Texas plumbing marketing that knows El Paso's 42 freeze nights from Houston's 10

Plan your winter work metro by metro. The cities that freeze most often were not the ones that filed the most claims in 2021.

NOAA's 1991 to 2020 normals count the nights a year at or below 32°F:

• El Paso: 42.0 nights (NOAA, El Paso airport)
• Dallas-Fort Worth: 29.2 (NOAA, DFW airport)
• San Antonio: 14.0 (NOAA, San Antonio airport)
• Austin: 11.9 at Camp Mabry (NOAA)
• Houston: 10.1 at Bush Intercontinental (NOAA)

Now set that beside the storm of February 11 to 19, 2021. The Texas Department of Insurance report counts 511,473 insurance claims from it, about 85% of them on residential policies. Harris County reported 112,163. By our sum, that is more than Dallas (48,479), Tarrant (36,405) and Collin (21,723) combined. Bexar reported 44,285 and Travis 31,885. El Paso County is missing from TDI's top 25 altogether, and the 25th, Rockwall, reported 2,437. These are claims of every cause, from burst pipes to ice-laden limbs. Read them as a map of damage, not a count of plumbing calls.

Part of El Paso's absence is the grid. El Paso Electric says the city escaped that week's outages "mostly because" it is not on the Texas power grid. It draws on the Western grid instead. So El Paso's missing claims say as much about the grid as about its houses.

Our reading of the two lists is simple. Where freezes are routine, winter work comes in steadily. Where they are rare, one hard week can find the least protected pipes all at once. El Paso's winter campaign is a season of hose bibs, irrigation shutoffs and water heaters. The city still gets hard freezes: the same utility recalls February 2011, when days of single-digit to below-zero cold froze and broke water pipes in homes and businesses. Houston needs a hard-freeze plan that can sit unused for years, then run at full volume for a week, call cover included.

Saying you answer around the clock will not carry that week. Of the 47 Texas plumbing websites we read in October 2026, 36 already advertise emergency or 24/7 service. The plan needs a person who picks up at 2 a.m., not only the words.

Dallas-Fort Worth has a window you can book against. Fort Worth's National Weather Service office gives November 22 as the average first freeze and March 12 as the average last. So freeze pages, after-hours cover and the customer safety message belong live by mid-November.

Texas water is not one product. A water heater or softener page should quote the customer's own utility, not a statewide line. Here is what the utilities themselves publish:

• San Antonio: SAWS puts typical hardness at 15 to 20 grains per gallon, from the Edwards and Trinity aquifers. It says plainly that hard water is not a health hazard.
• Austin: Austin Water's 2025 report gives an average of 93 ppm, about 5.4 grains. The utility softens its water with lime.
• Houston: the main system averaged 135.5 ppm in the 2025 report, roughly 7.9 grains by our conversion. The city's other systems differ.
• Dallas: the 2025 report prints no hardness figure, so test at the tap or ask the utility.

A statewide hard-water banner fits San Antonio's 15 to 20 grains. It overstates Austin's 5.4, the next big city up I-35. San Antonio's utility even hands plumbers an honest reason to call. Its backflow page reminds owners that the yearly test does not replace care of the water heater's pressure relief valve and thermal expansion equipment.

Backflow testing takes a second license and runs on a calendar. TCEQ, the state environmental agency, requires a Backflow Prevention Assembly Tester license to test or repair assemblies. Getting and keeping one takes:

• An application fee of $111, per TCEQ.
• Two years of qualifying experience. Work that needs a master or journeyman license counts.
• A 40-hour course, then written and practical exams.
• Renewal every three years.

The state's backflow rule has an assembly that guards against a health hazard tested on installation and at least once a year after. SAWS sends residential irrigation customers their reminders quarterly. It treats a failed report filed with its T&M form as a delinquency.

That is repeat work with a date printed on it. Picture a San Antonio backflow page that names the licensed tester, explains the reminder letter and offers to file the report. It answers mail the customer already has. Check each city's own tester registration before you advertise there, and confirm with counsel which licenses your techs need.

Send a freeze safety tip and a sales offer as two separate texts. Texas law treats them differently, and keeping them apart lets the tip reach everyone who opted in.

Before a cold front a plumber usually has two things to say. "Wrap your hose bibs, and here is where your shutoff valve is", with no offer, is on our reading not sent to make a sale. Add "book a freeze check this week" and the same text becomes a telephone solicitation. SB 140, the state's 2025 texting law, brought text messages under that term on September 1, 2025. Sent apart, the safety note goes to everyone who opted in, and the offer goes only where an exemption holds.

The offer needs one of those exemptions, or a registration. Consent is the plainest. For now the Secretary of State does not ask a business to register as a telephone seller for texts the customer agreed to first. It cites its position in a 2025 federal lawsuit. So the booking form, the missed-call reply and the invoice should each ask for that consent in plain words.

The telephone seller law adds two more tests. One covers an offer to service or repair something the customer bought from you. A flush or anode check sent to your own water heater installs fits. The same text to a purchased list does not. The other covers any past or current customer, if the company has kept its current name for at least two years. A shop renamed or bought in the last two years cannot use it.

Where registration does apply, it runs one year. It costs $200 to file plus a $10,000 security, according to the Secretary of State. The same law sets civil penalties of up to $5,000 per violation, and federal consent rules apply on top. Calling hours and the no-call list are in the texting playbook. Have counsel look over the list before the first cold front.