By Jondi Gumz
When Mahina Marx, general manager at Bay Plumbing, heard the U.S. Senate passed a bill with billions in aid for small businesses, she reached out to Adam Weiss, her banker at Santa Cruz County Bank.
“We absolutely want to do that,” she told him.
Weiss called her back to say he was about to go into a meeting where he would get details, then he emailed to say the money is coming.
“As soon as the banks were able to take applications, theirs was online,” Marx said. “It was extremely straightforward — proof of payroll, annual payroll divided by 12, then multiplied by 2.5, that was the initial application.”
The loan application covering payroll for 17 employees got tentative approval and then Marx uploaded the required financial documentation.
“The turnaround was incredibly fast,” she said.
Employees at Bay Plumbing in Santa Cruz enjoy a Christmas party in December before anyone knew COVID-19 was coming.
Complicating the application was the fact that the owner of Bay Plumbing owns a second business, Pacific Energy Sales.
When Marx reviewed the application online and saw only information for Pacific Energy and nothing about Bay Plumbing, she sent an SOS to Weiss, who was working from home with his two small children.
His answer: I can call you in an hour.
And he did.
“I could hear his kiddos in the background,” Marx said. “He followed up with the IT people, he emailed in the evening, and it was completely squared.”
She felt a sense of relief.
“It was a race for sure,” she said. “If we had been with a larger bank, we would have been left behind.”
She joined Bay Plumbing in 2003.
A year later, when Bay Plumbing switched from Coast Commercial Bank to Santa Cruz County Bank, Marx began working with Weiss.
“He’s always willing to go the extra mile,” she said.
Bay Plumbing is considered an essential business providing sanitation and safety.
“We were able to stay open, which we are extremely grateful for,” said Marx, who is grateful for her customers.
“We’ve cut back hours, but we’ve been able to keep everyone,” she added, noting one of the showroom sales staff is not working due to doctor’s orders. “Now that restriction lifted, we’re already seeing an uptick in construction.”
The March 16 shelter-in-place order came so fast, it was a shock, she said. Then came all the restrictions.
“We’re strictly adhering,” she said. “Our entire staff worked really hard to go with the flow and adapt as quickly as possible.”
She added, “You have to be so vigilant, the masks, washing our hands…washing our hair. If one of us gets it, we all go down, it will take the business down. Not only we want not want our families to get it, we don’t want to give it to each other.”
