Arndt & Son Plumbing were regular exhibitors at a popular long-standing annual home show in Madison, Wisconsin but with little to show for it.

“People would come up and talk to us,” says Tyler Arndt, who along with his dad, Dale Arndt, runs the third-generation plumbing and heating business located in Brooklyn, Wisconsin. “A lot of people would say, oh, that would be nice to have. We even had a little radiant floor display hooked up. But there was very little that we could show of all our work other than pictures.”

In the meantime, Tyler had closed on a seven-acre parcel outside the town of Oregon and was planning to build his home.

And as he continued to draw up plans (a self-proclaimed perfectionist, Tyler took on the role of GC) for the spacious two-level home that would, naturally, have great bathrooms and radiant heating and snowmelt Tyler figured why continue to set up a booth at a home show when he could turn his whole home into one big showroom?

“I just wanted to be able to take our customers where we could show them the level of craftmanship of what our installations really looks like, and they could see with their own eyes how we do what we do,” Tyler adds.

Finished in 2021, the home’s main 2,100-square-foot level features three bedrooms, two and a half baths along with an attached 800-square-foot garage that’s all radiantly heated inside with snowmelt outside on the main walkways and in front of the garage.

“There’s a big difference between talking about radiant heat,” Tyler explains, “and actually walking inside on a cold day and feeling the difference only this type of heat provides. And everyone appreciates seeing clean, safe walkways after a snowfall.”

The master bathroom includes a stand-alone tub and shower system that features a towel warmer and one of the latest trends in design: a zero-entry shower with a concealed drainage system.

“That’s a trendy idea that not a lot of people may appreciate,” Tyler says. “Just showing customers how that works is a big benefit to remodeling jobs,” Tyler says.

The lower level remains unfinished for now, but the mechanical room is the star of the show anyway. Tyler’s been keeping track on water and energy usage since he finished the home.

“We all know that radiant is a large investment,” Tyler says, “but we can show a solid return that goes a long way in helping our customers make the best decisions they can for the long haul.”

In this connected world, Tyler can also take out his smart phone and show customers how he can control the system’s performance.

“There’s no substitute for that,” Tyler adds. “Pictures and product literature just won’t work.”

Tyler also figures he’s tapped into the demands of today’s customers who have already gone online to do their own research.

“We’ve seen that with a lot of radiant work we’ve received recently,” Tyler explains. “People do their homework, maybe they’ve come across an article about us and then they end up on our website wanting to know more about the company. There’s less need for a home show when customers already know what they want, and can easily find us online. Rather than spend a weekend at a home show, I can spend more profitable time bringing them right here to my home to show them what we can do for them.”

Rising Star

Tyler’s been a rising star in the plumbing and heating community, and in particular national and state PHCC matters, almost as long as he’s been a PHCPPro.

And that’s a long time, too. He figures the first radiant heating system he helped on was when he was 7, holding down the PEX lines straight and tight while his dad’s crews fastened them down.

“I just felt that was my calling,” Tyler adds. “From that point, I never really thought about wanting to do anything else other than become a plumber.”

Throughout high school, he continued to help his dad as “child labor” in the field until he officially became a laborer at 17 with the business his grandfather, Louis Arndt, started in 1972 with the motto, “Prompt Professional Service,” that remains to this day.

Arndt & Son is a residential and light commercial new construction, remodeling, service and repair company with specialties in radiant and snowmelt and septic and well systems.

About the only rough spot in Tyler’s career came one day during his sophomore year when he sat down with the guidance counselor to discuss career opportunities.

Tyler told the counselor what he’d already been doing to prepare for his career in plumbing.

“It was a terrible experience to be honest,” Tyler remembers. “When I told her I wanted to be a plumber, she looked me in the eyes and said, no, you don’t. At least go to college first, try it out for the first two years to get your general studies in. And if after that, you don’t like college, you have plumbing as your backup plan.”

Tyler stuck to his guns and eventually became part of the high school’s “school to work” program, essentially working a half a day at Arndt & Son and then the rest of day in class at the high school.

After graduating, he enrolled in Madison Area Technical College and quickly received scholarships from Goulds Water Technology; the Wisconsin Water Well Association; Ridgid Tools; and the PHCC Educational Foundation.

His early hands-on work with his dad paid off.

“I was the only one who knew how to pour a lead joint,” he says. “My instructor didn’t even know how to do it. So I taught that class. Later, not many besides me knew much about well water pump systems and I taught that portion of class, too.”

Straight A Student

During his five years of apprenticeship training, Tyler maintained an A average before writing his journeyman’s test. He wrote his master license three years afterward since Wisconsin requires eight years of training before reaching that level.

Tyler’s only 31, but here are just some of his accomplishments in the profession so far:

• Won the PHCC Plumbing Apprentice Contest in 2014. (And a year later he returned to judge the contest.)

• Named one of the top five “under thirty” in radiant heating in 2016 back when the RPA was known as the Radiant Panel Association.

• In 2020, at the age of 26, he was elected as president of the Wisconsin PHCC, the youngest person to hold the position.

We first met Tyler when he was wrapping up those presidential responsibilities.

“Plumbing is a puzzle and you have to figure it out,” he told us back then. “You’re pretty much like Sherlock Holmes and you have solve the mystery. Plus, not everything’s always the same. A customer could call with an issue and the next day another could call with the same issue – but the solution could be different each time. Nothing is repetitive about this work.”

Since then, when he’s not Sherlock in the field, Tyler is busy modernizing the company’s accounting, marketing and online presence.

“We’ve gone from mailing out paper bills two years ago,” he says, “to having everything on a tablet the tech needs to present to the customer. And we’ve gone to flat rate, too.”

Which is not to say he’s not busy in the field either since he does most of the company’s boiler work and holds a pump installer’s license and a cross-connection license as well.

“Tyler’s in charge,” Dale says, only half joking. Like his son, Dale worked alongside his father at a very early age and learned the trades from the ground up.

“Tyler has me beat though since I was 10 when I started helping my dad,” Dale says.

We first met Dale decades ago when he was racking up national awards for his radiant installations.

While radiant and snowmelt have become more commonplace over the years we’ve reported on the industry, Dale is one of the true pioneers for the work in Wisconsin with projects ranging in size from 400 square feet for a home up to 18,000 square feet for a fire and emergency response building.

It was the early-1990s – before even the RPA was started – when a customer asked him to install a radiant system.

“I really didn’t know too much about it,” Dales adds. “But I asked our supplier for a rundown. And then a rep met me at the job site. After about 20 minutes, I had it all under control, and we’ve been doing it ever since.”

The company routinely gets big jobs including a snowmelt system for a driveway replacement and patio totaling more than 2,400 square feet; a commercial office space radiant system totaling 1,500 square feet and residence featuring radiant heat totaling 4,000 square feet and another nearly 2,000 square feet for snowmelt.

“We don’t skimp on materials, regardless of the cost,” Dale adds. “I believe better materials lead to better work quality, and we give our customers the best work quality out there.”

Likewise, Tyler is keeping up with his dad’s commitment by staying on top of industry trends. He regularly takes manufacturer training classes to keep up with the latest products and services on the technical side and also routinely takes classes on the leadership and business side of the profession. Both he and Dale are familiar faces at PHCC meetings, in particular its Quality Service Contractors group, and RPA gatherings.

And while he’s always loved working with his hands, Tyler still prioritizes the relationship he has with customers and would-be customers doing a walkthrough of his home.

“The price of our work will always matters to many customers,” he explains. “But we can counter that with our company’s long commitment to quality. We’ve always done our best to tell customers why we’re going to take the time to do things right. Coming over to my house is just a better way to show customers our story.”