Like many other heating contractors across the nation, Jesse Ravenelle and Francis Davis, owners of Affordable Air LLC in Plainfield, Conn., say the slowdown in the housing market has affected their heating and cooling business. With the recent downturn in the economy, Affordable Air is looking at advertising as a solution to increasing business next spring - if not sooner. Ravenelle said his past experience has shown that advertising definitely increases the volume of work.

Affordable Air buys Heil products from distributor Sid Harvey Industries Inc. in Groton, Conn. Ravenelle said Sid Harvey salesman Tim Dulin told him about online options for a Heil direct mail program called the AdVantage^SM Program.

“This is definitely a program I want to be involved in,” Ravenelle said. He noted that the “GoHeil” Website is helpful, but with the demands of running a business, he hasn’t had time to explore all the helpful business tools the Heil dealer Website has to offer.

Ravenelle has been depending on Heil products for over 12 years. He said he rarely sells any heating and cooling unit that is not a Heil product, and in the last eight years since he and Davis started this business, they have had only one compressor changeout in a Heil unit.

Affordable Air has six employees on staff - all certified - and the business does mostly new installations of high-efficiency, two-stage Heil gas furnaces.

For more information, visit www.goheil.com.

Publication date: 12/01/2008