Messages

Thanks Chris:  Always nice to hear, I am gearing up for a show the last weekend in Sept.  Decided to try something really artsy.  I am videoing it and will post it as soon as I have it finished.  Thanks for the pep talk, you dont know how little things like that help when sales are really slooooow.

I also use Quick Books and love it, I do not trust the cloud!

30 years this year!  I was hot rodding a 73 camaro and needed the interior redone, couldn't afford, or find anybody in my area who did auto, so I did it myself.  It came out ok and I decided to go to school and learn the trade.  Started out doing only auto, but soon found out I would have to do everything if I wanted to pay the bills.  Today I only do furniture, I have a few special people who I will do auto for.

I have a customer that bought a simple "studio couch", no arms, attached seat and back cushion. She paid $10,000.00 thats right ten thousand dollars and the down is working through the ticking. I am going to replace the ticking cover for her in the seat cushion. You would think for this price they would only use top quality products. The price is ridiculous!!!

I build an extremely high quality sofa that retails for 5,995.00.  This sofa is built using 5/4" thick maple frame using pegged mortise and tenon joinery and is custom made with the exposed wood being the spices of the customers choice.  It has a true 8 way hand tied coil spring system, is padded with horsehair and cotton with down and feather cushions.  In my opinion a better sofa cannot be built, different yes, but not better, it will last for many generations. 

This is of course not a mass produced product, but if a fancy design center in NY NY wanted to purchas said sofa for retail and I were to wholesale this sofa, I would have to sell it to them at my retail price.  This means they would easily want to get around ten grand for it.  Which also means I would have to set my retail price to match theirs if I were to continue selling retail.  So is the price for my sofa at ten grand ridiculous? absolutely not!  Of course I cant compare my sofa to the "studio couch" because I don't know how it is built, it could be that 10 grand for the studio couch is ridiculous, but not for the one I produce.

Once upon a time all furniture was built by people like me, it was expensive and upholstered furniture was considered a luxury, but people usually were able to have a few nice pieces.  It just goes to show you how Americans have been impoverished since about 1913 and they don't even really know it.

OK, so let me get this straight, American labor is so expensive that we have to build our stuff overseas to take advantage of slave labor in order to sell anything to the poor Americans.  Unfortunately the slave labor rates of 3 bucks a day is so expensive that we have to substitute quality materials for cheep junk in order to sell anything to the poor Americans.  Unfortunately the slave labor rates coupled with cheep junk material is so expensive that we have to substitute slave labor for robots and we are to expect that these robots will be so wonderful that we can start using quality materials again?  I see a trend here, the robots using quality materials will be so expensive that the quality materials will have to be substituted for cheep junk material in order to sell anything to the poor Americans. One question, who is going to build these wonderful robots, China! ofcourse.  So we will have cheap junk robots trying to make cheap junk furniture to sell the the poor Americans.

The poor Americans are going to stay poor until they wake up and realize it is prohibitively expensive to live when you have to keep buying the same thing over and over and over and it is far cheaper to pay the price upfront for quality that last and last and last.

Chris:  I think it all depends on how much you need the business.  I spent years having to have the business so we could eat.  It was real difficult to get away then, now a days, I dont need the income to survive, so my prospective it a little different, but those early years built up a psychology that was very difficult to let go of.  I finally started just saying screw it! I put a sign on the door saying closed for vacation and recorded a message for the phone saying when I would be closed.  This summer I even put a sign on my door with

SUMMER HOURS
9 to 5 by chance, or by appointment.

Sorry to hear about the trouble with the RV and the toad.  I am not looking forward to that and I know it's coming.  A 30 year old buss that has been sitting now for 4 years is bound to have some "bugs" that need working out.  Hopefully the major components will hold together, I hear the price of rebuilding an 8v71 two stroke is around 4 grand a hole!

Hi Virginia:  I get a lot of this type of upholstery work, I guess you could call it a restoration more that just a simple recovering.  I have a video series on youtube that shows the whole process, you can watch the whole series (very lengthy) or just pick and choose the parts you have questions on.  The process I use is very similar to how it would have been done originally except I use bought edge roll and I do not sandwich my horsehair between two layers of burlap. 

http://youtu.be/OOM7FTJfeG8?list=PL0BD294FB1AA07F01

I do not charge any extra for leather.  I have never had good luck cutting multiple pieces of material, it seams like they always slip around and come out a little different, so I usually make one good pattern and use it for cutting out the rest one at a time.  I do charge extra for pattern matching, the extra time, not to mention the added stress easily increases the cost of a wing chair by a couple hundred.

I once had a guy stop into my shop for some alterations on an old canvas jeep top, it was the old original style cotton duct canvas.  The top was for a different model, but with a few changes it would work on his jeep.  I gave him a price and he told me the guy down the street would do it for half that.  I told him that sounded like a good deal and he should take it to the guy down the street.  The guys mouth about hit the floor LOL.  I know their were some spots in that top that had some dry rot, so I was so glad to see him leave.  Even though I told him their was some dry rot he insisted that it would be ok, he would have been back and it would have been a nightmare, so glad he gave me an out.

It is so true that people get spoiled by low ball rates.  I think what we are dealing with today is the Wallmart mentality in the general population.  I have people come into my shop and tell me "there just aren't any upholsters around anymore!"  Then I give them a price and they say thats to much and leave, gee I wonder why there aren't many around anymore? 

I have people complain about the junk furniture they have and when they find out it is going to cost more to repair that broken chair than buy a new one, vs having me build one, or buying more junk, they just go buy more junk.  I make and sell high end heirloom quality furniture and accessories, most people in my area can not afford my products, according to them, but I see them buying new Motorcycles, Boats, Snowmobiles, 4 wheelers and what ever new toy catches their fancy.  Anybody looked into the cost of a new boat these days?  Sure they can finance these toys, but I gladly do lay-a-way without interest. 

Caning, I don't know why I continue to do it?  I have to charge 4 bucks a hole to make my shop rate, but usually cut that to 3 bucks and than bitch about it when my back, butt, or feet really start to ache after 12 hours of weaving.  I say never again, but usually take on another job, hoping they will come back for some upholstery, new furniture, or have that rip fixed in their car seat.  Funny thing is, after 30 years I have never had customers over lap, furniture customers stay furniture, weaving stays weaving and auto customers stay auto, weird.  People today have lost sight of the true value of American labor.

Glad to hear I am not the only one who is slow this summer.  I haven't been this slow since 1987. I am enjoying it though, my garden is the best it's been in years, weed free finally! The money I am loosing will be made up in produce. LOL  I also did some teaching in the past. Worked for the adult learning center teaching upholstery and also did a few of my own classes, usually had six students at a time. I ran classes one night a week for three hours for six weeks.  Most students who worked at home during the week could finish a club or wing chair.  It was fun and nice to make money while someone else did the work!

That's what I usually do, send a registered letter saying that in 30 days they will be disposed of, and keep a copy.  If you think they really do want their
seats back you could threaten a storage fee, some times that help them come up with the money, or the time to come and get them.

I also stick to my estimates and have eaten many jobs over the years.  But for some reason most trades people I have had to deal with do not.  From mechanics to plumbers they all seam to have the attitude that an estimate is an estimate only and does not reflect the actual cost of the job.  Most people I deal with have such a fairy tail vision of what upholstery should cost if I did not have a reputation of sticking to my estimates I would not get the business.

Sounds like you are doing a lot of leg work for this VW customer, that you are probably not getting paid for.  I used to do it also, but I decided long ago it was very unprofitable. I cant research all the different fabrics used in all the different classic cars, I now tell the customer if they want something different than what I have samples for they will have to do the research. I wouldn't call the vendor of C O M either, I would have told the customer to come pick up the car and let me know when they have all the right materials and we could reschedule. That bay could be used for your boat work, bikes, furniture, whatever, but sitting with a stalled project is just costing you money.  I know it sounds like poor customer service, but he bought the materials elsewhere so he is not your customer in this respect.  Sorry to be such a pail of cold water, but where I live time are getting tough, real tough and my time is very valuable.

Thanks guys:  Man it's been one stressful event after another here lately, I guess when it rains it pours. LOL The rest has been of personal maters and not business related.  They came and picked up there remaining furniture and it was uneventful thankfully.  They brought help for loading, but I would not let them touch a thing. The last thing I need is someone getting injured on my property.

I am going to guess that she comes back to you at some point in time and I am hoping you tell her to go pound sand.

Chris, I wouldn't have it any other way, even it I was about half starved!

I have one decorator that decided I was charging too much for supplies like foam and batting.

During our back and forth, trying to come to terms, I was told who my supplier was and what my markup should be and subsequently what I should be able to charge for my services.  This was a turning point, where I decided I no longer wanted them as a client.

Thanks once again everybody for your support, it really means a lot.