Owners Earl and Reena Philpot aren’t letting the size of their dealership limit their opportunities.
Above: PDS’s London, Kentucky office.
Twenty something years ago, PDS co-owner Earl Philpot was lying in the emergency room for the umpteenth time after getting injured in a coal mine accident when he realized that it was time for a career change. His experience as a mining electrician was his ticket out of the mine and into a new career servicing MFPs.
Earl found his first job in the office technology industry, thanks to his wife Reena, whose cousin was a manager at a Toshiba dealership in Louisville. Moving from Southeast Kentucky to Louisville, Earl took a major pay cut to service copiers. When a telemarketing position opened at the dealership, Earl encouraged Reena to apply.
Earl and Reena Philpot, owners of PDS.
With no sales experience, she became the dealership’s first telemarketer, tasked with calling 100 people a day. “They gave me lots of goals, and I loved it,” recalled Reena, who found this job more flexible than her previous office position. “I just had to call people all day, and I didn’t have to tell anybody when I wanted to take a break.”
Reena received a bonus if she made more than 25 appointments a week and a commission whenever a machine was sold. Then came the transition to outside sales. That began as part of a cold-call contest, except no one told her it was a contest. Her cousin dropped her off at a building in downtown Louisville and said, ‘See everybody and give them a card.’ She had barely started when she was thrown out of the building. When her cousin returned, he asked, ‘What happened?’ recalled Reena. “I said, ‘Well, they threw me out.’ And he said, ’You’ve got to go back. Here’s a customer we have. If they see you again, tell them you’re here to see this customer.’”
Long story short, Reena won the cold-calling contest, which was the beginning of a new career in outside sales. “I couldn’t believe I got paid to visit people,” she said. In her first year, Reena was one of Toshiba’s top 50 salespeople in the nation.
After her cousin left the dealership and started his own company, Reena and Earl followed. Unfortunately, the non-compete Reena’s cousin had with his previous employer created issues, and Earl took a position servicing hospital equipment and copiers for a hospital. Four years later, Earl was offered an opportunity to acquire a small copier company, but neither he nor Reena was ready to get back into the copier business…or so they thought.
Starting a Copier Company
Eventually, after running the numbers, Earl called Reena, who was now a stay-at-home mom, during his lunch break and said, “Let’s start a copier company.” Her response: “Sounds great, I’ll see you when you get home.”
PDS operates out of London and Lexington, Kentucky.
By the time Earl returned home, Reena had a list of people to call. That was the start of PDS (Precision Duplicating Solutions). It was initially a part-time job, with Earl working at the hospital during the day and servicing copiers in the evening. However, this schedule was not sustainable, and he and Reena decided that if they were going to run a business, they had to fully commit to it.
The following Monday, Earl gave his two-week notice. On the Friday of his last day, Earl got in his car and had a panic attack. “I was like, ‘Oh my God, I’m leaving the insurance and a paying job and don’t know what we’re going to do,’” he recalled. On Monday morning, the hospital called and offered PDS its contract to service its copiers. That was 21 years ago.
Today, PDS has 18 employees and is a single-line Konica Minolta dealer with two locations, one in London, Kentucky, where the business started, and the other in Lexington, about an hour and fifteen minutes away. Earl runs service, and Reena runs sales. Overall, PDS services 33 counties, with Lexington being the closest big city. “We’re hoping to expand more into that area,” said Reena.
Building the Business
For the first few months, PDS was based out of the Philpot’s one-car garage. After outgrowing the garage, they rented a building for about $700 a month. Six months after launching the company, they hired their first service employee, followed by a part-time admin. A year after moving into the building, the owner asked if they were interested in buying it.
The Philpots were hesitant because it seemed too soon to invest in a building. A couple of years later, spurred by growth, Earl and Reena contacted the owner and asked if he was willing to sell them the building at the original quoted price. The business still operates out of that London location today.
The lobby of PDS’s Lexington office.
PDS’s customers range from SMBs to hospitals and health care facilities, churches, schools, and nonprofits. Customers choose PDS over competitors because of its personalized service. “Our customers have Earl’s cell phone,” said Reena. “I always tell the story about how his Sunday school teacher from when he was a kid called us on the Saturday night before Easter because she was out of toner, and guess who took her toner?”
Then, there was the time PDS was bidding for the business of a small school looking to buy 15 copiers. Earl was sitting in a room with his competitors, the only service person among a group of salespeople competing for the business. “They were all trying to outdo each other, and I could tell the customer was getting frustrated,” said Earl.
He added, “I finally interrupted and said, ‘Hey guys, look, we can all agree that everybody’s copier copies, faxes, and scans. Some may do it better, some may do it worse, but we all do the same thing.’ And I looked at the guy from the school district and said, ‘Because they’re copiers, they’re going to break; it’s just part of it. What it comes down to is when you place that phone call, how quickly are they going to get here? How quickly are they going to replace your part? And if they can’t get you going, how quickly will they get you a loaner till they get you up and going? I do all of that.’” PDS got the business.
A Perfect Match
A PDS service vehicle.
Earl and Reena are often asked by friends how they can work together all day. The secret, according to Reena, is setting boundaries. It took some time to figure that out, but when they go out to dinner, they leave their phones in the car. “We still end up talking about work, but usually, it’s the more joyful parts,” said Earl.
“We understand our skill sets well, and we’ve done that in parenting,” added Reena. “Work is like how we parent. I was in charge of education; Earl was in charge of sports. We did things together, but he was the first decision on sports; I was the first decision on education. That’s the way we do it at work. I’m first decision on sales, he’s first decision on service. On other things, we come together about how to make it work so we have a strong front together. That’s how we did with the boys. If we disagreed, we worked it out. We usually understand the other person’s point of view and reach a decision in the middle.”
The Konica Minolta Connection
It’s difficult for a small startup copier company to find an OEM partner, even one with a five-year legacy of successfully servicing copiers. The goal was to find an OEM that was strong in color. “We knew we had to find something Earl wanted to work on and something that I wanted to sell, which was challenging, and then something that somebody else didn’t have in our area,” said Reena.
Konica Minolta stood out because it checked all the boxes, but then the deal fell through, which was not ideal because PDS had a big opportunity with a school system. As PDS was about to sign with another OEM, Konica Minolta called back. That was the week before Christmas, and by the first week of January, Earl was taking classes on how to service the equipment. That was 16 years ago.
The Philpots enjoy the benefits of being a single-line dealer. “You get good pricing, so that’s worth a lot,” noted Reena, who gives props to Konica Minolta’s Laura Blackmer for the assistance she provided during the supply chain crisis to ensure that PDS was able to take care of its customers.
Most of the equipment PDS sells are A3 and A4 MFPs. It also sells Pure Water Technology, DigiTech scales, and FP Mailing Solutions. Unified communications, production print, and solutions from Konica Minolta’s All Covered subsidiary represent other areas of potential diversification.
What’s Next for PDS?
Despite being in the business for 21 years and having no plans, at least in the short term, to retire, Earl and Reena have invested in their continuing education by attending industry events, which isn’t always easy for a small dealership. I met them at this year’s Executive Connection Summit (ECS), the second time they attended ECS, and was surprised to see a dealership of their size represented.
The inspiration for attending that first ECS in 2022 was burnout and an invitation from Mike Stramaglio, whom Earl had been interacting with on LinkedIn. It was a rough time and the Philpots were thinking of selling the business. At the last minute, they registered for ECS and drove from Kentucky to Arizona.
“That was a changing point in our business,” recalled Earl. “We met some great people who introduced us to all these other people. We’re this small dealership, and we’re meeting all these huge companies. We made many friends and left ECS with this new fire under us.”
After returning home, they informed their employees about their plans to improve the business. “God put two control freaks together,” acknowledged Earl about him and Reena. “We found out we had to trust our employees more and let them do their jobs. We started to do that in 2022. Things started turning around, and the business started growing.”
Last year, PDS had its best year ever, with $2 million in revenues. This year’s goal is $3 million. And starting this past January, there’s more family in the family business thanks to the addition of sons Korey and Ben. “They came to us,” said Earl. “They said they’d like to help us grow it, and maybe down the road, they can take over.”
After spending time with Earl and Reena at ECS and then following up with a one-hour telephone interview, Korey and Ben don’t need to look to far to find two brilliant mentors.
