Hire a Specialist in the Industry

Hire a Specialist in the Industry

Today I wanted to talk about an interesting call we received last night at about 7:30 in the evening from a homeowner. What had happened, I don’t want to get into a lot of details of who, why or when, but what had happened was one of the big bug companies here in Florida, these … Let me go back a little bit. These customers have been hearing noises in their attic, so they call out a big bug company to find out what was going on. When they, the big bug company gets there, they sell them a rat job with exclusion and trapping, they charge them $500 to seal up the residence from invading rats into the attic, and $500 for some rat trapping. Well, about 7:30 that night things took a turn and the homeowner discovered that it wasn’t rats he had, it was a raccoon, and he needed someone out there right away.

For more information and a FREE inspection Call Nuisance Wildlife Removal at 1-866-263-WILD!

We send a tech out and the tech called me and he was just in total disbelief that this company would’ve sold these customers a rat job, per se, rat exclusion, rat seal up, when there’s absolutely no signs of rats, none. Not one dropping could he find in that attic, but on the outside roof it was full of coon droppings, raccoon droppings. My tech was like, “Why did they do this?” I’m like, “Well, it comes from a myriad of different things. One is experience, knowledge, having the right tools.” He goes, “Well, what’s even worse is, when they sealed this up they just used expanding foam.” They basically used probably $10 worth of expanding foam to seal up this house. He says, “It looks like crap and it’s not going to hold anything. It’s not going to keep anything out.” He tried to get the raccoon out for probably a good hour and a half and it was playing the game of in the soffit, out of the soffit, run down the soffit, go to the other way on the soffit.

In that point in time we just decided to ease up on the raccoon and let it have some space and do some trapping. This company … The moral of the story is this company sold these customers something they didn’t need and it was due to their inexperience, or the inexperience of the salesman, or the inexperience of a technician. If you see raccoon droppings right next to the entry hole, which as a matter of fact, is huge, enough to fit a basketball into, as opposed to, something to fit a golf ball into. If we have all this evidence there and they sell a rodent job, and why is that? I think a lot of it has to do with, like I said before, a lack of education, a lack of training, but I also have … A lot I think is pre-programmed. I even noticed with our techs sometimes that they get out on a job and we try to relay as much of the information from a customer to our techs as we can before they get out there.

A customer will say, “I think I have rodents living in my attic.” They get out there and it’s not rodents, it’s a raccoon, or a possum, or other types of … We’ve had ducks, Muscovy ducks in attics. They get so pre-programmed I think sometimes that, “Oh, well it’s rats.” That’s where I’ve had to talk to my office and tell them, “Just tell them they got noise in the attic, let them do the investigation, let them do the inspection, let them put the tools that we have on their trucks to work to identify the problem correctly the first time and let it happen in the natural way.” That way, they get up there, they see raccoon evidence, they see a raccoon entry point, they’re not seeing rat droppings in the attic, it’s a no-brainer for them. If you put, the homeowner thinks they have a rodent problem, then they’re pre-programmed for rodents. Rodents are stuck in their head, they just don’t … That’s part of the issues with it.

The other issues is these big bug companies are breaking in the wildlife field, because it’s extra money, extra income and I’ve seen some of them, they’ll come out and do a wildlife job … Well, they come out and attempt to do a wildlife job for free in order to steal the Sentricon termite contract from another pest control company, or to get them to sign up for monthly or quarterly or yearly pest control with them. These are a lot of the tactics that the big bug companies are using on the wildlife end. Hey, I don’t blame them. They’re out there, they’re trying to get more revenue and recurring revenue, which is the important part, but you got to think about the customer. I’ve been in this business 20 years and I believe in being honest and admitting if we have a fault to it. A lot of these other companies don’t. The funny thing was when he called his bug company back last night, they told him, “Well, we don’t have any on-call people, so you’re going to have to call someone else.”

For more information and a FREE inspection Call Nuisance Wildlife Removal at 1-866-263-WILD!

I thought that a little strange, but I’m sure that gentleman was on the phone this morning figuring out how he can get a refund. At least I would be. The moral of the story is some companies are more specialized in doing certain things. Sure, we all can kill bugs, we all can do termites, we all can do fertilization, we all can do wildlife control, we all can do all of this, but if you want it done right you want to find the people that are the most highly skilled in that field. Now, can we get rid of roaches and ants and stuff like that? Yes. Have we done clean outs? Have we done stuff where we go into daycares and got rid of problems with an integrated pest management approach that other companies failed, and failed, and failed? Yes. That’s really not our specialty. Our specialty is wildlife. We can do the bugs, and we do a good job at doing bugs, but at the end of the day this company was based doing wildlife.

That’s why we have the special ladders, the rappelling gear, the thermo imaging cameras, the inspection scopes, all sorts of stuff like that, that we add to our arsenal of tools almost on a daily basis. We find, I like to say, the new cool tool that really helps us out and gives us an advantage over our competitors and gives us an advantage over the bug companies. Like I said, bug companies are not bad and that’s not what I’m saying here. What I’m saying is, when you go to hire a company, hire a specialist in that field. You may or may not pay a little more, but let me tell you something, saving money is sometimes more expensive. As these folks found out last night. An emergency call is not cheap to come out in the middle of the night to deal with this. At the end of the day, they have our fees on top of the other company’s fees and if they would have hired us in the first place, I’ll be honest with you, that house would’ve been cheaper for us to exclude and trap and get rid of a raccoon, than what they paid the first company. We would’ve been less than $1000 on that job.

Now they’ve got a $1000 tied up with the bug company and they’ve got several hundred tied up with us for an emergency call. Just something to point out there I thought was kind of interesting. Moral of the story is, pick the person with expertise in the field that you’re looking for, not just the biggest ad in the phone book, or the biggest website presence, or stuff like that. Pick the people … Call them up, ask questions, “Are you insured? Are you licensed? What license do you have,” because … This is a whole separate podcast. Wildlife guys can be licensed under a couple different licenses here in Florida. Let’s just say, we’re not all created equal. That’s for another time. Do your research, do your research on who you hire, and get the most experience you can for your dollar. If you guys ever have any questions, feel free to call us.

Phone number’s 1-866-263-WILD. Again, that’s 866-263-WILD. We can get you probably the answers you need, if you just need some helpful advice, we’re here for that too. Hope everyone has a great day and look forward to seeing some of you guys on our social media and stuff. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and all that stuff … Links are available on our website, www.wildlifetrapper.com. Again, that’s www.wildlifetrapper.com. We have some pretty interesting stuff at times posted on there. Have a great day and hope to hear from you guys.

With over 20 years of experience solving urban wildlife conflicts, call Jeff Norris, the wildlife trapper for all your nuisance wildlife problems, 1-866-263-WILD. Find us on the web at www.wildlifetrapper.com. Also, stay up-to-date with local wildlife issues. Connect with us on Facebook at facebook.com/wildlife.trapper. We are your experts for the most humane and technologically advanced solutions to all your wildlife problems. Call now for more information or free inspection, 1-866-263-WILD.

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