Allow me to share with you something most septic companies won’t: there are two categories of people in this reality. Those who think septic systems are just “buried containers for waste,” and those who’ve had raw sewage gurgling into their yard at 2 AM. I understood this difference the hard way in 2005—knee-deep in mud, shivering in a Washington rainstorm, as my siblings and I helped a veteran installer repair our family’s failed system. I was fourteen. My hands were raw. My jeans were wrecked. But that evening, something changed: This isn’t just dirt work. It’s families’ lives we’re preserving.

The majority of companies begin by pumping tanks. We launched by creating them—from scratch. Back in the early 2000s, web site when other kids were gaming on Xbox, Art Nikolin (our ops manager) and his brothers were digging trenches under the careful eye of a septic veteran their old man hired. Project by project, that installer saw something in us. Possibly it was our fierce refusal to walk away when a PVC pipe failed at 9 PM. Or how we would argue about soil percolation rates like kids debate pizza toppings. By 2008, we were not just assistants—we were certified installers. But here is the kicker: we learned this craft backward.

Understand, 90% of septic operations start with service. They know how to service a tank but couldn’t tell you why the leach field went bad three years after installation. We got our hands muddy from the bottom up. Actually. I think back to this one hellish summer—2006, I believe—when we put in 17 systems across Snohomish County. One homeowner’s yard had soil like granite. The “expert” crew before us quit. But our mentor taught us a trick: hydrate the ground overnight, dig at first light. We finished by noon. That system? Still running perfectly 18 years later.

Fast forward to 2023. We get a phone call from a panicked homeowner in Woodinville. Their fresh septic system—installed by a “budget” crew—failed during Thanksgiving dinner. Raw sewage oozed into their yard. The company abandoned them. We showed up at 10 PM. Art took one glance at the tank placement and groaned. “They put it uphill the house? Gravity doesn’t work that way, people.” By dawn, we had redesigned the complete layout. Protected them $20K in landscaping repairs too.

This is what sets Septic Solutions LLC unique: we construct systems like we are gonna maintain them. Because truthfully, we did. That first tank we built as kids? Our family used it for a long time. Every pipe we placed, every tank we set, had our reputation on the line. When you’ve actually eaten dinner 10 feet above a septic field you constructed, you don’t cut corners.

I’ll get honest—septic work isn’t pretty. But you’ll find an skill to it. In 2015, we tackled a disaster job near Lake Stevens. Rocky terrain. Limited budget. Three other companies claimed it was impossible to be done without dynamite. We put in a week carefully digging around rocks, repositioning the drain field millimeter by millimeter. The client got emotional when we completed. Not because it was affordable—but because we saved her century-old oak tree.

Our edge? We’re not just installers. We’re experts of soil. We know which brands of PVC crack in Washington’s freeze-thaw cycles (skip the blue-striped stuff). We have memorized which counties have clay that will choke a drain field in 5 years. Shoot, we even redesigned our tank baffles in 2019 after observing how grease buildup cripples pumps. Minor tweak. Major impact. Maintenance teams love us for it.

You want stats? Okay. Since 2010, 92% of our systems have lasted 10+ years without major issues. But data do not stink when things go wrong. Ask Mrs. Henderson from Monroe. Her last installer used inferior aggregate that converted her leach line into a cement-like tomb. We used New Year’s Day 2021 breaking it out. She mailed us cookies for a twelve months.

This is the harsh truth: the majority of septic failures take place because someone missed a step. Did not test the soil thoroughly. Used cheap tanks. Got wrong the water table. We’ve fixed countless of these messes. And every time, we file away another lesson. Like in 2022, when we began adding double risers to every job. Why? Because Randy, our lead tech, got tired of watching homeowners destroy their lawns during maintenance. Now maintenance is a brief job.

I won’t lie—this work takes a toll on you. Art’s got a picture from our initial commercial job in 2009. We appear like babies playing in Tonka trucks. These days, we’ve developed crow’s feet from studying at soil reports and laugh lines from clients who turned into friends. Like the retired couple in Bothell who demand we stay for lemonade after each service calls. Or the brewery in Everett whose tank we replaced last fall—they called a beer “Septic Solutions Sour.” (That’s… an unique taste.)

So yes, we aren’t not the most affordable. Or the showiest. But when a storm cuts power and your tank’s backing up? You aren’t going to care about discounts. You’re going to want the guys who’ve 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 trapped ankle-deep in catastrophe.

Thinking back, it seems funny. That installer who taught us as kids? He stepped away years ago. But his lessons still resonate in our heads every single time we disturb ground. “Push deeper,” he used to say. “Future you will thank past you.” Turns out, he was not just talking about septic tanks.