Customers & Choosing Fixtures

Danno6102

I'm looking to startdoing some kitchen & bath remodels & was wondering how you guys go about offering fixture choices to your customers? Do you have catalogs of the manufacturers that you offer or do you just tell them to go to Home Depot, Lowe's or other stores & pick them out & let you know which ones they decided on. I was thinking of doing the latter. It would give my customers almost endless choices to find exactly what they want. They (& I) wouldn't have to spend hours pouring through catalogs. I would give them a sheet with a list of all the fixtures they needed to decide on with the vital info I needed to get the correct one. Like, store, make, model #, color, contract allowance amount, etc. I could then review the list & make sure everything will work with their new design.

What do all of you veteran pros do?

Thanks,
Dan

firemike

I used to do the catalog thing years ago, but they become obsolete so fast that it became more of a hassle, plus having to carry them around, keep them updated, get them back from a customer, etc. After an hour or two of going through catalogs, the customer would finally decide on something, and I go to order it and find out it is now discontinued or the production run is over because they are retooling for a newer version, which will be available in 2 - 3 months.

Now I either send them to one of the showrooms I work with, or tell them to go to the big boxes or places like Great Indoors, and look around to see whats available, and what they like.

Also, with the internet, most can do their initial "shopping" online and narrow the choices down tremendously, sometimes even make their choices without leaving their home or office.

Saves me a lot of time sending them to the showroom, and I don't end up having to play referee as far as picking between which one hubby likes and the one wifey likes. Then having to go through which color looks best, which toilet seat is better, etc. Go to the showroom, look, operate, touch, compare, price it out, and decide!

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-Mike-

Mike Finley

There are endless fixtures to chose from, but only a finite amount of choices from a specific customer.

What finishes were your considering?

We like that silvery kind, not shiney...

You mean brushed nickel? (this is what brushed nickel looks like)

Yes, that's it.

You said you wanted a granite counter top in the bathroom, so usually most people want what is called a wide spread faucet style because the faucet will mount through the granite and not the sink. (this is what a wide spread faucet looks like)

Oh, yes, my neighbor has that and I like it.

90 percent of our installations are usually Moen, because they have such a wide selection of products, they are high-quality, and they have great traditional looking styles. If you are leaning more towards a designer look then we usually look at Danze or Hans Grohe or one of the more expensive designer brands, it's kind of like the difference between Levis or Guess Jeans.

No, we like traditional and Moen is a good brand.

Okay, I'll include one of the more popular Moen, wide spread faucets in brushed nickel and we can start there. If you don't like the look of it we can substitute another, but at least this will give us a starting point.

(- more than 75% of people will stick with our first selection)

Yes, you can send people out to find their own fixtures, but be prepared for them to come back with

• Cheap units that are not what you expected to install and you end up spending extra time on them.
• Units that don't look great and you end up with nasty pictures of your projects to show potential clients.
• Low quality or off brands that end up breaking and even though they know you don't warranty products you don't supply they still end up with a bad taste in their mouth when you have to tell them so.
• Wrong products that delay your projects.
• News that what they wanted is a special order and it will be in, in 2 weeks, but turns out to be 4 weeks, then it comes in wrong and it takes 3 more weeks...
• Wrong sized products that don't work with the sinks.
• Calls from them asking you questions in the store.
• Products they bought out of the clearance aisle that you discover are missing parts...
• Customers who drag their feet and still haven't purchased their fixtures.
• Customers who purchase the products on the internet and not realizing that the valves weren't included and needed to be spec'd and purchased along with the trims.

And of course you give up your mark up which is part of your profit. The bottom line is you can be a problem solver at a high profit margin or you can be hired help as an installer at a low profit margin.

PS - keep in mind that the big boxes and stores like the Great Indoors and others will not have 'suites' in stock. Suites are matching fixtures. Anything beyond a sink and a tub/shower valve combo and your customer is going to be stting down, looking at a catalog with the person at that store and ordering the products not in stock and paying the store the mark-up on all of it. AND that $7.00 an hour employee will screw up the order 10% of the time, especially if it gets complicated.

The last 3 bathrooms the fixtures totaled $7200 retail. Do the math on the profits given up by sending them to Home Depot. If you give up the simple and easy profits on fixtures you will have to make up for them somewhere else. And what is going to pay for you double checking your customers fixtures to verify everything is correct before the project starts? Or are you just going to wing it and pray you don't discover once the project is underway the fixtures don't have a problem and are not 3-4 weeks on back order in the middle of everything with your plumber tapping his foot with the meter running?

Danno6102

Very good points. I would let them know that I would purchase all of the items & that I do have a markup to cover my time & feul to get them. I do not like the thought of the HO buying anything. I could also offer information on manufacturers. What's higher end, mainstream & what's junk, & what I would suggest.

I think with me doing all of the purchasing & gathering of the items, it might help eliminate most of your bad points. If I saw something that would raise a redflag I could bring it to their attention, explain why, & have them pick another or leave it up to me to pick something similar that will work. I might try it on the first couple & see how it goes.

I do greatly appreciate the feedback.

KillerToiletSpider

If you send your customer to Home Despair, or Lowe's, they will just buy the product they choose, and expect you or your plumbing sub to install it. Now you, or the plumbing sub, have lost any profit made on the fixture, but you will also be expected to warranty whatever piece of crap the HO bought.

All of the work we do is done through interior designers, it is their job to help the HO select fixtures, some of the GC's we work for supply them, some have us supply them. For the work you are doing, find a local plumbing supply house with a showroom, and suggest that the HO go there to make their decisions, the showroom will only give list price on items, which allows you or the plumbing sub a chance at a bit of profit on the fixtures.

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A flush is better than a full house.

Teetorbilt

Get an ID that you can work with! Sorry, I'm a construction dude. My only contact with what's hot and what's not is from a gazillion mags that pour through my mailbox and I don't have time to read.

The right Interior Designer will change your job from 'Thank you! Here's your check.' to 'OMG, I can't wait to show everybody.' This = s referrals.

__________________
You can't solve you're problems with the same level of thinking that created the problems.

Albert Einstein

Plumber

Danno
I usually send them to my supplier and I meet them there. I sit down with them and my supplier, We go through the and pick out everything! Before I start to rough in anything. The reason I do this is because when I worked for ________ company they sent the HO to the supplier and they picked out wall mount fixtures and NO ONE told us. When it came to finish time we had to re rough the whole master bath and pull and reset the vanitys. (every supply was coming up through the floor) Was a real pain in the butt! Now that I'm on my own and have learned some lessons through others mistakes on their behalf. I don't know what supplier you use here in IN. I'm not sure if I can post the name of the suppliers on here But here's My E-mail address If they allow it (qualitypipingllc@sbcglobal.net) wish you the best of luck!

747

I bought mine at lowes a moen my plumber slapped it on no problem. I was going to install my self until the new vanity didn't line up with the previous drain pipe. Then i figure i had to call him to mess with the drain pipe. He told me he stopped carrying fixtures because he can't compete with lowes and menards on price. So he just tells customers go there get what you like and i will slap in on. Vanity install was no problem for me until the drain pipe didn't line up.

troubleseeker

Send them to the plumbing supply showroom, if you do not have one already, establish a relationship with someone there so that you can call and deal with a known person over any problems, and there will be problems over time when ordering plumbing fixtures. Sending them to Lowes or Home Depot often gets you a lot of cheap crap to install, or boxes that have been opened, had a part raided from, then retaped and returned to the store. The store doesn't know any different, so it just gets restocked and some unlucky person ends up with it one day. I will not get anything from the big boxes that has had the factory seal broken on the box, just for this reason. And when you start doing special order items from big boxes, you will be gauranteed that a crucial component for the installation did not get ordered.