From $1M to $8M: How One HVAC Owner Transformed His Business

Recently I had the chance to visit Craig at Ocean State Air in Portsmouth, Rhode Island, and what I found completely blew me away.

Not just the impressive new facility (though that was stunning), but the business philosophy that took his company from $1 million to $8 million in just 8 years.

Craig started his HVAC company 21 years ago by himself. Today, he runs a 40-person operation with five install crews (expanding to six this month) and a fresh approach to employee motivation.

Here are six lessons on scaling a service business from my conversation with Craig:

"Eight years ago we were doing a million dollars in business," Craig told me. "We were sort of stuck in that $1 million mark until I hired my first sales person."

But it wasn't just adding sales that unlocked the growth. It was how Craig started thinking about his business structure.

Craig looks at each van as a revenue-producing machine. Not just a vehicle, but a complete business unit.

"Now we have vans that are capable of producing or installing one to one and a half million dollars a year," he explained.

Let that sink in. Each van – with the right team and mindset – can generate $1-1.5 million annually. That's more revenue than his entire company was doing just eight years ago.

"The mindset being that I want to get my guys trained up and to a point where each installer or lead has its own business," Craig said.

Instead of thinking about his techs as employees who happen to drive company vehicles, Craig sees each van as an entrepreneurial venture. The van becomes the platform, the tools and team become the means of production, and the lead technician becomes the CEO of their own million-dollar operation.

Craig's goal isn't to manage his team, it's to help them think like business owners.

"I want them to start treating it like their own business," he said. "So we're not managing them as much as far as ‘start at this time,’ ‘do this.’ The more they understand the numbers, the more they can take ownership."

His approach is simple: give them the same financial motivation that drives every entrepreneur. When a technician can see that working efficiently today means starting another profitable job tomorrow, when they understand that 22 productive days per month directly impacts their earnings, that's when the magic happens.

The result? Technicians who push themselves to be efficient not because Craig is watching, but because they can see how it directly benefits their paycheck.

One story Craig shared really stuck with me about the power of understanding gross profit.

As any owner knows, materials get left behind on jobs constantly: "I can't tell you how many times you can see a $25 roll of tape left behind, or half a box of line set, which right now costs $250 to $300," he said.

It adds up fast and eats into margins.

But when technicians understand that leftover materials come directly out of their job profitability, everything changes. Suddenly they're bringing unused materials back to the warehouse manager saying "I don't want this on my job cost."

The transformation is remarkable: technicians who used to think nothing of leaving materials behind now treat every roll of tape and piece of equipment like it's coming out of their own wallet — because it is.

What really gave me goosebumps was Craig's long-term vision.

At 60, he's not looking for an exit strategy to the highest bidder. He wants to sell the company to his employees.

"I want to be the old guy that shows up and just tells war stories," he laughed.

Craig is actively preparing his team for ownership. Each van operates like a million-dollar business unit. His technicians understand gross margins, job costs, and customer satisfaction. They're not just learning how to install HVAC systems, they're learning how to run profitable businesses.

"My goal is that everyone that works for me has the ability to achieve their personal financial goals. The sky's the limit as far as I'm concerned," he says.

As the business has grown, Craig faces the challenge many successful owners know too well: maintaining the personal touch that built the business.

"The unfortunate part is I can't have that personal relationship like I did 21 years ago. I used to know every single thing going on in this company.” Now, it’s impossible to keep across everything. 

His solution? Systematize the customer experience and find ways to maintain his standards at scale.

His team gives customers surveys asking if they were respectful, courteous, and took care of the house. They're trained on the basics: booties on every job, covering floors and beds, parking at the end of the driveway.

But Craig knows the real challenge: "Day one here, everything looks great. You covered all the floors. Day two, are they still as perfect as the first day? It's that consistency. That's the real challenge."

This is where incentives come into play. Craig’s techs aren’t just techs, their CEOs of their unit and they know they’ll be compensated for keeping standards high. 

Craig's team is young. The average age is around 25-26 and most started as apprentices right out of trade school.

His approach to keeping them engaged? A clear progression system from level one through five.

"Someone said that the generation we're on — X or Y or Z, I don't know — but they grew up on Donkey Kong, so they want to know what level they're on," Craig laughed.

Level one starts with the basics: running lines, insulation, cutting holes in walls. Level five is a master tech with 8-10 years of experience. But Craig's expectations are aggressive: apprentices should be able to install a wall mount ductless head by themselves within a year, and ideally be capable of running their own crew within 18 months.

The key to achieving this rapid progression is giving people a clear path forward. Craig remembers his first job, seeing the work chart and knowing exactly where he wanted to go: straight to the top. Now, he offers the same opportunities to his team and the vision becomes the carrot that drives people forward.

Craig cracked the code that most service business owners struggle with: how to scale without losing quality or burning out.

The answer isn't more oversight or tighter controls. It's alignment.

When your people's success is directly tied to the business's success, when they understand the numbers that drive profitability, when they can see a clear path from where they are to where they want to be — that's when the magic happens.

That's when your $1 million plateau becomes the launch pad to $8 million and beyond.