Looking to the future: Gulf Island trying to diversify in downward economy
July 26, 2017
TAMCO puts safety first
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An engine shop on Houma’s east side that has weathered both good times and bad is entering its 25th year of operation.
S&H Engine, located right on Picou Industrial Court right off of Grand Caillou Rd., is a full-service Cummins diesel engine shop specializing in commercial and industrial engines. The business both sells and services any size Cummins engine and will provide on-site repairs for any boat that cannot make it to them.
Ritchie Scurlock, a Larose native, began working in the diesel business at Cummins Sales and Service in Morgan City in 1982. After half a decade there, he moved to Benny Cenac’s Marine Engine Sales in Houma. When that company closed, Ritchie said he wanted to be his own boss and opened up S&H with his brother, Joe, and business partner Jim Hitt.
Shortly after, Hitt exited the company and was bought out by the Scurlock brothers. Ritchie oversees the day-to-day operations of S&H and said his business has changed considerably over his time in charge. According to Ritchie, when S&H first started, a majority of its customers were shrimpers. Over the last 10 years the customer base has switched to the industrial side as shrimpers have found mechanics who broke off from larger shops to start their own business or even just did repair work themselves.
Ritchie said the switch to a primarily industrial clientele has not changed his company’s work much, as the engines are still Cummins engines. However, the state of engines has changed over his 35 years of working on them, though. He said due to emissions standards, all engines are electronic now, meaning all mechanics must be comfortable with computers. Ritchie said running diagnostics can help pinpoint a problem, but the engine is still a mechanical device, and the most important information is what the customer says they are experiencing.
“We’ll plug in, [the computer will] put you in the right direction, check this, this and that. But you still have to understand there’s still mechanical parts that can break that might not turn a check engine light on,” Ritchie said.
The shift to the industrial side has changed his his company’s yearly schedule, though. Instead of normal, predictable busy times and downtimes based on shrimping seasons, the company can now have busy or slow months any day of the year. The new client base has also made S&H susceptible to the current oil and gas downturn snaring the rest of the local economy. According to Ritchie, 2016 was the worst year for his company. He said every year in business, S&H had brought in more revenues than the year before. Last year was the first time that trend did not hold.
“They’ve had other slowdowns, just this time it’s been a lot more aggressive,” Ritchie said.
To alleviate the problem, Ritchie said he instituted a pay cut for his staff of about 15 workers, right in the average number of employees S&H has but less than its peak of 20 during boom times. Ritchie said he knows the cuts did not go over well, but he did them so he would not have to lay anybody off.
“They didn’t like it, but what are the options?” Ritchie said. “That was the choices we gave them, basically, is we can do a pay cut and keep everybody or start to lay people off and be stuck with shortened people. If you lay people off, you’re losing people you don’t want to lose”
Ritchie said the company stabilized after those cuts, and this year is looking better than the last. He credited his company with watching its money when times were better as key to its survival during the slowdown. According to Ritchie, while business is not all the way back, he does see signs for optimism going forward.
“It’s coming back, it’s just going to be slow,” Ritchie said. “We’ve had customers start putting their boats back to work. It’s just taking a little time. I think by the end of this year, next year it’ll be a lot better.”
