Ask Chris Litas what he does for a living and you won't get a pitch. "We're an essential service that people need, really," he says. "If I'm having a barbecue and someone asks me what I do, I just help people out when they're in strife." That's the short version. The longer one is that Litas Mainstone has become one of Perth's more trusted plumbing and gas businesses, the kind that gets the call for a burst pipe at midnight and a whole-house renovation alike. Chris and his business partner, Chad Mainstone, are very good at that work. The one thing they'll happily tell you they were never good at is the books
The partnership goes back the better part of two decades, to a job a lot of Western Australians would recognise. Chris and Chad were working for the same company when the chance came up to work on the restoration of the historic Caves House in Yallingup, the heritage building down in the South West that has stood since the early 1900s. Chad's father was running the development, and the offer was a simple one
"He said, guys, are you interested? And we just jumped at it," Chris says. "That's basically where it started, twenty-odd years ago. We went in and did all the plumbing works on a very tired old building"
They never lost the taste for it. Both of them love renovating, they've done plenty of it on their own places over the years, and that thread still runs through everything the business does, from high-end bathrooms and kitchens through to a newer venture - a renovation company called Loom that gives the younger tradesmen on the team a chance to learn the craft properly
"It's good for the guys, because the youngsters get to see what it takes to renovate houses," Chris says. "You're there from the very beginning to the very end, and the most rewarding thing is watching people walk into their new bathrooms and kitchens. It provides a different level of enjoyment"
The one job they weren't good at
Chris is not someone who ignored the numbers. He describes himself as a naturally good saver who was always reasonably on top of the financial side. The problem was never a lack of attention. It was that keeping the books in-house simply never worked, however they went about it
"We've had internal bookkeepers, we've tried to do things ourselves, and that's never worked," he says
The symptoms will be familiar to anyone who has run a growing trades business. Suppliers ringing the office. Payments slipping between the cracks. A set of numbers that always seemed to be a step behind where the business actually was
"There were people ringing all the time saying, this hasn't been paid, that's not up to date," Chris says. "Now everything's up to date, everything's checked"
The turning point wasn't another hire or another late night at the kitchen table. It was the decision to hand the whole function to a team that does it for a living. When Litas Mainstone brought in Digit, the starting point from both sides was refreshingly practical - agree exactly what each party needed from the other, then let the bookkeeping quietly run in the background
"We had discussions with Digit about what do we need out of you, and what do you need from us," Chris says. "Just to be regularly updated in our ledgers. It makes the girls in the office lives a lot easier, and they say the same thing, it's just effortless"
Effortless, and up to date
That word, effortless, is the one Chris returns to, and it is a high bar for the finances of a busy trades business. The difference, the way he tells it, is that Digit stays in front of the work instead of waiting to be chased for it
"Digit do it well in the sense that they're always keeping themselves updated," he says. "When you need answers, you get them very, very quickly. The service is impeccable"
The change that clearly means the most to Chris, though, isn't really about Chris. It's about Chad. For the first time, his business partner can sit down with someone about the numbers and genuinely oversee that side of the business, something he had never done before
"The best thing has been being able to communicate with someone," Chris says. "He'll oversee things he's never done before. His life is a lot easier, because he's dealing with a very organised bookkeeping team"
This is what outsourcing a function looks like when it actually works. Not a lever pulled to shave a cost, but a job lifted off the plate of two people who would far rather be on the tools, or planning the next renovation, than reconciling an account at nine at night. Handing it over is what let them get back to the part they got into business for
"It's probably the best decision we've made, as far as delegating a role that we're not good at," Chris says
Asked what he'd say to another owner weighing the same call, his answer is the one a good decision tends to earn in hindsight
"I'd highly recommend it," he says. "If I was a business starting out now, knowing what I know, I'd have done this a long time ago, for sure. It's worth it"
