SALEM, Ohio – Lloyd Gordon always had an entrepreneurial drive.
During the mid-1940s, the Pittsburgh native had found himself in Texas working for Gulf Oil along with another brother. Not long into the job, he felt the pull to break out on his own.
Gordon began doing some research on the benefits of home water softeners, then a technology still in its infancy. The business at the time consisted of using ion exchange tanks that would remove minerals such as calcium, lead and heavy metals from a residential water supply.
“He decided he wanted to start his own business, and he wanted to be within 60 miles from Pittsburgh,” recalled Carolyn Gordon Jones, Lloyd’s daughter. “So he came back and drove around and liked the feeling of Salem.”
Her late father set up the business in a building that housed a bicycle shop at 776 North Ellsworth Ave. With help from his brothers, Gordon opened the venture in 1945, laying the foundation for a lasting family legacy.
“That’s the reason it’s called Gordon Bros.,” Jones said.
Business Flows
Eighty years later at the same location, business at Gordon Bros. Water Systems flows stronger than ever, as the company – now in its third generation of family leadership with a fourth generation engaged – has adapted to the many changes across the industry.
“It was basically a soft-water business when I started in 1966,” said Ned Jones, Carolyn’s husband and today company chairman. “Water softeners were better for your hair. They were better for washing. So you would save money on things like soap and soap-related products.”
Carolyn Jones’ brother, Bruce Gordon, served as president and CEO until his death in 2010.
The business has since undergone revolutionary changes, Ned Jones emphasized. “The real change came about 30 years ago with drinking water – that changed everything,” he said.
He said that when he started in the family business, approximately 20% of the market was concerned over the quality of their drinking water. “Now, it’s completely flip-flopped,” as consumers flock to the shelves purchasing purified bottled water for their drinking needs.
Single automatic water-treatment systems can be installed to serve an entire household, he said. Through the use of reverse osmosis, these systems are able to remove impurities from the water supply. The company also sells compact water systems tailored specifically for drinking water for residential and business customers, he said.
“I think we’ve become more of a health industry,” Carolyn Jones said.
Still, every customer is different, added Scott Jones, company president and the third generation of the family to run the company. His daughter, Mallory, represents the fourth generation working at Gordon Bros.
“We go into a home and customize their system, depending on their water. Every situation is different,” Scott Jones said. “So it’s not like you’re buying something off the rack.”
New Technology and Wider Opportunities
A critical part of the company’s business is its 50-year relationship with Kinetico, a pioneering water-treatment equipment manufacturer based in the Cleveland area, Scott Jones said. During the 1970s, Kinetico invented a completely new way of water treatment, and Gordon Bros. was among the first to recognize the benefits. “They revolutionized our industry with a nonelectric water system,” he said.
Instead of a plug-in system, Kinetico’s water-treatment products use water pressure to operate, much like a sprinkler system, he said. “They created a design that works off water flow.”
The partnership has also opened new marketing and sales opportunities. Approximately 15 years ago, Gordon Bros. struck up a relationship with Home Depot through Kinetico. Since Gordon Bros. is a Kinetico dealer, the company can provide service for these brand products and sell them through Home Depot locations in a 15-county area in Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia.
“I think that’s a big deal,” Scott Jones said. “When we’re in the Pittsburgh market, for example, people don’t know who we are like they do in Salem. “But they do know Home Depot. When we start talking about our relationship with Home Depot, it builds a tremendous amount of credibility.”
Crisis Response and New Initiatives
Moreover, the public has become more conscious over water conditions, especially in the aftermath of natural disasters or crises such as the train derailment in East Palestine three years ago. “One of the first concerns after East Palestine was the water quality,” Ned Jones said.
Gordon Bros. also performs water analyses for customers to determine the level of impurity, either from well water or municipal systems. Although municipalities have improved treatment processes, some of the older cities still have water piping infrastructure that is aging or obsolete and could potentially pose a public health risk.
“Even if you get the water really, really clean at a treatment plant, you have these really old distribution systems,” Scott Jones said. To replace this infrastructure in many cases is cost-prohibitive for cities, so it makes sense to consider some type of water filtration system for the home.
He emphasized that cities in this region do a great job of protecting the public. However, as standards change, so do the costs of upgrading water systems.
“They do a nice job. We’re here to finish the job that they started,” he said.
Water testing has also become more sophisticated, and it is able to detect impurities that would not have registered on tests conducted a decade or so ago, Ned Jones said.
Gordon Bros. employs approximately 50 at its Salem location, and business continues to expand because of new product and service initiatives and an overall increase in health concerns, Scott Jones said.
Business exploded during the Covid-19 pandemic, he said, as the company’s services were deemed essential and people refrained from traveling and became more concerned about their health. Public awareness and demand did not subside in the wake of the crisis. “I would say we’ve almost doubled our business in the last five years,” he said. “It’s really crazy.”
The company operates a water station at its showroom where the public can walk in and fill jugs of water at 40 cents per gallon. “You’d be amazed at all the people coming in from everywhere on a daily basis,” he said.
Other initiatives include sales of “water club” memberships that include discounted service and parts and free salt delivery to water systems. “It’s about $100 a year, and they get a lot of benefits,” he said. “We started with 0 and now we’re up to 6,000 members.”
More importantly, such efforts improve relationships and communications with the company’s existing customers.
“It’s probably been the biggest and smartest thing we’ve ever done as a company,” he said. “Before, we were losing customers because we weren’t communicating well enough and they would go elsewhere. We’re finding now that when people need new things, they stay with you.”
Pictured at top: From left are Scott Jones, Mallory Jones, Carolyn Gordon Jones and Ned Jones.