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Franklyn,
I don't exactly remember how I ended up at your site, but I did and loved it. Its too bad you don't live closer.
Actually it's too bad you don't live closer to me (grin). I live in the ideal spot. I'm halfway between Seattle and Portland. Halfway between Mt. Rainier and the Pacific Ocean.I live in Omaha, NE and have been in the floor business for about 1.5 years now. I picked it up pretty quick and I am pretty much able to do anything, install, sand and finish. I also accidentally fell into and love it.
I've been in the wood floor business over 30 years now. I had a customer in Washington D.C. when I lived there that really helped me see how lucky I was.She was remodeling a house which needed everything. New roof, new electrical, new plumbing and fixtures, drywall repair and paint. This house needed everything.
She was "fussy"...everything had to be just right and she was willing to pay to make it right.
One day at the end of a hard day of floor work I asked her, "Mind if I ask you a question?" She said , "No". I asked, "with you being so "fussy" why did you buy such a wreck of a house? Why didn't you buy one which was all fixed up?"
She said, "You know it's interesting that you should ask that. You'd be surprized that anyone would admit to it but I'm a bureaucrat. I get paid very well for what I do. Money is not a problem for me. I make plenty of money.
I shuffle papers all day. The problem is I never see the end result of anything I do....so I take my money and find a house that needs a lot of TLC and give it everything it needs. When this house is done I'll sell it and find another house and give it everything it needs so I can see some physical accomplishment in my life."
I thought to myself how lucky I am that that human need for accomplishment is built into my job.
I was working for my father-in-law doing plumbing and he moved and wanted wood floor in his kitchen, so for 3 whole days instead of plumbing, my brother-in-law and I glued down prefinish floor in the kitchen.
The whole glue thing sucked, but the process and the finished product where very satisfying.
Can't say that I like gluedown floors myself. I usually end up with it all over my hands, clothes and even my face. Messy messy.So one day afterwards we stopped by a local wood flooring place to get some stair nosing and I hated working for my father-in-law, so I asked if they were hiring, they said sure and after my two weeks notice I was there.
Sounds a lot like how I Got Started
I love my job, the only thing I wish is that is wasn't such a cookie cutter job. The most extravagant thing I've done is putting a picture frame border on a room with the inside and outside going opposite directions. I would like to do more, but its too expensive for people to get. I also think my company is kind of like the 'clerk' which I am not or try not to be.
Working for someone else can really limit you. I almost always suggest laying the floor 45 degrees to the walls when I look at a job. Sometimes it's a good laugh and sometimes I end up installing diagonally which looks really cool. Add a diagonal field with a border and you have a diamite floor.I often stain the border in place so it keeps the costs down but has the look of an exotic species. There are pictures of this on my website.
The only thing I do is save the leftover scrap and extra pieces from jobs, whereas other workers cut up and throw away. After 2 years of collecting I have about 1300 ft of 2.25 red oak.
I save scraps myself. I had a customer who wanted to have a border on an existing floating floor. I ended up taking all the floor up by cutting it into 2x3foot rectangles. It's engineered real wood and the plan is to inlay my scraps into it and make tables when I retire. The pile of 2x3 panels is sitting in my storage and is as tall as I am.But I see a lot of overcharging which pisses me off. There have been times when they bid the job wrong some 500 sq ft over, but they said the client didn't know, so oh well.I have Bloodwood (which should make some great roses) Rosewood, walnut, maple, vertical grain fir, ash, purple heart, bamboo and a number of other species to putter around with.
Have you seen the Missing Money on my website? I think you will find a good example of my thoughts on this in the answer I supply.
And the wood was wenge, expensive, and the estimator planned on using the leftover for his horse trailer at 16.00/ft. It made me sick.
Sorry about going on, but it is just good to see that you view things the way you do.
No problem. As you can see I use some of the emails I receive to make unique content webpages.
I kind of just was wondering about how you did the goldfish floor in particular, how did you make the template and the pieces to go into the floor and how were the pieces installed, sanded and finished, and maybe some more info on pickeling and how that works.
The goldfish came from a book at the library which was an overhead view to illustrate how goldfish propell themselves through the water.I am eventually hoping to do this as sort of a side job on my own once I become a high school teacher, which is what I will be. But I want to do it more for the creative side and the fun and cheaper, so that more people can enjoy it without having to break the bank for it.I made a copy of it and inlarged it at Kinkos to the right size for Koi. I Then glued the paper to 3/8 inch birch plywood and cut out the templates with my scroll saw. I used a drum sander attachment on a dremel to make them smooth cuts.
I screwed the templates down to another piece of plywood and using a bushing on my router cut the shapes into the plywood. This told me what the final cut into the wood would be. By experimenting a little with the reduction feature on a copy machine (98% to 90% reduction) of the images used to make the templates, I had images which matched the size of the final cut.
From there I just needed to cut the fish pictures up into pieces and paste each piece to a piece of wood with the grain going the way I wanted it to go and just cut out each piece. Because the pieces of paper fit together before you cut them with sissors the resulting wood pieces have to fit together as well.
I learned this technique while my wife was doing stained glass. The technique is the same only the material differs and wood is a lot easier to work with. I used this same technique to inlay rosewood treble clef signs into a floor once as well. Stain glass books and coloring books are great places to get ides for inlays.
I do all of the above at the same time. I teach people how to do wood floors. They learn something, save money, get satisfaction of accomplishment, and I make it fun.
Anyways, thank you for your time and I appreciate any and all advice. I was also wondering if there were any certain things I would need to know to start my own business, at least on the business end of things.
Well, let's see. Talk to an accountant, City Hall, an attorney, and a banker and if they don't totally discourage you from starting then you probably should give it a try.Thanks again,Definitely build a website. I predict from the trend I am seeing that in another 10 years the Yellow pages will be in the same catagory as the outhouse is now. Ask 20 people who can afford to have wood floors done if they go to their computer first or the yellow pages first to find something these days.
Surprisingly, many flooring companies have no web presence. If you simply list the names of all the local flooring companies on your webpage your webpage will show up when anyone searches for those companies by default.
Bryan
PS- I was also curious what pay was like out there for someone like me? is it by the sq ft or hourly and how much?
Washington State has to be the most unfriendly state for people in the construction industry of any state in the United States.I wouldn't suggest coming here to be in any construction related industry.
I Teach Wood Floors I have been a wood floor mechanic for over 30 years. My site is 30 years worth of pictures and experience with wood floors.
See also:
wood floors, woodfloors,
hardwood floors, flooring, woodflooring, refinishing,
unfinished, solid, parquet, installing, Olympia, Tumwater,
WA, Lacey, woodfloorist, Franklyn, Washington