“FREE ESTIMATES”, OUR LIFE LINE

Most of my fellow residential contractors would say they spend way too much time on free estimates. Over the last 25 years I have been asked for a free estimate hundreds of times. We all know the routine. The phone rings and the voice on the other end barely introduce themselves with the usual question. ”Do you give free estimates?’ We have accepted it as a fact of life in the painting business. It’s one way a customer learns what a painting project would cost them, if they can afford to have their house professionally painted, compare one contractor to another and plain old curiosity. I know dozens of my associates in the business will start with some pre-qualifying questions. Many times this will include, “Do you have a budget for your project?” Invariably they will say something like “Oh no, that’s why I called you.”

Budgeting is as important as preparation and is part of the preparation process for a successful painting project. It is very important to the customer to be educated about what they want and how much it may cost. In the past, the only way we as professionals would educate the customer or quote a project was to take the time and visit the customer’s site. Contractors and consumers are extremely busy and can’t afford to waste each others’ time on a project they can’t afford, or, as a contractor, can’t handle.

Let me tell you about a recent situation I encountered. My good customer referred us to their friend with a similar house. I called on a Thursday and asked a few pre-qualifying questions to the potential customer. I asked if they’d ever had a professional painting contractor paint their home. The client answered with a “no” and had painted it themselves in the past. I asked the homeowner to visit a web site, www.mypaintbid.com, I had just learned about. I asked that they visit the website before Saturday’s appointment in order to budget their project and learn more about it. I showed up on Saturday, met the homeowner for the first time, went over the three rooms to be painted and proceeded to work up an estimate. I calculated the project the same way as I had been doing with all my clients, taking my time not to miss anything. I planned on doing the job the only way I know, and that’s “the proper way”. I had felt from the beginning that this was a great referral. All the signs seemed to be there; a nice home, a project I could complete without a problem, a friendly homeowner and a professional presentation with a fair estimate. I thought… “I’ll get the job.”

After I presented my price and the work that needed to be done the homeowner said she was expecting the price to be in the thousand dollar range and my price was just over three thousand. No one wants to be caught off guard, “sticker shocked” or told their price is too high. I asked the homeowner if she had taken the time to go to the web-site and she told me she was to busy and did not have a chance. Needless to say, I did not get the paint job. The entire process had taken me just over two hours of my time plus travel costs to meet with the homeowner, let alone her time.

The process of estimating and educating customers as we know it today is about to change. We as professionals must change our approach to this process. We still need to have personal contact with prospects however, consumers must take an active role in the process by budgeting and educating themselves before involving others in a project they want to undertake.

Looking for new ways to inform, educate and budget our customers’ requirements will take all of us into a future of growing our business profitably. Good old quality customer service painting may not be changing today.

Educating and standardizing costs within the paint industry as we know it is about to take a revolutionary new direction with mypaintbid.com, a new innovative internet based system using the industry’s best practices. The added side benefit of this is that the newcomer to the paint contracting business might not be so anxious to give away their services when they also see the standard price for a particular project may be three times what they were previously quoting. Let’s look at change as our “Future” in the service of painting.

Painting & Decorating, Inc.
Toledo, Ohio