For years, the most important data at Fluid Plumbing, Electrical & Air Conditioning was calculated by hand.
Every week, someone spent six to eight hours clicking through more than 250 jobs within the company's field management software, recording what each tradie sold, what they completed, and what estimates were still outstanding, to calculate conversion rates, average sales and overall tradie performance.
It was an arduous task. But David Mikkelsen, the company's owner, relied on this data to learn how his business was actually performing.
"And even then, that data was always then a week old," Mikkelsen said.
By 2024, Mikkelsen had grown Fluid from a one-man operation into a 35-technician shop doing $6 to $7 million in annual revenue. He had already made one major pivot — walking away from commercial and strata work to focus entirely on residential repairs.
But to keep growing, he knew he needed more out of his software.
He started making trips to the United States, attending Nexstar Network events and following tradies like Tommy Mello and Tom Howard. That’s when he kept hearing the same software repeated over and over: ServiceTitan.
Finally, Live Data
In January 2024, Fluid went live on the software for the trades. With ServiceTitan, the spreadsheet marathon was one of the first things to go.
A report that once took six to eight hours to produce now hits every manager's inbox automatically, each night.
“We’re not relying on one person anymore,” Mikkelsen said. “Everybody that needs it gets it instantly.”
The companywide visibility into crucial metrics has given Fluid the confidence to make changes it couldn't have made before ServiceTitan.
Call tracking: Before ServiceTitan, Fluid's CSRs had their calls recorded — but there was no way to measure how well each one was actually booking jobs. Now Mikkelsen can see individual performance across hundreds of daily calls. "We can see which CSRs are performing really well, which ones are not," Mikkelsen said. "And then we can give individual coaching to those people to get them to improve."
Dispatching: Before, leads were split evenly across the service team regardless of who was running them. Now, Mikkelsen knows exactly which tradies are performing at the highest level — and he sends them to the best jobs. "Someone that's got an average ticket of $5,000 versus someone with an average ticket of $1,000," Mikkelsen said. "I know who I want to send to that job."
All of this has impacted the bottom line. Since going live on ServiceTitan, Fluid's revenue per active truck per day is up two-and-a-half times.
And the results are starting to pile up.
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Records, Repeated
In the past six months, Mikkelsen says he's been having the same conversation with his team over and over.
“I'm becoming a broken record, because I'm constantly coming in saying, 'We've broken our record,'" he said.
He's not exaggerating. March was a record month — until April. April was a record — until May, when Fluid posted a record sales month of nearly $1.7 million. Along the way, Fluid had a record sales week of $438,000 and a record single sales day of $125,000.
Fluid's Flow Club membership program is adding another revenue stream. Launched earlier this year, it averaged $2,600 per inspection in its first week, and comes with a welcome pack that includes a big umbrella with their logo and tagline, ‘We’ve got you covered.’
The company’s goal for the coming financial year is $28 million, which, you guessed it, would be a new company record. But Mikkelsen's eyes are already looking ahead to a bigger number: $100 million.
He's already mapped the path on how Fluid could get there — an electrical division that's growing, a new air-con team that sold $77,000 in its first full week, and new financing options heading to Australia that will open more customers up to premium work.
He’s seen that it’s possible.
“I could rattle off 10 or 20 businesses that have done that in the U.S. (on ServiceTitan),” Mikkelsen said. “So I feel like there's a bit of a formula now.”
The keys to getting there, Mikkelsen said, are in two critical areas.
“ServiceTitan is integral,” he said. "(And) none of it would be possible without the people we've got.”
