By Andrew P. McCoy and Fred Sargent
Published On July 15, 2022
From the beginning of our visit to ECSI, a subsidiary of Hunt Electric, Bloomington, Minn., there was no doubt we had landed in the midst of a very busy organization that fully aspires to be, as they describe it, “a team of low-voltage electricians, technicians and system integration experts.”
While we have known many executives’ paths lead to traditional electrical contracting companies, we were especially curious about the career path Jerry Hein followed as a founder of ECSI that eventually led him to his current role.
For the benefit of their future success, we think electrical contractors should strenuously seek to redefine their business to encompass the complete gamut of capabilities that their company must be poised to deliver in the coming years.
Take us back to the beginning of your journey that brought you to the head of ECSI, an organization of some 150 people with a steadily climbing trajectory.
I always loved tinkering with electronics. At 12 or 13, I was constantly creating different kinds of circuits on a breadboard. In my late teens, there came a time when I helped a neighbor fix her TV. She suggested that I investigate the technical school that her son had attended. Shortly thereafter, I enrolled and earned a two-year degree. From there I went into a progression of stints in satellite TV, security, fire alarm, data and AV systems. Then I decided to start a business.
Let’s talk about customers’ needs and the changes you see happening in the marketplace that redefine service and maintenance.
The biggest difference is that customers are more open to a service and maintenance plan. After all, every place you go as a personal consumer, they try to sell you an extended warranty. I was in Fleet Farm the other day and they asked me if I wanted to buy a protection plan—on two shovels and a pitchfork!
We also see customers doing more budgeting for their annual service and maintenance costs. They like the idea of anticipating their yearly service and maintenance expenses as fixed costs. They want to “set it and forget it!”