Erik Bernal: Enjoying a Sip of Success with Elite Water Systems and a Breath of Clean Air with Certified Pure Wellness
By Rudy Arispe
While Hurricane Katrina proved to be devastating to New Orleans residents, the 2005 disaster turned the tide somewhat in Erik Bernal’s favor, if only because it led him, ironically, into the water systems industry.
Bear in mind, however, Bernal wasn’t entirely spared from hardship. He worked for an elevator company at the time, so when Hurricane Katrina struck, it left him temporarily displaced. He took shelter in Baton Rouge during the interim and when he was finally able to return to New Orleans, he came upon “a huge filtration truck pumping water out of the river and they were purifying it. A sign on the vehicle read, ‘Microbiologically safe water.’
“I didn’t know what that meant,” he added. “I did some research and learned that it’s the cleanest water you can possibly get. You can’t get that statement on tap or bottled water. That’s when I started getting passionate about it.”
Soon after, he left the Big Easy to join his brother who, coincidentally, was working in Oklahoma City for a water purification company. Carving his niche in direct sales, the Winters native eventually relocated to San Antonio following a job offer to open a field office for General Electric water softeners in 2007. Four years later, Bernal diversified and founded Elite Water Systems, which works exclusively with homebuilders.
Today, Elite Water Systems has expanded its client base by offering water treatment solutions to more than 45 Texas homebuilders in San Antonio and Austin, in addition to an array of products and services to existing home and commercial customers. That vision to connect with homebuilders first came to mind many years ago.
“When I started doing direct sales back in 2007, I used to wonder why builders weren’t offering water treatment solutions to new homebuyers,” said Bernal, CEO and owner of Elite Water Systems. “It used to bother me that they didn’t.”
As the largest supplier of Pentair water treatment products, Elite Water Systems is filtering its way into homes everywhere with just a turn of the faucet.
“Our products are offered through the design process of the homebuilders,” Bernal said. “That’s the main way of making homeowners’ water safe and saving money by avoiding costly repairs from hard water by having a whole home water system. It’s not about having soft water, so that there’s no water stains on glasses, dishes or lime build up on shower walls. It’s about living healthier with high quality drinking water.”
For more information about its full range of water treatment systems, drinking water systems and other services, visit www.elitewateroftexas.com.
While Bernal is awash in success with Elite Water Systems, he also takes time to enjoy a breath of fresh, or rather, purified air as executive vice president of Certified Pure Wellness, a brand, he said, synonymous with the hospitality industry, namely Hyatt, Hilton and Marriott hotels worldwide. Customers can find the Pure Wellness technology at www.pureroom.com to get associated with the same experience that his now available in the residential market.
“Certified Pure Wellness is the number one wellness amenity offered to Hyatts, Hiltons and Marriott hotels – and now Starwood and IHG hotels,” Bernal said. “The amenities they offer are called ‘Pure Rooms, where ‘it is never allergy season.’ ”
Bernal explained that in recent years there has been a large movement not just to live healthier but to “travel healthier,” especially for business executives who travel frequently and are conscious of their health.
“Think about five-star hotels,” he said. “They all offer great pools, great restaurants and wonderful rooms to sleep, but they’re not catering to the wellness traveler. When you check in to a Pure Room, you’re going to get pure air and pure water. The room is hypoallergenic. They certify that the space is contaminant free.”
And just as Elite Water Systems offers new homeowners water treatment solutions, so, too, does Certified Pure Wellness provide Pure solutions to homeowners exclusively through homebuilders.
“The concept is now offered to homebuilders’ clients, so they can have the same ‘pure room’ experience at home, just as they can at a Hyatt or Marriott hotel,” Bernal said, adding that multiple homebuilders now offer the Certified Pure Wellness concept as a standard feature. Many other builders have adopted Certified Pure Wellness as an option.
To achieve pure air quality at home, builders are utilizing the Super V air cleaner which is a greater than MERV-16 filtration product. “It provides perfect air right out of the vents. It’s air quality that exceeds the Asthma and Allergy guidelines by 50 percent,” Bernal said. “We also use a centralized water treatment solution to provide water quality from every faucet that exceeds even the strictest EPA standards.”
Although Bernal juggles responsibilities for both companies, he points out that one doesn’t detract from the other.
“Being executive VP in business development for Certified Pure Wellness nationwide doesn’t interfere with my position as owner of Elite Water Systems because I’m the connector with the builders,” he said. “As I build relationships through Certified Pure Wellness with builders, I’m also establishing Elite with the builders at the same time.
“Elite is the largest Pentair water dealership in the country, and now we’re powered by Certified Pure Wellness,” he added. “We’re a complete, home-wellness, solutions provider where a consumer can design the wellness of their home and control it via home automation. We certify your home through a patented process and provide you a certificate that states your home is virtually contaminant free.”
To learn more about the Pure Experience, visit www.pureroom.com.