Is the slow down affecting you.?. - TilersForums.com

[Sully]

You wanna get respect, do 4 years getting kicked up the arse and smacked up the back of your head for £10 a week. No offence meant.[/quote]


And what exactly did you learn during the 4 years from this kicking up the arse exercise that makes you a better tiler than Jimmy new van?

In my humble and limited experience, IF you offer quality work, you should never have any fears of being undercut by a lesser tiler and certainly shouldn't need to be scraping around the 'price comes first' end of the market. If you are scraping around fighting for work from the undercutters, than maybe a few more kicks in the arse are appropriate.

No offence meant of course

Andrew

 

[P'boro tiler]

hmmmm

anything i say will annoy somebody.

about a year and a half ago i was determined to be a great tiler and thought id try and do an apprentiship. Now theres no college within a hundred miles of me that does one. So i thought id try and work along side somebody; but every tiler said stuff like "why the heck would you want to be a tiler its a **** job etc". So believe me I tried to do things the traditional way. The tilers I spoke to obviously didnt want anymore competition.
...But then i found out that one of the best tilers around my neck of the woods never did any training and never worked for anyone. He started out much like me (without basic training tho) and started doing cheap ceramic splashbacks etc. He'll now do any kind of tiling and earns a fortune. Is this really wrong????

i started out doing tiny jobs and have progressed loads. most of my first few jobs were tiling wooden floors and im now brilliant at that. Im not that experienced in walls still and i have a lot of respect and admiration for the time served tilers who find it easy now (most of the time)

as for affecting other peoples prices; i doubt i do! i hardly ever do a m2 rate and if i do its usually well above the standard set prices. for instance i'll do uncaliabrated slate for £45m2 inc materials. a time served tiler will do it in half as much time and so much twice as much money

ive bn told im the best floor tiler around as well. when i do wooden floors i either screw down every 150mm and tank the floors or a overboard them. every customer i speak to says that none of the other tilers around plan to do any prep before tiling on a chipboard floor. so whose robbing the customer then? not me! im doing a job thatll last


rant over,

 

[gid]

And these are the guys that are undercutting the real pros. Some of us have spent many years on **** wages doing an apprenticeship and then years learning after. Because of this we could command a premium wage. I expect to get at least £1,000 a week for my efforts and expertise, and along comes Jimmy new van and undercuts me by half. Then they have the bare faced cheek to come on here and after taking on the job and ask how to best do it!! Trouble is the customer 8 times out of 10 takes the lowest quote. Now you multiply that by all these chancers and all the real pros are being squeezed out because we refuse to demean ourselves by working for rubbish money. There should be a bloody law against these adverts on the right. they make me sick. You wanna get respect, do 4 years getting kicked up the arse and smacked up the back of your head for £10 a week. A 1 week BAL course then you set yourself up as a tiler, taking jobs off of real tradesmen because you are willing to do the job for half of what we would charge, you're taking the ****.
No offence meant.

First post on here and prob going to upset some people but never mind.
I for one have to agree with the above post.I started tiling for myself in 1987 and am sick of all the numpties who are in the trade.Lost track of the amount of jobs I have had to put right ,done by people who are charging buttons .

 

[P'boro tiler]

yea ive made a fortune fixing jobs done by time served experienced tilers.

 

[gid]

yea ive made a fortune fixing jobs done by time served experienced tilers.

im a bit slow and i know thats mostly because im still quite new to the business but does anybody have any tips of how to get the job done quicker?????
is it all about getting every cut right first...
your above quote says it all

 

[P'boro tiler]

im still slow apart from when i do stuff that ive done many times before. I dont feel like im working any quicker but seem to get the job done quicker.
I think it is about getting every cut right first time. I say this because i did a kitchen floor on the diagnol a few weeks back, i then had to do two more floors upstairs in the same property. there was no room to put a wet cutter so i had to do all cuts downstairs. I cut out about 20 sheets of lining paper to the size of the tiles and then i made piano cuts, i then made it fit and cut it to shape. i then traced this onto the tile and went downstairs and cut the tile. i got 80% of the tiles right first time atleast and was so much faster than before.

ok 80% is perhaps a bit cack but i had the toliet, shower and basin to cut round and diagnol layout


the faster i try to work, the slower i actually am! i used to race round like a headless chicken :lol:

 

[Sully]

Without wanting to repeat myself - but I will, IF you have confidence in your ability and offer a professional service, you will be very much aware that there is plenty of work out there and that the 'inferior' tilers are absolutely no threat and quite often an opportunity for you to gain work (as in the example previously stated). Of course, you shouldn't feel threatened IF you can hit the standards yourself.

IF

 

[P'boro tiler]

too right

cheeky newbies like myself should be struggling to compete with the old guys who perhaps offer a better service (ok thats not usually the case around here, but it should be!)

 

[Richardb3303]

I started off scabbling comercial concrete structures before i even whent near a trowel, but in answer to the original question of is the slow down affecting me... well yes and others have fallen by the way side in droves and buggered off back to the UK rather than weathering it out here in Spain... and like i said in another forum on here (any tilers from or working in spain i think it was called) the ability to diversifie will keep you from going under....

 

[gizmo]

Without wanting to repeat myself - but I will, IF you have confidence in your ability and offer a professional service, you will be very much aware that there is plenty of work out there and that the 'inferior' tilers are absolutely no threat and quite often an opportunity for you to gain work (as in the example previously stated). Of course, you shouldn't feel threatened IF you can hit the standards yourself.

IF

:yes: totally agree

 

[andy-p]

:iagree:

 

[gid]

Today
60 m floor tiling with heating and insulation
1 bathroom floor
3 bathrooms totaling 55m
All ready now
pfffft

 

[Fred]

Didn't think it was affecting me. But my phone has not rung for a week. SW London and you'd think I'd be rocking. Usual thing with certain folks in my area, barting the price, going as low as thinking if they don't have trims around windows/external joints, they will get a better deal!!!!

He wanted £100 taken of the final bill for that!

I'm going in the local paper as a last ditch chance to get work. The yellow pages has been, for me, a waste of time.

 

[doug boardley]

booked uo till about mid february

 

[TilingLogistics]

Today
60 m floor tiling with heating and insulation
1 bathroom floor
3 bathrooms totaling 55m
All ready now
pfffft

All done today:huh2::huh2:

Kev