Cool Clear Water owner Bob Kjelsrud has sold his business to Cathy Rosner, who has been his manager for almost 13 years.
He started the business 33 years ago this summer and said selling it to Rosner was the easiest decision he ever made.
"She has always done a great job. I’ll be there to support her in whatever she needs and she knows that.”
Kjelsrud told the staff Thursday, March 27, about the sale and said he wore all black to make the announcement.
“I told them I had some good news and some bad news, and I’d start with the bad news.”
After 33 years and just turning 74-years-old, he told them he had to pass the business on.
“There was sheer silence and everyone was looking down and kind of sad. I then told them, the good news was that I’ve had lots of offers and the fellow that is buying it is a good man and then I said, ‘that man’s name is Cathy,’ and there were smiles and ‘yahoos.’ I have always been blessed with really good staff. I have the best people that worked for me over the years. And presently, the staff that Cathy has put together is phenomenal.”
Recalling his own start, he said he built the business from absolutely nothing.
In 1974, he moved to Williams Lake from Kamloops for work and after a few different jobs, embarked on operating a bottled water company. He began at home in Rose Lake with help from a company from Alberta that set up the equipment in his basement.
“We started out making 50 bottles of water a day. I’d fill up my little Mazda van with 20 bottles of water and a couple of water coolers and I’d come into town and knock on doors.”
Within six months he had most of the available business at sawmills, schools and other spots and he graduated to doubling the plant, making 100 bottles a day.
He hired neighbourhood kids to help him load the van and he’d deliver and set up water coolers for customers.
“It was a pretty good strain on my marriage," he said, adding he eventually moved the business into town and set up a little shop on Mackenzie Avenue North and increased the size of the equipment.
Today they can process 250 18.9-litre bottles an hour. They use municipal water and he said the reverse osmosis technology has improved.
“You can take almost the worst quality water in the world and clean it up. Coming into Williams Lake just meant a little more maintenance and changing the membranes more often.”
They started following the health rules from Alberta initially, which meant they needed to a send a sample to an independent lab every other week to check for coliform bacteria, which they still do. Every bottle is batch coded so if a customer finds a bottle didn’t taste right, Cool Clear Water would be able to to check the batch.
“We’ve never had to do that but it’s a safety factor," he said, explaining when the water comes in it has about 550 to 660 parts per million of dissolved solids and after the reverse osmosis it drops to five parts per million.
Kjelsrud said the business has grown with the economy and the population.
When one of his employees, the late Neil Jeck, saw an opportunity to deliver pet food, Kjelsrud decided to give it a try. After a few trials, the store settled on a Canadian company from Ontario and today has six different Canadian suppliers, including at least one from B.C.
“It costs a little more but you feed your pets less," he said of the brands they carry. "We guarantee everything we sell.”
As for the name of the business? It came from the song Cool Water by the Sons of the Pioneers, he said, smiling.
Even though his own father was killed in a railway accident when he was only 16-months-old, Kjelsrud tells people he is the luckiest man.
“I have had a whole life of people helping me. People seem to sense if I need direction. The moves I’ve made weren’t really calculated, they just sort of happened. Like a pinball machine I kind of bounce around. Bad things that have happened have always led to something better."
Kjelsrud has a daughter and grandchildren in Alberta and a son in Williams Lake, he said.
As for Rosner, she arrived in Williams Lake in 1995. She worked at 7-Eleven for 18 years, 15 of which she was the manager.
She was approached by Kjeslrud to come and work for him.
Both of them said Cool Clear Water has amazing clients, some who have been there since the very beginning.
Working at Cool Clear Water involves a safe, friendly environment and physical labour, which Rosner said she needs.
There are five employees on staff and Rosner said she will carry on with the fair atmosphere Kjeslrud created.
For years Kjelsrud has made donations to causes in the Williams Lake area, but is always done quietly, she added.
“I’m excited, but it’s very emotional," she said Monday. "I've always wanted to own my own business, ever since I was a little girl.”
