Let me share with you something the majority of septic companies will not: there are two categories of people in this world. Those who believe septic systems are simply “underground boxes for waste,” and those who’ve had raw sewage bubbling into their property at midnight. I learned this distinction the tough way in 2005—standing in muck, shivering in a Washington rainstorm, as my family and I assisted a grizzled installer restore our family’s collapsed system. I was 14. My hands blistered. My pants were wrecked. But that night, something crystallized: This isn’t just digging. It’s folks’ lives we are safeguarding.

The majority of companies begin by pumping tanks. We began by constructing them—from scratch. Back in the beginning of the 2000s, when most kids were glued to Xbox, Art Nikolin (our operations head) and his family were excavating trenches under the experienced eye of a septic veteran their old man hired. Project by project, homepage that installer noticed something in us. Possibly it was our relentless refusal to give up when a PVC pipe exploded at 9 PM. Or how we’d sit and argue about soil percolation rates like kids argue about pizza toppings. By 2008, we were no longer just assistants—we were qualified installers. But this is the kicker: we learned this craft backward.

Look, 90% of septic companies begin with maintenance. They get how to clean a tank but can’t tell you why the drain field failed three years after installation. We got our hands dirty from the foundation. No joke. I think back to this one brutal summer—2006, I recall—when we constructed 17 systems across Snohomish County. One client’s yard had soil like bedrock. The “pro” crew before us gave up. But our teacher taught us a method: hydrate the ground overnight, dig at dawn. We wrapped up by noon. That system? Still running perfectly 18 years later.

Skip ahead to 2023. We get a phone call from a terrified homeowner in Woodinville. Their recently installed septic system—constructed by a “budget” crew—failed during Thanksgiving dinner. Raw sewage oozed into their landscaping. The company abandoned them. We got there at 10 PM. Art took one peek at the tank positioning and shook his head. “They put it uphill the house? Gravity doesn’t work that way, people.” By sunrise, we redesigned the whole layout. Protected them $20K in landscaping damage too.

This is what makes Septic Solutions LLC different: we create systems like we’re the ones gonna depend on them. Because actually, we did. That original tank we built as youngsters? Our family depended on it for a decade. Every pipe we placed, every tank we positioned, had our reputation on the line. When you’ve eaten dinner 10 feet above a septic field you constructed, you don’t cut corners.

I’ll get honest—septic work is not appealing. But there is an skill to it. In 2015, we took on a nightmare job near Lake Stevens. Boulder-filled terrain. Shoestring budget. Three other companies insisted it was impossible to be done without blasting. We spent a week carefully digging around rocks, fine-tuning the drain field precisely. The client cried when we wrapped up. Not because it was budget-friendly—but because we saved her hundred-year-old oak tree.

Our edge? We’re not just installers. We’re historians of soil. We understand which brands of PVC break in Washington’s freeze-thaw cycles (skip the blue-striped brand). We memorized which counties have clay that’ll choke a drain field in 5 years. Heck, we even improved our tank baffles in 2019 after noticing how grease buildup destroys pumps. Small tweak. Major impact. Maintenance guys thank us for it.

You want stats? Okay. Since 2010, 92% of our systems have survived 10+ years without significant issues. But data won’t stink when things go south. Ask Mrs. Henderson from Monroe. Her previous installer used inferior aggregate that converted her leach line into a cement-like tomb. We used New Year’s Day 2021 jackhammering it out. She delivered us cookies for a year.

Here’s the harsh truth: nearly all septic failures occur because someone ignored a step. Didn’t test the soil correctly. Used inferior tanks. Misjudged the water table. We’ve personally fixed dozens of these failures. And each time, we record another insight. Like in 2022, when we decided on adding dual-access risers to each job. Why? Because Randy, our head tech, got sick of watching homeowners destroy their lawns during checks. Now maintenance is a 15-minute job.

I won’t lie—this work takes a toll on you. Art’s got a photo from our earliest commercial job in 2009. We appear like babies playing in Tonka trucks. These days, we’ve developed crow’s feet from peering at soil reports and laugh lines from clients who are now friends. Like the senior couple in Bothell who require we stay for lemonade after all service calls. Or the brewery in Everett whose tank we replaced last fall—they named a beer “Septic Solutions Sour.” (It’s… an unique taste.)

So absolutely, we are not the cheapest. Or the flashiest. But when a storm knocks out power and your tank’s overflowing? You won’t care about deals. You will want the team that have been there, done that, and still smell like slight regret. The team that answers at 2 AM because we’ve personally all been that homeowner stuck ankle-deep in crisis.

Thinking back, it is funny. That installer who mentored us as kids? He quit years ago. But his lessons still resonate in our heads every time we open ground. “Dig deeper,” he used to say. “Future you will thank past you.” As it happens, he was not just talking about septic tanks.