Jeremy Stacy, “List-en!” associate producer
Rick Frederick interview
June 29, 2009

Rick Frederick: This is Rick Frederick, Frederick's Floorcovering. We're in Parma, Ohio.

My father started the business in 1960. I've been in it for 40 years and my son's been in it for the last eight.

What type of flooring products do you sell?

RF: We sell carpet, ceramic tile, vinyl tile, hardwood, laminate, a couple of specialty floors like cork and bamboo. We also sell cabinets and countertops.

Let’s talk about carpet installation. How long does a typical carpet installation take?

RF: There are a lot of factors involved. The amount of furniture to be moved is a factor. Whether or not we're taking up the old carpet and pad [is another factor]. Of course the layout of [the floor plan] and the type of carpeting have a lot to do with it as well.

Generally, a good crew of installers does 75 to 100 yards of carpet in a day.

A living room, dining room, hall and stairs in a decent sized room is probably 60 yards, maybe 70 yards.

There are floor plans that are more difficult than others too. The stairways, for example – some stairways don't have a stringer on both sides so you don't go wall-to-wall with the carpet and you have an open side with a post coming out of it. Sometimes carpet has to be wrapped through those posts.

In situation like that we would always recommend certain styles of carpet that hide all of the little cuts and seams that you make in it better than others.  

Regardless of the style of carpet, there's still a lot of time involved in doing a stairway like that. One guy could spend an entire day doing a stairway with two posts on it wrapped over on the sides.

How do you determine the difficulty of a job?

RF: When we go out to measure a house, it's not just to get the room sizes, it's also to look for out-of-the-ordinary things and bring up options and to the customer because there's different ways to do things like the staircase for example.

How much do you charge for installation?

RF: Basic installation we charge by the square foot. We charge 75 cents a square foot for basic installation. What that covers is installing the padding, installing the carpet. What it doesn't include is taking up the old carpet and pad, it doesn't include furniture moving, it doesn't include - there's a little labor for stairs - and that depends on what type of stairs they are.

A couple of little odds and ends things - transition metals in the doorways, we charge a couple dollars extra for those.

Do you charge for carpet removal?

RF: To take up the old carpet and pad, we charge 20 cents a square foot, which is a $1.80 a yard.  

To take that carpet and pad and put it out on their lawn for the garbage man to pick up, we don't charge anything. But, if they want us to haul it away and throw it in our truck and fill up our dumpster, we charge 15 cents a square foot for that.

Furniture moving is very relative to the room and the piece of furniture involved. The example I use a lot is if we have a very large living room and dining room that's empty of all furniture except for a couch, which we can easily move between the living room and the dining room, we wouldn't even charge to move that couch. But, that same couch in a bedroom, where we don't have a seam, where we don't have a place to put it and we have to move it back and forth, five, six times, we would probably charge $25.

How can a homeowner save money when it comes time for installation?

RF: The ways to save money are by taking up the old carpet and pad and moving the furniture. They can help themselves out by making sure that the floor is very clean underneath prior to the installation.

When the installers get there, all they can do is sweep the floor. As an example, if they've got real old carpet underneath that had old rubber padding, a lot of times that rubber padding just turns to dust and it's just crumbled underneath and it's just powder.

The guys can sweep that up, but they're not going to get all of it up. Picture a new padding and new carpet and every time you step on the carpet, air is moved underneath the carpet and that air is looking for a place to escape and its place of least resistance is around the perimeter of the room where the edge of the carpeting is.

So every time you step on carpet, little wooshes [sic] of air is pushing whatever is underneath there - in this case some kind of dust or dirt - towards the edge of the carpet and it escapes out around the perimeter  of the room. If you've got a real light colored carpet, you get these air filtration lines around the outside where it's black.

How can a homeowner tell if their carpet was installed correctly?

RF: As far as stretching, which is the most important part of it, anybody can make it look kind of good when it’s done. As far as telling if it was stretched properly or not, it's hard to tell that because the backing on carpet has basically a stiff back to it and if it's stretched in with the knee kicker – it's a tool that you use to push down on the carpet that stretches the carpet and hooks it on to the tackless boards that are secured around the perimeter of the room.

That will stretch carpet to some degree, but it won't stretch it as tight as a power stretcher would. Now a power stretcher is the same idea, except the head on it - the part with the prongs in it that go into the backing of the carpet - is probably four times the size. And rather than hitting it with your knee, it uses a series of tubes that hook together and attach to a flat padded end on the other side of it that mounts up against the wall - the based board - and hydraulics stretch it that way.

An installer could not install the job without a knee kicker. But, to do the stretching across the room, you need the power stretcher. What you do is you secure the carpet on one wall and then stretch it from that wall to the other one.

So the starting wall you would use the knee kicker and then the power stretcher to stretch it across. That's the most important thing with installation, that it be power stretched in because it's the only way you can stretch it tight enough.

If you don't stretch it tight enough - when the guys walk out, it will look as good as if it was power stretched - but what happens is as you walk on it, the backing of the carpet softens up and if it secured around the perimeter and the middle softens up, it's going to wave. You're going to get some wrinkles in the middle.

So with power stretching you've got it tight enough in theory that you never get to the point where you have the wrinkles in it. We power stretch everything and even so, maybe once or twice a year we'll get a call to go back and restretch.

There are other factors involved too. Sometimes the adhesive in the backing is excessive and it's real stiff.

Do you offer a warranty on the work?

RF: We do. Most places warranty everything for a year, and that's a good idea because then the carpet goes through all four seasons. The difference in temperature and humidity and any imperfections in it will probably show up in that one year.

We extend our warranty for two years.

What’s the most common problem with carpet after it’s been installed?

RF: Well, afterwords, you know if people come in to replace the carpet, or call us to restretch the carpet to fix the wrinkles. That's probably the most common fault with carpet. It's by far the most common fault with installation of carpeting is it's not stretched properly.

Nowadays, carpet doesn't wear out. In the old days, wool carpet would actually wear out. It would have fiber loss. It would wear down to the backing of the carpet because it may take 30 years for it to happen, but carpet actually wears out on wool.

Now with the synthetic fibers, carpet doesn't wear out in 100 years, but it mats down.

How can a homeowner extend the life of their carpet?

RF: The first, most important thing is getting the right quality and style of carpet for the right area. A spare bedroom doesn't need the quality that a family room does. There are different styles that resist matting better than others. And then there's the amount of fiber in the carpet and the type of fiber.  

Nylon is by far the most resistant to matting.

Vacuuming - the most important thing. I tell people that you could hire someone to run a vacuum on your carpet 24 hours a day – it would be ridiculous to do of course, but it would be the best thing for your carpet.

If dirt is in your carpet and you walk on it, you're abrading the fibers. It's like taking sandpaper to the fibers. If you picture these fibers standing up - like all carpet does - and dirt's at the bottom of it and it abrades those fibers – like little trees – they're going to fall down. They're not going to want to stand up.  

That's where carpet uglies out. It doesn't wear out, it uglies out because it wears down.

Can you bring a matted carpet back to life?

RF: If it's nylon and it's vacuumed regularly, it will come back up and the dirt will be out of it and it will stay up longer.

Even if you vacuum this 24 hours a day, at some point, you're going to need it steam cleaned.

Steam cleaning is kind of a misleading term because it's not live steam, it's probably better described as hot water extraction. It uses hot water under pressure with a mild cleaning agent in there. I emphasize mild because it's not a strong cleaning agent because you don't need that.

The water pressure and then vacuum immediately follows that so it's rinsing the carpet out and that gets the dirt out. That extends the life of it as well.

Most carpet manufacturers actually put it in their warranty that it needs to be professionally steam cleaned every two years or you void the warranty.

How often should homeowners have their carpets professionally cleaned?

RF: It depends on the location. That spare bedroom that you never walk in, you know, five years certainly wouldn't be a problem. But the family room that they got three dogs and six kids, you can do that every month.

Another example I like to use is we had a white carpet in our showroom. Now people walk in right from the outdoors in the winter with snow and salt and all kinds of dirt and we had that white carpet - it was an off-white, but still it was a very light colored carpet. We had it in the showroom for 11 years and it held up. But, we probably cleaned it six times a year. So that's 60 – 70 times we've cleaned that carpet over the period of it's life and it still looked pretty good when we got rid of it.

How can a homeowner ensure they’re getting a quality installer?

RF: Besides the obvious of having someone working in their home being trustworthy. As far as installation goes, it's pretty tough to judge an installer whether he's going to do a good job or not without knowing a lot of the technicals of it.

But, power stretching is the most important factor that an installer can do for you that you're not going to notice the difference.

It's going to take him a little longer to use the power stretcher and he's going to have to purchase this power stretcher, which is going to cost hundreds and hundreds of dollars, but in the long run or even in the short long term within a year or so you're going to have wrinkles if you don't power stretch.

If I had one thing that I was telling a homeowner to ask for and insist on is make sure people power stretch.  

Are there certifications for carpet installers?

RF: There are, but to be real honest with you most of them aren’t. I'm kind of shocked that it takes a license to touch somebody's hair, but you don't need a license to be an installer. There are agencies that are working on this trying to come up with certifications.

The Carpet and Rug Institute is kind of the backbone of the carpet industry. When there's a problem - if there's a dispute about carpet or manufacturing or installation problem - they write the book on installation. They literally have written the book on what's the right installation. And they write the book on manufacturing.

Over the years there have been a number of organizations that have tried to certify installers and it's just tough to do.

I think the most important thing is to trust who you're buying it from because if an installer doesn't do a good job, you shouldn't have to deal with that installer, you should deal with the person you bought the carpet from.

Do you use subcontractors to install your carpet?

RF: Technically we do use subcontractors. The subcontractors we use are subcontractors strictly for tax purposes. We pay them by the job, by the amount of work that they do. They're not paid by the hour. But, they work strictly for us so we have control of them and I know that's what people are looking for when they ask if we use subcontractors.

I always emphasize to anyone bringing up that point that if you have a problem with your carpet. You call me and we deal with it.

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Jeremy Stacy, “List-en!” associate producer
Joel Schreier interview
July 2, 2009

Joel Schreier: My name is Joel Schreier. I'm with Home Carpet One and we're located in Chicago.

How do you help customers make sense of all the carpeting choices?

Schreier: We do it in a few different ways. The thing that hopefully makes us a little different than others is that we have professionals on the sales floor who have been doing it anywhere from 10 to 30 years selling all sorts of flooring including carpet.

The most important thing in any sales process, including carpeting, is finding out what the customer really needs and what the purpose and hopes for the purchase are.

How is the room going to function? What's the lifestyle like? How long do you expect the flooring to last? Basic questions like what your budget is.

Those are all central to putting the customer into the right product for them. It seems no matter who the customer is, the bottom line usually – once you've established the basic category of carpet that's appropriate for them – it usually comes down to color. We really are a fashion business.

What are the most common mistakes customers make when picking out a carpet?

Schreier: I think the most common mistake most people make - and it's happening more and more today because of the economy and people trying to stretch their dollars further - is they sell themselves short on the type of carpeting they buy.

They go for let's say the builder type of Berber carpet that is very inexpensive, but doesn't last very long.

And there's several different types of fibers of carpets - wool, nylon, polyester, olefin - and olefin being the worst and olefin being the cheapest - and often times when someone doesn't have the type of help they need, they end up going down to the least expensive product and they end up being disappointed with the purchase.

I would say that unfortunately in our business, cheaper is almost never better.

You're paying the same for labor no matter what, so that's almost a fixed cost. And if you've got 1000 square feet and let's say the labor is 75 cents a square foot, that $750 isn't going to go away. And if you spend a dollar [per square foot] on the material versus three dollars [per square foot], you already have the cost of all the labor and you're just paying the same amount to put an inferior product down.

Walk me through the carpet installation process.

Schreier: First, either they've chosen a carpet we stock - and we stock about 70 different styles to make installation happen faster - or we order it in. In either event, first we walk through what to expect and explain to them that we use independent subcontractors to do the installation, which is basically how every Chicago carpet firm handles the installation of carpet.

Then, we let them know someone from our warehouse will be contacting them to let them know when their carpet arrived and when they can expect the installation to occur.

Usually a carpet installation - to people's great surprise - will take most of the day.

Why is that?

Schreier: It's a very labor-intensive process installing carpet. Usually you're talking about a very exacting process. You can't rush through it. What you have is a relatively durable piece of fabric that you're putting on the floor and you only have one chance to do it right. And if you make a mistake, you usually have to go back and buy another piece of fabric. It's not like you can patch it in any significant way to cover up an error.

You only have one chance to cut it and if you cut it short, it's going to be obvious. So we make sure that we take the proper time and that we hire the right subcontractors to give our customers the very best job at the end of the day.

How do you select your installation subcontractors?

Schreier: We focus on quality of installation. We have one gentleman who's got his own installation service that's been doing work with our company for 35 years and he runs seven crews. He stands behind his work and we stand behind the work he does.

Frankly, we're very fortunate. I can't think of a carpet installation crew that hasn't done work for us for at least five years. So we're not in a position of having to try out new people. We are one of the higher volume stores in Chicago so we're able to keep several different installation crews busy.

But, whenever we try somebody out, we try them out on a low-risk commercial job, whether it be an office building or a rental apartment. We would never experiment with somebody in somebody's home.

What happens when a problem arises with an installation?

Schreier: Well, we call them opportunities, not problems. Because it's an opportunity to show that we do a good job when the going gets rough.

Ultimately, we stand behind the installation. We do insist that the subcontractor take responsibility for his or her work. And they typically are able to go fix their own problems or we hire another crew to fix their problem if they don't think they're capable of doing it.

And that's part of our contractual agreement with each subcontractor. They're all obligated to carry insurance and workers compensation insurance and liability insurance. So there's no shortage of guarantees for the customer.

Do you offer a warranty on the installation?

Schreier: Absolutely. The subcontractor warrants the installation to us for a year. And frankly, most problems will happen within the first few days, let alone weeks. So that usually is more than enough. But, we offer a life of the product guarantee on all installations.

So if you buy a product from us, we stand by it for the expected life of the product. And every product has a different time period. But, most of them go beyond the expected life of the customers' expectations for how long they'll have the product.  

The typical carpet is replaced every seven years.

What should a homeowner look for in a carpet company to ensure they will get a quality installation?

Schreier: One thing that I skipped, if I may. We offer on all of our Carpet One products a super, super guarantee called the Beautiful Guarantee. And these are the items that are marketed through our Carpet One group, but what it basically says is for a period ranging from 60-100 days - depending on the product - if you don't like the carpet for any reason, we'll replace it for free. Whether it's the installation you didn't like, whether it's the color you didn't like, whether it's the material you didn't like.

In fact, any Carpet One store offers that same Beautiful Guarantee. So it takes most of that risk away from the consumer.

But, to answer your question about what should somebody look for. I think it's crucial that they find somebody that has a storefront because that means they have an investment in their reputation and they have every motivation to find the best possible people they can.

Secondly, don't just believe what the retailers may say about themselves. Look online. Use the tools. Look at City Search, Angie's List, Yelp. You know, there's going to be good, bad and ugly and make the decision yourself about what kind of quality work people do.

How much do you charge for installation?

Schreier: We make the installation available for our customers through the independent contractors and we charge 75 cents a square foot for carpet installation.

Do you charge for things like old carpet removal and moving furniture.

Schreier: Sure [its] typical in the industry and we're no different. We charge depending on job and the difficulty of the work, but our standard charges are 20 cents [per square foot] to take up the old carpet and 20 cents [per square foot] to haul it away and 25 cents a square foot to move furniture.

How can homeowners best prepare for an installation?

Schreier: That's a great question. The best way to prepare for an installation is to put your house in a position for the carpet to be installed. And that's by doing common sense things -removing things from the drawers, from the closet floors, making it easy for the installers to do what they do best . That's install the carpet.

If they have to spend a couple of hours moving little knickknacks, they may not be in the right frame of mind to start the job. They're people, too.

Also, always, whenever you have workmen in your house, if you've got valuable things don't put anyone in a position to fail. Know where your valuables are and safeguard them. Just common sense stuff, I think.

If you want to save money, you can do some of the take up and haul away yourself.  That's an easy way to save money. It's not easy work though. I've done myself a take up of carpet once and I cut myself across my face. The backing of carpet can be very rough and the 20 cents you'll save may not be worth it.

How long does an average installation last?

Schreier: Let's say you have a 100-yard job, which would be like a decent sized basement and maybe one other room in the house. You could expect that to take between six and nine hours depending on whether there's carpet existing, whether there's furniture to move. Those things will make the job take a little bit longer.

Stair labor always adds a little bit of time. That's the hardest part of any carpet installation because you have to go stair by stair.

Do you charge extra for a carpet installation on stairs?

Schreier: We do. We charge $75 for a flight of stairs. If you're doing a custom runner, that just depends on what you want done. That's a per job charge.

What can homeowners do to extend the life of their carpet?

Schreier: The best thing anyone can do for carpet is to vacuum it. It's like brushing your hair or washing your hair. You take care of it and it's going to look good.

When you vacuum the carpet, it takes out the dirt and other things that might be on your feet or fall from your counter - wherever it may be - and it removes it before it gets the chance to get ground into the fiber.

When you see carpet getting matted down, and looking sort of lifeless, it's probably because it wasn't vacuumed often enough and so the dirt has built up.

But, if you vacuum it three or four times a week, you prevent that from happening. And don't use a Dyson vacuum.

Why is that?

Schreier: Because it will rip the carpet right out of the backing.  [It's] too powerful.

Most often cause of carpet complaints has to do with using a vacuum that's too powerful. They're a great marketing company, but it's not good for most carpets.

Is there any way to bring a matted carpet back to life?

Schreier: You should think about having your carpet professionally cleaned at least once a year. Hot water extraction is the best method - and I don't have a cleaning business - you want to make sure you find a very qualified cleaner. Again use tools like Angie's List. I recommend it. That's one place you certainly don't want to try and save money.

What can happen with a cleaner who doesn't know what they're doing - they can leave residue in the carpet after they clean it and that residue - if they over soap it, if they use too much cleaning stuff - can actually attract dirt. So your carpet can look worse two weeks after you had it cleaned that before.

Make sure you get somebody that's very good - hot water extraction, they don't need a lot of soap - and that's the best way to try and cure a problem that's already occurred. Then make sure you start a regular maintenance schedule with vacuuming.

And if you have a looped wool carpet, don't use a vacuum with a beater bar. That will ruin your carpet. Use a suction vacuum only.

What's a beater bar?

Schreier: You know those hairbrushes you see on most vacuums - the rotating brush – that is the beater bar. That's good for plush carpets, but it's not good for looped carpets, especially wool looped carpets.

It will literally braid the fiber and make it pill more and it will sort of look like the Wild West with those cotton balls blowing around. And you don't want your expensive wool carpet to look like that.

When can a homeowner tell if their carpet needs replacing?

Schreier: Well, people usually replace their carpet three years after it needs it. So I guess the best thing is to ask a friend because they're going to be more objective than you are. But, if it doesn't look good after you have it professionally cleaned, then it's probably beyond the pale.

You know, you asked me about the most common mistake people make, and I talked about not choosing a quality product. But, I also think people tend to go too light in the color. It's a great idea to go as dark as you can go, especially in areas like stairs, go with carpets that have more than one color in them to hide anything that happens or minimize how apparent it is.

What role does padding play in the life of a carpet?

Schreier: You certainly want to use a quality pad under any carpet. We use excellent padding under every carpet, but you want to look for a dense carpet [padding]. You don't want to use a pad that's less than six pounds in density for a residential application.

You want to ask the people you're buying the carpet from what the pound or ounce weight of the padding is. That's a very important thing. It's an area of great confusion. Ask to see a sample, step on top of it, feel it, test it out for yourself.

One great place to add value to the carpet is to take a look at a rubber pad. I would say it's worth upgrading to because it adds comfort and it adds life. It's firmer, yet it's a denser type of padding than most other so it will add more life to your carpet.  

It will help it bounce back and make it more resilient. Sort of like a box spring on a mattress. We've all slept on mattresses with bad box springs and we know what that feels like. Carpet's not that much different.

Is there anything else you'd like to add about carpet?

Schreier: I would say that one thing people should keep in mind is wool carpet is an excellent, excellent option. The price of wool has not gone up nearly as much over the last 10 years compared to synthetics. Synthetic carpets are mostly made of oil by-products and wool carpet is made from sheep. The price of sheep hasn't gone up very much.

It's green, it's an excellent fiber for maintaining, it cleans up well, it's naturally resilient, it's fire retardant. There are a lot of benefits to wool and you can see for yourself the prices of wool are very comparable to nylon, which didn't used to be the case. Wool used to be way more expensive than nylon or other synthetic fibers. It's just not the case anymore.

Episode 48 – Tattoo - Transcript

Twinkle VanWinkle, “Listen!” associate producer
Joseph Smith interview, owner, Big Brain Productions in Omaha, Neb.
May 29, 2009

Twinkle VanWinkle:: Can you give me your name, business and location for the record?
Joseph Smith: My name is Joseph Smith, and the name of the business is Big Brain Productions. We are located at 1123 Jackson St., in Omaha, Neb. The zip is 68102.

TVW: How long have you been in the tattoo business? How long have you been tattooing?
JS: I have personally been tattooing for 17 years. I got my first real job in 1992. They way things progressed through my career, I pierce now and own and manage the shop, which has become a bigger and bigger responsibility.

TVW: How many employees do you have?
JS: We have 12 employees and we do almost 400 services a week.

TVW: What do you call a tattoo artist?
JS: A tattooer, tattooist, a tattoo artist. I guess it hasn’t been offensive to be called anything. I have been doing it 17 years and I kind of learned the humble way. I didn’t do what’s called an apprenticeship, although that is what I recommend to people trying to enter the business today. Apprenticeship saves a lot of missteps. In this business missteps can be awfully costly. Just for the sake of your clients it always better to do an apprenticeship.

TVW: What are some of the steps in beginning the tattoo process?
JS: The first step in beginning the tattoo would be shopping around. I think in our industry it is ultra important to find quality. Not everyone is born equally talented. I think the first step is shopping, around, asking your friends, and looking at people’s tattoos. The ones that you like are the places you should shop I think that is the first and most important step.
Then when you get to the shop that you like, you need to discuss a design and make sure that you and your artist are on the same sheet of music with it. Then the artist should draw it and possibly schedule you an appointment. The next step would be to apply a stencil to your arm or the part that’s to be tattooed.  (repeat for better quality). The next step would be to apply a stencil, which is a pre-made outline of the design. We use those not necessarily to trace from but to make sure that we are centered in the area and that all the details are included. Then we do actually use that as a guideline to outline the tattoo. After that it is just the artist’s artistic ability to color it in. Then after you receive the process, it is your responsibility to take care of it. You do that by using like a moisturizer or a cream or an anti-bacterial salve like Neosporin.

TVW: What are the standards for safety? Anything federal or state requirements?
JS: We hold ourselves to the very highest standards. The state [of Nebraska] requires to autoclave all your instruments, which means you put them in a heat and pressure sterilizer. I personally am a Red Cross volunteer and authorized provider to give safety courses that are industry specific, as well as CPR and things like that. Our guys go through training once a quarter. They are all vaccinated for hepatitis and all the blood-borne pathogens that you are subjected to in this business. So we not only hold ourselves not to the cleanliness of the tools but our own personal health is important. We enforce them seriously. It’s not something we just do to meet the standard. We actually try to overachieve in that category. We‘ve got a full-time person whose sole responsibility is the sterilization of our equipment and our work areas.

TVW: What is the equipment you use that has to be sterilized?
JS: The tattoo machine is the part where it would most likely be contaminated if not cleaned properly. The tattoo machine consists of a needle, obviously, and a grip. All of your needles are a single-use. As soon as we are done with them we throw them into a sharps disposal. We have a company come and pick it up and dispose of it properly. The second part is the grip. That is the most often the most contaminated part. That is all done in-house. We have a guy, who I said earlier, whose specific job is to clean that tube in a sterile environment, package it in a self-sealing container and run it through the autoclave.  After it comes out of there we market with a batch number, we log it into a book. When we take it out of the inventory, we cross it off the logbook and makes sure the expiration date is corresponding to the entry date. If it doesn’t, we don’t use the equipment. We put it back into the system to be re-sterilized. So I guess the tattoo equipment consists of a tattoo machine, a needle and a grip.

TVW: What questions should a consumer ask an artist/shop?
JS: I always think you should ask about experience, how long the tattooer’s been doing it, what styles he is proficient in, what his personal interests in tattooing are, and what his specific talents are. It’s always good to work in that artist’s specific talent. The second question you would want to ask is about sterilization. You should ask them how they sterilize their work area, how they sterilize their tattoo chair, their work surface and how they sterilize their equipment. Ask them if you can see evidence of it being sterilized, which each shop does that differently. Every shop should have evidence of that, whether it is a test strip, whether it is a logbook, whether it’s both, whether it’s diagnostic test to make sure their equipment is running properly. They should be able to prove their sterilization. Don’t just take their word for it. One of the best things to rely on is your natural instinct. If the guy is stumbling over the questions, if the place doesn’t look well lit, or the place is just generally unkempt or unclean, that would be a good sign to walk out. This is kind of hard to articulate, but there should just be a vibe, shouldn’t be a doubt in your mind. Well, maybe a doubt, but it should be easily satisfied. If it’s hard for you to take their word for it, I would just leave. That is kind of hard to put into words, that you should just have a general vibe. If they’re organized and their work area is a mess, you’re not going to know how long that soap bottle has been sitting on their counter, you won’t know if the paperwork that is all over the place is interfering with their sterilization process. You should just get a vibe. A good instinct is a very important tool when shopping for a tattoo shop. It should be more than just a question; it should be a feeling when you walk in there.

TVW: What do you ask the customer?
JS: We ask them if they have any health conditions. We can’t tattoo on somebody that is pregnant. We like to know if you are diabetic because that can also affect the healing process.  We don’t care if you have hepatitis or AIDS or any of that stuff, because we treat people like they have it even when they don’t. There is no extra step that we take for somebody who has AIDS. We do that for people who say they are clean, because they might be lying. We ask the questions, but it doesn’t necessarily affect how we perform the procedure because we treat everyone like they are sick. We aren’t allowed to discriminate, so if you have hepatitis, we are legally obligated to tattoo you. We don’t refuse much service, so therefore the questions we ask aren’t necessarily to prevent, but just to make sure we give you the proper service. Medicines you might be on make a difference in healing. Acne medication will make a tattoo not heal well. We ask age, date of birth and we ask for your address – that kind of stuff. Those are all important in case there is an outbreak or we have an infection spread. We need to have good records to go back and inform the clients who were tattooed on that same day or in that same time period that they need to be extra conscious of this problem, make sure they don’t have it, and if they do help them get the medical treatment they need.

TVW: What is the average price for a tattoo? Average size?
JS: $100 is a good starting point. You could get an hour or two worth of work for 100 bucks. That is still a hard question to answer. Obviously big ones are more expensive than little ones. I would say our average client spends  $100 per visit.

TVW: What do you use for aftercare? Or suggest to your clients?
JS: We actually have an aftercare product that we have manufactured for own purpose. We have a salve that we offer. We also give you a list of other options, which include plain old hand lotion. Washing it is the biggest part of the aftercare. You can get away with minimal salve, as long as you are doing a good job washing it with soap and water. We recommend you wash your hands first, and then wash your tattoo with an anti-microbial soap. Then apply a small amount of ointment to it afterwards.

TVW:  I have seen some people wrap tattoos in plastic wrap. What is the purpose of this?
JS: That is more to prevent the spread of blood on your ride home. We have to bandage our tattoos before you leave and some people use a non-stick pad, some use plastic wrap. The purpose of that is to keep blood from dripping, to keep your blood on you instead of it spreading to our other work areas, to the bathroom, to the front counter, to the car and until you get home. That is more to prevent blood transfer than to protect the tattoo.

TVW: Do you guarantee your work?
JS: We do guarantee our work. That is important for us to get repeat business.  If the tattoo doesn’t heal well, which is usually the case. That’s why would have to give somebody a guarantee, if it didn’t heal well. We want our work to look good, and that is why we have return business. If you don’t guarantee your work, you’ll have clients out there showing bad work. That is never a good business decision. Yes, we guarantee it for life, because that is how long you are going to have it.

TVW: What about fading?
JS: Right. If it faded due to a bad healing process, we would guarantee it. Even if it was your fault, even it was our fault, it needs to look good. I guess I’m a little more pragmatic than assign blame. If it needs to be touched up, we touch it up. As far as the fading because that is the nature of the art form. Our products have come a long way in the last 10 years. You know you see those old sailors that have those anchors on their arms and it’s turned all blue and looks like a big blob?  Well, tattooing really doesn’t do that anymore. So, guaranteeing against that is not really practical because that is not really a major concern anymore. Our industry is almost like every other where it has advancements, and new products come out to improve the durability of a tattoo. These days you could get a tattoo at the age of 20 and it still look good at the age of 60. That really isn’t what the guarantee is for. The guarantee is if there is a problem with the healing process.

TVW: Do you have to be federally or locally licensed? In your state?
JS: Yes, in our state we do have to be licensed. You have to have a high school diploma to be a tattoo artist. You have to be 18 years of age. You have to take some classes in blood-borne pathogens. You have to have cross-contamination courses, so you know the proper sterilization techniques and the proper techniques to keep disease form spreading. You have to renew that education every two years.

TVW: Does any of your equipment have to be regulated or tested?
JS: The autoclave is required to be tested. We do ours by a third party where they stick a little envelope into the autoclave. We run a cycle in the autoclave. We send [the envelope] back to the company and they run a test to make sure the autoclave performed to the standard that all autoclaves in the country have to perform. That would be the only federally regulated. Our state requires that we have dates and a logbook of the tools we have run. That is not necessarily a federal requirement.

TVW: What is the oddest thing you have had to tattoo? Or place you had to tattoo?
JS: Hmm, the oddest thing? Well, is this a family program? You know some of the weirdest things I have ever done was to incorporate a mole, like a birthmark into a tattoo. I did a skull where the birthmark is the eye. Just working in anatomy into weird places. Making your bellybutton a part of a tattoo. That stuff is always kind of unusual. Other than that, people realize the permanent nature of this stuff. What might be funny for one specific time isn’t necessarily going to be funny for your whole life. So I think people really do take into consideration the permanency of this procedure. They don’t really want to be stuck with it for the rest of their life. The way our shop actually runs, we are a professional place. People don’t walk into stores like ours, and I hate to sound like I am bragging or we are above that, but really we get more of a serious clientele. They way we present ourselves and the way we hold ourselves to the standard that we do, we really weed out the silly tattoos. We really don’t get a lot of the racist stuff; we don’t get a lot of the marijuana stuff, or things like that. That is just not part of the way we conduct ourselves. Our clientele don’t feel comfortable asking for things like that, Hopefully by the first impression, they know we aren’t one of those kind of places.

TVW: Are you appointment only, or do you have walk-ins as well?
JS: We try to keep a good mix of it. We have 12 employees, like I said.  We perform a lot of services. So, a lot of times we are appointment only. But if someone cancels, we like to get the walk-ins because they are easy stuff to do – people who want a little cross, or grandparents’ name that has passed away. That’s 15 to 20 minutes worth of work, so we try to provide for both. We don’t necessarily require you have an appointment. We can draw on the spot. But sometimes for convenience because our schedules are so full, we do make appointments. We try to keep a balance.

TVW: What kind of styles do you do? Are their trends? Things that are more popular?
JS: There are trends within the industry. One of my favorite styles is the traditional design like the pin-up girls or the anchors. Some of the more traditional things like the hearts and roses, with a new kind of twist to it. I call that neo-traditional. That is one of my own favorite styles. There was a real big call for the realism. People want portraits of their kids, or of their parents, even of their loved ones every once in awhile. Even though I say don’t get a picture of your wife. There are certainly trends. The tribal tattooing was real popular five years ago. Starting to fade away a little bit. I have been doing this a long time, and I have seen other fads and trends. The stuff that really endures is the traditional designs. In this industry there is a lot of tradition and a lot of social significance to the tattoo. I think people are searching for that meaning. The real tattoo collectors usually stick to the traditional elements of this industry.

TVW: Do you see a lot more custom work now?
JS: That has been one of the biggest changes since I started in this industry. When I started, people would come in and pick a design off the wall and it would be that. You’d put it on just like the design, and when you were done they would walk back out to that board and they would compare it to see if you did a good job. Now, nobody wants to get the one that is on the wall. If they see a heart with a banner through it, they want the banner to be doing something different. They want the heart to be shaded different. Even the pre-designed designs, people always want to make changes to them. The days of picking something off the wall and getting it done are long gone. You are right. Almost everything is custom these days. Even the pre-designed designs will have their own twist on them when we are done.

TVW: Is their anything you won’t tattoo, or part of the body you won’t tattoo?
JS: No, not necessarily. We try to counsel clients into making good decisions. Tell them the consequences of their decision and the limitations of what we can actually perform. Our argument is pretty persuasive. But I they insist, it’s their body and their money. I’m not here to pass a moral judgment on what they want.  I’m here to try to make it as reasonable as possible. We’ve tattooed faces before, and we’ve tattooed hands, and feet. The trick to doing that, to say, “We’ll tattoo anywhere,” is being flexible on the design. If the client is flexible on the design, they can usually get what they want. It’s when they come in here and want something that is really beyond our capabilities that we have to tell them no.

TVW: What drew you to this field?
JS: I get asked that question a lot and it is really hard to put into words what drew me to it, because it was a very instinctual desire to do this. To me it is almost like asking someone why they are hungry. It’s just kind of nature to want to do this I think. I’m from Orlando, and it is just a melting pot. Even as a kid I tried to get real close to people who were tattooed at lines a the amusement parks, or in line at the restaurant. I’d always try to get next to them so I could see it. I have always been fascinated with this industry. The more I got into it, the more fascinated I became. It just kind of sucked me in and I have really never considered another option. It really just consumed me the second I was introduced to it. I was lucky to have a little bit of artistic talent. It is an absolute must to have in this day and age — a lot of artistic ability. The industry is growing and growing and growing and there is just not room to be mediocre anymore. There is just so many people doing it, that the mediocre ones are weeded out really fast. Before you do am apprenticeship, I recommend getting art school. I recommend coming into a tattoo shop with a resume a mile long before you ever ask to be a tattooer. It is so competitive now, so you have to be talented and you have to be able to compete even to get your foot in the door. You have to demonstrate first of all a desire and an interest, but second of all you have to have an enormous amount of talent to be in this business anymore. It’s not like it used to be where any biker could buy a tattoo machine and be a tattooer. The clientele won’t settle for that anymore.

TVW: What is the most important aspect of your job?
JS: The most important? The rapport you build with your clients. I think that people will take your suggestions easier if you are personable. I think one of the most under-utilized assets in a person’s repertoire is their ability to be disarming. I think it’s an important part of this job and people don’t use it properly. There are lots of places that you could get a great service, and it doesn’t always mean you are going to get great customer service. You could have a great, talented person doing your tattoo. If they are kind of a fuddy-duddy and don’t make you feel comfortable, it’s going to be a hard process. The flip side of that is you may go to someone who is really personable, but who doesn’t have a lot of talent and you end up with a bad tattoo. The most important parties being able to find both. You do that by getting to know them first. I think that is the most important parties understanding who is tattooing you and making a good decision based on personal knowledge of that person.

TVW: Is there anything you would like to add about the art of tattoo and the tattoo industry?
JS: I think that our industry has come a long way to bring itself out of the shadows. I think that it is a great thing. I think that we have done a lot to legitimize ourselves by accepting the laws, coming out of the shadows, participating in society in a responsible way. I think that this business has grown; the industry has grown, weeded out some of those shadier characters. I think there is a lot to be proud of in this industry. I don’t think it’s the bikers and the burnouts, and I am glad to be recognized by Angie’s List as a responsible part of the business community now.

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Twinkle VanWinkle, “Listen!” associate producer
Brett Anne Safford interview, Angie’s List Portland member.
June 1, 2009

Twinkle VanWinkle: Can you give me your name, location and Angie’s List chapter for the record?
Brett Safford: My name is Brett Safford, and I am in Portland, Ore. And I think that means I am in the Portland chapter.

TVW: What did you look for when you started thinking about getting your tattoos?
BS: Mainly I looked for tattoos from people I know. I asked them what their experience was and that was how I found my tattoo artist. Mostly I don’t ask them as much as I look through their books. If some of the stuff they have done is a style that I like it is usually a good fit for me.

TVW: How much did you pay for your tattoos?
BS: I have two from the same artist, and they are both pretty small because it was just a shop minimum. I think it is $60 a shop minimum and $120 an hour. But both of mine only took about 20 minutes. It was just $60 each.

TVW: What did you do when you got the tattoos?
BS: I went in and I showed her my art and she really liked it. It was kind of a last minute thing, because I went with somebody else to get her tattoo and she ended up not getting it. So I had something I was interested in and we put it together. I wasn’t planning on getting that first tattoo from this artist, and I just got it. She was nice and the place was clean. It was just easy to get done. It was meant to be.

TVW: Why did you file a report on Angie’s List about your tattoo experience?
BS: Partly because it was a report drive and I thought what else could I file a report on. And I had a really good experience there, and I like their business. Give them a good report and hopefully other people will use them.

TVW: What was the most important factor in making your decision to go with this shop? Or in general?
BS: Knowing other people who had gotten satisfactory results. That is really important to me, to know someone else. You can read all the reviews or look at their art, but I really want to talk to somebody who has worked with the person or the shop.

TVW: Did they explain their sterilization process, and aftercare procedures?
BS: They didn’t explain it too much. It was pretty clear. I had been in shops before so I knew about it. I knew it was already in pre-packaged and sterilized sealed baggies that they opened in front of me. Then the aftercare, they did a really good job of explaining. My husband, who used the same shop, he even had a few questions after. He emailed the shop and got a quick response. They were really good about the aftercare part.

TVW: Did they guarantee their work?
BS: I’m sure they did but I don’t remember.

TVW: How many tattoos do you have from this particular shop?
BS: I’ve gotten two from this particular shop. The first is on my back; it is just some star, in the shape of the Pleiades. I just like it. They are called the seven sisters and my birthday is the seventh. The second was, I just did the Portland marathon with a friend and it was sort of a commemorative thing. So we each got the same tattoo. She got her tattoo back in Las Vegas and I got mine here.

TVW: How many tattoos do you have?
BS: I have three total.

TVW: Have you had any bad tattoo experiences? Not healing properly?
BS: No. All good experiences.

TVW: What about your other tattoo?
BS: Well I was like two weeks after turning 18 and I was like, “I’m getting a tattoo!” Now it has more meaning because at the time it was just a drawing I like and I went into the city one day and got a tattoo. It wasn’t a really planned tattoo. That was when I was living in Seattle

TVW: How often do you use Angie’s List?
BS: The most important time was when we signed up a year ago. It was because our water heater was broken and we were about to have a baby. We had the baby two days later. We were having a home birth. We needed the water heater to work, so it was super important for that. And we are about to do some bathroom remodeling so I am looking forward to using it for that. So I just posted the reports and I know that I will use it more in the future as we do more remodeling and healthcare and stuff.

TVW: Has Angie’s list helped you out with finding service providers?
BS: Yes it does. I am glad to be a member.



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Twinkle VanWinkle, “List-en!” associate producer
Interview with Conan Lea, owner and artist, Voluta Tattoo, Indianapolis

Twinkle VanWinkle: Can you state your name and business for the record?
Conan Lea: I’m Conan Lea. This is Voluta Tattoo in Indianapolis.

TVW: How long have you been tattooing?
Lea: I’ve been tattooing 10 years in November, so about nine and a half.

TVW: What kind of training did you have?
Lea: In tattooing, I did the regular apprenticeship where I beat the streets and knocked on all of doors until someone would take me in because they liked my portfolio and gave a chance for someone to clean their studio or probably about a year before I got to do anything.

TVW: Did you have any art school training?
Lea: I did. I had some art school training. [I am a] art school dropout. I joined the Marine Corps instead. I drew on my sketchbooks and locker boxes and all of my friends.

TVW: What would you say is the first step a consumer would take in getting a tattoo?
Lea: These days should do their homework online and search for portfolios and some sense of the studio, some sense of the ethics behind the studio, and the people who run it. Once from there they should probably head on out and knock on doors and walk in and just feel the place and see if they like it.

TVW: What are some questions they should ask when they enter a shop?
Lea: Well, if they walk in and they are not terrified and what they see doesn’t make them go running away for the door because everyone in there is scary – if they enjoy the place – they should immediately ask to se their sterilization procedures and to see artists portfolios. They should look for chemistry in the room, if everyone is awake or sober, if the clients are happy.

TVW: After you find a place, what is your next step?
Lea: The next step a collector should take after they have found a studio is to make sure the artist portfolio is stunning and their work is saturated, their lines are crisp if lines are necessary/ They should see that the studio maintains good relationship with their client, that they’ll get the appointments that they are promised, that the artist will show up on time and be ready in advance of the appointment. They should seek a consultation where they can sit down and be listened to and tell their story. They need to make sure the artist can translate that.

TVW: Next?
Lea: We have somebody come here, at Voluta, and say, “Come in, meet us. We can feel you, you can feel us.” We’ll have coffee. We’ll talk, we’ll laugh. You’ll bring your references, your ideas. We’ll lay them all out on the table and take two approaches and make sure the tattoo we pick together, that we collaborate on will be something you will always be happy with. An approach, one, to hear you and hear what you are saying, and then we’ll look at the artwork and see if it matches what you are saying. Very often they’re very different, what you think you like in words and the pictures, references one might bring. They are not always the same thing. We want to fuse what you think you like with what your eye tells us you like. Then we draw and draw and draw until you’re happy before we ever tattoo.

TVW: Next, do you use a stencil, pattern?
Lea: We take three approaches. We take drawing it out completely in advance, and sort of patterning it on the body carefully tracing the lines on or the rough sketch on. Then we just paint from our head. The other is a fusion of that and markering, where we will fuse the patterns to the markers to the body to make sure that it flows and moves and never offends the natural curve of the body. The third way is we take markers and draw it straight on and go to it out of our head. Depends on the client’s comfort level with that.

TVW: What are some questions you ask your clients?
Lea: I like to know who they are, which to some other studios sounds haughty, but I want to make sure you are making a decision you’ll never regret. I make sure the ink you pick, you’ll always love. So, you’re not here at post-divorce. You’re not here drunk. You’re not here because you are in a mad phase. You are here because you have something that is so lovely you always want it for your own, under your clothing. Getting to know you helps us out if your decision is socially responsible. I do it for a living and I don’t have them on my face or forearms because I just don’t want the attention that those sorts of tattoos would bring me. I don’t want someone else doing that.

TVW: What is an average price, per hour?
Lea: In the world-class studio that we try to be, we like to showcase different levels of artistry and each comes with a cost. The younger artists who don’t have very thick or diverse portfolios range from $100 and hour to $150 an hour, depending on how long it takes for them to lay out the tattoo and the level of their vision.

TVW: Do you guarantee your work?
Lea: We stand behind the work to the extent that we won’t stop until it’s perfect. If you need a touch a month or so later after you’ve been wearing and you want to lean a little more towards blue than green. You decide you want it to with a theme that might be a little more lined than painterly. Bring that in and that’s on us to touch up. After the tattoo is photographed, and you’re wearing it and we all love it, and you go to the Bahamas and you burn off your tattoo, we go back on the clock to fix it. In the aftercare instructions, and though the whole process, we tell everyone how to baby their new investment.

TVW: What aftercare you recommend?
Lea: Our aftercare is thorough and very simple.  We cover the tattoo and tell you if you are going straight to bed, leave the bandage on and keep it covered over night. Take it off the next morning and clean it really well. We use no Bacitracin, no triple anti-biotic, no A & D. We use only Curel lotion. Curel was suggested to me by a dermatologist early in my career and it’s healed my entire portfolio. We all love it. Moisture is the key to healing a tattoo and that’s just the way we do it. Everybody has their mix. Ours is simple.

TVW: What are some of the styles of tattoos?
Lea: Well, considering here at Voluta we have no designs to choose from, they are all custom. They are collaborative. They are drawn with you. Finding out who you are helps us determine the style of the tattoo, be it art nouveau, be it something art deco, something light and painterly in a watercolor fashion, something creepy. We have to figure out what makes you tingle. That’s what we do here. So far none of us are specializing in a particular style. We like to stay diverse. It keeps us limber. It keeps us artistically growing. So when you come up with a style, we do our homework on it — everything from a Lichtenstein to a Van Gogh to Celtic knot work to hard tribal to portraiture. So style here is diverse as the wearer.

TVW: How would you describe your relationship with the customer compared to other businesses?
Lea: It’s completely personal. Tattooing at the level we tattoo is completely personal. We want to make sure we hear you. That’s what’s most important. Because if you leave and you feel that you were rushed and you feel that we didn’t care, you’re stuck with that. So tattooing is sacred to us. There aren’t many permanent connections with another person. Some of them are wonderful, like making a baby with someone – that’s staying forever. Teachers, they impact us forever. So we take it on that level. Every time that you pull up your shirt, you see us. We want you to smile at that point it’s as personal and intimate as friendship.

TVW: Are there any procedures/regulations that you have to follow? Local, state, federal?
Lea: The Feds don’t so far mandate on high and reign down on us. Not yet. So far our inks are not FDA regulated, neither are all the vitamins we take and most of the supplements. The FDA isn’t really too concerned about it. Other than that, we have the state level and the city level legislation if you will. In Indianapolis, they are stringent. They require blood-borne pathogen universal precautions, CPR, first aid. They require that artists be vaccinated for hepatitis.  They require that we have an autoclave, which is a big expensive hospital style sterilizer that terminates all the pathogens, bacterial creatures in the world if you put them inside there. We even have the autoclave tested monthly to make sure that it’s clean and running properly and that there are no creatures living in it. They inspect us regularly. They can drop in at will. We encourage it. We post their desires on the wall with a phone number where you can call the board of health at anytime and report something that you saw that you didn’t like.

TVW: What is the oddest thing someone ever asked you to tattoo?
Lea: Someone once asked to tattoo their uvula.  They wanted a little George Washington portrait on their uvula. Ok I made all that up. When people ask you to tattoo specialty body parts, if you will, it requires a private session. That happens. I never really know what to say.

TVW: Is there any part of the body that you won’t tattoo?
Lea: It’s person by person. We will not tattoo the parts of the body that we just don’t think will help someone along in life.  We don’t do hands unless it’s on an industry collector, who has work on their neck and face and hands and they are living ink. We can’t really see any reason outside of that to tattoo anyone’s face or hands. We don’t tattoo the inside of the hand because it doesn’t stay. I guess we tattoo every place as long as it’s not going to hurt someone, that’s totally our call. I don’t want my children mad at me for tattooing one of their friends’ forearms and ruining their life. I don’t tattoo deejunums. There.

TVW: How do you feel about tattoo shops being on Angie’s List?
Lea: I think tattoo shops on Angie’s List are a good way to go. Thinking people will go out and do their homework. Thinking consumers will go out and seek a good artist. That’s the way of the Internet these days. Anybody that’s looking for anything goes out and looks for a rating on it. Angie’s List seems to be really thorough, and they seem to be impartial opinion or political sway. I like the fact that tattoo studios can be on Angie’s List because I think the cream will rise. The consumer will become more educated, and when they are more educated that means they only go to the good shops and the bad shops won’t make it anymore.

TVW: What do you think is the most important part of your job?
Lea: I think the most important aspect of my job is listening. I have to listen, because the custom level of tattooing, it’s not about me or what I want or think. It’s about knowing you well enough to give you a tattoo that keeps you happy forever. Second to that, that I continue to grow as an artist, so you get better ink.

TVW: Why did you decide to become a tattoo artist?
Lea: I decided to become a tattoo artist because my friends said it would be a good idea, when I was in the Marines. They sort of, in drunken fashion – they were drunk – not me! I was always in church, of course. They always thought I would be great at tattooing because I could draw and they liked tattoos. I guess that made sense, therefore I would be good at it and I would like it. I was resistant to it, but they were right. I love it. Therefore a natural progression in art, from one media to another.