One blue Triton to five vans

For September and October I’m stepping back from the day-to-day at Zac Power. Nothing changes for customers. Same crew, same standards, same phone number. But it’s the first time since I started that I’ve properly handed the business to someone else, and it’s happening for a good reason, so before I go I wanted to write down how we got here and say thank you to the people who made it happen.

Getting here

I didn’t pick Cowra. Amy did, or more accurately her scholarship did. It guaranteed her work and Cowra was where she was placed. We tried the long distance thing for a year while I finished up in Sydney, and at the start of 2018 I moved out here with no real plan beyond being in the same town as her.

I’d done my trade at PM Electric in Sydney and picked up an advanced diploma in electrical engineering along the way, so I found work locally while I got my bearings. It didn’t take long to work out I wasn’t a fit. I didn’t share the attitude towards customers, the communication was poor, and I was spending more time apologising for the work than doing it. I didn’t want my name attached to that.

In 2019 Amy and I got back from Europe. We’d bought a house, we were about to start trying for kids, and I was working for someone I didn’t respect. It was now or never. Zac Power had been registered since 2017, but that year is when it actually started: me, a blue Triton, a handful of labourers and 100 percent solar. The garage was the depot. When stock outgrew the garage I rented freight space off Geronimo Farm Equipment, a connection made through the Business Chamber, and that arrangement carried us for two years.

What became clear in the first few months was that Cowra was full of people who were sick of tradies not calling back and not turning up. My communication hasn’t always been perfect, but it’s been consistent and upfront, and that turned out to be most of what people wanted. Within three months I was paying myself a steady wage. I haven’t missed a pay since, for me or for anyone who’s worked for me.

The hard years

2020 was the first full year on my own, and it was COVID. Phones went dead. Supply came and went. Nobody could tell you whether you were allowed on site next week. I was lining up at the mobile testing clinic every week so I could work if the phone rang. Towards the end of that year I put on Jake, my first apprentice.

2021 was worse and better at once. My son was born. The Delta lockdown shut regional NSW down again from August. And we took the plunge on a premises, because even through all that the business was growing and needed room. That’s the depot on Young Road today. When my son arrived I took a month at home with Amy and the baby, and rather than leave a first-year apprentice with nothing to do, I sent Jake to Sydney to work at PM Electric for the month. It’s where I learned the trade, and I wanted him to see how a proper shop runs. He’s finished his time now, which is a proud moment for both of us.

Then 2022, the floods. The morning the dam release was announced we had eight hours to prepare. By that night the river had cut the town off from the hospital and the ambulance station, and as an SES flood rescue operator I spent it helping get people and supplies across. The last job was walking an elderly bloke out through shoulder-deep water. I lost close to a week of work to the floods and the business lost about a month of cash flow. I was carrying stock for over 30 days and had to sit down with suppliers and talk through payment plans. I told customers exactly what was happening and every one of them was understanding. That year taught me more about running a business than the good years did.

COVID had already shown me that being all solar was a risk, so we’d pushed into general electrical work. In 2023 a local air conditioning business left town, and that was a gap we could fill. This year I went back and completed my Cert III in air conditioning and refrigeration myself, because I won’t put my name on work I don’t understand properly.

Growth has been steady every year since. Team members have come and gone, which is part of any trade business. The ones who’ve stayed have built something.

Who’s running it

Jamie started about four years ago as a general sparky. He’s the one who has pushed me for growth, not the other way around. We’ve worked through development plan after development plan together and he’s gone from the tools to solar leading hand, and over the next two months he’s stepping into operations. The jobs, the crew and the schedule are his.

Tash came on in 2025 from a trade background and runs the office. She’s the one who keeps me on task, and if you ring, she’ll sort you out.

Lakey heads up air conditioning. Sky is putting the final touches on her apprenticeship and is basically a tradesman already, with Andrew, Lachy and George backing them up on the tools and holding the standard we work to. We’ve got another tradesman starting in September to take the pressure off, and we’re currently on the lookout for two more apprentices. From September that’s a crew of ten and five vehicles on the road.

If a business only works when the owner is there, it’s not a business, it’s a job. I’ve spent a long time building something that works without me. This is the first real test of it.

Why now

I’m getting married.

Amy has been beside this business the whole way. We did things a bit backwards, buying a house in 2019 and then having the kids, who are now two and five. Over the long weekend we’re getting married, and then we’re taking the kids to Fiji for two weeks. It’s our first real holiday since that trip to Europe in 2019, the one that started all this.

In 2025 I stepped back from Fire and Rescue and reduced my SES commitments after more than five years, so I could be more present at home and in the business. The same year I was made Chairman of the Cowra Business Chamber, which has become the main way I give back to the town that gave a bloke with one ute a go. This break is the same idea. Be where it matters.

Thank you

To every customer who’s had us in their home, shed, shop or paddock: thank you. Some of you have been with us since the Triton days and have had us back four or five times. That trust is the only reason any of this exists.

To the team, past and present: you’ve put up with a lot of change, a lot of new processes and a boss who doesn’t sit still. This business is what it is because of you.

To the suppliers, other tradies and businesses around Cowra who’ve referred work, lent space, or just had a yarn at the counter: this is a good town to run a business in because of people like you.

And to Amy and the kids, who’ve carried more than their share. That’s what the next two months are for.

While I’m away, call the office on (02) 6342 3354 or email accounts@zacpower.net.au. Tash and Jamie have it covered.

See you in November.