Drop Your Standards to Earn More Money
By the Anonymous Decorator
This is going to be a controversial one and not every decorator will agree with me, so I’m going to remain anonymous. However, I feel like most professional painter and decorators’ will secretly agree with what I’m about to say. A lot of the time, it is better to get in and do a job as quickly as you can in order to earn more money on a price. The bottom line is, if you drop your standards, you’ll earn more money.
OK, I’m not talking about every job. Horses for courses and all that. I see some amazing work on Painter and Decorators’ Forum UK and the high-end stuff needs to stay just that, high-end. That said, most of the day-to-day jobs just needs to be to a passible standard. Just get in, do your job and get out.
If the client has had a plasterer in and they have left a shocking finish, it isn’t your problem! Let them get the plasterer back if they’re bothered, don’t waste a full day sanding and filling.
If the last decorator got paint on door hinges, just leave them!! You could spend hours cleaning that crap up and they still won’t look right by the end.
Don’t even worry too much about getting horribly rough woodwork completely flat, they were happy enough with it the last time around.
The bottom line is, people don’t always want to pay you a fortune to decorate to a top standard. So to make a good living, you need to drop down to a more realistic level. If you see paint on the floor that was there before you got a brush out, just take a picture of it, throw a sheet down and crack on.
If you can get away with one coat on the ceilings, just do it. As long as you do what you’re paid to do and the client is happy, nothing else really matters. It’s still going to be a million times better than if a muggle did it.
The Standards of Rentals and Newbuilds
OK, we’re talking about extreme examples now, but this is a proper illustration of a standard of work to fit a certain market.
If you are decorating a cheap rental property for a landlord, the overriding factor on your quote is the price. It has to be, it’s a business for the landlord, not his or her home. The chances are the tenant won’t look after it anyway. Minimal prep and one coat on everything is what is required more often than not.
House bashing on a newbuild is even worse. It isn’t the type of work I do, but I feel sorry for the sh1t that flavour of decorator has to put up with!! Prices are mega tight and they’re up against some harsh conditions. The standard of every other trades’ work is very low. The only way for a house basher to make money is to churn out a lot of work in a short space of time, to a standard just high enough to get away without getting pulled. No caviar for them poor buggers at night!!
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Drop Your Standards to Earn More Money
