Down-Selling for Success

2 OCTOBER 2017 – “Would you like fries with that?” Now there’s an idiom that represents the traditional upsell strategy for business success. Your customers come to your store asking for A, and your sales guy is trained to convince them that they would be much happier with A+. Or maybe they suggest that the customers should consider purchasing B and C to go along with that A. Either way, the theory goes, you come out a winner because the upsell got your customers to spend more than they had originally planned.

While that strategy may be fine when you’re selling a happy meal, it could have dire consequences for an HVAC business. In fact, Jerry Zickefoose, the comfort advisor at Leitch Heating and Air Conditioning has found great business success doing just the opposite – actually down-selling his customers.

Here’s how down-selling works…

In early Summer, Maryland-based contractor Leitch Heating and Air Conditioning got a call from Rose, a homeowner who was concerned her air conditioner was simply ineffective at cooling her entire home. A Leitch service tech came out to her Prince Frederick, Maryland townhouse to assess the situation and found that the upstairs was indeed much hotter than the rest of the house. He took pictures using an infrared camera that clearly showed uneven temperatures throughout the structure. When the tech returned to the office, he shared the photos and explained to Jerry that Rose was looking for a larger air conditioner – one that could effectively cool her entire home.

No matter how big a system they installed, I knew the upstairs would remain unbearably hot until they fixed the ductwork. So that’s what I suggested they do.”

Jerry explained to them how leaks in the ductwork kept treated air from reaching its intended destinations and how those same leaks could also be responsible for excessive energy bills and poor indoor air quality. He also told them about a new method of sealing ductwork called aerosealing, that worked from the inside to find and seal leaks throughout the entire duct system.  He said he was sure the final results would fix the problem – and do it all for a fraction of the cost of purchasing and installing a bigger air conditioning unit.

“In a way, they were reluctant to believe me,” said Zickefoose. “They had gotten estimates from other HVAC businesses in town that all told them they needed a new system. I guaranteed them that this wasn’t the case.”

So Rose and her husband scheduled a duct sealing appointment for the following week at which time the Aeroseal team at Leitch arrived ready to roll. With the AC unit in the garage, the team backed up their truck into the driveway and began setup. Using the wireless Aeroseal system, there was no need to unload equipment. Instead, a long flexible tube connected the sealing system in the truck directly to a temporary hole cut into the exposed ductwork coming from the AC unit. With all of the vents in the house temporarily blocked with foam plugs, the next step would be to flip a switch that sends a mist of sealant into the duct interior.

“We block the vents so that the only way air could escape the ductwork would be through the leaks,” explained Zickefoose. “This drives the sealant spray to the holes. Unfortunately, when we first began blowing the sealant into the ducts, we weren’t creating enough pressure inside the ductwork to do the job.”

It was clear to Jerry that somewhere between the air conditioner and the vents, the ductwork was broken. There was a gap somewhere along the route that was so big that pressurizing the duct system proved impossible. After a bit of observation, and a bit more thinking, Jerry believed he knew exactly where they would find the problem.

With the confidence that comes from years of experience, Jerry cut a 2’ x 2’ hole in the drywall where he thought the broken ductwork would be found. And like Captain Hook following a treasure map where X marked the spot, there, just inches from the incision point, they found that the original contractors forgot to cap the end of a trunk line.

After an easy fix, they turned on the sealing equipment again and found that even with the trunk capped tight, the computerized aeroseal system indicated that there was still more than 500 CFM of leakage in the duct system – the total equivalence of a single 95.6 square inch hole.

“So we flipped the switch that sent sealant into the ductwork and watched the monitor to see the leakage rate drop lower and lower,” said Zickefoose. “Twenty minutes later, we finished sealing with a final leakage rate of just 13.3 CFM.”

With the job finished, the Leitch crew quickly packed up and headed off to their next project. Later that evening, Jerry called Rose to see how she was doing.

“She told me the difference was obvious,” said Zickfoose. “She said there was immediate relief and that fresh cool air was blowing out of the upstairs registers like never before.”

Jerry called again several weeks later. Rose told him that the difference was night and day. Not only are her upstairs rooms now cooler and really comfortable for the first time since owning the house, but she said that she now sets the thermostat much higher in the summer months and the air conditioner still cycles on a lot less often.

She also thanked Jerry for solving a problem that she and her husband once thought was impossible to fix. She said that she and her husband were now a Leitch customer for life and that she had already recommended Jerry and Aeroseal to family, friends and neighbors.

And Jerry…he’s happy when he can down-sell. It’s turning out to be the most profitable strategy he could ever hope for.

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