Be very careful when dealing with Pirtek. Most pirtek locations are owned by Franchisees that have very little training in Hydraulics or hydraulic hose replacement. The franchisee pays a ton of money to be a franchisee, and the contract he signs forces him to buy ONLY Pirtek hose and fittings. The Franchisee is a "captive customer" and is charged not only franchise fees on sales, but must pay whatever price HQ wants for its hose and fittings. The franchisee is charged between 1 and 6 times what HQ pays for the product. After all the charges are figured in the billing price to the customer is extremely high.
The Pirtek business model is highly front-end loaded, ever making it to profitablity is near impossible. More Pirtek locations have been closed, Terminated, gone bankrupt or been re-franchised than have been successful. The franchisee is stuck in a one-sided contract, forced to stock expensive product, given a small territory and limited training and very little support. All these add on increases are passed on to the customer, mostly construction companies and heavy equipment rental companies. Pirtek claims "ETA one hour", they fail to mention that almost all the vans only stock hose up to one inch. There are alot of hoses out there that are much larger than one inch, as a result jobs take longer than an hour, the charges increase and the customer ends up with an unsavory invoice.
Pirtek has a record of being slow growth, only 38 open franchises in the US in 12 years. Many have closed or been refranchised, some have had more than one owner that went bankrupt. Its a sad story for most franchisees as well as the employees. The expensive Pirtek business model, along with small territories, very little training, and established hydraulic hose vendor competition, along with waste and disposal charges, insurance and employee expense make it near to impossible to turn a profit. Owning a Pirtek franchise is like buying a job, a risky low paying job. Pirtek is rated at the bottom of the Franchise 500 List at 447, at this rate it will not be on the list at all.
Pirtek and its management team use the Pirtek Franchise contract to do what ever they want, its a one-sided onerous contract, right now one of the first Pirtek locations is for sale in Mira mar, California. The San Diego location is about ten years old and was once Pirtek Franchise of the year! Still, the owner walked away. Pirtek must be a pretty bad business to go from Hero to Zero in ten years.in Connecticut Irwin Zeatz was franchisee of the year, later he was sued by PirtekUSA on various issues. See Zeatz vs Pirtek, in the end Pirtek ended up with two failed Pirtek locations in Fairfield Conn.in Tampa, a location opened up in early Pirtek sold another location in Clearwater, only 14 miles away from the Tampa location within 3 months. Both locations have been re-franchised and struggle to make a reasonable profit if any!
Due to territory disputes, high prices, insane maintenance costs, waste, ever increasing insurance costs, fluctuating fuel costs and over promising and under delivering, onerous contracts, frequent litigation, customer complaints, employee turnover, inventory costs, re-franchising, short duration training, franchise fees and product up-charges, and numerous failed locations the evidence would suggest Pirtek is a Bad Business. Consumers as well as prospective franchisees may want to steer clear of this business until the dust settles. There is no need to rush into a potential rip-off
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