You’ve decided the house needs to be painted. Questions now arise in rapid-fire sequence:
Who to call?
How many to invite for bids?
What are the project specifications? Hiring criteria?
How to select the right contender?
What is the vetting process?
It would be so easy to just go with your gut and select one contractor and run with them but we know
that notion is fraught with risk. Choosing the wrong contractor can lead to a dozen ways the project
could start “heading south” – the contractor proves undependable, their people are less than
competent, doors are left unlocked, and there’s that beer missing from the fridge… There is no end to
the trouble that can happen if you make the mistake of trusting the wrong contractor. We often rely on
our gut or a “wing and a prayer” only to learn we’re slightly off target, or dead wrong. Happens all the
time.
It makes sense to delegate the selection decision to someone who knows the trades market intimately.
Engage an individual with years of experience doing projects, knows the players, and is in tune with
numerous sources of intelligence that aren’t shy about reporting past performance – both the good AND
the bad. Someone who has some skin in the game if they fail to deliver a team that can absolutely
deliver; a point man/woman who can make things right when things go wrong.
Your project partner can take a lot of the inevitable friction out of the painting experience is a general
painting contractor. This is typically a contractor who gets the job done by subbing out the work to the
most appropriate team, even when it seems there are a lot of options to choose from. It’s an elegant
solution to the hand-wringing process homeowners encounter when trying to manage a project with
little experience. The solution is to delegate the entire job from beginning to end to a GC who conducts
the diligence necessary to deliver the desired result.
The efficient sub-contracting business model was popularized by the franchising industry. Makes sense:
a group of franchise owners collaborate to come up with the solution for homeowners that eliminates
their risk of choosing the wrong contractor. The only problem is the franchisee has to pay a royalty fee
that is passed on to the homeowner.
Burke and Crew has adopted the sub-contracting model to assure their clients benefit with access to the
best painting crew available to get any job done professionally and efficiently… without the headaches.
