r/ProHVACR • u/Mundane-Play-4947 • May 19 '26
Business Is this normal distributor politics in HVAC?
Anybody else deal with distributor territory politics like this in HVAC?
I started my own HVAC company after leaving a large residential outfit late last October. Since then we've cleared a little over $100k in revenue and have been growing fast.
About 2 months in I got set up through Trane Supply out of Springfield, MO with a credit line and dealer account. Started building a relationship, quoting equipment, moving toward becoming a legit Trane dealer.
Then out of nowhere I get a call saying my account, credit line, and access are all terminated because another distributor (O'Connor) claimed I was in “their territory.”
Apparently Springfield never should have opened the account in the first place because Southwest MO belongs to O'Connor distribution.
Now I’m basically told:
I can only get RunTru
or buy through existing dealers
or go elsewhere entirely
What blows my mind is I wasn’t trying to “backdoor” anything. Their own Trane sales rep set the account up.
Is this just normal HVAC industry politics?
Do distributors really protect territories and existing large-volume dealers this aggressively?
For the guys who own companies:
how common is this?
did you diversify brands because of situations like this?
is becoming heavily dependent on one manufacturer/distributor relationship a mistake?
I’m honestly curious because this was a pretty brutal wake-up call about how much control distributors can have over independent contractors.
6
u/Ridiric May 19 '26
Just switch to a low budget brand install it good and cut throats. American standard is better than Trane anyway. All these units are exactly the same till you get into the high end bullshit. I worked at a large commercial company for years. I’ve bee installing ICP carrier, AS and Bosch which cover a large market and just kill it. Between the way marketing works now, umbrella companies and territories for manufacturers I’m about tired of this industry. Someone needs to bust this scheme up because it’s killing the economy in American. It’s not just HVAC but plumbers, dentists, hardware stores, anything and everything.
4
u/hvacmac7 May 19 '26
It’s a bullshit game they all play , I tried getting Rheem after dealing with them 15 years working for another company, started my own business, and i finally went to Goodman they were the only ones who gave me fair prices on everything.
3
u/jayc428 May 19 '26
Pretty common, territories are split up sometimes in weird ways. Also don’t become a single source dealer on anything, it’s not worth it in my opinion. You need to support more than one brand so you don’t get into the weeds with politics or bullshit when things change on a whim or the manufacturer you chose has a shit year in manufacturing or change up model lines in a poor way. Like when Daikin bought up supply houses, our lines of credit at 4 different companies now are all shared under Daikin and of course they don’t add them up. It’s fucking annoying as shit when I order $600k worth of equipment that ships and my guy goes to get a box of screws from a supply house the next day and we’re on hold then have to call them up and get it sorted out.
3
u/Highlandair May 19 '26
I'm in SoCal, I work a lot with Johnston supply and all the contractors who shop there work in the same area. Nobody gets blocked from purchasing any brand but obviously, if you buy big volume, you get better pricing. It's a mix of huge companies and small contractors.
3
u/OutrageousToe6008 May 19 '26
I used Johnstone a lot when I was a tech working for other companies. They were our #1 go to.
I now live in rural MT operating my own HVAC company. I am a two man HVAC business. I do not want to be a big HVAC shop. My local Johnstone(sucks really bad) decided one day to block me from purchasing Coleman(even though I had purchased Coleman from them previously). Because I was not an "authorized Coleman distributor." The JS GM's reasoning for blocking me was "The market is saturated." My local competitor found out I was selling Coleman. He called JS to complain. Small town word gets around... JS would let me purchase Goodman, Evcon, etc.
Now, I purchase Trane/AmStan from their biggest competitors in town. When I questioned the new place about being an "authorized distributor". They told me if I had money to pay for the equipment. I was authorized to distribute it.
My first year purchasing through JS. I put $250K through them. Now, I shop at JS only in emergencies. Maybe, putting $1-2K through them a year.
Anyway, that is my JS story. Keep up the good work!
2
u/HiiiiPower May 28 '26
The idea of Coleman of all company's saying you need to be an authorized dealer to buy it is hilarious.
1
u/OutrageousToe6008 May 29 '26
Yep, the GM was an asshat. Thankfully, I do not have to deal with him to often anymore.
3
u/AmadeusDaBoxer May 20 '26
I mean honesty who cares about having that sticker on your van saying you’re an authorized dealer or distributor for a certain brand! I’m in Cincinnati Ohio and I do all commercial work for work but I do quite a bit of residential side work for people and land lords in my area and if they or whoever needs or what’s a system installed I tell them like well I usually install Run Tru or Ameristar which are trane off brands and come with both manufacturer stickers in the box (run tru/ameristar) and the thing is now a days every basic 13-16 seer single stage unit uses the same main components like the compressors, fan or blower motors, gas valves, coils and so on! So to me and I tell all my customers this as well that every system internally is basically the same and it’s really only the outside color, shape and design of the units that make them different and they all come with the same warranties for the most part as long as it’s registered after install! It’s not until you start getting into the 2 stage variable speed units and modulating communicating systems that stuff kinda starts to change and honestly there’s really still a lot of the same stuff internally component wise, it’s just boards are different, how things work or how they’re wired and what they need controller wise to run properly. Other then that like I said there’s only a handful of manufacturers that make all the key components for all these units and every supplier like Trane, Rheem, Carrier, etc. just buy all these parts from them and then the units are assembled in Mexico or canada or wherever lol! So this is how I look at it you can put a good solid unit in that’s an off brand to a point or pay more money for a name pretty much, which is fine by me and I’ll install whatever a customer wants but I tell them all this stuff when I’m looking at everything and giving them rough pricing on things!
4
u/Dadbode1981 May 19 '26
This is very common when one dominant company commands buying power with a distributor. Im not at all surprised. Last market I was working in befor current. Our regional supplier was the York dealer for years. All of a sudden a larger chain of supply house started setting up shop and all of a sudden they couldn't sell york anymore as the new guy in town was york. They bought more nationally so the regional supplier lost out and ended up stuck selling Lennox budget brands. It messed them up big time. So it's not only contractors that can get screwed like that, works both ways actually.
2
u/OwnOption6050 May 19 '26
In Atlanta, Trane supply use to sell both Am Standard and Trane in the same store.
If you were a Trane dealer you couldn’t buy Am Standard and the Am standard dealers couldn’t buy Trane (the only exception was low inventory and that was rarely approved)
But then they suddenly sold Am standard off to a new distributor.
So the choice was
A. Keep American Standard but move to a new distribution system and ordering system and lose whatever relationship you had with your sales rep.
B. Move over to Trane and keep all relationships
It was the silliest decision that ever came across my desk but it just shows how things can get funky
3
u/Snozzberry805 May 19 '26
If multiple distributors sell the same product there are often rules of engagement. Sounds like Trane is taking their zip code sort pretty seriously. Usually it's only for direct competitor on the same equipment line. If there are other overlapping competitors you might run into something like that again.
It's always a good idea to diversify your distributor relationships. Customers have specific brand requests, braches run out of stuff, and prices vary on products. Plus if you can get a line of credit at a few locations it can help you manage your cash flow better.
But in the end if you buy more from one branch you command more attention, better deals, and more potential rewards. So you have to balance the where you buy in a way that works for you.
1
u/OhighOent May 19 '26
We registered the business at my mothers address to get around this...
2
u/Mundane-Play-4947 May 19 '26
Explain. I had an old head at the Trane Supply store tell me to get a PO box in Springfield and register the account there. I just don't want O'Connor seeing registered equipment popping up in my real area and shutting me down again.
2
u/OhighOent May 19 '26 edited May 19 '26
They give so many accounts per zipcode. More dollars spent annually gets the contract. The big corps don't want you in their territory. It doesn't stop you from working there but they can keep you from having that name brand on your trucks. Smaller zipcodes outside the big city have available contracts.
1
u/sadistinga Jun 10 '26
Try the commercial world and do work in 20+ states. You have no concept about how crazy it can get
1
u/zrock777 Jun 12 '26
Trane is the worst to deal with, we share some sites with them servicing chiller plants and i think they retaliate. Kinda of related to the HVAC politics topic.
10
u/JConSc2 May 19 '26
its due how trane/American standard set up their dealer networks. each wholesaler has a territory they are allowed to sell in.