History of Solutions for Industry, Inc. (SFI)

It all started in early 1996 with brothers John and Greg Survil sitting on the back deck at John’s house and discussing the possibilities of going into business together. John was working for a manufacturer’s representative at that time and Greg was still in the Air Force. Greg’s days flying the F15 were behind him and he wanted to run a business. John had a marketing plan for selling coils already in place, so they put their resources together and within four months Solutions for Industry, Inc. was up and running.

Greg took care of the entire business end of things and John handled customer relations and marketing. The first year was extremely lean but in between organizing systems, there were constant tutorials as Greg learned the HVAC business from the coil side of things outward. He was incredibly intelligent and a great people person. The synergy between the two brothers as they grew the business and enjoyed each others’ company was infectious and many good ideas were conceived and implemented. Tragically, Greg contracted leukemia in 1998 and a relapse in 2000 took his life. Clearly, SFI has continued its tradition of excellence, but one of the biggest and brightest stars left all too quickly.

Philosophy of SFI

John and Greg realized before creating Solutions for Industry, Inc. that there were already many participants in the coil business. However, John had noticed from his commercial sales days at Carrier Houston that there were very few people who were knowledgeable about both systems and coils, in particular about Carrier systems and coils.

It takes individuals who are very detail oriented to not only understand the systems to begin with but then to also design coils properly. It takes commitment to ensure that the coils are ordered accurately and shipped in a timely fashion. We couple those traits with a desire to establish true relationships with customers so that doing business can also be both enjoyable and productive. At SFI, we want to know the folks we are working with as well as their applications, which is why we believe you will find that SFI is not “just another coil company”.

We enjoy doing our job with a sense of humor; keeping a smile on our face and keeping things light and relaxed. But at the same time, we want to make sure and share our thoughts on your application, express our opinions about what can be done to make things better, and ask “Did you think of this?” types of questions. This can help keep you out of trouble, or make sure that you have presented your quote to the contractor in a complete manner. We don’t just “send you a quote”. We treat the situation as if we had to sell this to a contractor ourselves and what would we do to make our quote to them more clear so that there are no misunderstandings. We treat your orders with the same kind of concern; we make sure the shipping addresses are accurate and that the appropriate “tags” and telephone numbers are included so that when the coil(s) reach the job site, the receiver has a clear understanding of what they are looking at.

So to summarize, we want to make sure that we understand your application, we help you design the best possible coil for the job, we get it shipped on time and clearly mark the shipment so that you don’t get nuisance calls after the coils ships. Just like we would want it if we were in your shoes.