How commercial HVAC owners can step into quarter million dollar plus jobs on purpose by proving they can carry the risk, not by trimming price.
Key Takeaway: Bigger jobs are not a courage test. They are a proof test. You win them when you can show, in plain English, that your team can carry the risk, the schedule, and the cash without drama.
Mel's phone buzzed during lunch. It was the project manager he had been waiting to hear from for two weeks. He picked up on the first ring.
"Hey, just wanted to let you know we went with another team. They do more of this size work."
Mel kept his voice neutral. "Was our price way off?"
The PM hesitated. "Price was fine. Your package just looked light for a project that big." The call ended.
Mel set his phone on the desk and stared at his laptop. Four hundred twenty thousand dollars of controls and rooftop replacement for a distribution center. Same region. Same crews. Same type of equipment his team had been installing for a decade.
He did not lose because his techs were not good enough. His lost because the people on the other side could not see him handling the risk. That is the part most shops miss.
You do not break into bigger jobs by slashing price. You break in by showing that you can carry more risk without dropping it.
Reality
Mel spent that evening replaying the call. He pulled up his proposal and the bid instructions side by side. His package had:
What it did not have was what the PM cared about most on a four hundred thousand dollar project:
His numbers were fine. His risk story was missing.
On a $30k dollar job the buyer wonders, "Can you fix this without embarrassing me?" On a $300k job the buyer wonders, "Can you finish this without blowing up schedule, tenants, or cash?"
If you treat those as the same conversation, bigger jobs keep slipping away.
Fix It
The next morning Mel called the PM back. "Off the record. What did the winning contractor show that I did not?"
The PM did not rush. "They sent a one page project resume with three jobs between $300k and $500k. They named the PM and superintendent in the proposal. They attached a simple schedule and a safety plan... Then the line that stuck.
"You looked like a strong service and small projects shop. They looked like a project team."
Mel wrote the sentence down. That afternoon he pulled his operations lead, Luis, into his office. He opened the $420k proposal next to the bid instructions. "Tell me what is missing."
Luis scrolled through page one. Page two. The equipment list. The pricing sheet. He leaned back.
"Where is the project manager? Where is the schedule? Where is the plan for how we would protect their operations?"
Mel watched the screen. "I thought the GC knew we could handle it." Luis shook his head.
"On a $100k job, maybe. On a $400k job, they need to see it in writing. You gave them a scope. They needed a safety plan."
Mel did not argue. He just wrote that sentence down too.
Pro Move
Do what Mel did while the sting is still fresh. Pick one bigger job you lost in the last 12 months. Call the buyer and ask two questions.
Listen for patterns around risk, schedule, safety, and capacity, not just price.
Remember what your buyers are dealing with. Commercial and industrial property managers are treating HVAC as strategic infrastructure now, not background equipment. They are under pressure from tenants, regulators, and corporate sustainability targets. When systems fail on large sites, it is not just uncomfortable. It hits production, logistics, and lease risk. That is why they lean toward contractors who look built for complex work.
You do not have to be the biggest shop in town. You do have to look like you understand the stakes.
Quick Win
Before you chase the next stretch opportunity, answer three questions on paper for that job.
If you cannot answer those in one short paragraph each, you are not ready to talk credibly about the job. You are still thinking like a bidder, not a partner carrying risk.
Reality
Most owners decide they want bigger jobs after they see a tempting RFP. Then the clock starts. Now you are scrambling.
Mel realized he was doing the hardest part under the tightest deadline. Bigger jobs were not passing him by because he lacked the skills. They were passing her by because she had never taken a quiet week to put her proof in one place for work above her comfort band.
Fix It
Friday afternoon, Mel cleared his desk and called Luis and his office manager, Sandra, into the conference room. "We are going to build a package I can send in fifteen minutes the next time a bigger job shows up."
They started with the easiest piece: the three largest jobs they had actually completed. Mel pulled up the $180k office retrofit from last year.
Luis had run it. Clean schedule. No drama.
Sandra asked, "What did you do that kept the tenants happy?" Luis thought for a second. "We worked nights and weekends. We staged the work by floor. We had one point person for complaints." Mel typed it up.
Project: Class B office retrofit
Value and gross margin: $180,000 at a healthy project margin
Scope: Rooftop units, controls, tenant coordination
How we protected operations: Night and weekend phasing, floor by floor staging, dedicated complaint contact
Outcome: Zero tenant complaints, finished two days early
He read it back. "That is what a buyer needs to see. Not just what we did. How we kept their building running and still made money." From there they built a simple package they could attach or tailor in under fifteen minutes whenever a stretch opportunity appeared.
The first version contained:
They did not fabricate anything. They pulled what they were already doing on scattered jobs and packaged it in a way that answered a buyer's silent questions.
"Can you carry a project like this without choking?"
If you are stepping up in job size, this AGC best practices checklist on preventing subcontractor default is a strong gut-check for what “qualified subs” and “buyer-safe execution” actually mean.
If you want to see what that shift looks like in a real shop, the Real Results story walks through how another commercial HVAC CEO went from winging it to scaling with control.
Pro Move
Owners who grow from small projects to multi million dollar commercial work rarely do it with extra hustle alone. They grow because they start running the business in a way that looks like the size they want, not the size they are.
That usually means:
Contractors who have scaled from startup to several million in revenue consistently point to those basics as the turning point. They moved out of white knuckle mode and into documented systems, better leadership, and more professional financials before they took on consistently larger work.
If you want bigger jobs, your package is how you show that maturity on paper before anyone sees your crews in the field.
Quick Win
This week, do not wait for the perfect RFP. Pick one day and build the first draft of your bigger job package.
You can refine the package later. The important part is having something you can send within an hour whenever the next bigger opportunity appears.
Reality
When you say "bigger jobs," your team often hears "any huge logo that will have us." That is how you end up bidding a hospital tower or semiconductor plant when you have never run a clean room or night shift crew rotation in your life.
Mel almost fell into that trap. His average project sat around $60k. His largest completed job in the last two years was about $180k. The two biggest opportunities on his board that quarter were:
Both were bigger. Only one was the right next step.
Fix It
In the conference room, Mel grabbed a marker and drew four lanes on the whiteboard.
Then she wrote the two opportunities on the board.
$900K lab job – Lane 4, unfamiliar systems, no deep relationship
$320K multi rooftop – Lane 3, familiar work, existing relationship
Luis studied the board."The lab job is at least two rungs up. We would be learning critical systems in real time." Mel nodded and crossed it off.
"Right next step is Lane 3. That is where we prove we can handle more without gambling with the crews or our cash." He focused his best thinking and his new package on work that lived in that lane.
You do not have to jump three rungs to grow. You have to pick the next step that stretches you without breaking your crews or your cash.
Pro Move
Draw your own ladder using your numbers.
Now put rules around it.
Bigger jobs strain cash too. Talk with your banker and your surety agent before you go all in. Make sure you understand how retainage, slower pay cycles, and added material exposure will hit your line of credit. A healthy line and a clear plan beat blind optimism every time.
If bonding is the gate you keep bouncing off, start with the Small Business Administration surety bond program overview so you understand how SBA-backed bonds work before you chase the next bigger bid.
Quick Win
Open your current pipeline. For each opportunity above your usual size, tag it.
This week, move one "two steps too high" opportunity out of the way. Replace it with one target account in your right next step that looks like your best work, just at a higher ticket.
Tell your sales lead exactly why you made the switch. You just turned "bigger jobs" from a vague idea into a deliberate lane.
Reality
Deciding to go after bigger work is easy. Running a clean experiment is rare.
Most shops treat larger bids like weather. If an RFP lands in the inbox, they scramble. If it does not, they forget about the goal until the next dry spell.
Mel wanted proof, not hope.
So he turned the idea into a 90 day test.
Fix It
Monday morning, Mel called a short huddle with Luis and his two sales leads.
"For the next 90 days, we are going to prove we can win 1 job in the $200k to $300k range. Not hope for it. Prove it."
He wrote 3 names on the whiteboard. Property managers who already knew his work and had portfolios big enough to matter. "These are our targets. We are going to show them the package. Ask for one upcoming project a step above our usual size. And we are not sending blind numbers anymore. Every stretch job gets a short planning call."
For 90 days they:
Every time they lost or passed, they logged the reason.
By the 60 day mark they could see the patterns. They were getting invited to more serious conversations when they showed up early with a clear plan and a package that answered risk questions up front.
Pro Move
Do not measure your test only by wins. Track three metrics that tell you whether you are earning the right to bid bigger work.
Run the Bid Win Rate Scorecard before and after the test so you can see whether your success rate is improving on the work that actually moves the needle. You are training your team to treat bigger jobs as a lane with rules and feedback, not one lucky break.
Quick Win
Write a short debrief script you can use the next time you lose a stretch job. Something like:
"I appreciate the chance to bid. For my own learning, what did the winning contractor show that made you feel safest picking them for a project this size?"
You are not begging for a second chance. You are doing field research on what bigger buyers actually care about. Use what you learn to tighten your package and your right next step rules.
Eleven weeks into Mel's 90 day test, a $285k multi rooftop project opened up with a regional property manager he had worked with on 3 smaller jobs. His typical work with this PM had been around $75k.
This was different. Four buildings. Tight coordination. The PM was blunt on the first call. "I trust you on the small stuff. I need to see that you can handle this without it becoming my full time job."
Mel's old instinct would have been to bid tight, skip the documentation, and hope the relationship carried it. This time he led with the package. He sent a short note and then walked the PM through it on a 20-min video call.
He explained how Luis would own the schedule and how his senior techs would handle rotation between buildings. He used one project profile story from the office retrofit where they finished early with zero complaints. Halfway through, the PM stopped him.
"This is what I needed. Send me the pricing when you are ready."
Mel priced it to protect the margin the way they had on their best work. He did not chase the bottom. He won at $285k.
The closest competitor was $272k. When he told Luis, he looked at the signed contract and shook his head.
"That is more than double anything we have run in one shot."
Mel smiled. "Same crews. Same equipment. Now they can see it on paper."
For the first time in his career, he wasn't chasing bigger logos. He was building bigger proof.
A week later, sitting in the same trailer that had smelled like coffee, dust, and marker ink on the day he lost the $420k job, he flipped through the new job file. Nothing had changed about the way they changed out rooftops. Everything had changed about how safe they looked to hire.
If you are reading this, you are probably not wondering whether growth is possible. You are wondering whether your sales system, mix, and pitch are strong enough to support bigger, better work without burning your crews.
Here is how this post fits with the rest of the Sales Growth Stack.
Run the Bid Win Rate Scorecard this month to see whether your next lift is mix discipline, pitch structure, price protection, or bigger job credibility. Fast pulse. No spreadsheets.
This week:
When you consistently win the right bigger jobs with clear roles, clean documentation, and healthy margins, you are doing more than growing revenue. You are proving that your capacity is in the business, not just in your head. Buyers notice that. It is the kind of shift that earns stronger valuations when it is time to sell, because the risk sits with a system, not a single owner.
When you want a bigger job strategy, proof package, and bid discipline your team can run without you hovering over every estimate, the Sales Growth Workplan is where we build it.
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“This is the stuff no one tells you. We’re making more with less stress.”
— Louis, Texas
