Brynn Cooksey was on the podcast a year ago, back in episode 26. At the time, Air Doctors was a home performance company in Southeast Michigan that did HVAC — assessments, work scope, fix the home, test out.
On this episode, he described his business as a heat pump business. Today, 97.8% of the systems Air Doctors installs are heat pumps. He's opened a market in Georgia. Pennsylvania and Illinois are next on the roadmap.
The key to his business transformation is not just the heat pump. It's his entire process: from load calculations and Goldilocks system design, to exceptional install and commissioning practices, to his team's unwavering commitment to test in and test out on every install.
A few years ago, when the market started moving in Michigan — IRA rebates, utility incentives, city-level programs in places like Ann Arbor — Brynn kept getting called into homes where a heat pump had already been installed by someone else.
The customers' bills had gone up substantially. Fifteen hundred, two thousand dollars a month.
Here's the part worth sitting with: the equipment was fine. As he describes those systems, they were cold climate, inverter driven, all the bells and whistles. Good machines, correctly matched to the climate.
What failed was everything around them. "It wasn't because of the heat pump," he says. "It was the way they were put in, the way they were designed and specified."
That's how a technology gets a reputation it didn't earn. Brynn still meets contractors who tell him heat pumps don't work in cold climates — an opinion formed, in a lot of cases, by watching installs like these.
The failure list is short, and it's not exotic. Replacing like for like. Replacing without a load calc. Not evaluating the duct system.
Brynn's framing of it is the most generous version anyone offers on this topic: bad design practices "that before building science baptism, we were all guilty of."
Nobody arrives at this work knowing it. That's the honest starting point, and it's how Brynn teaches the material — as a walk through what goes wrong, and why each step exists to prevent it.
The flip side is just as direct. Do the load calc. Evaluate the ducts. Weatherize the shell. Then, in his words, you're going to get a great heat pump outcome.
The reason this matters more with heat pumps than with what came before is that the margin for error is thinner. As he puts it, a heat pump is not a box swap type of device — if you put one in wrong, bad things happen. Fossil fuel equipment forgives a lot of design sins by brute force. A heat pump doesn't, which is exactly why the contractors who do the design work get separated from the ones who don't.
The business outcome is where this gets interesting for owners.
Air Doctors put in 30 or 40 heat pump systems in Michigan following the same process every time, and the customers' bills came down. That gave Brynn something most contractors don't have: a documented set of results across a portfolio of jobs.
Utility companies started reaching out to ask what it would take to run those same programs in their territory.
That's the sequence. Process produced results, results produced data, data produced inbound from utilities, and inbound produced multi-state expansion. Not a marketing campaign. Not a bigger ad budget. A repeatable process that could be proven after the fact.
"Heat pumps have absolutely transformed my business," he says. "We've won some major projects just because of our best practices."
He's careful to hand the credit to his team — he still spends most of his time on HVACU, training contractors around the country, which is only possible because the operation runs without him.
Brynn is keynoting the US Heat Pump Summit, September 15–16 in Worcester, Massachusetts.
His pitch for who should attend: everyone, but owners especially. Becoming a heat pump business is an owner-level decision, and the room is full of people who've made it — contractors who went from one or two trucks to thirty or forty, or added several million in revenue in a few years. For technicians, the practitioner lineup includes people like Tim DeStasio, Jennifer Hetrick, and Ty Branum.
His description of the conference itself is the line that got the biggest laugh in the taping: "Unlike other conferences, it's not PE-ish." The attendees are contractors, and they lean home performance. Most good conferences are broad by design. This one is narrow on purpose.
He also makes the practical case. You're coming off a hot summer, cash is up, and you're heading into the slow season. It's two days. You're in and out, and you can start implementing the following week.
The thread running through all of it is that Brynn can prove his work.
A load calc is a document. A duct evaluation is a document. Test-in and test-out numbers are documents. Commissioning data is a document. None of that is glamorous, and none of it is what a homeowner asks about on the first call — but it's the reason he has 30 or 40 jobs he can point to and say exactly what happened to the bills.
Contractors who skip those steps aren't only risking a bad install. They're ending the year with nothing to show for the good ones. Same work, no evidence.
That's the difference between "we do quality installs" and a portfolio a utility will build a program around. One is a claim. The other is a file.
The equipment is available to everybody. The record isn't.
[00:00] – Introduction
[03:09] – Meet Brynn Cooksey
[05:34] – Why the U.S. Heat Pump Summit Matters
[08:02] – Navigating the Heat Pump Jungle
[09:17] – Growing a Multi-State Heat Pump Business
[12:23] – Who Should Attend the Summit?
[14:30] – Why Brynn Accepted the Keynote Invitation
[17:08] – Why Contractors Should Make the Trip
[19:08] – Closing Remarks
00:00:00.000 — 00:00:43.560 · Speaker 1
The customer's bills increased substantially. 1500 to 2000 bucks a month when these heat pumps went in and the technology got a bad rap, and when they got a bad rap, it wasn't because of the heat pump. The heat pumps were cold, climate inverter driven, all the bells and whistles that we enjoy. It was the way they were put in, the way they were designed and specified.
So when we say navigate the Jungle, we're going to discuss those bad design practices that before building science baptism, we were all guilty of replacing the like for like replacing it without a low count, not evaluating the duct system. All the no nos. We're going to talk about why you need to do it. And then if you do all these things, you authorize the building shell, you're going to get a great heat pump outcome.
So that's the core premise behind the presentation.
00:00:47.560 — 00:02:18.700 · Speaker 2
Hi everyone. Brynn Cooksey is back. He was episode 26 over a year ago and a lot has changed since then. On episode 26, Brynn described ER doctors as a home performance company that did HVAC. On this episode, Brynn calls his business a heat pump business because he's installing 97% plus heat pumps in people's homes. He's in the middle of expanding from Michigan into Georgia, with immediate plans to grow into Pennsylvania and Illinois. He's expanding to those states because utilities there are inviting him in and supporting his growth. Those utilities are doing that not because of his marketing and not because of how charming he is, but he is very charming.
Those utilities are asking him to grow there because of his data. His team has done tons of installs where he could prove the homeowners bills actually came down, because the work his team did to permanently reduce loads in the home to Goldilocks, size the heat pump system to do a darn good installation, and to prove all of that with excellent commissioning and test in test out processes. On this episode, Brynn also talks about the other side of that where he's been the second contractor in on jobs were good equipment or wrong sized equipment, went in badly, and the homeowner's bills went up by thousands a month. All of this is what Brynn is going to talk about at the US Heat Pump Summit, where he is this year's keynote speaker. I'm super excited about his session. We get a taste of it on this episode, and if you want to see it live, the US Heat Pump Summit is September 15th and 16th in Worcester, Massachusetts. It is one of our favorite conferences of the year, and if you're a fan of this podcast, like you should definitely be there. If you can take the time off, if you could afford the ticket and travel there.
We'd love to see you there. If the price of the ticket is an issue, the summit is kind enough to set aside a small batch of three full conference tickets for listeners of this episode. If you're interested in that email, contact@usheatpumpsummit.com, subject line free tickets and tell them amply sent you. Okay. With that, let's get into this very interesting episode with the one and only Brynn Cooksey.
00:03:14.530 — 00:03:22.170 · Speaker 2
Hi, and welcome to the Heat Pump podcast. I'm Ed Smith and today we have the one and only Brynn Cooksey. Brynn welcome back.
00:03:22.570 — 00:03:24.210 · Speaker 1
Thank you for having me back again.
00:03:24.210 — 00:03:31.050 · Speaker 2
So I was just looking. So you were a year ago, but you were episode 26, so it's been a minute. A lot happened since then.
00:03:31.090 — 00:03:39.810 · Speaker 1
It has businesses rolling. We're going to be talking about the US Heat Pump Summit here in a little bit. So that's a good thing. Things are well I can't complain. It's been a good year.
00:03:39.850 — 00:04:07.400 · Speaker 2
Thanks. All right. If anyone wants the full Brynn Cooksey story I'll just say right now they should go listen to episode 26. It was awesome. We learned about your background. We learned about your business. But I know how much has changed with your business. So before we even get to the Heat Pump Summit, and for anyone who missed episode 26, give us the quick version.
Who are you? What are you building there? Doctors? What are you building with HVAC? You give us that overview.
00:04:07.440 — 00:05:13.590 · Speaker 1
Sure, a high level. Brant Cooksey, born and raised in the Michigan area of southeast Michigan. That's where our headquarters is, a company called Air Doctors. So we're a home performance company. And basically we're known for three things in that business. We do home energy assessments. We come up with a work scope, we fix the home, and then we test out that's our forte.
In the midst of that, we solve three problems. So we solve indoor air quality problems. We solve comfort problems in. We're known to reduce our customers bills by about 50%. So that's the air doctors. That company is grown just because of especially our embracing of heat pump technology right now. Late last year, we opened up a Georgia market where we're starting to participate in rebate programs down there.
So we have a small crew in Georgia and on our roadmap for markets that we'll be looking to enter into, will be surveying Illinois's. So that's going good. Growing a lot of fun. They're having a blast with the whole heat pump market transformation HVAC is where I spend most of my time. So we think building science and heat pump technology is so critical to everybody's benefit that we run around the country and tell people about all the stuff of how to fix it, how to design it, how to incorporate it into your business.
So it's an actual profit center. So that's what we do with HVAC.
00:05:13.630 — 00:05:29.510 · Speaker 2
You awesome. And I can't recommend HVAC you enough. You are one of the best trainers in the industry and congratulations on going multi-state. That's huge. And Georgia is not next to Michigan.
00:05:29.510 — 00:05:39.310 · Speaker 1
No, it's not as we're talking. I'm actually in Atlanta right now hanging out with the team here. So it's a lot of fun. It's some new challenges but everybody needs heat pumps. So we're glad to do it.
00:05:39.350 — 00:06:06.820 · Speaker 2
Cool. All right. I think we're gonna peel back that decision a little bit more and learn more about that heat pump focus. But the reason I wanted you on here was because you're key. Noting the US heat pump summit. When I saw that, I gave a little fist pump into the air. I couldn't think of a better person to do that.
We're big fan of yours. We're big fan of the US Heat Pump Summit. Tell us what it is. What makes it different from other conferences on the HVAC calendar? Give us an overview of the USC Pump Summit.
00:06:06.860 — 00:06:47.420 · Speaker 1
I was extremely honored and shocked. So we're looking to have fun and see everybody in September at the USC Pump Summit. The reason why I like this conference is the attendees are contractors, and they're a little bit more home performance focused. And if you think about a heat pump is not a box swap type of device, if you put a heat pump in wrong, bad things happen.
And at this conference, you're going to get the nitty gritty of how to put heat pumps in, how to size them correctly, how to implement the technology. But it's also a contractor focus. So it's going to help you adopt these best practices in your business so that you can set yourself apart. So that's why I love this conference.
Unlike other conferences, is not PE ish that we're going to call it. So it's not.
00:06:47.460 — 00:06:48.380 · Speaker 2
That's amazing.
00:06:49.260 — 00:07:32.250 · Speaker 1
Yeah. It doesn't give you the vibes that you'll get us some conferences. So it's really a bunch of like minded contractors that are practitioners and manufacturers who are looking to adopt this awesome technology. And it's been huge for our business. So yeah, we're going to be the keynote and talk about the market.
Some of the best practices give a little bit about our story. And then I got a session later on in the conference called Navigating the Heat Pump Jungle. And what we're going to talk about in that session is there's a lot of, we'll call it bad information. Now, where I still today get contractors who say heat pumps on work in cold climates or they suck or something like that.
So we're going to get no holds barred. This is the design process to get you from a replacement system to a functioning heat pump system. We're going to incorporate build a science in the mix of it. So we're going to navigate the heat pump jungle.
00:07:32.290 — 00:07:51.850 · Speaker 2
Awesome. That comment that's not very. It really made me chuckle because Eric and I love this conference. Obviously we're huge fans of heat pumps. You saw a ton of our customers there last year. This will be our third year going, but it's also, as you said, that I was like, this is one of the few conferences I go to where the NX crew isn't wandering around.
00:07:51.890 — 00:07:52.850 · Speaker 1
Absolutely.
00:07:53.090 — 00:08:09.880 · Speaker 2
Yeah. So yeah, it's a plus one, that one friend. All right. You give us a little more of a taste of navigating the heat pump jungle like that. The core problem you're addressing there, you tease it a little bit. Can you give us a maybe not the appetizer?
00:08:09.920 — 00:09:20.470 · Speaker 1
Sure. Yeah, absolutely. I'll dive deeper for you. So the reason why I came up with this presentation title a few years ago when he pumps were market transformation was starting to get rolling, especially in Michigan. The IRA rebates were out, utilities were having some incentives. Different municipalities, like the city of Ann Arbor, were starting to have some incentives.
So a lot of people were asking about them. And I was the second contractor in after several heat pump installs and those heat pumps went in wrong cut, the customers bills increased substantially 1500 2000 bucks a month when these heat pumps went in and the technology got a bad rap, and when they got a bad rap, it wasn't because of the heat pump.
The heat pumps were cold, climate inverter driven, all the bells and whistles that we enjoy. It was the way they were put in, the way they were designed and specified. So when we say navigate the jungle, we're going to discuss those bad design practices that before building signs baptism. We were all guilty of replacing the like for like replacing it without a low count, not evaluating the duck system.
All the no nos. We're going to talk about why you need to do it. And then if you do all these things, whether as the building shell, you're going to get a great heat pump outcome. So that's the core premise behind our presentation.
00:09:20.470 — 00:09:51.390 · Speaker 2
Awesome. And you mentioned this before we started taping that. You're branching out into these new locations, which is a massive undertaking. And in the new locations you're going to, it's all heat pump focus. So would you tell me a little bit more about why you're branching your business out? Because I think it's a great testament to what heat pumps plus building science can do for a business when you install them, right?
00:09:51.430 — 00:11:09.180 · Speaker 1
Sure. Again, when you're installing a heat pump, if you are a heat pump contractor, you're going to be focusing on best practices, because there's some things we have to do with heat pumps that we don't have that disadvantage with fossil fuels. The benefits heat pumps are more efficient. They reduce carbon emissions and many people say that they actually provide better comfort.
I've experienced that when we look at the heat pump, if you step back and zoom out and you look at the whole house as a system. If I don't do these things well, I have some issues. So heat pump contractors, first off, they have to follow best practices. The reason why we decided to upgrade our business where he pumps is our primary focus, and then venture out to other states, is because we were being asked, because of our data that we produced in Michigan, about projects where we've put in 30 or 40 heat pump systems, and all the customer's bills were reduced because we followed our process.
So we were contacted by a couple of utility companies and stuff like that to see what it would take to run those same programs there. I would tell you, it heat pumps have absolutely transformed my business. We've won some major projects just because of our best practices, and that's one of the things I'm going to share at the Heat Pump Summit is that if you follow these design practices and learn how to communicate them to customers, you can have some serious wins.
So the opportunity knocked and we were prepared to go and that's how we got there.
00:11:09.220 — 00:11:35.740 · Speaker 2
It's so cool to hear that because when we interviewed it on the pod a year ago, I would say you were sort of angling in this direction, but a year ago you were still a home performance contractor. You did HVAC, but you agnostic. It depended on what the home needed and you took the holistic approach. But this time last year, you weren't like, we're a heat pump business, which is a cool and very interesting switch.
00:11:35.780 — 00:11:47.220 · Speaker 1
Yes, we're not 100% yet. We still have some contracts where they're still asking traditional, but I'll say we're 97.8% heat pump focus.
00:11:47.260 — 00:11:52.100 · Speaker 2
That's a heat pump business brand. 97.8 that's a heat pump business, man. That's cool.
00:11:52.540 — 00:12:04.180 · Speaker 1
We're going to offer heat pumps to every customer and let them decide what they want to invest in. So we've seen the benefits of what is done and especially in our community in Michigan. So know where heat pump business I'm going to call it what it is.
00:12:04.220 — 00:12:13.770 · Speaker 2
That's awesome. You know, to comment on this, but I'm still amazed that now expand new locations, you're still spending most of your time on HVAC you rather than just the expansion. That's a testament to the team you built.
00:12:13.810 — 00:12:27.770 · Speaker 1
I can't do anything. I'll give a shout out to the air doctors in the HVAC team. They are 100% both feet and committed to what we're doing, and I enjoy going to work and working with my team every day, so I wouldn't be able to do anything without them. So give them a shout out.
00:12:27.810 — 00:12:54.570 · Speaker 2
That's awesome. All right. We gave listeners there a little taste of the business impact of focusing on heat pumps, which they'll get a lot of at this event. If folks are listening to the Heat Pump podcast. So we've got the ideal folks listening who should be there. But couple questions for them as they're like thinking, well, is it worth it?
So first question on that. Who should be in the room? Owners, techs, sales leaders, heads of operations? Who should be there?
00:12:54.650 — 00:13:46.480 · Speaker 1
All of the above. I particularly like to see the owners there in order to transform your business and become a heat pump business as the head. You're going to have to make the decision to become that or understand the best practices to why it's a sales advantage. So owners definitely should be in the building.
You're going to interact with a lot of contractors that have some really substantial growth. There's several examples that they're going to be speaking there where they started out 1 or 2 trucks and now they're 30, 40 trucks plus, or they've grown their business revenue wise by five, six, $7 million in a few years.
So it's a lot of owner focus, but also from a text, you have the industry's best practitioners out there. You have your Tim Day studios and your Jennifer HVAC chicks and all these other awesome practitioners. Tai Branham and another one, they're going to be there speaking, and you're going to get the cutting edge of the best practices.
And with that being said, it's just awesome event to be at.
00:13:46.520 — 00:14:04.360 · Speaker 2
That's awesome. When I went to the last one in particular, it's like my favorite people in the industry were all there. It was just I couldn't believe it. Usually you get some percentage, but I was like, anyone who would win on my top 20 or 30 list was just there. And I was like, this is awesome.
00:14:04.400 — 00:14:34.870 · Speaker 1
Yeah, I had a blast. I went last year and everybody was there. All my friends in the industry, people we collaborate with to do certain projects with, and it was just a blast to see. And I learned some things that I walking away with. I walked way home and started to implement into our businesses. I learned about some new products or things that are being done differently.
I heard about some awesome updates coming out for some tools that we use, so it was just an awesome event to go to. Like I said, it's non PE ish. You're going to learn it's going to be chased around a conference to sign up for some type of program for sure.
00:14:34.910 — 00:14:47.909 · Speaker 2
Yeah. Totally agreed. All right. There's a lot of stages you could be on. There's a lot of stages you are on. You are a busy guy. The last I don't even know. Pretty much all the conferences I've been to. You've been on stage
00:14:49.110 — 00:14:58.950 · Speaker 2
and. All right, you're in Georgia, you're in Michigan. You don't necessarily spend that much time in Worcester, Massachusetts. So why'd you say yes to keynote this one?
00:14:58.990 — 00:15:33.180 · Speaker 1
Why did I say yes? One, I'm a big fan of this conference. I like you guys podcast. He pumps if you truly understand the benefits. And you could communicate that there are business transformational. They've done wonders for our business. I wouldn't be where I'm at today if I didn't start to offer those. And then two, I want to share the story of how it did impact our business.
When you put the right things in place, if you do the local kind of duct design and the duct assessments and the best practices, and if you can turn it into language that the customer understands, you can get out of the rat race, the race to the bottom, which we talked about in our last episode.
00:15:33.220 — 00:16:37.050 · Speaker 2
Yeah, I love that. I didn't ask myself, but I'll answer this one from my end too, because I think it's September. October is a crowded time. The reason we like to go to this a we just think heat pumps are the best HVAC technology that's out there. If you do them right. Homeowners will be more comfortable. They will be healthier.
They will have better bills. But they're one of these things that if you don't do it right, none of that materializes. Comfort is worse. Bills are higher. It's this tool that you just got to use, right? And it demands more. And so we love that. And what it demands is building science, knowledge. And fundamentally that's what amply is how do you assess the home.
So you got to know the building science aspect of it, and that's how you get there. So for us, it's just like it marries all the things that make us so excited to build our company, to build our software, to work with our customers and our viewers, a bunch of customers who their businesses are 90% plus pumps.
And that's the level I call I love you, you're 97.8. Anyone over 90, that is a heat pump business. Yeah, we have a lot of fun at this one.
00:16:37.050 — 00:17:13.880 · Speaker 1
Yeah. To your point, those best practices, that's really the magic. If you can separate yourself from a competitor and you can offer the customer something that's going to be healthier for them, could have positive bill impacts. You don't have carbon emissions or reduce their carbon emissions. You don't have combustion byproducts from that appliance.
There's a lot of upside. And if you let your customers know, there is that demographic of customers who prefer this type of technology. So this is a conference to get all that information. And it's not a conference out there like it. It's really specific to this and other conferences that are great that grow out.
This one is real specific. So that's another thing I like about it.
00:17:13.880 — 00:17:52.760 · Speaker 2
All right. So the conference is September 15th and 16th in Worcester. A lot of my customers are coming off an insane busy summer. And so they're busy or they're tired. And it's in Worcester, Massachusetts, which is not on many people's bucket lists for where they need to go before time runs out on them. Sure.
And man, there's a lot of states Massachusetts, the northeast are good for heat pumps. But Colorado, the Midwest, there's a bunch of other places that are doing awesome stuff. And heat pumps. West coast, for anyone who's listening, who's on the fence? What's your pitch for? Why they should buy the tickets.
Get the airfare. Show up for this one.
00:17:52.800 — 00:18:54.390 · Speaker 1
First things first. I just spoke with Brant Davison and he gave me a little gift for that audience here. He mentioned that he has a small batch of free tickets remaining for the listeners of this episode, and what they need to do is email him Contact at the USC Pump Summit. Com and put in a subject line free tickets.
All right so one we just took your ticket off the table right. So you can get in the house for free. All right. So which doesn't happen which is a conference admission. It can be pretty expensive. You just came out of a hot summer. So your cash is probably up and you're rolling it to the slow season. This is a good time.
September is usually where we start to cool off, especially in our part of the country. Why not hop on a plane and go to a conference where you can take away in two days? It's not a long conference. You're in and out. You get back in. You get back home, and you can now start to implement the stuff that you learned about heat pumps.
You can put those into your business. So it's a no brainer. It's on our calendar every year. It's definitely an event that we're looking and we're going to plan stuff around. Just we make sure that we're there.
00:18:54.430 — 00:19:02.430 · Speaker 2
Awesome. And of course, Brynn Cooksey will be on stage, which is reason enough to buy these tickets and get the.
00:19:02.470 — 00:19:13.620 · Speaker 1
Icing on the cake. Yeah, I'm going to work up a couple dad jokes and I'll tell people just by drowning when we use heat pump technology. What it did for our business. And we're going to be real specific. So it's going to be a good time.
00:19:13.660 — 00:19:23.380 · Speaker 2
Awesome. All right. Bren, thanks for joining us on the Heat Pump Summit. Thanks for headlining this. We will be there. We will be in the audience. Yeah, I'm looking forward to it.
00:19:23.420 — 00:19:29.980 · Speaker 1
I am to tell Eric we say hello and we'll bump into you guys in a little over a month. About a month and a half, huh? Yeah.
00:19:30.060 — 00:19:31.620 · Speaker 2
All right, man, thank you so much.
00:19:31.780 — 00:19:32.620 · Speaker 1
Take care. We'll see you.
00:19:35.980 — 00:19:58.340 · Speaker 3
Thanks for listening to the Heat Pump podcast. It is a production of Amply Energy and just a reminder that the opinions voice were those of our guests or us, depending on who was talking. If you like what you've heard and haven't subscribed, please subscribe on your favorite podcast platform. We'd love to hear from you, so feel free to reach out!
You can reach us once again at hello@amply.energy
00:19:59.900 — 00:20:02.420 · Speaker 3
No. com. Just dot energy. Thanks a lot.