By Susan Elise Campbell
Thomas Pest Services is continuing to build its client base north of the Capital District with a newly opened branch office in Saratoga Springs.
According to co-owner Sarah Thomas-Clark, the company’s service area now extends from Ulster in the Hudson Valley to the Catskills and Adirondacks, and beyond Saratoga into the North Country.
“My husband, Bill, and I started the company in our basement in 2010, so it is a very full-circle moment to come back to the Saratoga market, after moving headquarters to Albany,” she said.
There is a service manager at the new branch who oversees a team of seven to 12 technicians specializing in pest control and pest prevention for residential and commercial customers.
“This is a strategic move in that the team members live in such towns as Corinth, Ballston Lake, and Sacandaga Lake region,” she said. “They won’t have to drive to Albany for their weekly meeting or to pick up supplies, so they can get to their next customer sooner.”
“Now they have an extra 30 minutes a day to do an add-on service or address a new customer’s need,” said Thomas-Clark.
The company currently has 75 employees, including management, sales and service.
“How we went from two in the basement to a staff of 75 in 15 years really comes down to our people,” she said. “We couldn’t do what we do without our team.”
Thomas-Clark said that as a small, family-owned business, she and her husband “try to treat everyone like family.”
“The workplace focuses around core values that guide all our decisions and interactions, both in the field and within the company,” she said. “This culture creates opportunity for employees to feel at home and to advance their careers.”
“These values have truly trickled down to our people through training, support, leadership, and community involvement,” said Thomas-Clark. “And that trickles down into the services we provide for customers.”
The core values are in writing and “posted everywhere” — on the walls of the office, on thomaspestservices.com and in monthly internal communications, she said.
“Every month we highlight one core value in our newsletter and tie it back to people who have lived that core value throughout the month,” she said. “If you’re going to have core values, they must be a part of your constant communication.”
Many businesses in diverse industries have faced challenges hiring and retaining employees, and Thomas-Clark said that “last year we were in that boat.”
“But we feel blessed to say this year that we are not, but are excelling with the hiring,” she said. “We have learned over the years that hiring is a 365-day-a-year job.”
“We hired my sister to find staff for all four locations,” she said. “We are constantly interviewing for great talent and posting positions, because sometimes people decide pest control is not for them or they are moving on to the next stage of their career.”
“Having a bench of people to go back to has worked out very well for us, but it means being very intentional about hiring,” Thomas-Clark said. “It also means that once they get in the door that people know they have a clear path that is outlined with 30-, 60-, and 90-day goals.”
According to Thomas-Clark, some people do not think there is career growth potential at Thomas Pest Services beyond obtaining a pest control license, but there is.
“We have had technicians move on to become service managers and we do promote within,” she said.
“There is also what we do for the community to protect them from pests,” she said. “At the end of the day it’s more than just squashing the bug.”
Two long-term team members worked for Thomas Pest Services while they were going to school and are now enjoying their new chosen careers.
“We worked around their schedule and it is bittersweet to see the move on with their degrees,” she said. “It’s also fulfilling because we gave them the building blocks to get there.”
Thomas-Clark said their market is saturated with pest control companies of all sizes, from one-person operations to national chains. All have the same goal of solving people’s bug, rodent and wildlife problems, but different companies go about it differently.
“To be honest, we focus on doing our own thing and not the noise about what other companies are offering,” she said. “And that is, we do relationship-based pest management every day to move our company forward.”
Thomas Pest Services covers a variety of markets equally, according to Thomas-Clark. These include interior and exterior residential and commercial work controlling ants, ticks, mosquitoes, yellow jackets and spiders, as well as rodents and mice.
They also effectively and humanely remove bats, raccoons, woodchucks and other animals and work to prevent them from returning. Personnel from one of the four branch locations do wildlife control.
Some customers use one-time services, while others have year-round maintenance contracts. It’s a misconception that pest control is a seasonal business, said Thomas-Clark.
“Every home is different, so each customer’s services are customized,” she said. As a result, fees for services vary “based on the size of the structure, the type of issue the customer has, and the recommendations we make.”
“Much of the work we do it invisible but that’s what we want,” she said. “If you don’t see bugs, we are doing a good job.”
Learn more about job opportunities and the full range of services available at thomaspestservices.com.