Choosing The RIGHT Plumber For YOUR Job

Protecting the health and safety of Texans

Here in Texas, there are four professional licensing levels for a plumber: apprentice (NOT a license), tradesman, journeyman, and master plumber. New plumbers start out as an apprentice. Apprentices are only able to test for a tradesman license after 4,000 hours of on-the-job plumbing experience and completing 24 hours of educational requirements. By comparison, the journeyman license requires 8,000 hours of plumbing experience and 48 hours of education. Then to test to be a master plumber, an individual must have held a journeyman license for four years. If you’re keeping up with the math, that’s a minimum of EIGHT years before one can sit for the State Board of Texas master plumber examination.

Master Plumber Alan Burkhalter, owner of local Alan’s Plumbing, says, “It’s confusing. People look at this and think they need a master plumb - er to work on every plumbing job. But there’s a big difference between a water main break and a leaky toilet tank. For one you should have a lot of experience before you touch it, the other’s a pretty easy job. Here at Alan’s Plumbing, we require attention to detail and integrity of every plumber at every level. And because we never hire outside help, we have the ability to look at each job and select the plumber(s) with the appropriate level of experience to do that job.”

Alan’s Plumbing has served as Fort Bend’s go-to plumbing company for more than three decades. Today, the family-owned company boasts Burkhalters at all levels of experience. Alan’s brother Chris and his son Luke are also master plumbers. His son Beau is journeyman-licensed and studying for his master plumber license. His son Jake is an apprentice close to his journeyman license. Journeyman-licensed plumbers Jeff Johnson and Jaime, and

by Amy Sharp

tradesman-licensed Trevor complete this local, plumbing team.

“First and foremost, anyone doing plumbing in your home should have a license they can produce when asked,” says Alan. “However, you should also be aware that a tradesman can run a truck and do residential plumbing with only two years of experience under his belt. Again, perfectly fine for a simple job. But some of these houses around town are 20+ years old…it takes experience to know what to do. We clean up a lot of messes caused by inexperience. We’re happy to help of course, but it’s better to get things done right the first time around. When you call Alan’s Plumbing, you can be confident that we’ll always send the right plumber with the experience required for your job!”

Houston radio super couple Theresa “RockFace” Moley on 94.5 The Buzz and Adam Clanton on SportsTalk 790 are in love with everything about Classic Chevy Sugar Land. “It’s a different, family-owned experience,” explains Theresa. “Everyone, from sales to service to collision, takes care of you. They treat both employees and customers like family.”

“I think I’ve known Jeff Sebastian (owner of Classic Chevy Sugar Land with his wife Tiffany) since 2018,” says Adam. “We text about sports all the time! When I bought my 2020 Trail Boss, Jeff set me up with Lloyd. Lloyd has been our salesperson ever since. I was very happy with the Trail Boss, until I saw a brochure for the 2022 Silverado ZR2. I asked Lloyd, ‘What’s that?’ He responded, “It’s your truck on steroids!’ Lloyd crunched the numbers with me, and we made it happen. My Silverado ZR2 was one of the first built in 2022. It’s just amazing!”

“Tiffany is my sister from another mister,” laughs Theresa. “We text back and forth all the time. When my daughter recently turned 16, I wanted to buy her a used car. I did not believe in buying a new car for a teenager. I met with Lloyd, and he shot straight with me. He told me that leasing a new car was my best option. We chose an Equinox, and we got a phenomenal deal. All safety features are standard on the new Equinox. My daughter does a lot of highway driving to her school, and I love that her car is so safe. Lloyd could have just sold me a used car like I asked. Instead, he recommended an option that was a better deal and safer.”

“We’ve used the service department a million times at Classic Chevy Sugar Land and the collision department on occasion,” continues Theresa. “At both, the service is outstanding. The collision department made all the calls for us and took care of insurance. We barely had to do anything.”

“At Classic Chevy Sugar Land they invest in you,” say Adam and Theresa. “You’re not just investing in a vehicle. We are a Classic Chevy family. Our four-year-old son is already a Chevy fan whipping around in his little, red Corvette!”