment of the business continued to grow.
Soon Purzycki started thinking this could be a formula for a side business. But he may have been the only one. Backflow manufacturers discouraged him telling him it was not a sustainable business model. Still, he persisted and by 1977 he had established BAVCO to sell repair parts and the needed accessories.
Today, BAVCO is 35 employees strong and serves a loyal and growing client base from coast to coast.
Those 35 employees, which includes 4 sons and 3 nephews, are well versed in all things backflow. BAVCO sees itself not only as supplier for their contractor customers but as a valuable informational resource for them as well. The company website features hours of company-produced “How To” instructional videos for the trade.
Additionally, everyone taking phone orders has a deep knowledge of the intricacies of rebuilding and repairing BPA. They will counsel contractors to sort through problems they are encountering with the goal of shipping exactly the right part the first time. Says Purzycki, “I sometimes think some of my competitors make their money off their returns (through restocking fees) but we don’t regularly charge restocking fees. We know the added cost to the contractor, and to us, if he orders the wrong part so we go above and beyond to make sure we are selling them the correct part they need…instead of the one they ‘think’ they need.”
Jim Purzycki of BAVCO
A backflow prevention assembly ready to be shipped by BAVCO
The BAVCO warehouse is well organized and tidy.
A backflow prevention assembly on display at BAVCO.
The folks at BAVCO ship every one of approximately 160 orders each day if the order is received by 3 p.m.
Quickly Supplying Even Hard to Find Parts
A recent visit to BAVCO’s headquarters in Long Beach, CA provided SouthernPHC Magazine the opportunity to see the operation firsthand.
BAVCO receives, picks and ships every one of approximately 160 orders everyday if the order is received by 3pm. That goes for any state in the union. BAVCO fills orders for the west coast directly out their Long Beach headquarters and from San Antonio TX or Charlotte NC for points east. For any area, parts orders placed by 3 pm are delivered to the contractor’s business in one or two days, Monday-Friday.
What this means for the contractor is that he or she can have a single source for any part for any serviceable backflow prevention assembly regardless of when it was manufactured or who the manufacturer is as long as it is still currently being made by the original manufacturer (OEM). Jim Purzycki is quick to point out that if a contractor gets called out to service a BPA that was manufactured in 1948 then it’s possible he won’t have the part…nor will anyone…but he has made a point of trying to keep that situation from ever occurring.
Case in point, when manufacturers have gone out of business, BAVCO has deliberately purchased all remaining parts inventory before that manufacturer closed their doors. “I have many, many parts in our inventory that I know I will never sell,” says Purzycki, “but, there’s always that chance one of my customers may need one of those obscure parts and I don’t want to disappoint them.”
Indeed, walking through BAVCO’s warehouse Jim points to a number of large pallets of parts that will likely never be sold. It would be expected that when an order does finally come in for some obscure part from a long-ago forgotten brand, BAVCO would markup the sales price of that impossible-to-find part to make up for the cost of holding that part in inventory for, potentially, decades. “No,” says Purzycki, “we sell an obscure, rare part out the door for the same price it was when it came in the door… no matter how long we’ve had it.” “I remember how unhappy it made me when a supplier did that to me (marked up a hard-to-get part) when I was an active plumber (Purzycki still maintains his plumbing license) and I’m not going to do that to my customer.”
How to make Money in Backflow Testing
Although it varies by market, generally backflow prevention assemblies require annual testing and, as they wear out, will need a rebuild every 5 years or so to return it to its original factory specifications. Contractors are charging anywhere from $20 to $100 for performing these tests. Is this a potential new revenue stream for your company? Maybe. First, it depends on your customer mix. Since testable BPA’s are primarily required in diverse commercial plumbing applications, there is very little need for the installation of a BPA in residential plumbing systems. But if your customer base is primarily commercial then this is a service that might be worth pursuing for your company. There are some caveats. Certification for backflow testing is not easy to obtain. It requires a student to attend a minimum 40-hour training course either one night per week for a semester at your community college or a dedicated week-long class. Cost runs roughly $900-$1,500 for the class. Then you have to pass the exam and purchase approximately $1,000 worth of tools. The main caveat, however, is that certification follows the person…not the company. So, if you send your best employee to school for a week you can only offer backflow testing and certification as long as that employ remains on your payroll and is the one doing the testing. Additionally, the certification class teaches all about backflow theory and test procedures, but very little on how to repair the over 3,000 different types of assemblies in the field. So, when it comes time to repair or rebuild these assemblies, you have to turn to the manufacturer for guidance (if the product is still being manufactured) or find a school like the University of Florida TREEO Center that offers such training or, alternatively, rely on third party resources. BAVCO offers an extensive library of training videos that are free and online. Fortunately, as a contractor, you’re likely to find a commonality of the different assemblies used within your market so you likely won’t encounter all 3,000 different models in your area…but it remains a challenge to be considered if you’re looking at entering the field. On the plus side, the need to assure backflow prevention is a field that can only grow. Though not required on residential installations, we might only be one catastrophic event away from new regulations that will require this level of protection on every home.
A Brief History of Backflow
Plumbing contractors sometimes run into customers that believe backflow prevention assemblies are yet another example of government overreach. Plumbers understand that the plumbing trade is not just about running pipes and moving water but it’s one trade that is at the core of maintaining the health of our nation’s citizens. Backflow prevention assemblies are a key element to that end-goal but it wasn’t so long ago that we didn’t have a full understanding of that.
At the bottom of the Great Depression, the 1933 World’s Fair in Chicago was billed as “The Century of Progress” and was to provide people a “glimpse of a happier, not-too-distant future, all driven by innovation in science and technology.” There were over 39,000,000 paid admissions to the fair. Between June and November 1933, however, over 1,000 people, visiting the fair from all across the country came down with what was thought to be a severe case of food poisoning which ultimately killed 98 people. Thanks to the investigative work of one man, Joel Connolly of the Chicago Bureau of Sanitary Engineering, the outbreak came to an end when it was discovered that what was thought to be food poisoning, the usual excuse at the time, was actually amoebic dysentery caused by defective plumbing which had permitted sewage to contaminate drinking water in two hotels, the Auditorium Hotel (no longer in existence) and the Congress Hotel which still operates today on Michigan Avenue. This high profile example, the first of its kind, showed that the plumbing fixtures themselves could cause a cross-connection which could carry a contaminant into the drinking water supply of a municipality with serious consequences. There had been growing awareness of the problem for decades. As far back as the late 1800’s, business owners in Massachusetts were complaining about employees missing work due to food poisoning. In reality, the textile mills were cross connecting the fresh water drinking supply when they introduced river water to their systems to run their cotton and dye processes and creating a contamination in the process. In 1910 an awareness of these hazards sparked engineers to develop early national Plumbing Codes. Other events moved us closer to a full understanding. In the 1920’s, ships from all points of the globe would come into Los Angeles port and take on water. Due to differences in pressures between the ships and the municipal water system the LA municipal water supply was contaminated by these ships.
So, while there was an emerging understanding of “pressure contamination” it was the 1933 Chicago Worlds Fair episode that brought “fixture cross contamination” to the forefront. Although progress was delayed by the onset of WW II by the late 1940s backflow preventive measures commonly called cross-connection control was understood as a necessity.
Moving forward three decades, despite great strides in improving our municipal water supplies, fully 14% of the country’s drinking water supply still was considered “harmful to the health of the citizens”. In 1974, the EPA was established first to clean up the nation’s air but secondly to clean up the nation’s water supply. They developed the first “recipe” for clean drinking water on a national level and backflow prevention remains a crucial piece of the puzzle.