Technology continues to be a key driver of growth in the pest control industry.

To stay ahead of those advancements, Jason Carpenter, owner of Environmental Pest Management, Columbus, Ohio, has grown his 22-year pest control business by treating close to 1 million apartment units annually, with the help of innovative software and employee training.

EARLY YEARS.

After working for 13 years, Carpenter took a gamble and started his own business by taking out a second mortgage and using $10,000 from his savings to start Environmental Pest Management.

In 2006, a few years into business, Carpenter said he noticed that he could capitalize on the rise of bed bug infestations by focusing on the treatment of the nuisance pest in multi-unit housing properties.

“I had a call that came in from a large property management company,” he said. “[When] I walked into the unit, it was just loaded with bed bugs. I said, ‘Forget this, I’m not doing it.’ When I was walking out, I asked how much the job was going for, and she said $40,000, and then I stopped and said, ‘Why not?’”

Come to find out, the same property manager had 10 other buildings on their property. What was one $40,000 job, turned into many others for Carpenter.

“I kept wondering how many other properties in the area were just like these ones,” he said. “[It turned out] she was just the tip of the iceberg.”

Today, 90% of Environmental Pest Management’s revenue comes from apartments, and 10% comes from residential, Carpenter said.

THE COMPANY NOW.

Business has become a family affair for Carpenter, as his wife, Karen, runs the day-to-day operations, and their eldest son, Brandon, is responsible for managing technicians and the wildlife department.

Along with 75 other employees, Carpenter said it’s vitally important they understand their company’s vision and then align the vision internally to assign roles throughout the company for continued growth.

“If we say our vision is to deliver exceptional experience every time, we need to define what ‘every time’ means,” Carpenter said. “I can’t say I expect our employees to deliver exceptional experiences without telling them what steps to follow in order to do that.”

EFFICIENCY THROUGH TECHNOLOGY.

Starting in pest control in 1990, Carpenter is no stranger to the ways technology has shaped business efficiencies over the years.

He remembered the years before cell phones where he would put a quarter in a pay phone in between services to communicate with co-workers in the office. Additionally, he recalled having to hand-write everything.

As the years passed, he said he was trying to find ways to become more technologically efficient. Then, while attending a seminar, he said he had the idea to create his own pest control software.

“This guy was talking about the software he uses for his HVAC and cleaning company, so I met with him and asked if his software could help with our apartment complexes,” Carpenter said. “We wrote the code together…it’s been 18 years since we’ve had that software and have changed it countless times.”

His in-house software, PestGenius, tracks, records and monitors all of the pest control treatments completed at any one particular property. It shows where the issues are in each unit, what the next steps are for eradication and builds a report from there, Carpenter said. “It pulls files, videos and photos attached to the unit,” he said. “It also allows the managers and owners to pull the information for themselves.”

Carpenter said by utilizing this software for nearly two decades, it’s given Environmental Pest Management a leg up to grow significantly where “nobody else is,” which is through apartment complexes. “We train our employees on more than just how to use the software, but how to interact with the customer and different standard operating procedures for whatever technician is servicing the property,” he said. As the company continues to be in high-growth mode, its three main focuses are efficiencies, resources and training, according to Carpenter. “This has been a big focus of mine, and we want to make it into a video format so we can speed up the training” and use it for future training purposes, he said.