Every trades business owner is looking for good techs right now. The ones finding them are doing this.

Every trades business owner has said it. It’s the universal excuse why the truck sits parked, why you’re turning down work in your busiest month of the year, why you’re working weekends again at 50 years old when you swore you wouldn’t.

Here’s the thing nobody wants to hear: the good ones are working somewhere else, and they’re working there because that owner figured out something that most haven’t.

It’s not that qualified tradespeople don’t exist. Over 80% of contractors report difficulty filling hourly craft positions, and the average age of a skilled tradesperson is now past 55, which means the shortage gets worse every year, not better. But inside that same shortage, some shops are consistently attracting quality people while their competitors post the same Indeed ad for the fourth time and wonder why nobody’s applying.

The difference isn’t luck. It’s not higher wages alone either. It something most owners overlook entirely and it’s the whole story this week.

Most owners respond to this problem the same way: post a job on Indeed, wait, get frustrated, post again. Maybe bump the hourly rate by a dollar and repost. Then wonder why the same low-quality applicants keep showing up.That sounds like a soft, feel-good answer. It's not. It's a financial one.

Here’s what the data says about why that approach fails: trades workers are not browsing LinkedIn. They don’t respond to generic job board posts. Word of mouth within trades communities is powerful, and a recommendation from a respected journeyperson carries more weight than any job posting ever will. The shops consistently winning the hiring game figured this out years ago.

One Denver-based HVAC company called Mountain Air Systems is a case study worth paying attention to. They were struggling to fill technician roles using only Indeed and Craigslist. Sound familiar? After implementing a multi-channel approach that included partnering with three local trade schools, joining their industry association, and launching a $1,000 employee referral program, they increased qualified applicants from 4 to 14 per open position within six months. Their time to fill dropped from 78 days to 31. Retention improved 35%.

They didn’t find better people by posting more jobs. They built a system that made good people come to them.

→ 89% of trades businesses trying to hire in 2026 say they had few or no qualified applicants for open positions, according to the National Federation of Independent Business. One-third of all owners had openings they could not fill at all. NFIB

→ The average age of a skilled tradesperson in the U.S. is now past 55. The retirement wave hitting the trades over the next decade will make today's shortage look mild by comparison. Blue Collar Recruiter

→ Employee referral programs produce hires that stay 35% longer than candidates sourced through job boards. The best hire you'll ever make is the one your best tech recommends. Blue Collar Recruiter

→ Trades workers are not on LinkedIn. Trade-specific job boards, apprenticeship program boards, union halls, and word of mouth within trades communities significantly outperform general platforms for skilled trades recruiting. CPG Incorporated

→Improving technician productivity often creates more capacity than hiring. The fastest-growing home service businesses in 2026 are getting more value from every existing technician through better scheduling, reduced drive time, and optimized dispatching before adding headcount. FieldEdge

1. Build a referral program and pay real money for it.

Your current crew knows every good tech in your market. They've worked alongside them, trained with them, and know exactly who shows up and who doesn't. A $500 to $2,000 referral bonus for a hire who stays past 90 days is the highest-ROI recruiting spend available to a trades business. It costs a fraction of a recruiter, produces better candidates, and improves retention because nobody vouches for someone who'll embarrass them.

Set it up this week: announce the bonus amount, make the referral process simple (a name and a phone number), and pay it fast when it hits. Speed of payment signals that you're serious.

2. Partner with a local trade school before they graduate.

The best time to hire a young tech is before someone else does. Reach out to the HVAC, plumbing, or electrical program at your local community college or vocational school. Offer to do a guest talk, sponsor a tool, or take on an apprentice. Most programs are hungry for industry partners. You get access to motivated students before they've signed on anywhere, and you get to evaluate them before you hire them. This is how the best shops build their bench.

3. Stop posting generic job ads. Write one that sounds like you.

"Competitive pay. Great benefits. Team environment." Every trades job ad reads exactly the same, which means yours disappears into the noise. The best candidates, the ones who have options, are reading your ad and deciding whether your shop is somewhere they'd want to work. Write it like a human being. Talk about what you actually pay, what your truck setup looks like, what the culture is, what you expect, and why someone who's good at their job would want to be there. Specificity beats corporate speak every time.

4. Make your shop known in the community before you need to hire.

The trades run on reputation, and that reputation extends to employment as well as work quality. Shops that are known as good places to work don't scramble when they need a tech because they already have people who want in. How do you build that reputation? Show up at trade association events. Be visible in local trades Facebook groups, not pitching, just being a presence. Let your crew talk about their work publicly. Sponsor something at the local vo-tech. The investment is small. The compounding effect over two or three years is enormous.

5. Fix your retention before you fix your recruiting.

There's a reason the good techs are already working somewhere else, and sometimes that reason is that they left a shop just like yours. Before spending another dollar on recruiting, ask yourself honestly: why do people leave? Is it pay? Is it how they're treated? Is it the equipment they're asked to work with? Is it that nobody ever tells them they're doing a good job? Fixing a retention problem is almost always cheaper than solving a recruiting problem. A shop with low turnover has a waiting list. A shop with high turnover is always recruiting.

I spent over two decades working for other people before I started building something of my own. And in that time, I watched good tradespeople walk out of shops that needed them badly. Not because they got a better offer somewhere else. Because nobody ever made them feel like they mattered.

The shops that kept their best people weren't always the ones paying the most. They were the ones where the owner knew your name, knew what you were good at, and told you when you did something right. Where the truck wasn't a disaster. Where the tools worked. Where you weren't expected to perform miracles on a schedule built by someone who'd never touched a tool.

Good techs talk to each other. They know which shops treat people right and which ones grind them up. That reputation travels faster than any job posting.

If you're struggling to hire right now, the first question isn't where to find people. It's why the good ones aren't already knocking on your door and what you'd need to change to make that happen.

Fix the shop first. The techs will follow.

Thank you for taking the time to read The Trades Brief. If someone forwarded this to you and you want it every Tuesday — subscribe free at TradesBrief.com.

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— Deputee

P.S. Next week: Most trades businesses lose everything they built over the summer when slow season hits. The smart ones don't. Here's how they protect their cash flow before winter arrives.