The Golden State: Where & How to Live, Secure, Visit, Enjoy and Thrive in California
Carpet Laying And Estimating Website
CARPET LAYING AS THE SECOND STEP IN THE SELLING PROCESS
At this point, if you're read and absorbed the foregoing material, you can see that a number of important values depend upon you in your capacity of carpet layer, estimator, or workroom superintendent. You of course must assume by the time your services are called for that the carpet salesman has done his job well in guiding the customer to make the proper choice of color, texture, weave, pattern, and fiber. Moreover, he has "sold" the customer on the superior value and long-range economy of wall-to-wall carpet versus rugs. At this point the customer wants, more than anything else, to be satisfied with her choice of material and with the final appearance of the carpet in her home. Everything from here out depends on you and on the kind of job you do for the customer.
The next chapter shows how you can either build more sales for your company and yourself by following the right principles of conduct and workmanship—or jeopardize everything, including your own future, through carelessness and lack of attention.
Pleasing The Customer And Your Employer
Carpet laying is a profession, not just a "job." The same is true of its related activities—estimating and planning, workroom operations and supervision, and carpet repairing. In any profession, a man's worth is judged by the quality of his work. A carpet layer's work is judged not by one but by two "bosses"—the customer and the employer. It doesn't take long for either one to detect a careless or thoughtless workman and in these days of intensified competition, no firm can afford the luxury of carelessness or indifference.
On the other hand, quality workmanship and careful attention to important details cannot go unnoticed by either customer or employer. A satisfied customer means a satisfied shop superintendent, and these two add up to recognition and better pay for the carpet layer.
You get the reputation of being an expert only if you do expert work, consistently. Once you get a reputation for carelessness in carpet laying, you might as well take up some other trade where quality workmanship is not important.
THE CUSTOMER IS THE TOP BOSS
We saw in Chapter 1 how much is "riding"' on the carpet laying mechanic by the time he enters the customer's premises. The relationship with the customer was actually begun by the carpet manufacturer months or years previous, when the carpet was designed and produced in response to market demand and preferences. This relationship was cultivated and transformed into a sales contract by the carpet salesman, who pledged his own and his company's experience and reputation when he "sold" the customer on this particular installation. And now this relationship becomes the sole responsibility of the carpet layer, whose job, as the representative of his firm, is to preserve the customer's confidence and good will throughout the installation period and for an indefinite period in the future.
