Small engine techs....lets talk.

[belgian]

As I asked him, had your lunch, he said yes. Lets turn this around. If that job was so important to him why didn't he skip lunch. That way had the saw stopped around noon I woulda said bring it on over right now, I got 2 hours before lunch. Ya see Brother Belgian at lunchtime his main concern wasn't the job or the saw, it was his lunch. At 2pm I'm just like him, my main concern is filling my belly,LOLOL That burger sure did taste good,mmmmmm

Far as lost sales from him have you any idea how many sales I pick up around noon while I'm giving up a regular noon time lunch everyday of the week so the guys can come in on their regular lunch hour, trust me, the number is staggering compared to that one contractor. Can't getem all Belgian so you do whatcha can to get the most.

Well, somewhere I missed the contractor lunch part in your original post, but that does change the picture of course.

I agree that you can't have a business model that fits all cats, but if you do wish to address the pro market, service is a major issue. Many machine manufacterers do offer a "service contract" for that particular reason to differentiate themselves from competitors. And the service part brings sometimes more $$$ than the sale of the equipment itself . Now I don't think such a service agreement would be applicable for chainsaws, but I hope you see where I am coming from.

PS. Burgers, folgers, smokes.... jeez Thall, you are living dangerously...

 

[BloodOnTheIce]

I want to have this made into a sign at the shop

"You can't have good, fast and cheap"
"You can have fast and cheap, but it won't be good"
"You can have good and cheap but it'll won't be fast"
"Which one one would you like?"​

 

[THALL10326]

Well, somewhere I missed the contractor lunch part in your original post, but that does change the picture of course.

I agree that you can't have a business model that fits all cats, but if you do wish to address the pro market, service is a major issue. Many machine manufacterers do offer a "service contract" for that particular reason to differentiate themselves from competitors. And the service part brings sometimes more $$$ than the sale of the equipment itself . Now I don't think such a service agreement would be applicable for chainsaws, but I hope you see where I am coming from.

PS. Burgers, folgers, smokes.... jeez Thall, you are living dangerously...

Not fussing with ya at all, in fact I kinda agree with ya but, that little big word, but, mans gotta eat sometime during the day,LOLOLOL

Belgian I'd like to stay and talk but its 1.50pm here. I don't think your gonna make it here in time from acoss the water to buy anything so guess what, I'm taking lunch early today,:hmm3grin2orange: :hmm3grin2orange: :hmm3grin2orange:

 

[THALL10326]

I want to have this made into a sign at the shop

"You can't have good, fast and cheap"
"You can have fast and cheap, but it won't be good"
"You can have good and cheap but it'll won't be fast"
"Which one one would you like?"​

Hey I liked that, someone has it right at your place,

 

[belgian]

Not fussing with ya at all, in fact I kinda agree with ya but, that little big word, but, mans gotta eat sometime during the day,LOLOLOL

Belgian I'd like to stay and talk but its 1.50pm here. I don't think your gonna make it here in time from acoss the water to buy anything so guess what, I'm taking lunch early today,:hmm3grin2orange: :hmm3grin2orange: :hmm3grin2orange:

Swell, It's saturday and 8 pm here, so I had my dinner already :hmm3grin2orange: :hmm3grin2orange:

 

[RED-85-Z51]

Red ya need to do what I do and make a few bucks in the process. I get the same deal your talking about all the time, "have you got a minute to sharpen a chain right now". Most times my answer is do you need it right now. They say yes, I was planning on sawing today. Here's the clincher. I go well are ya saying you only have one chain for your saw, they go yes. I say welp ya need to get a few spare chains so you won't be caught without a sharp chain. They go well thats true, your right. I sell them a few new chains and makem leave that dull one. The ones that refuse to buy a new chain the answer to "can you do it right now" is NO!! Sometimes they get hot and start bit-ching. I just tellem quit ya bit-ching and buy a dayumm chain or leave your dull till I get around to it. 99 times out of a 100 they buy a new chain and leave the dull one. I call it getem while they are down,LOL

I also get the ones that want to jump ahead of everyone else. I'll have a saw or trimmer tore apart on the bench that I'm in the middle of. Here comes Mr I Want You To Stop And Look At Mine Right Now. Sometimes I may stop and take a look at theirs but most times I say this unit I'm working on now was here before you came in, this isn't the ER room. Some find me to be a real smart azz but the way I see it would these same people like me jumping ahead of them at the grocery store line, hell no. I'm a firm beleiver in first come first served. Not withstanding I do a awful lot of on the spot repairs so I have little mercy for those that think they can jump ahead of everyone esle, especially when I'm right in the middle of repairing the unit that came in before the I Want Mine Now guy.

Best one to date. Had a contractor in the middle of a concrete cutting job. Apparently his machine stopped. Its 1.55pm. I go to lunch at 2pm everyday so people on a regular lunch hour can swing by on their lunch hour and buy. This guy calls and tells me his concrete saw had stopped and he's in the middle of a job, can he bring it over. I say sure but I'm going to lunch in 5 minutes so bring it by at 3pm and we'll see whats going on with it. He gets all tissy on the phone saying I need it done now. I say have you had your lunch yet today, he goes yeah. I say good, I haven't and its 2pm and I need a
f-cking hambuger, see ya at 3pm. He never did bring his saw by, wonder if he got it running, all I know is that burger sure did taste good. That story sound mean Red?, it shouldn't. See the line where he said he had his lunch. Welp that job wasn't so important he would skip his lunch over it so why should I,LOL

We are the opposite on lunch, we eat at 11:00, so the lunch rush can get waited on...But every day, we can all be sitting down to burgers, BLT's, Chicken..whatever it may be, and some A-hole will walk inside the shop with a saw, carry it inside to where we are eating...hold it up, and say "can I get this sharpened, Im in kind of a hurry".

There are 2 clients we have that one of us will get up and do it for...1 tips 10 bucks every time, the other spends more than a few grand a year at our store...everyone else can wait.

People have alot of nerve...we only take a 15 minute lunch...damn.

 

[RED-85-Z51]

Ya see all kinds doncha,LOL

Sold a lady a MS310 once. A few days later she brough it back raising hell, dayumm thing is POS, it won't start. I was busy, tossed a tag on it and said I'll get to it.

Saw looked like new for it was only a few days old. An old farmer walked in while I was fooling with. I popped the gas cap and sniffed and went what the f-ck is in this tank. The old farmer stuck his nose near the tank and grinned and said give me a paper towel. He rolled it up , stuck it down in the tank and pullled it out. He said watch. He took a match and lit the towel and it sat there and burnt nice and slow and then the smell became clear, kerosene.

I called the lady to come get her saw and when she showed up it was my turn to have alittle fun. I said there is nothing wrong with this saw except for the dummy putting kerosense in the fuel tank. She goes whattttttttt. I said yup, it was filled with kerosene. She goes oh I'm so sorry, I have a mexican thats clearing for me and he was the one using it. As she walked out the door I thought serves ya right,LOLOLOLOL

Aint it funny how the product is always a POS whenever they screw the product up by doing something stupid, gotta lovem..............

Quite often a saw or trimmer comes in and the complain it wont start, so I sniff the tank...

20 minutes later when the burning in my chest passes and my vision returns, I drain the tank, add fresh, new filter, clean the carb...pull pull and off it goes. Tune it in, and give it to them...Charge them 35-45 depending on how bad, and what machine.

I explain it had stale fuel in it, and explain how I fixed it.

like clockwork about an hour later my Boss will come out and tell me "that XXXXX you fixed is coming back, wont crank"

So it comes back...first thing I always do is dump the gas out of the tank, into a clear jar..and give it a whiff...9 times out of 10, it's orangish...or pistch black..and smells like what came out the first time.

I ask the customer how long they ran it for...always "until it ran out, then I refilled it, ran a minute, then died".

I tell em to dump the crap gas in their 1 gallon into their nieghbors truck...and get soem fresh mix.

------
Also see alot of "saw wont oil". It's amazing how many people think a tank of oil is supposed to last all day..

And the ever popular "That chain you sharpened is dull as sh*t". Every time, they have put it on backwards.

It's scary.

 

[Erick]

Space ole buddy, you keep bringing the cash and the attitude and I'll keep take'n 30 minutes to cut ya chain in half for ya.





Had a good one just the other day, Guy comes in with a rocked out chain about 1/2 gone and has 6 or 7 drivers all boogered up wants a break and mend and replace the links, he also wants it sharpened. No problem explain to the fella that it's gonna cost him 11.50 to do the work or we'd be willing to just cut him a deal and sell him a new chain for 12.00...... so 10 minutes later I got his junk chain all fixed up for him.

Man says "it's still a good chain, no since throwing it out"...... ya just can't fix stupid.

 

[Metals406]

Space ole buddy, you keep bringing the cash and the attitude and I'll keep take'n 30 minutes to cut ya chain in half for ya.





Had a good one just the other day, Guy comes in with a rocked out chain about 1/2 gone and has 6 or 7 drivers all boogered up wants a break and mend and replace the links, he also wants it sharpened. No problem explain to the fella that it's gonna cost him 11.50 to do the work or we'd be willing to just cut him a deal and sell him a new chain for 12.00...... so 10 minutes later I got his junk chain all fixed up for him.

Man says "it's still a good chain, no since throwing it out"...... ya just can't fix stupid.

That customer is super smart--brilliant even... :monkey:

 

[THALL10326]

Space ole buddy, you keep bringing the cash and the attitude and I'll keep take'n 30 minutes to cut ya chain in half for ya.





Had a good one just the other day, Guy comes in with a rocked out chain about 1/2 gone and has 6 or 7 drivers all boogered up wants a break and mend and replace the links, he also wants it sharpened. No problem explain to the fella that it's gonna cost him 11.50 to do the work or we'd be willing to just cut him a deal and sell him a new chain for 12.00...... so 10 minutes later I got his junk chain all fixed up for him.

Man says "it's still a good chain, no since throwing it out"...... ya just can't fix stupid.

LOLOLOL, good one.

I just went over to Wendy's, got me my usual #2. Dayumm it took 15 minutes in line before getting a chance to order. I thought easy now ole Tom, you know how you feel about raving customers,LOLOL

 

[RED-85-Z51]

I'm sure you've all heard the joke "where does a 500 pound gorilla sleep? Anywhere he wants to." Well, what does a paying customer with a fi####l of cash say? That's right, anything he wants to.

There ought to be a law that saw dealers have to be at least as smart as the customers. If I go in and tell the dealer man to sharpen my blade, I don't want to hear about "that saw ain't got no blade chief, it's a bar."

Well fudge me with a stick! A bar is where I go before I come here and deal with aholes like you, and I don't see any beer in that saw. If I want to call the blade a purple hairy mouthed dildo, that's my business, as long as you sharpen my hairy mouthed dildo and charge a reasonable price and be quick about it. But I didn't want to upset the shop man's sensibilities, so I acquiesced and told him to sharpen my got damed bar.

Then he tells me that I need to keep the blade out of rocks. Hmm, a saw is a tool made to cut things. If a saw will not cut things, then it is either a poorly engineered piece of equipment or I have been taken on a piece of crap. If I want to saw rocks, then got damed it all I'm a gonna saw rocks! If your pos saw won't do that, then that's your problem.

Anyway, I get my blade back and it's sharpened all right--damned near 3/4 of the teeth are gone! On top of all this, the butthole charged me nearly the price of a new blade to butcher mine and call it sharpening. I stood there and watched, and he took damned near 30 minutes on one chain! Now, I understand a dealer has to make some money, but I don't like providing the Vaseline like this. I tell you, there ought to be a law against dumb arsed saw techs!

If you dont like the way your dealer does it, I highly suggest you invest in some files, a couple manuals, and do it yourself....and yes we have told some customers just that.

---
We had a guy when I first started where I work, brought in a POS shinny blower, had to order this expensive arse carb kit for it, thing worked like a top...

He brings the blower back nearly a month later complaining it wont crank..flooding ,etc..what it was doing before.

So I pulled the carb apart, and it was filthy, full of debris.

Then I started to notice little things about the blower, stripped screw heads that I didnt strip..air filter was busted on the top, didnt notice that before...then I took a peak at the serial number, and compared it to the one on the reciept I made out before....boom, different blower.

Customer had 2-3 identical blowers, one of his employees told him that that one was the one we had just repaired, and it was acting up. I cant stress how important it is to get serials on jobs.

 

[rebel3.0]

So kind of off topic, but how many customers do you guys see in a day? And were are you located, town, city? Great thread :spam: Our busy time is between 11:30 and 1:00 so i take my lunch after if I can get away.

 

[Erick]

There ought to be a law that saw dealers have to be at least as smart as the customers.

But if the dealer was just as smart as the customer who would fix the saw???? :dunno:

 

[mattinky]

I'm sure everyone has had a run-in with a customer that stands out, the one you'll never forget. Here's mine:

At one of the bike shops I worked at a guy brought a Honda Spree scooter in that would'nt run, said he'd taken it to 3 or 4 other shops and no one could figure out what was wrong with it. He says he's in no hurry, take your time - I just want to find someone that can get it going...

I fooled and fooled with it and I could'nt figure it out either so I called another mechanic that was a friend of a friend that was the Spree guru. He told me what he thought it might be and we ordered the part, this is one week after the guy dropped it off. The guy calls and wants to know if I have it fixed, I tell him no, but explained to him that I had talked with another mechanic and was pretty sure I had it figured out and that we had the part on the way.

So this prick gets pi@@ed off over the phone and lets me have it because it's not fixed yet. I said "You told me that you were in no hurry and have'nt been able to find anyone that could fix it, that in fact I have way more time in it than I could charge you for and have been doing my very best to get it fixed. I think I have it figured out but it's going to be a day or two before the part gets here" he tells me thats not good enough, and that if I was any kind of mechanic I'd have it fixed and proceeds to talk to me like a dog. I then calmly told him to come get it and hung up on him.

I have the scooter all torn apart at this point, but instead of putting it back together I took all the parts and threw them out the shop door into the parking lot, bolts and parts scattered everywhere. Very childish on my part, but I'm so mad I can't see straight, so he comes in and starts running his mouth to the girl working the counter and says "Where's that f***** mechanic?" She tells him the best thing he can do is load up his parts, leave and leave me alone, which he did. I don't think I've ever been as mad as I was that day and if he would have come into the shop and run his mouth to me I would've whipped his ass right there on the spot.

 

[volks-man]

I'm sure everyone has had a run-in with a customer that stands out, the one you'll never forget. Here's mine:

I have the scooter all torn apart at this point, but instead of putting it back together I took all the parts and threw them out the shop door into the parking lot, bolts and parts scattered everywhere. Very childish on my part, but I'm so mad I can't see straight, so he comes in and starts running his mouth to the girl working the counter and says "Where's that f***** mechanic?" She tells him the best thing he can do is load up his parts, leave and leave me alone, which he did. I don't think I've ever been as mad as I was that day and if he would have come into the shop and run his mouth to me I would've whipped his ass right there on the spot.

what were you thinking? don't you know that the customer is always right?
this man was only trying to give you some of his hard earned money!!! your reaction was wrong!!!


















but he still deserved it!!!

 

[THALL10326]

I'm sure everyone has had a run-in with a customer that stands out, the one you'll never forget. Here's mine:

At one of the bike shops I worked at a guy brought a Honda Spree scooter in that would'nt run, said he'd taken it to 3 or 4 other shops and no one could figure out what was wrong with it. He says he's in no hurry, take your time - I just want to find someone that can get it going...

I fooled and fooled with it and I could'nt figure it out either so I called another mechanic that was a friend of a friend that was the Spree guru. He told me what he thought it might be and we ordered the part, this is one week after the guy dropped it off. The guy calls and wants to know if I have it fixed, I tell him no, but explained to him that I had talked with another mechanic and was pretty sure I had it figured out and that we had the part on the way.

So this prick gets pi@@ed off over the phone and lets me have it because it's not fixed yet. I said "You told me that you were in no hurry and have'nt been able to find anyone that could fix it, that in fact I have way more time in it than I could charge you for and have been doing my very best to get it fixed. I think I have it figured out but it's going to be a day or two before the part gets here" he tells me thats not good enough, and that if I was any kind of mechanic I'd have it fixed and proceeds to talk to me like a dog. I then calmly told him to come get it and hung up on him.

I have the scooter all torn apart at this point, but instead of putting it back together I took all the parts and threw them out the shop door into the parking lot, bolts and parts scattered everywhere. Very childish on my part, but I'm so mad I can't see straight, so he comes in and starts running his mouth to the girl working the counter and says "Where's that f***** mechanic?" She tells him the best thing he can do is load up his parts, leave and leave me alone, which he did. I don't think I've ever been as mad as I was that day and if he would have come into the shop and run his mouth to me I would've whipped his ass right there on the spot.

Dayummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm, thats getting right down huffy with the customer, hot dayummm I love it,LOL

 

[THALL10326]

So kind of off topic, but how many customers do you guys see in a day? And were are you located, town, city? Great thread :spam: Our busy time is between 11:30 and 1:00 so i take my lunch after if I can get away.

Seasonal thing here. In the spring its run you hiny off. Summer it slacks off, fall it picks up, winter slow again.

 

[rebel3.0]

Yea at the place I am at now it is really slow. I cant wait for spring, it will pick up then. Only see a handfull of customers all day now.

 

[volks-man]

Seasonal thing here. In the spring its run you hiny off. Summer it slacks off, fall it picks up, winter slow again.

i do not understand.

i never cut in the summer. i don't cut if it is even warm out. my first outing was today and i still sweat my b-lls off! why so slack in winter? doesn't anyone else cut like this?

is it all mower and yard stuff?

 

[rebel3.0]

summer time for us is weed eaters and lawn tractors. Gotta love them rocks