The role of the “granite guy” in the scheduling process of any residential job – new construction or remodel – has never been an easy one. Since countertops are one of the last things to be installed in a kitchen or bathroom, the installer is stuck with two difficulties.
Just as I’ve never run into a residential install that was exactly like a previous one, each multi-family install I’ve done presented itself to me as an experience where lessons can always be learned. This “never seeing the same river twice” phenomenon is, in part, what keeps countertop installation interesting and not some factory-belt, Pink Floyd-style drudgery.
The relationship between a fabricator and the template/install crew can be an orderly and mutually beneficial if it’s based on cooperation, an open communication channel and a well-defined set of operating procedures.
It can also be the opposite: a tension-filled, adversarial relationship with ambiguous or condescending communication, lots of finger-pointing, and inconsistent fabrication from one job to the next.
It may be hard to believe that your outlook on the world can determine if you’ll be a successful templater, but I’ve found it to be spot-on: the more-pessimistic the person, the more potential for being a great templater.
One of the questions I hear the most at jobsites from homeowners and contractors alike is: “That stuff must be pretty heavy, eh?” (Or, where I’m at now in the South, “Reckon that stuff must be right heavy?”)
By Jason Nottestad
So, we’ve considered when you should and shouldn’t charge for chip repair (Stone Business, March 2009) and the first four steps of how to prepare yourself as well as the repair area (Stone Business, May 2009). Let’s get down to the nitty-gritty of actually doing the job.
One of the most-common repairs I’m asked to do deals with chips near the edge of the kitchen sink. When washing pots, pans, or heavy dishes, soapy water makes it hard to hold onto anything; dropping something this heavy onto the corner of a piece of stone almost always results in a divot.
In the last articleI offered some rationale behind the politics of when to do a chip repair, and when to charge for your work. Now that we’ve established the ground rules for what makes sense from a business perspective, let’s take a look at the fundamentals of the repair.
By Jason Nottestad A chip repair on a granite or engineered-stone countertop is one of the more-perplexing issues facing a fabricator, from both a customer-service and business perspective. While I’ve never found chip repair...
The benefits of digital templating for the homeowner are obvious. A good templater, using a system to its fullest, can involve a homeowner in the measuring process to such an extent that they’ll feel confident that both the countertop shape and measurements will be accurate.