Virtual-reality training for plumbing technicians sounds about as plausible as clog-proof toilets.

But at High 5 Plumbing in Colorado, it’s a reality as apprentices don headsets every week and learn how to make plumbing repairs — even though they’re nowhere near a kitchen or a bathroom.

About two years ago, the company invested roughly $2,000 in a virtual-reality software program called Interplay Learning. Coupled with headsets from Meta, it makes training more like gaming — something fun that technicians actually look forward to, says owner Levi Torres.

The bottom-line benefits: Significantly shortened training time. Plumbers make more money earlier in their careers, which boosts overall company revenue — and employee retention. And better technician engagement during training.  

“We can get someone with zero plumbing experience and give them a headset that takes them into a fake bathroom, where they can figure out why a toilet is making an odd noise, for example,” Torres explains. “The nice thing is they can get trained without breaking a toilet or flooding someone’s bathroom. Furthermore, they can log into the cloud-based app at home and do training there instead of on business hours. It has drastically changed how we train our technicians. It’s like a video game to them.”

Torres says that the program helps him produce licensed residential plumbers in about 18 months, which is about six months faster than usual.

“If I have, say, three people in the program now, I know I’ll have three licensed plumbers producing revenue by the end of a year,” he says. “They’ll start making good money significantly faster if they’re truly committed to the program.”

While virtual training doesn’t completely replace in-the-field training, it speeds up the learning process because when apprentices ride with technicians, they run into problems they’ve probably already handled during the virtual training, Torres says.

However, it takes a while for the training to yield financial benefits, Torres warns, noting it took about a year before he saw results.

“You have to realize it’s an investment,” he says.

The company gives apprentices six to 10 hours of paid virtual training per week, which motivates them to get trained faster. And they only get access to virtual training after they complete a stint as a warehouse apprentice, which involves pulling and delivering repair parts, and then graduate to being a field apprentice.

“After that, the only thing that slows them down from advancing is lack of knowledge,” Torres says. “The ultimate goal is to graduate to an installer, because then they can earn performance bonuses. And the more Interplay Learning you do, the better your chance is of advancing faster. Some guys go from being a field apprentice to an installer in as little as 60 days. If you give people the right tools, they’ll use them to succeed.”

Read more about High 5 Plumbing in the upcoming January 2024 issue of Cleaner magazine.