Most people never think twice about their water meter. At best, they know it is has a brass body with a plastic cap located somewhere outside the house. At worst, they think “What’s a water meter?”. Although we know water meters well, we are continually seeking opportunities to increase our understanding of products and technologies in order to better serve our clients. Recently, we had the opportunity to tour the assembly plant of the third largest water meter manufacturers in the United States with one of our clients. The team was able to learn more about their manufacturing and assembly process, RF coding techniques, various product lines, and quality control checks they implement in order to exceed American Water Works Association (AWWA) quality standards.
Of course, the engineering nerds in the group had to peek inside the meter to see the hardware and how the various components intricately worked together, while the data nerds were absorbed by the software side; including data collectors, transmitters, and the backend platform that takes the digital output and turns it into usable numbers…gallons.
As we continue to manage the installation of thousands of water and electric meters across the country, the opportunity to work with our vendor partners and clients to increase understanding of the product/technology and contribute to the development of future software upgrades that would better serve our clients is invaluable. Opportunities like this illustrate the importance of these relationships and why treating our vendors more like partners, only helps Burton to better serve our clients.