Wastewater Lab Jobs in Michigan (NOW HIRING)

Sales Engineer

JMark Systems | Walker, MI (Grand Rapids area)

Hybrid, with regular travel to customer sites

Full-time | Sales & Engineering | Reports to the General Manager

Since 1984, JMark Systems has designed, built, and installed industrial water and wastewater treatment systems for manufacturers across North America. We've delivered hundreds of systems to customers including NASA, Mercedes-Benz, and Moen — everything from slant plate clarifiers and reverse osmosis skids to complete turnkey wastewater treatment plants, plus mobile treatment rentals and white-label equipment for OEM partners.

Every system is engineered, assembled, and quality-checked at our facility in Walker, Michigan. Made in the USA, built to last.

We serve aerospace, automotive, electronics, food & beverage, metal finishing, mining, petrochemical, pharmaceutical, plating, power generation, and textile operations. In 2022 we joined WTRBOX, which gives us broader reach and resources while keeping the small-team, customer-first way of working that got us here.

We're a lean team of engineers and fabricators who like solving hard problems for people who make things. If you want your work to be visible and your ideas to actually get built, this is a good place to be.

We're looking for a Sales Engineer to own the technical sales process from first conversation to signed order. You'll be the person a plant engineer calls when their wastewater discharge is out of compliance, their water costs are climbing, or their existing system can't keep up with a new production line — and you'll figure out what they need, then price and propose it.

This is a genuinely hybrid role: part consultative selling, part applications engineering. You'll spend time in plants looking at real process water, time at your desk sizing equipment and building quotes, and time with our engineering and fabrication teams making sure what we sold is what we build.

•     Qualify and develop opportunities. Respond to inbound inquiries, follow up on leads, and prospect within our target industries and installed base. Understand the customer's process, water chemistry, discharge requirements, and budget before proposing a solution.

•     Perform technical discovery. Visit customer facilities to assess process water and wastewater streams, review lab analyses and discharge permits, take measurements, and identify treatment objectives and constraints.

•     Engineer the solution. Select and size treatment technologies — clarification, filtration, reverse osmosis, softening, chemical treatment, sludge handling — and develop process flow diagrams and equipment configurations in collaboration with our engineering team.

•     Build and present proposals. Prepare detailed quotations covering scope, equipment specifications, budgetary and firm pricing, installation requirements, and projected operating costs. Present to plant engineers, maintenance managers, EHS staff, and executive decision-makers.

•     Manage the sales cycle. Track opportunities in CRM, forecast accurately, negotiate terms, and close orders. Capital equipment cycles are long — you'll need to keep multiple deals moving.

•     Support the handoff. Work with project management and fabrication through design review, submittals, and startup so the delivered system matches what the customer bought.

•     Grow existing accounts. Identify aftermarket opportunities — spare parts, service, system upgrades, expansions, and rental solutions — within the installed base.

•     Represent the company. Attend trade shows and industry events and support marketing with technical content and case study input.

•     Bring the market back to us. Share competitive intelligence, customer feedback, and product gaps that inform what we build next.

•     Bachelor’s degree in chemical, Mechanical, Environmental, or Civil Engineering — or equivalent hands-on experience in industrial water treatment

•     3–7 years of technical sales, applications engineering, or field service experience involving industrial equipment, water/wastewater treatment, or process systems

•     Working knowledge of water treatment fundamentals: pH adjustment, coagulation/flocculation, clarification, filtration, membrane systems, ion exchange, and sludge dewatering

•     Ability to read and interpret P&IDs, process flow diagrams, and equipment drawings

•     Proven ability to build a technical proposal and defend it commercially — you can explain both the engineering and the payback

•     Strong written and verbal communication; comfortable presenting to a room that includes both engineers and finance

•     Valid driver's license and willingness to travel to customer sites (approximately 25–40%, primarily North America)

•     Authorization to work in the United States

•     Experience selling or specifying capital equipment with $50K–$1M+ project values

•     Familiarity with industrial pretreatment regulations, NPDES/POTW discharge requirements, and zero liquid discharge concepts

•     Background in one or more of our core markets: metal finishing, automotive, aerospace, food & beverage, or plating

•     Experience with AutoCAD or similar, and CRM platforms

•     Understanding of pumps, controls, PLC-based automation, and instrumentation as applied to treatment systems

•     Curious about process. You want to see the line, understand the chemistry, and know where the water goes.

•     Comfortable being the expert and the salesperson. In a small team, those are the same job.

•     Organized without being told. Long sales cycles reward people who follow up on time.

•     Honest about scope. You'd rather lose a deal than oversell a system that won't perform.

•     Real ownership. You're not one of thirty reps working a territory script. You'll shape how we go to market in your accounts.

•     Short path from idea to build. Our engineering and fabrication teams are down the hall, not in another time zone.

•     Interesting problems. No two industrial waste streams are the same. The technical work stays fresh.

•     Established base, growth mandate. Forty years of installed systems and referenceable customers, plus JMark resources behind a real growth plan.

•     Benefits. Health, paid time off and holidays.

Based out of our Walker, Michigan headquarters with a hybrid schedule — expect a mix of time onsite with the engineering team, home-office work, and travel to customer facilities. Candidates should be located in, or willing to relocate to, the West Michigan area.

Send your resume and a short note about a technical sale you're proud of — what the problem was and how you solved it — to sales@jmarksystem.com.

Applications are reviewed on a rolling basis.

JMark Systems is an Equal Opportunity Employer. We consider all qualified applicants without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, age, disability, protected veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law. Reasonable accommodations are available for applicants and employees with disabilities.