These guides are written for plumbing owners who would rather run the business on numbers than on gut feel. Each one teaches a method you can use this week with your own records, whether or not you ever work with us. They build on one another: price properly, hire deliberately, then track the whole business weekly.
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Hiring plumbers and apprentices in Canada: an owner's playbook
Treat hiring as a system you run all year: define the role, make the company easy to find and easy to apply to, score every candidate the same way, verify certification with the provincial body, and plan the first 90 days.
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The weekly scorecard every plumbing owner should run
A weekly scorecard of about ten numbers, each with an owner and a target, tells a plumbing owner whether the business is healthy weeks before the bank balance does. This guide shows which numbers to pick and how to run the review.
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How to set a plumbing labour rate that actually covers your costs
A plumbing labour rate should be calculated from four inputs: annual overhead, direct labour cost, billable hours and target profit. This guide walks through the method, two worked examples and the mistakes that quietly drain margin.
How to set a plumbing labour rate
What it teaches: how to calculate a labour rate from four inputs, namely annual overhead, the burdened cost of each plumber, honest billable hours and target profit, and how to turn that rate into flat-rate prices.
Who it is for: any owner whose rate was last set years ago, or was borrowed from a competitor, and who feels busy but underpaid. It includes two worked examples, a two-plumber shop and a six-plumber company, and shows why better billable hours can be worth as much as a price rise.
Read how to set a plumbing labour rate. The related service is pricing and profit consulting.
Hiring plumbers and apprentices in Canada
What it teaches: recruiting as a year-round system: writing a role scorecard, building a careers page that persuades licensed plumbers, using several recruiting sources, interviewing consistently, verifying certification with the provincial body, and planning the first 90 days.
Who it is for: owners turning work away because they can't staff it, and companies losing apprentices in their first year. It is careful about where business guidance ends and employment-law advice begins.
Read the hiring playbook. The related service is hiring and team structure.
The weekly owner scorecard
What it teaches: which ten numbers tell a plumbing owner whether the business is healthy, where each number comes from, how to set targets from an annual goal, and how to run a 30-minute weekly review that ends in actions rather than discussion.
Who it is for: owners who find out how the year went from their accountant, and teams that want a shared picture of what "good" looks like each week. It includes a sample scorecard with three numbers flagged for action, and what to do about each.
Read the weekly owner scorecard. The related service is growth planning.
How to use these guides
Reading is the easy part. The value comes from working through one guide with your own figures. A suggested order:
- Week 1: pull last year's profit and loss statement and run the labour-rate calculation. Compare the result with what you charge.
- Week 2: pick your ten scorecard numbers, find where each one lives and fill in the last four weeks.
- Week 3: write a role scorecard for your next hire, even if you aren't recruiting yet.
- Week 4: hold your first 30-minute scorecard review and agree one action per red number.
By the end of a month you will know your real cost per billable hour, have a baseline for the business and have a clear picture of the next role you need.
What the guides won't do
The guides are business guidance for plumbing owners, not technical or professional advice. They don't cover plumbing methods, codes or permits; those belong with your licensed plumbers and your provincial or territorial regulator, listed on our region pages. They don't replace an accountant, an employment lawyer or an HR professional either, and they say so where it matters.
Every figure in the guides is illustrative and labelled that way. Your own invoices, call logs and timesheets are the only numbers that matter for your company.
When to ask for help
Some owners use the guides alone and never need us, which is fine. Others find that the calculation is easy but the change is hard: raising prices without losing the office's confidence, recruiting while running jobs, or keeping a weekly meeting alive. That is where a consultant earns their fee.
If you want a second pair of eyes on your numbers, see our services and pricing, or call, text or email to book the free first conversation.
Frequently asked questions
Are these guides free to use?
Yes. They are written so an owner can apply them alone. If you want help applying them to your own numbers, the first 30-minute consultation is free for eligible trades businesses.
Which guide should I read first?
The labour rate guide, in most cases. Pricing affects every job, and the other two guides assume you know what an hour of your company's time costs.
Do the guides include legal or tax advice?
No. They are business guidance only. Where a topic touches employment law, privacy, advertising rules or tax, the guides point you to the official source or suggest a qualified professional.