Community Highlights: Meet Dan Hood of D&S Heating and Cooling Ent. Inc.

Today we’d like to introduce you to Dan Hood.

Hi Dan, so excited to have you on the platform. So before we get into questions about your work-life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today?
Fresh out of high school I got a job at Forest City Auto Parts as a part salesman. Worked my way up to store manager of the Rt615 location. They started closing down other locations and so fear of my store being one I resigned and went into HVAC as my best friend suggested. So I started working at Airtron a really large new house construction installation company with service and change out department as well. Within the next 12 years I worked at 5 different companies total before starting my own business, from the few years prior I would get laid off at or around Christmas for a few months. After starting my business we had lived paycheck to paycheck as most people do my age, so very little savings. I would do little advertising on facebook, postcard marketing, made up flyers. In the mix of all this new stuff I had realized if I got caught doing my own work while working at a hvac company I would get fired, so I had to quit. So I got an assistant manager position at Auto Zone in Chardon while I slowly built up my business. Every job I did I deposited the checks, cash into my new business checking account. One embarrassing moment I had going into the bank to make a deposit the branch manager was assisting me and she made a facial expression that showed me she was internally laughing at me because my account balance was probably only a few hundred dollars. Fast forward 2 years working 10 hrs a day 6 days a week at Auto Zone and my business account had gotten over 12k so I put in my 2 week notice, at this time I was the commercial manager, and then they kept asking me to stay one more week twice so I did, but made it official on my wife’s birthday June 10th 2014. I’ve since had 4 past employees and my wife and son both work for me full time with nobody else at this time.

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
We had problems as most hvac companies do keeping busy in the slow seasons. So I knew this before going out on my own as why I told myself I wanted 10k in the account for my payroll. By May of 2015 my account balance only had enough money left for one more paycheck and boom I got a handful of jobs to fill my account again. So it was always a goal to have at least 60k in the account by Christmas so I had enough money for overhead and my payroll to get me to June. My newest job is to keep my son busy enough to keep him happy as my favorite employee.

Thanks – so what else should our readers know about D&S Heating and Cooling Ent. Inc.?
I always try to teach my customers about their hvac systems little bit at a time during my visits to help them get the most of their hvac system. I’m very honest as there are lots of bad hvac people that boldly lie to them, and I only know because these customers tell me what they have been told. One really bad lie, “they don’t make or sell r-22 anymore “ you can buy as many bottles as we want. We specialize in new house construction as I have installed a good 2000 plus hvac systems in many different setups from digging slabs to 4 furnace and ac houses. We do furnace and air conditioner repairs and replacements. We currently only service residential and the Lake County area. We install the top name brand Carrier, and Carrier invented air conditioning.

How do you think about happiness?
I love it when a customer thinks they might need a new furnace, and I come out and clean the flame sensor and the bill for my service was only $88. Easy fix

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.hvaccontractormentoroh.com/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/share/19vTChfx8k/?mibextid=wwXIfr