The best-read, most highly acclaimed series in the 47-year history of Supply House Times has been updated and made available to fill the gaping hole in the plumbing industry's product knowledge training.

“The College of Product Knowledge has been the road map to follow for developing a comprehensive training program for effective industry salespeople,” said longtime user Jonas Weiner of Best Plumbing Supply, Yorktown Heights, N.Y.

“The College of Product Knowledge has been a valuable resource in our business over the years and continues to be an essential tool in our plumbing training curriculum for all of our employees at all of our will call counters and decorative showrooms,” said Russ Diamond of Los Angeles-based Snyder-Diamond, noted for having one of the best employee training programs in the industry. “The fundamentals of basic plumbing systems, product applications and industry terminology are concisely communicated and have provided a great foundation for all of our sales professionals, who depend on product knowledge as part of the selling process and to enhance our reputation in our local market as the problem solvers and the best place to shop.”

Supply House Times' College of Product Knowledge was originally launched in 1979 and ran for 30 issues, culminating in a 300+ page reprint manual that became the industry's most widely used product education resource. College of Product Knowledge was justly acclaimed for its completeness, technical accuracy, clarity and readability.

Authored by plumbing product guru Don Arnold, thousands of copies of this College of Product Knowledge manual were purchased by industry companies and individuals until it finally went out of print many years ago. Yet, requests for it have continued to pour in.

For the last several years, Don Arnold has authored periodic updates that have appeared in this magazine to address changes in various plumbing products since the original series ran. The new College of Product Knowledge includes these updates as well as the original articles.

Not only had many plumbing products changed over the preceding years, so has communications technology. For your convenience, the College of Product Knowledge has been republished in a CD format. No doubt you'll find the 2-ounce disk a more convenient medium than a 5-pound book. Moreover, it makes it easy to issue subsequent updates.

The College of Product Knowledge CD is simple to navigate and provides more than 100 products broken into 27 sections in 300 pages. Four-color diagrams show product cut-aways and flow direction. It features an entirely new section on tankless water heaters, along with an overview, glossary and section quizzes (and answers), clickable table of contents, and expert compilation by consultant and writer Don Arnold, who has worked as a product design engineer with several leading plumbing manufacturers.

All information is contained in high-resolution PDF files to retain the clarity of its original appearance in Supply House Times magazine. This collection contains no advertising, just 300 pages of solid information.

The uses of the College of Product Knowledge are the same now as they were originally:

1) Programmed training for entry-level individuals with no plumbing background. It is applicable to manufacturers, wholesalers, contractors, engineering firms, architects and any other employers whose people need to understand plumbing systems and components.

2) A comprehensive product reference for everyone else. “The audience for this kind of training just keeps coming,” says Arnold. “The folks who studied the original edition are now the veterans in the business, and they're the ones now needing such a resource to train rookies coming into their firms.”

Written in a “plain English” conversational style rather than technical jargon, Don Arnold's explanations are easy to grasp even by persons with modest reading skills. Each product section is accompanied by detailed illustrations, as well as a quiz at the end. By clicking on a particular heading in the index, the reader is automatically linked to that section.

Product subjects include:

• Overview of plumbing system
  
• Steel & copper pipe
  
• Plastic supply pipe
  
• Supply pipe fittings
  
• DWV systems
  
• Specialty pipe & fittings
  
• Residential faucets
  
• General application valves
  
• Special application valves
  
• Water heaters
  
• Water treatment products
  
• Residential fixtures
  
• Private water systems
  
• Sump pumps & sewage ejectors
  
• Disposers and dispensers
  
• Chemicals and compounds
  
• Plumbing tools
  
• Commercial products

Note that, like the original edition, this updated CD release provides complete coverage of each subject. The College of Product Knowledge rerun articles appearing in Supply House Times and Plumbing & Mechanical in recent years have been abbreviated versions.

How To Order

The CD version of College of Product Knowledge is available for only $127. Discount pricing available for multiple copies. Discuss it when placing your order.

To order, contact Candace Roulo at 248/244-1275 or via e-mail at rouloc@bnpmedia.com.