[mitchellreid]

Teresa,

Is this the same Vinyl Conditioner they sell, or maybe used to sell, in 8 oz bottle sets with a Vinyl Cleaner? and also by itself by the Gallon?

Thanks

Mitch

[mitchellreid]

Upholstery – The Unsung Hero of the Dr. Vinyl Franchise System(You might want to add this to your Franchise’s Trades)

A few years ago our Franchise was “pushed” into the upholstery and wheel business by the relentless calls mostly from dealers and a handful of restaurants. My boss said he would take on one trade if I would take on the other. When I got the upholstery side of the deal I thought I had it made and would get very few calls. I thought this will not interfere, at all, with my interior work at my normal dealership stops. That relief didn’t last long. Restaurants started calling, slowly at first. It seemed I would get a call, service the account, and get a good grasp on their needs by repeated visits. It seemed I had just enough time at first to learn one restaurant’s needs before the next would call. As time progressed the calls increased. I was unsure how the word got out about our ability to do upholstery. I certainly wasn’t telling anyone and our Franchise never did any advertising, but the calls kept coming anyway. I suspected restaurant managers sharing their upholstery contacts with other restaurants or managers moving from one restaurant chain to another, but I was wrong. It was Dr. Vinyl Corporate! Those guys receive calls all the time and they were directing them to us if the work was anywhere near us. Those guys at corporate were not aware of my work avoidance tactics. We started working upholstery in our home town and it has grown to working in multiple states. I will have to admit as much as I fought the change, it is very profitable, not to mention convenient work. The cutting, the sewing, and the installing are mostly done inside regardless of weather. I know all you techs have to admit that sounds very comfortable to say the least. It is also very convenient. If it rains one morning, I can easily go to a restaurant before they open and recover some booths that I have sewn. When I am done or when they are ready to open to the public, I can head to my car lots if the rain has passed. If it continues raining, I can go back to the shop to sew the next job. There is very little interference with your car lot work. The car lots like for you to come during the daylight hours and the restaurants want you to come during the hours the are normally closed to the public. Some want you to work only from 8 to 11 am, others from 11pm to 11 am, while still others are open 24 hours a day and just ask you to avoid their busiest times of the day. This type of schedule has really helped me to make the most of my time. I can sew and install when it is convenient for me and continue working my car lots. Today, I am a little removed from the Interior side of Dr. Vinyl. I still work some car lots so that I can train new interior techs that my boss hires. However, I now have many restaurant accounts that I service. I have also trained several upholstery techs to handle the workload we have in our Franchise area. We now have 5 techs that work interiors and some form of upholstery as well. This can be a very profitable side of the business. This trade is one that seems to be dying out. Most of the upholsterers I know are older guys who are slowing retiring or at least getting out of the business. It seems like the perfect time for our Franchise, and possibly yours, to enter the trade and fill the void. Think about it.
I almost forgot the best part, the profitability side of the trade. To steal a line from the previous post by Buster Coppage, in the Upholstery business I say “It’s all about the Clevelands” because Grover Cleveland is the guy on the $1000 bills.

[mitchellreid]

Maintain your Client/Vendor Relationships

When I am “courting” a new customer I know that I need to earn their trust first. There are several ways I have found to do this and none of them will cost you or your clients anything.
On a car lot I will do things like: bring in Dealer plates, that have been left inside cars, to the Manager (not the receptionist or the salesmen), let the Manager know if a car has a flat tire, brake problems, a cracked windshield, items broken beyond repair, or other serious car issues. This shows the Manager you are trying to help him move that car and not trying to charge them anything for it. It shows you are part of their team. If the Manager asks “Why you are doing this?”, tell the truth. You have already seen that car and done all you can do. You need it to be sold and make room for another car that you can work on. This way you become an ally of the Manager because that is what he is trying to do everyday. Not only is he trying to move those cars off the lot, he is trying to in every way to convince “his team” (the sales force) to do the same. They may only be interested in their check. You, however, have shown him that you are aligning yourself with his goals. One of his main goals is moving cars off the lot. It is a constant part of a viscous sales cycle. How long has this car been on the lot? Why isn’t it moving? What do I have to do to sell it to a buyer? You are helping him solve that problem. You are not asking for anything monetarily. You just want the car to move and telling him what is wrong with it.

In a restaurant I will advise the customer based on what is in their best interest. They may ask if I can repair rather than recover something. I will tell them the truth. I can repair the booth back and it will hold up because it is in a low traffic area, and the same kind of contact is unlikely in the future. However, I also tell them the truth on the other side of the coin. I can repair that booth bottom a hundred times and will gladly do so but I will have to charge them each time, and because it is in a high traffic area it will very likely reoccur, or I can recover the booth bottom and it will last for considerably longer. I will gladly do either that they wish, but I just want to make sure I tell them up front the pros and cons of each. I am not telling them what to do, but I am telling them what I would do if this were my booth. I also want to be upfront with them so that in the future they will continue to use my services. I would rather disappoint my customer on the front end than the tail end of the transaction. Managers who are willing to listen tend to appreciate this approach. As time goes by, they come to depend on it.

Simple, no cost things can win you new customers for life as well as maintain current accounts for years.

[mitchellreid]

Clean / Organize Your “Office” aka Your Van

If you have ever had to wait on a manager, customer, or a traffic jam to clear, then you have had time on your hands that if left unused can never be recovered. Use this time to clean up your van and organize your tools. I have always been able to get more done, therefore, charge more per hour when my van is clean and organized.

Once the Interstate backed up for an hour due to an accident, I had thrown my equipment back in my van hurriedly so I could make it to my next stop. Now was the perfect time to clean up the inside of my van. I started with the cab and all my scattered paperwork, moved to the mid area of the van, and finally to the rear of the van where most of my work actually happens. I even had time to clean my mirrors and windows inside and out! While other people were wandering around in the median and stretching, I was standing on my front bumper getting the bug guts off my windshield. As a matter of fact, the rear windows were so clean for the first few weeks after that cleaning, I had to double check to make sure my rear doors weren’t open. In any case, I found that beyond the normal cleanup that I might do at home after a busy day or week and beyond just refilling supplies, a good thorough cleaning of my van made me faster and more productive on the car lots I was working. Everything was in its place and topped off ready to go. That hour “stuck” on the Interstate made me more money because I used that time to increase my productivity. I know that I spent a great deal less time searching for things I normally just threw back in the van in a pile. There were no tangles to deal with or little pieces out of place. Everything was where it should be, just waiting for me to pick them up and make money with them. This also encouraged me to spend 5-10 minutes at the end of each day getting the van ready for the next.

Nowadays, I don’t mind getting stopped on the Interstate due to some construction or accident delay. There is nothing I can do about the Interstate being a parking lot, but there is something I CAN DO. I put the van in park and go straight to work. Time is money. If I can use this captive time to increase my productivity then I know I can easily make more money in the future.

[mitchellreid]

Thinking outside the box:

I was once asked to remove white paint overspray on the cowl of a car between the hood and the windshield. The manager told me that they had tried every solvent they had in their detail department and were still unable to remove it. I tried all my cleaners and solvents and came up with the same results. So I thought to myself what do I know about this situation and how can I use it to help me solve the problem. The paint was white. The cowl was black. The cowl held paint so well that it would not release it even to a solvent wash. All I could think to do was to paint the cowl black. The manager was amazed when he saw I had removed something no one else could. He asked me what I had used to remove it and this is where I had to “Think outside the box”. I told him that I had signed a confidentiality agreement with Dr. Vinyl and could not reveal any trade secrets or I could put my job in jeopardy. This was indeed true and it still made me look like the hero in the customer’s eyes.

A simple solution and thinking outside the box is a deadly combination.

[mitchellreid]

Will,
Sometimes for spots I use one of the rectangular attachments anyway even if it is overkill. If I cannot gain direct access to the site (ex. in a corner of a storage well), I lay down my damp or wet towel on top of the stained area, then place one of the attachments as close as possible to the stain and close up any gaps between the attachment and the surrounding area with more towels. These towels need not be wet. They are mainly to prevent steam from escaping. They will, however, soon become wet and very hot due to the steam. Be careful when removing. Also to combat any residual staining, while extraction is usually the preferred method, I have found that wiping the surface of the stain with a clean, dry cloth immediately after removing the steamer will usually do the trick when any residue remains. By using this method I have not needed to dye anyplace I have removed red dye. Plus I have found dyeing a wet surface is highly difficult with aerosol dyes. Think about it.

Mitchell Reid

[mitchellreid]

Teresa,

Thanks for all your effort. This forum dialog is a great thing. Maybe that should also be mentioned in the newsletters that go out to all the Dr.Vinyls. Maybe then we might get a little more participation in the discussions. Thanks again.

Mitch

[mitchellreid]

Teresa,

Thanks for the listing of the filler products and their descriptions. This will be very helpful in the future. It is really great to have this kind of information when ordering these products. I appreciate you taking the time to describe them to me. The warehouse does have almost all of the products on hand. The medium vinyl hyde is not. However, it can be ordered if needed. Please don’t spend too much time worrying about the B2. The reason why it is no longer available is that the manufacturer went out of business years ago. If you happen to find another filler that is similar, I would like to know. My guess is that it will be one with much higher curing temperatures required.

Thanks,
Mitch

[mitchellreid]

I spoke with Brian Greenfield today. I had some questions and he shared some upholstery pearls of wisdom that are probably not covered in the Basic Upholstery class. I plan to and encouraged Brian to keep a running log of these sort of items to share with other upholsterers at the 2019 Convention. I hope other Dr.Vinyls will do the same. Maybe this will help us pass some knowledge on to others and shave some time off the learning process of advanced upholstery.

[mitchellreid]

Teresa,

I have not used FX-8. I appreciate the FX-9 sample. I guess what you are looking for from me is what kind of consistency of filler am I most comfortable using. As my most senior painter says he can shoot any type of paint they send him, even jelly. I can use any of the fillers that you mentioned. However, I prefer the consistency of the following: Extra Thick Vinyl Hyde, Duraflex, and even XR-15. The thinner fillers usually require more layers and patience than I have to offer.

I didn’t mean to send you on a hunting expedition about the B2. I just meant that it seems we are constantly obtaining new fillers with lower cure temps without thinking about the environment that we use or store them in. In the summertime, interior automobile temperatures can easily reach 140 degrees F. Long term exposure to that temperature range will slowly cure fillers that normally flash cure at 295 degrees. Just wanted to put a little caution with our scientific advancement.

Sincerely,

An Old Dog

[mitchellreid]

Teresa,

From a tech’s point of view it seems like there has been a great deal of replacing of fillers. They seem to come faster these days. Was there something wrong with the previous fillers? I am not trying to complain, but I am trying to understand the progression of the fillers. Are the strengths the same and they just have required less and less heat to cure the product or is it other enhanced features like grainability or durability that have driven the multiple replicants. Maybe a simple listing of these fillers, there progression, and there traits would help the techs in the field understand this a little better. I know it would help me. Maybe it is just a case of too much new technology too fast for this older tech.

Sincerely,
One Old Dog

[mitchellreid]

Teresa,

Are all the available heat cure compounds you listed available through the Dr.Vinyl Warehouse?

I have used all you have listed but FX-9. My favorite is not on the list and that would be B2. It is from before your time Teresa. I still carry it on my van for emergencies. When I say emergencies I mean when one of the products you have listed above has cured inside it’s container either in my van or in shipment to me during hot weather. I only use B2 to get me thru to the next shipment of the latest and greatest filler. While I keep all the newer fillers in a cooler in the hot weather the B2 remains outside the cooler. Although B2 is not as advanced as the others it has one thing that the other fillers do not…LONGEVITY even in the HEAT. You would have to check with Tony or Darrell but I don’t think the warehouse has carried B2 for 10 years. 10 years and this B2 filler has still not cured! What a product. Still works in any climate and without shelf life worries. I know we have made great strides in filler technology but sometimes the OLD TRICKS STILL WORK.

Sincerely,
An Old Dog

[mitchellreid]

Good point, Brian. I forgot about the different attachments that the steamer comes with. They do give you a lot better access to small spaces The large rectangular attachment covers a lot greater area than an iron does as well.
I left out one of the cons by accident and it can be an important one. If you leave the steamer on one location too long it can and will shrink the carpet or make it loose its “memory”. By memory, I mean the way it has been thermo-formed to fit into the vehicle. Sorry for leaving that out.

[mitchellreid]

Maybe by the next convention we (“the upholsterers”) can get together and get a list of things we know of, or that we actually have done, or things that we need to know how to do that might qualify as “advanced” information. That might give corporate some basis on which to start building a Upholstery 2 Class. I know there are things that Nina and Brian Greenfield, as well as others, have done that I would love to see in a classroom or video setting. I am going to start keeping a running list of things I need to learn about upholstery. Maybe others will as well.

[mitchellreid]

Steve,

If there are no plans for future advanced upholstery classes, could we do some advanced demos at the next convention?

The reason I am asking is that I have customers asking me to do more complicated work. This work includes things like chairs that have upper and lower sections with mushroom shaped decorative nails, booth backs with buttons and pleated seams, high back waiting room chairs that are completly upholstered on every visible side that are more recliner shaped, and other work that is basically further advanced then the booth bottom and chair cushion wrap and staple type work that I have become somewhat proficient at. There is hardware that is brand new to me when I disassemble a “new” type of chair. I try to be especially careful with this hardware because I do not have any on hand to replace it and I would have difficulty describing it to someone so that I could order more of it. There are tack strips and hidden seam hardware, etc. that just need a little daylight shed on them so that we can continue to provide a greater service to our customers.

If I am asking too much about having classes, would it be possible to get a list of Dr.Vinyls who do these types of upholstery work and see if they would be willing to give classes at their facility?

Or maybe just posting videos on the Dr.Vinyl website of this type of upholstery work would be enough. That way people could see how the work is supposed to be done without the classes. Myself and others have been scouring Youtube for help in this arena. Some of the videos are legitimate and some are not. The problem is that sometimes without experience it is difficult to separate the two. I would have a great deal more confidence in instruction coming from Corporate Dr.Vinyl then an “upholsterer” who has an online video but at best unfounded credentials.

I know you all at corporate are busy but you could help many of us in the field with this information. For example, I spent 6 hours taking apart, recovering partially, and putting back together 1 of the waiting room chairs mentioned previously. 80-90 % of this time was dedicated to taking the chair apart. I had to be very careful because I wasn’t sure that I could recover the unit or not, until I got it mostly disassembled. It was like exploratory surgery in unchartered waters. Sewing took 20 minutes. Reassembly and stapling took about 30 minutes. So the unknown and unfamiliar really hampered the process. This is where help is needed. The other 5 chairs will be easier now that I have a grasp on the previously unknown. It just seems that everyone should not have to spend the 5+ hours I spent, every time they come across this chair that is “new” to them.

Please just think about it.

Thanks from the Wandering Upholsterer,

aka Mitchell Reid

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