Today we’d like to introduce you to Megan Kokesh.
Hi Megan, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for sharing your story with us – to start, maybe you can share some of your backstories with our readers.
JJ Kokesh and Son is a family owned business serving St. Louis and surrounding counties for 125 years. It has been passed down through four generations. This lineage of soft-spoken, thoughtful, knowledgeable, yet daring Kokesh men started with one fifteen-year-old Bohemian stepping off the boat at Ellis Island in 1890 and heading west to St. Louis. He was a serious and creative person with big ideas. He knew he would be successful if he stuck to some solid basic principles to deliver high-quality service with respect, dependability, and professionalism. This formula would serve him very well. Jerry Joseph Kokesh was no different than most immigrants dreaming of America as the land of endless possibilities. Right away, he landed a position working in a glass factory, hoping to save enough to start his own business. Jerry Joseph, “JJ,” was a seriously determined young man who would walk 8 miles each morning to his glass factory job, work 12 hours, then walk home 8 miles, all to save up enough money.
According to a 1957 article in The Missouri Master Plumber newspaper featuring JJ and his memoirs, JJ said, “Back in 1894 during the depression, it was practically impossible to beg, buy or steal a job. I picked up my grip and firepot and left the city. I stopped at Bellefontaine on Olive Street Road and opened my shop in an old barn. I circulated my territory in a horse and buggy. My first job was installing water, a flat-rim sink, and a pitcher spout pump in a house. The complete job installed was $15.00. The installation was a novelty in the country; every farmer’s wife wanted one. I was in business!”
At the ripe age of 19, JJ paid $1,000.00 for 4 acres of land in “Stringtown” at the crossroads of Clayton Road and Baxter Road. At this time, this corner boasted a blacksmith shop, a tavern, a grocery, and a small school. Surrounding this unremarkable crossroad were farms as far as the eye could see. Although tinning work was in high demand to repair pots and pans, wash tubs, roofs, and gutters, JJ recognized the future was in plumbing and electricity. He built a new brick building sporting “JJ Kokesh and Son” proudly on the front. By this time, his business had expanded to include all of West St. Louis County. On May 6th, 1896, JJ married Josephine and later sired two young daughters, Georgia and Emma, and a son, Edward.
In 1914, his business was one of the first to buy two new service trucks with the company name emblazoned on their sides. His business territory grew extensively, needing to add employees. Being the tinkerer he was, he invented a carbide gas machine to generate electricity for home lights. His patent was granted, but unfortunately, a much larger company established itself as the sole electricity provider. Not to be deterred, JJ spotted the ever-expanding need for quality residential and commercial plumbing and HVAC services. He decided the best way to establish JJ Kokesh and Son as a St. Louis industry leader was to define and implement high-quality standards in their everyday practices. In 1927, the plumbing code went into effect, and JJ applied for and earned his Master Plumber’s Association License. He had high expectations of his employees to always be dependable, professional, courteous, knowledgeable, and respectful. By joining the Master Plumbers Association, he became certified, bonded, and licensed.
Throughout these years, JJ’s son Edward was right alongside him digging ditches, repairing plumbing and electricity, installing heating and cooling, and learning the business. During World War II, Edward enlisted and was sent to the Philippines. He returned home in 1945 to allow JJ to retire and take the company’s lead. His first executive decision was to delete electric work from the menu of services. It proved to be a smart move on his part because JJ Kokesh and Sons greatly expanded and even further established itself as a first-class provider of residential and commercial plumbing. Edward earned his Master Plumbers license in 1948.
Around this time, Edward married his sweetheart Helen and added Jerry, Carol, Alice, and Larry to the Kokesh clan. It was young Larry who went to trade school during high school to learn as much as possible to help with the family business. In 1955, Larry graduated high school, married his sweetheart, Charleen, joined the military service, and was sent to Germany for the next two years. His first son, JR, was born in Germany. Upon returning to St. Louis, Larry had two more children, Beth and Joseph. Over the next 3 years, Edward and Larry made critical decisions to drop heating and cooling from their services and strictly become a Union Plumbing business. They were wildly successful, and as the business grew, they found they needed to move their business to Manchester Road and add many more employees. By 1975, Edward felt he had done his best to position Larry to lead the Kokesh brand and retire. Like the Kokesh men generations before him, Larry encouraged his two sons to ride with him to learn the business. By the late 1970s, he had to expand to a new building further on Manchester Road to house 12 employees. The area was growing at a rate that could hardly be sustained. Larry continued to build his team, adding Irrigation Services to the line-up. By the early 80s, JJ Kokesh and Son had 25 employees and was bursting at the seams to handle the volume of work that kept coming in. In 1988, when the crash hit the hardest, Larry was wise enough to make the tough decisions to save the business by dropping to 12 employees, deleting irrigation from services, adding light commercial work and custom home and remodeling. It was a tough time for JJ Kokesh and Son, but Larry was not to be defeated. His son, JR, was right alongside him, and they held it together. Surprisingly, it ended up being the younger son, Joe, who earned his Journeyman Plumbing license in 2005 and his Master Plumber’s License in 2015. In September 2013, Larry officially handed the business over to Joe. In keeping with the Kokesh tradition, Joe married his sweetheart Megan. They are putting their heads together to mastermind the twists and turns of the future JJ Kokesh and Son.
Alright, let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall, and if not, what challenges have you had to overcome?
-Taking over a 3rd generation company
-Working as a husband-wife team
-Transition from mostly pencil & paper to new technology
-iPads, cloud-based software taking cc in the field
-Keeping customers and employees safe during the pandemic
-Expanding
-2 new apprentices, one in 2021 & one in 2022
Thanks – so, what else should our readers know about JJ Kokesh and Son Plumbing?
I worked for 10 years in social work, then met and married my husband and began training at JJ Kokesh and Son. I came with a fresh pair of eyes, knowing nothing about the business. My approach was to look at each part of the business, learn what I could, and then begin questioning why we did it that way—I worked with my husband, Joe, on each part of the business, from the way our warehouse was set up, to supplying all our plumbers with IPads in the field, to eventually buying our building and expanding our offerings. We took a long look at who we have been as a company for the last 127 years and had the good fortune to begin defining who we wanted to be for the next 100 years. We started with JJ Kokesh’s principles, “deliver high-quality service with respect, dependability, and professionalism.” We only added the idea that our family takes care of our customer’s family as a new principal – after all, our family has been the heart of Kokesh plumbing. We are a “one-stop shop” for Residential and Commercial plumbing, Offering repairs, replacement remodels, and new construction. As I told a customer the other day,” almost anything you need for your home or business, plumbing-wise, we can do!”
What has been the most important lesson you’ve learned along your journey?
Be honest and treat people how you want to be treated. I think about how I want to be treated as a customer and then do the same for mine. If I say something, I stand behind it. This is important for customers to know but also informs how we treat employees, which is one of the reasons we are a proud Union company. Our employees are taken care of, and they take great care of our customers.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.jjkokeshandsonplumbing.com
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/JJKokeshandSon
