Bill Jarms is still pumping out the work

Nothing like getting tossed into the water to see if you can swim.

That might have been how Bill Jarms felt the day he learned his dad, Ron, was not coming back from vacation. All of a sudden the pump business that was carved from the family's hardware store was all Bill's responsibility.

Ron Jarms ran the pump business from 1972-1991, Bill Jarms said. It was more out of necessity than want.

After a career in retail, Ron Jarms moved from Iowa to Cheney in 1972 when he bought the former Edgett brothers hardware store. "Technically the pump business started fairly early when my dad just bought the store," Bill Jarms said.

Ron Jarms was building a house and needed a pump. "The guy who had been the plumber for the hardware store showed him how," Bill Jarms said.

"He'd sell a pump off the shelf, they'd get in trouble and he ends up going out bailing them out and that's how the pump business started," Bill Jarms said.

When Bill, who just turned 57, was trying to carve his niche in the family business, the new pump venture was a natural, at least in the eyes of his father.

"I came along, he told me 'your brother (Tom) pretty much has the hardware store sewed up but you never know you might be able to make something out of the pump business,'" Bill Jarms said. "To the day he died, I'm not sure who's more surprised, him or me," that the business has taken off as it has.

Jarms laughed when it was suggested that he learned the business through a "flying-by-the-seat-of-your-pants style."

"My dad took me with him six times and then he left on vacation for six weeks," Jarms said. "I thought when he got back from vacation he'd be back on the truck."

It turned out Bill Jarms was wrong. "My first day was his last day, that was it," and Ron Jarms retired from the pump business.

And Jarms said he made all of his mistakes on his own time. "Most people get to work for somebody and make mistakes on their dime," but not for long.

Bill Jarms came close to doubling company income from his first year to the next, he said. "Soon as someone was making the pump business their priority the pump business grew like crazy," he said.

Initially it was Bill Jarms, some part-time workers and his truck but he soon hired a fulltime helper as business continued to boom. His daughter, Anna, runs the office and newly-hired Chad Hewey is a field technician who helps manage a business that was crazy busy this past year.

Because of the drought, work weeks were routinely 65–75 hours a week all summer long, Jarms said. They were so busy that he carried competitors' business cards.

"We gave a lot of work away and they gave a lot of work away," Jarms said. "They send 'em to us and we send 'em to them."

Jarms said it was easy to track how busy they were. "I would say if you went to the weather services website and you followed the temperature graph through July and August that you would follow my sales graphs same way."

The company installs and services pumps in a territory, primarily rural and residential, that stretches both 50 miles west and south of Spokane.

"I've always said that 70 or 80 percent of our work is the same 50-60 scenarios over and over again," Bill Jarms said, referring to how many of his jobs are the same. Problems can be a control box that's gone bad, a defective pressure switch, wiring or the pump itself that has failed.

The business started in the hardware store building, then moved to a building near the former Conoco and in 1995 Jarms said he bought the building the business presently occupies. "So we've been here on First Street for 20 years this fall," he said.

Jarms Pump Service is located at 4 First St. in Cheney. Business hours are Monday - Friday from 8 a.m. - 5 p.m. To contact Jarms, call (509) 235-5584 or visit waterpumpscheney.com

Paul Delaney can be reached at pdelaney@cheneyfreepress.com.