Billy Gregus built his business almost entirely on commercial HVAC — and he is not looking back. In this episode Derek Cormier sits down with Billy Gregus of Integrity Air to talk about what it really takes to break into commercial and why most contractors are leaving a massive opportunity on the table.

Billy shares how he landed his first commercial accounts, what it took to get in the door with clients like Amazon, and why commercial clients make decisions faster than residential. Nobody is selling warm beers. When an ice machine goes down or a chiller fails the business stops, and that urgency changes everything about how you sell and how fast you close.

They get into the real margins in commercial versus residential, how Billy competes with private equity firms buying up the market, and why the complicated jobs nobody else wants are actually where the money is. Less competition. Better clients. Faster decisions. From ice machines to chillers to full service accounts — Billy's business is growing because he does things other contractors simply cannot or will not do.

If you have ever thought about adding commercial to your business or going all in like Billy did this episode is your roadmap.

What You Will Learn: How to land your first commercial accounts and what actually gets you in the door. Why commercial clients make faster decisions than homeowners. What the margins look like in commercial versus residential. How to compete against private equity without their budget. Why doing the complicated work nobody else will do is your biggest competitive advantage.

Topics Covered: Breaking into commercial HVAC. Landing commercial accounts and service agreements. Getting clients like Amazon. Commercial versus residential margins. Competing with private equity. Ice machines, chillers, and complex commercial equipment. Building a commercial HVAC business from the ground up.

Who This Episode Is For: HVAC contractors who want to add commercial work. Trades owners tired of fighting over the same residential customers. Anyone who wants less competition, better margins, and bigger accounts.

About Escape the One Man Show: Escape the One Man Show is a podcast for contractors and trades business owners who are done being the bottleneck in their own company. Every episode host Derek Cormier breaks down the real tactics, leadership lessons, and culture shifts that helped him build Climate Experts into a multi-million dollar home services business in Florida.

Keywords: How to break into commercial HVAC. Commercial HVAC business growth. Landing commercial accounts. Competing with private equity in HVAC. Ice machine repair. Chiller service. Billy Gregus. Integrity Air. Escape the One Man Show. Derek Cormier. Climate Experts. HVAC business podcast. Contractor podcast. Trades business growth. How to scale an HVAC business.

Billy Gregus built his business almost entirely on commercial HVAC — and he is not looking back. In this episode Derek Cormier sits down with Billy Gregus of Integrity Air to talk about what it really takes to break into commercial and why most contractors are leaving a massive opportunity on the table.

Billy shares how he landed his first commercial accounts, what it took to get in the door with clients like Amazon, and why commercial clients make decisions faster than residential. Nobody is selling warm beers. When an ice machine goes down or a chiller fails the business stops, and that urgency changes everything about how you sell and how fast you close.

They get into the real margins in commercial versus residential, how Billy competes with private equity firms buying up the market, and why the complicated jobs nobody else wants are actually where the money is. Less competition. Better clients. Faster decisions. From ice machines to chillers to full service accounts — Billy's business is growing because he does things other contractors simply cannot or will not do.

If you have ever thought about adding commercial to your business or going all in like Billy did this episode is your roadmap.

What You Will Learn: How to land your first commercial accounts and what actually gets you in the door. Why commercial clients make faster decisions than homeowners. What the margins look like in commercial versus residential. How to compete against private equity without their budget. Why doing the complicated work nobody else will do is your biggest competitive advantage.

Topics Covered: Breaking into commercial HVAC. Landing commercial accounts and service agreements. Getting clients like Amazon. Commercial versus residential margins. Competing with private equity. Ice machines, chillers, and complex commercial equipment. Building a commercial HVAC business from the ground up.

Who This Episode Is For: HVAC contractors who want to add commercial work. Trades owners tired of fighting over the same residential customers. Anyone who wants less competition, better margins, and bigger accounts.

About Escape the One Man Show: Escape the One Man Show is a podcast for contractors and trades business owners who are done being the bottleneck in their own company. Every episode host Derek Cormier breaks down the real tactics, leadership lessons, and culture shifts that helped him build Climate Experts into a multi-million dollar home services business in Florida.

Keywords: How to break into commercial HVAC. Commercial HVAC business growth. Landing commercial accounts. Competing with private equity in HVAC. Ice machine repair. Chiller service. Billy Gregus. Integrity Air. Escape the One Man Show. Derek Cormier. Climate Experts. HVAC business podcast. Contractor podcast. Trades business growth. How to scale an HVAC business.

Most conversations about building a trades business come from people who have never actually done it. Coaches who have never run a truck. Consultants who have never made payroll. Gurus selling masterminds from a stage they bought their way onto.

This is not that.

In this episode Derek Cormier sits down with Texas Medley, a successful multi trade contractor based in Texas, for a real unfiltered conversation about what it actually takes to build a trades company. No theory. No fluff. Just two operators who have made the mistakes, paid the price, and figured out what actually works.

They get into the things nobody talks about publicly. What they wish someone had warned them before they scaled. What they got wrong. What they would never do again. What the gurus are getting wrong about the trades. And what the next five years looks like for independent trades business owners who get it right.

If you are building a trades business and you are tired of advice from people who have never been in the field this episode is for you.

What You Will Learn in This Episode: Most contractors are so focused on what is working for the biggest shops that they completely lose sight of what is actually relevant to where they are right now. Derek and Texas Medley break down the real lessons from scaling a trades business including the mistakes that cost them the most, the vendors and programs they regret, and the moves that actually moved the needle. They also get into the hard conversations about private equity, guru culture in the trades, and whether the industry is doing enough to bring the next generation in.

Topics Covered: What two experienced trades operators wish someone had warned them before they scaled. The biggest mistakes made growing a trades business and what they actually cost. What vendors programs and investments they regret and why. What the trades industry keeps getting wrong about growth coaching and private equity. Why private equity is not buying mom and pop shops and what a real exit actually looks like. What the biggest threat to the independent trades business owner is right now. Whether the trades industry is doing enough to attract the next generation. What the next five years looks like for trades business owners who get it right versus those who do not.

Who This Episode Is For: This episode is for HVAC contractors plumbers and electricians building their own company, trades business owners who want real operator perspective not guru advice, contractors doing one to five million in revenue wondering what the next move is, anyone thinking about getting into the trades who wants an honest picture of what it actually takes, and anyone who has ever paid for coaching or a mastermind and wondered if it was worth it.

About Escape the One Man Show: Escape the One Man Show is a podcast for contractors and trades business owners who are done being the bottleneck in their own company. Every episode host Derek Cormier breaks down the real tactics, leadership lessons, and culture shifts that helped him build Climate Experts into a multi-million dollar home services business in Florida.

Have a question you want answered on the show? Call 321-495-7788 and leave a voicemail. I will play it on an upcoming episode and break it down just like this.

Keywords: Real talk contractors. Trades business owner podcast. How to scale a contracting business. HVAC business owner podcast. Contractor coaching. Private equity trades. Texas Medley. Derek Cormier. Escape the One Man Show. Climate Experts. Contractor podcast. Trades business growth. Home service business podcast. Contractor mistakes. Two trades operators. Guru advice for contractors. HVAC contractor. Plumber business. Electrician business. Contractor life. How to grow a trades business. Trades business leadership. Working on the business not in it. Contractor scaling strategies. Home service marketing. Technician recruiting. Independent contractor growth.

Most contractors gave up on direct mail the moment Facebook ads became a thing. That was a mistake.

In this episode Derek Cormier breaks down why direct mail is still one of the highest ROI marketing channels available to contractors — and why the way most companies are doing it is exactly why it stops working. The problem is not direct mail. The problem is trusting a direct mail company to pull your list for you.

Derek breaks down how to use your own CRM data from ServiceTitan or HouseCall Pro to identify your ideal customer, how to pull targeted prospect lists using Melissa.com, and how to use AI to write personalized letters at scale so every piece feels like it was written by hand. This is not a spray and pray mailer. This is surgical direct mail that actually converts.

If you are handing your list to a direct mail company and wondering why it is not working this episode will change how you think about direct mail entirely.

What You Will Learn in This Episode

Most contractors hand their list over to a direct mail company and let them decide who gets the mail. That is the single biggest reason direct mail underperforms. Derek breaks down how to take control of your own list, target the right households, and write copy that gets a response.

How to pull your ideal customer data directly from ServiceTitan or HouseCall Pro. How to use Melissa.com to build a targeted prospect list based on your best existing customers. Why you should never trust a direct mail company to pull your list for you. How to use AI to write personalized letters at scale without them sounding generic. How to market to your existing customers with direct mail to drive repeat revenue and referrals. Why direct mail and digital marketing work better together than either does alone. Why the contractors ignoring direct mail right now have a massive opportunity to dominate their market.

Who This Episode Is For

This episode is for HVAC contractors who have tried direct mail and given up on it, trades business owners spending too much on digital ads without enough return, contractors who want to lower their customer acquisition cost while targeting better quality leads, and anyone who wants a marketing channel their competitors have abandoned and left wide open.

About Escape the One Man Show

Escape the One Man Show is a podcast for contractors and trades business owners who are done being the bottleneck in their own company. Every episode host Derek Cormier breaks down the real tactics, leadership lessons, and culture shifts that helped him build Climate Experts into a multi-million dollar home services business in Florida. Topics include recruiting in the trades, marketing for contractors, building company culture, leadership for trades business owners, scaling a contracting business, and how to build a business that runs without you.

Keywords

Direct mail for contractors. How to use direct mail to grow a trades business. Contractor marketing strategy. How to pull a targeted mailing list for home service companies. ServiceTitan customer data for marketing. HouseCall Pro customer list for direct mail. Melissa.com prospect list for contractors. How to use AI to write direct mail letters. How to market to existing customers in the trades. HVAC direct mail strategy. Escape the One Man Show. Derek Cormier. Climate Experts. Contractor podcast. Trades business growth. Home service business podcast. How to lower customer acquisition cost with direct mail. Why direct mail still works for home service companies. Old school marketing for contractors.

Cory and Christine from Eco Electric Plumbing and HVAC in Seattle Washington reached out with a question that almost every growing trades business owner is wrestling with right now. How do we attract better technicians, use social media more effectively, and stop spending so much on marketing without losing revenue?

In this episode Derek Cormier, founder of Climate Experts and host of Escape the One Man Show, breaks down the exact social media and marketing strategies he uses to recruit technicians, attract customers, and generate revenue from people who already know and trust the business.

Cory and Christine also share how working with Derek helped them drastically reduce their marketing spend while actually closing more sales. This is not theory. It is what is working right now in the field.

If you are spending too much on marketing and not getting enough from your existing customer base this episode is for you.

What You Will Learn in This Episode: Most contractors are so focused on finding new customers that they completely ignore the ones they already have. Your existing customer base is your most underutilized asset. Derek breaks down how to use social media to recruit technicians without paying for job boards, how to post content that builds trust with both customers and potential hires, how to market to your existing customers to drive repeat revenue, and how to lower your overall marketing spend while actually growing your top line.

Topics Covered: How to use social media to attract and recruit technicians. What to post as a trades contractor to build trust and authority. How to market to your existing customer base and generate more revenue from people who already know you. How to reduce marketing spend without reducing revenue. Why your existing customers are your most underutilized asset. How social media content can replace expensive lead generation channels over time. How to build a recruiting pipeline through organic content. The difference between marketing to cold audiences versus warm existing customers.

Who This Episode Is For: This episode is for HVAC contractors spending too much on marketing with too little return, trades business owners who want to use social media but do not know where to start, contractors struggling to recruit technicians in a competitive market, and anyone who wants to lower their customer acquisition cost while growing revenue from their existing base.

About Escape the One Man Show: Escape the One Man Show is a podcast for contractors and trades business owners who are done being the bottleneck in their own company. Every episode host Derek Cormier breaks down the real tactics, leadership lessons, and culture shifts that helped him build Climate Experts into a multi-million dollar home services business in Florida. Topics covered include recruiting in the trades, marketing for contractors, Facebook ads for home service companies, building company culture, leadership for trades business owners, scaling a contracting business, HVAC business growth, plumbing business growth, electrical business growth, and how to build a business that runs without you.

Keywords: Social media for contractors. How to recruit HVAC technicians on social media. Contractor marketing strategy. How to reduce marketing spend for home service companies. Marketing to existing customers in the trades. How to use social media to grow a trades business. HVAC recruiting strategy. Escape the One Man Show. Derek Cormier. Climate Experts. HVAC business owner podcast. Contractor podcast. Trades business growth. Home service business podcast. How to lower customer acquisition cost. Contractor social media content strategy.

A contractor named Chris Powers from Southern Values Cooling and Heating in Florida called into the Escape the One Man Show hotline with a question every growing trades business owner eventually faces. Should I hire selling techs or comfort advisors?

In this episode Derek Cormier, founder of Climate Experts and host of Escape the One Man Show, breaks down exactly how he thinks about this decision and why getting it wrong at the wrong stage of growth can cost you more than you think.

The answer is not one or the other. It depends entirely on where you are in your business right now.

If you are trying to figure out how to structure your sales team as you grow this episode is for you.

What You Will Learn in This Episode: Most contractors make the mistake of trying to specialize too early. When you are in the early stages of growth you need people who are flexible and can wear multiple hats. A selling tech who can diagnose a problem and present a solution is the right first hire. But as your business matures and your volume grows you need people who are exceptional at one thing. That is where the comfort advisor or what Derek prefers to call a project manager comes in. Someone who does nothing but present solutions, build relationships, and close. The difference in performance between a generalist and a specialist at scale is significant and Derek breaks down exactly when and how to make that transition.

Topics Covered: Why selling techs are the right starting point for most growing trades companies. How to identify employees who can play multiple roles as you scale. When your business is ready to bring on a dedicated comfort advisor or project manager. Why Derek prefers the title project manager over comfort advisor. The difference in mindset between a technician who sells and a person who specializes in presenting solutions. How specialization improves performance and average ticket at scale. Why trying to build a specialized sales team too early creates more problems than it solves. How to structure your team so techs and project managers work together effectively. What to look for when hiring your first dedicated comfort advisor.

Who This Episode Is For: This episode is for HVAC contractors wondering whether to hire selling techs or comfort advisors, trades business owners building out their first sales team, contractors doing one to five million in revenue trying to figure out the right structure, and anyone who has ever felt like their techs are leaving money on the table on every call.

About Escape the One Man Show: Escape the One Man Show is a podcast for contractors and trades business owners who are done being the bottleneck in their own company. Every episode host Derek Cormier breaks down the real tactics, leadership lessons, and culture shifts that helped him build Climate Experts into a multi-million dollar home services business in Florida. Topics covered include recruiting in the trades, marketing for contractors, Facebook ads for home service companies, building company culture, leadership for trades business owners, scaling a contracting business, HVAC business growth, plumbing business growth, electrical business growth, and how to build a business that runs without you.

Keywords: Selling techs vs comfort advisors. Should I hire a comfort advisor. HVAC sales team structure. How to build a sales team in HVAC. Selling technician vs project manager. When to hire a comfort advisor. HVAC business sales strategy. How to increase average ticket in HVAC. Escape the One Man Show. Derek Cormier. Climate Experts. HVAC business owner podcast. Contractor podcast. Trades business growth. Home service business podcast. How to scale a contracting business. HVAC comfort advisor. Trades sales team. How to grow an HVAC sales team.

A plumber getting his master's license next month reached out on Instagram with a simple question. If you had to start all over, knowing what you know now, how would you approach it?

In this episode Derek Cormier, founder of Climate Experts and host of Escape the One Man Show, breaks down exactly what he would do differently if he were building a contracting business from scratch today. This is not textbook advice. This is 14 years of real operator experience distilled into the things nobody tells you when you are starting out.

From branding to budgeting, pricing strategy to differentiation, hiring your first person to finding the right mentors, Derek covers every critical decision a new contractor faces and the order in which they actually matter.

If you are starting a contracting business or you are in year one trying to figure out if you are doing it right, this episode is for you.

What You Will Learn in This Episode:Most new contractors skip the most important step entirely. They throw a name on a truck and start chasing jobs before they have a brand, a budget, or a plan. Derek walks through the exact mindset shift that separates tradespeople from business owners, why most trades companies fail at this transition, and the specific decisions in the first year that determine whether your business scales or stays stuck.

Topics Covered:Why your mindset has to change before anything else does. How to build a brand that does not limit your growth. Why you should never put your name or your city in your business name. How to build a real year one budget. Why trying to make money on every job early on is the wrong strategy. How to use loss leaders and lifetime customer value to grow faster. How to differentiate yourself in a crowded market. Why you should study one to three million dollar companies instead of the fifty million dollar shops. Why hiring outside vendors before you understand your own business is one of the fastest paths to failure. When to hire your first person and how to plan it strategically. Why you need to always be training your replacement.

Who This Episode Is For:This episode is for plumbers electricians and HVAC contractors starting their first business, trades business owners in year one wondering if they are on the right track, contractors thinking about leaving their job to go out on their own, spouses and partners launching a business together in the trades, and anyone who has ever wondered what they would do differently if they could start over.

About Escape the One Man Show:Escape the One Man Show is a podcast for contractors and trades business owners who are done being the bottleneck in their own company. Every episode host Derek Cormier breaks down the real tactics, leadership lessons, and culture shifts that helped him build Climate Experts into a multi-million dollar home services business in Florida. Topics covered include recruiting in the trades, marketing for contractors, Facebook ads for home service companies, building company culture, leadership for trades business owners, scaling a contracting business, HVAC business growth, plumbing business growth, electrical business growth, and how to build a business that runs without you.

Keywords:How to start a contracting business from scratch. What I wish I knew before starting a trades business. Trades business branding. Contractor business plan. Loss leader strategy for contractors. How to differentiate your contracting business. How to find a mentor in the trades. Best books for contractors. How to hire your first employee as a contractor. How to build leaders in a contracting business. Escape the One Man Show. Derek Cormier. Climate Experts. HVAC business owner podcast. Contractor podcast. Trades business growth. Home service business podcast. How to scale a contracting business. Starting a trades business with your spouse.

You built a business, but you're still acting like an employee. If you're the owner and you're still running a truck, you are the most expensive technician on your payroll — and your company is paying the price for it.

In this episode Derek Cormier, founder of Climate Experts and host of Escape the One Man Show, answers a real question from a contractor who called in doing $1.5 million in revenue and asked the two questions every growing trades owner eventually has to face. When do I get out of the truck? And when do I hire my first manager?

Derek breaks down exactly how he thinks about both decisions and why getting out of the field as fast as possible is one of the highest leverage moves a trades business owner can make.

If you are still running a truck in your own company this episode is for you.

What You Will Learn in This Episode: The difference between owner tasks and technician tasks is not just a title — it is a dollar value. You can hire a technician. You cannot hire someone to build your company. The longer you stay in the field the longer your business stays stuck at the ceiling you personally can reach.

Derek walks through the real math behind why owner time is worth exponentially more to the business than field time, why most contractors stay on the truck longer than they should, and exactly what the trigger point is for bringing on your first manager — and it is not just about revenue.

Topics Covered: When to get out of the truck as a trades business owner. How to stop being the highest paid technician in your own company. When to hire your first manager in a contracting business. The difference between owner tasks and technician tasks. Why your business growth is capped when you are in the field. How to transition out of the truck without losing revenue. What high value owner work actually looks like. When your infrastructure is ready to support a manager. How to think about labor cost vs owner opportunity cost. Real advice for contractors doing $1 to $2 million in revenue. How to start working on the business instead of in it. What happens to your ceiling when you stay in the field too long.

Who This Episode Is For: This episode is for HVAC business owners still running a truck, plumbing contractors doing it all themselves, electrical contractors ready to scale, trades business owners stuck between field work and growth, contractors doing $500k to $2 million wondering what the next move is, and anyone who started a business but is still operating like an employee.

About Escape the One Man Show: Escape the One Man Show is a podcast for contractors and trades business owners who are done being the bottleneck in their own company. Every episode host Derek Cormier breaks down the real tactics, leadership lessons, and culture shifts that helped him build Climate Experts into a multi-million dollar home services business in Florida.

Keywords: When to get out of the truck as a contractor. How to stop being the highest paid technician. When to hire your first manager in a trades business. Owner tasks vs technician tasks. How to scale a contracting business. HVAC business owner podcast. Contractor podcast. Escape the One Man Show. Derek Cormier. Climate Experts. How to grow a trades business past $1 million. Trades business leadership. Working on the business not in it. How to transition out of the field. Contracting business growth. Home service business podcast. One man show contractor. Trades business systems. HVAC company growth. Plumbing business growth. Electrical contractor growth. Small business trades podcast. How to hire a manager in the trades. Contractor scaling strategies.

Recruiting in the trades is broken. Most contractors are posting a job ad, crossing their fingers, and wondering why they keep getting the wrong people through the door. In this episode Derek Cormier, founder of Climate Experts and host of Escape the One Man Show, breaks down exactly how he recruits great technicians, what most contractors are doing wrong, and the mindset shift that changed everything. If you are tired of settling for whoever shows up this episode is for you.

What You Will Learn in This Episode:

Most trades business owners treat recruiting like an afterthought. They wait until they are desperate, post a generic job listing on Indeed, and hope for the best. The problem is the best technicians are not sitting around browsing job boards. They are already working somewhere. Your job is not to post and pray. Your job is to build a company that people want to come work for and then go find them.

Derek breaks down the exact recruiting process he uses at Climate Experts in Melbourne Florida, a multi-million dollar HVAC, plumbing, and electrical company he built from one truck to a full team over 14 years. This is not textbook advice. This is what actually works in the field when you are trying to grow a trades business in a competitive market.

Topics Covered:

How to recruit HVAC technicians. How to recruit plumbers. How to recruit electricians. How to find skilled tradesmen in a tight labor market. Why most contractors fail at recruiting and what to do instead. How to use Facebook ads for recruiting in the trades. How to build a company culture that attracts top talent. What great technicians are actually looking for in an employer. How to stop relying on word of mouth and build a real recruiting pipeline. The difference between hiring out of desperation and hiring with a strategy. How to compete with larger companies for top trade talent. Why your culture is your biggest recruiting tool. How to onboard new technicians the right way so they stick around.

Who This Episode Is For:

This episode is for HVAC business owners, plumbing contractors, electrical contractors, home service business owners, trades business owners, contractors looking to grow their team, contractors tired of high turnover, small business owners in the trades, one man show contractors ready to scale, and anyone who has ever hired the wrong person and paid the price for it.

About Escape the One Man Show:

Escape the One Man Show is a podcast for contractors and trades business owners who are done being the bottleneck in their own company. Every episode host Derek Cormier breaks down the real tactics, leadership lessons, and culture shifts that helped him build Climate Experts into a multi-million dollar home services business in Florida. Topics covered on this podcast include recruiting in the trades, marketing for contractors, Facebook ads for home service companies, building company culture, leadership for trades business owners, scaling a contracting business, HVAC business growth, plumbing business growth, electrical business growth, home service marketing, technician training, sales for comfort advisors, and how to build a business that runs without you.

Keywords:

How to recruit HVAC technicians. Trades business recruiting. Contractor recruiting strategies. How to hire plumbers. How to hire electricians. HVAC business owner podcast. Contractor podcast. Home service business podcast. Escape the One Man Show. Derek Cormier. Climate Experts. How to grow a trades business. HVAC company growth. Plumbing business growth. Electrical contractor growth. Recruiting for home service companies. Facebook ads for contractors. Building company culture in the trades. How to scale a contracting business. One man show contractor. Trades business leadership. HVAC recruiting. Technician recruiting. Home service recruiting. Contractor growth podcast. Small business trades podcast. How to stop being the one man show. Trades business systems.