Eoff Electric Supply, Bend, Ore.

Chris Winters and Rick McKeone, the outside sales team at Eoff Electric’s Bend, Oregon location, have found the perfect one-two combination to knock-out the competition. Strong relationships and excellent service keep contractors coming back to this nearly 100-year old electrical distributor.

Among Eoff’s smaller branches, the Bend location has been serving the rural communities of central and eastern Oregon since 1981. The shop works with contractors on approximately 75 lighting retrofit projects annually for a diverse list of end-users including commercial applications, industrial facilities, municipalities and schools. They recently finished an upgrade at a large warehouse in Prineville, where they replaced 1000w metal halides with 290w LED floods, reducing the customer’s energy use by nearly 70 percent.

“We rarely knock on doors to solicit projects,” said McKeone, “because we’ve built such strong relationships with contractors. They bring us good leads and trust what we’ve recommended in the past, knowing that our solutions will be the right fit.”

The duo uses a common-sense approach to their recommendations, selecting DLC-approved products that are reasonably priced. While most projects are pretty straightforward giving them a clear idea of appropriate solutions, they make sure to evaluate each project individually rather than simply hop on board with the same idea every time. Sometimes there’s one really obvious recommendation and other times they offer a range for the customer to consider.

“Most importantly, we follow projects all the way through to the end to ensure everybody gets what they need. We make sure the paperwork is completed and submitted, walk through the close-out process, and track the delivery of incentive checks. By making the process easier for the contractor and the end-user, we also make it easy for them to come back for future projects,” continued Winters.