The Huddle - Episode 103 - Tools of the Trade

In this episode, joined by experts from Floor Tool Store (https://www.floortoolstore.com), we dive into the essential tools every flooring professional needs to execute their projects efficiently. This episode emphasizes the importance of being well-equipped, not only to improve work quality but also to enhance productivity and safety on the job. We'll explore the key pieces of equipment that can transform challenging tasks into streamlined operations. Tune in to discover how investing in the right tools can significantly impact your installation success and overall business performance.

The Huddle was created by Paul Stuart of Stuart & Associates and Go Carrera, alongside Jose and Daniel Gonzalez from Preferred Flooring. Aimed at helping you maintain forward progress in your flooring career, they cover topics from personal and business growth, to installation tips & tricks and everything in-between.

Want to be a guest on The Huddle? Email thehuddleforwardprogress@gmail.com today!

Create your FREE Installer profile at https://gocarrera.com and become part of the future of the industry TODAY!
GET TRAINED! Find a list of training dates here: https://gocarrera.com/resources/training/
https://www.preferredflooringmi.com
https://www.stuartandassociates.com

what's up team welcome to the Huddle your weekly Playbook where we strategize not only on playing the game but

changing it from mastering the fundamentals of the craft to distinguishing ourselves in the

marketplace we're here to give the installer a voice and ensure you're equipped with everything you need to

stand out in our Market let's band together and Forge a new Legacy in flooring this is where you belong

welcome everybody what's up fellas with me as always Daniel and Jose Gonzalez

although Jose does not look like he's uh in Grand Rapids at the moment they are

from Grand Rapids Michigan and today we have the gentlemen from the four tool

store Dylan Kevin and Justin guys what's going on today not much how's going how

you doing oh you know justy to rule the world you know um today's episode is on

uh you know having the right tools for the trade right like the

um all the tools that'll make you successful so we thought we'd bring on some experts in that realm as we often

do and word so easy on the people call

us installation experts too and we're still learning so I totally understand what you're saying there

no doubt well we had to bring on some guys so we chose these guys no I I we

always talk about being effective in as an installer uh being an old installer

myself and Daniel and Jose we all know that one of the keys to um profitability

is really having the right tools um you know I'm sitting in the back of my truck

if it wasn't for a hot spot I wouldn't be able get on this this uh podcast and

and chat with you fine fellas today so you got to have the right tools to accomplish whatever it is you're trying

to do and these guys have one heck of a awesome website and um although we're not here

just to feature them or anything we're just wanting you to know there's like online uh resources and there there's

been a big move to uh purchasing tools online here the last I don't know five

or 10 years right guys yeah absolutely absolutely how do how do people go about

it like I've always I always like to how do you get past the the people wanting to hold the the the roller or the knife

in their hands I think it's uh no different than all of us ordering from Amazon you know

think of something that you need quickly and you go find it online order it and it's there in two to three days most

likely you guys stock does you stock the the stuff and so the Fulfillment of it's

pretty quick and just out the door or is that how that works yep I mean uh we got a 110,000

foot Warehouse square foot Warehouse that is filled with about anything and

everything you can imagine so it's it's Turn and Burn when we get them in sounds

amazing only 10,000 square feet big shopping mall for us yeah it is

it's a massive shopping mall for contractors it's great kid candy store

what's your guys's uh what What's the what's the approach that kind of set you apart from the uh other online retailers

for for flooring tools I know you guys are a flooring distributor as well but

for the tools in particular what kind of uh set you apart um I mean online I don't think

anything sets us exactly apart we try to make everything simple and easy on our

website uh I think the biggest thing is the people you're buying from you know

our website's owned by Hank Specialties a Midwest distributor that's still familyowned and

operated since 1976 you know two guys started in a 20 by 40 foot garage basically and built it

into what it is so you know when you're on that website buying you're still buying from you know a family

business so we still care about everything that you guys are bringing back Sayan responses that we get we

handle customer service on there is topnotch we get to everyone as fast as we can any issues returns

anything do you guys speaking of returns how's that

work say say something comes in messed up or what have you

um what's what's a process there anything that comes in we just

require pictures of how it arrived damage through shipping want pictures in

the Box whatnot it's broken it's out sh Dam back cut dry Pi the

biggest thing that we can get sweet have you have you guys bought

uh online Daniel Jose oh yeah we online a long time

ago King and then I think um our our local distributor gets a little angry

sometimes because I'm like guys I can get this online for this much well you're Mr Amazon as angry at Daniel they

get angry at Daniel Daniel does that and you can't have one of one of the employees go up to the counter there and

then call Daniel hey what about this well that's not what it says online I can get it for Daniel Mak them he's the

bargainer on the phone it's uh it's actually pretty humorous but but uh um you can't you can't you can't knock a

brother for trying right well I tell you one thing that's

uh you know all this tool talk is really about making the installer as effective as possible um

and you know I know that there's still a lot of guys that like to go into the to

the locations um but we thought you know just introducing

uh floor tool store we show you the website real quick and let you know that

we'll pop up a QR code here in a minute so as you guys come on you'll get 15%

off through this Friday is that correct yep 15% off your order uh so we'll leave

this QR code up here but hey Daniel before that can you just throw up their

website real quick and and kind of uh

Meander around they they have their sales on here but I noticed that everything was really categorized nicely

and it was really easy to navigate the site so that's pretty cool that you can

go through and uh find what you need real quick uh tools for flooring there's

others that are out there uh but the key is really just trying to

get the installer to understand and get comfortable with uh buying online uh our Network in

particular uh being an online community uh takes advantage of some of these

things and so just wanted to give another resource quick view there and

we'll pop I like how it says everything that's in stock like it's ready to go

right now yeah orth it's waiting gold on that one and we're really uh pushing

just tools and installation supplies on there um if you look there's we got some

metals that you can buy but we're not doing base you know we got limited powders on there so it's really just

focused tools and your supplies that you need on your J kind of Everyday Use type

type of list correct we want to keep it to the consumables and the daily users now and

Dylan how long is our site been been active would you say it it's it's actually been active for probably a

decade or more it went uh dormant for a while and within the last three years I

kind of just started poking around on it and was like hey let's fire this thing back up and rechange everything we redid

the whole website layouts and we're we're still evolving it every day we're still adding products changing

descriptions just still doing the best we can with it really a fulltime job oh it can be at

day it can be on days yeah we're we're still in the process of of starting small with those you know

daily and weekly consumables as it continues to grow and we have time you know I'm I'm sure that offering that's

currently on there will will absolutely expand um we we need to I guess kind of

figure out our lane before we we fly too close to the Sun of course so what is the what what's the

goal for the site this is a little bit of a question uh for the installers out

there I mean do they get a outside of you know the obvious not

having to drive to a physical location what are some of the benefits of ordering and buying online in general

just is it just the convenience um M

main I mean Daniel why do you order online convenience probably the biggest

thing it is convenience it's so whenever I'm looking at something it's the time

that it takes right and that's where you get the the old school versus new school mentality it's I will order something

online and send it back before I take the time out of my day to go to

somewhere to try and see if that it's even in stock especially with some of these phone lines that they got now

where it's like it rings twice and then it's like you know push too if you want to be transferred to another location no

I don't want to be transferred to another location I have a question for this Branch right here and it's like I don't want to waste my

time doing that let me just order this it'll get in it's the the thing I need if it's not I I'll send it back or

whatever but my time is valuable and I can just do that real quick rather than

waste my time going over there and that that's something that I don't see that I my

time is valuable because I have so much going on so if I can save time by doing that that's what I'm going to do so I

mean you're purchasing um oh sorry go ahead bro no I was just gonna say one of

the things I see is um and I know that we've done is being able to order at the

point of need you know you're out on a job site you don't have something you're like I ain't gonna next time I'm gonna

have this thing and you're Canna order it right off your phone you know especially if you uh you know our go

career members just being able to log in partner deals and go straight to the site order the stuff get a good

discount it's it's kind of um that that's a convenience that I don't have

to drive but it I also don't forget to order it when I you know or to go to the

place and pick up the thing and end up on a job site with tool I need I mean this is all pretty Elementary stuff but

what's important is that our the the viewers know that there's plenty of resources out there and the easiest way

to uh be effective and I've said this before is have the right tools uh

there's nothing more frustrating than trying to make a screwdriver be a hammer and you're trying to get through a job

because you don't have the right tools to do it so um for all of our guides out there especially young uh you know

apprentices or helpers as you build your your business or you're building your skill set build your tools build up your

own personal like tool chest um I think it's super important for to invest in

yourself in that manner just as we always encourage you to invest in yourself in education invest in your

toolbox too 100% yep and the other benefit too

is that if you're purchasing like reoccurring tools if you're already know how a hand tool works or how it operates

you know what you like it's it's so easy just to go online and purchase that again um or purchase it in bulk so that

way you have what you need if you lose something you have a replacement on hand or if if it's in stock you have a

replacement on hand depending on how you're getting it shipped um there's and it like if you're like me if you go

there to buy a couple things and then you go to the store you're looking at everything else you might want or you

might need it might actually save you money by buying online instead of going and splurging a little bit sorry guys I

didn't want to give that secret away but um the convenience of it could save you money um because Danel not we do like

having we do like having tools that we'll be honest we do like you guys you guys have an impressive Tool uh

uh I don't know what to call it other than a portfolio at your office when I

came up yeah it's like a it's like a collection of the of the the tools that

you're not sure if you will use again or not but really come in handy when you need it correct as well as your

day-to-day stuff don't get me wrong but you guys had some unique stuff up there what's the Kendall says that he

likes uh tools for flooring because it over a certain amount you get free

shipping and I'm looking on your site right now and you guys also offer the free shipping on qualified orders over

$75 so correct

boom yeah this is my favorite type of installer maybe one of my favorite installers period Forge says I even buy

tools I don't need just to sometimes it's funny how we

these are the best of the best guys that are commenting right now the truth is is a lot of installers go out unprepared to

job sites and you know our our dedication here at the Huddle is

sometimes these aren't deep conversations uh sometimes we'll go an hour and a half on diversity and equity

and inclusion and then the next week we'll bring you an awesome uh uh an

awesome uh way to buy your tools and but it's it's just as important that

the fact is is efficiency on the job site I cannot say it enough I've been

there uh you know having the right router or the right welder or the right

Sky knife or or having a having a way to sharpen your Sky knife or or moving over

to um a different type of tool alog together where you can have interchangeable blades which I see is on

your guys' website as too for Norah's uh of a original system um all those things help you be

more effective and make more money so don't like I say on education don't short Change yourself because it costs

money to buy the thing yeah invest in yourself tools are an investment if you buy the right

tools oh 100% two is is our industry is our

industry and and the the insulation methods get more technical you can't go

on a job C like job site like we could 10 or 15 years ago with your standard tool pouch and your your single tool bag

right it's evolving it's getting more Technical and the installers have to as well um just just wanted to shout that

out there I I've been with this company for a little over five years I still have a garage full of tools that I may

have used once in the last five years but it's you know we all love our tools it's one of those where you invest in

the tools you have a hard time letting them go and a lot of that is because you invested in quality tools so kind of

like Paul what you were talking talking about you know you can get tools anywhere you can get basic tools anywhere it's it's the the 8020 rule

some of those tools will pay for themselves over and over and those are the ones that you need to have right

yeah yeah you're nice a lot of those specialty tools

you're only ever gonna have to buy once too yeah that's that was going to be my question about the specialty tools um so

you guys stay Innovative like you got specialty item that you guys distribute and and such yeah for uh so Han

Specialties we just we just took on floor Cloud that we uh just started

about last week I think it was that we're selling at our locations now that's awesome yeah floor Cloud's a

sponsor at at the Huddle here and and we we say it all the time like you want to

really save some time have floor Cloud on your job site save your installers a trip if you're an installer encourage

your to have uh floor Cloud on the job sites especially the larger ones uh it's

amazing how much money you can save if you don't go to a job that's not in the

uh proper site conditions for your flooring and you're you're scheduled there for a week and they could have

solved the whole problem right from a mobile application it's easy setup it's a

device that goes at the job site QR code on the front or a barcode

on the front of the device and you can um you're set up within minutes I know

that preferred flooring has it Stuart Associates so we're going to play a quick video from uh from floor Cloud

right now enables realtime monitoring of your

job site conditions via desktop or mobile device no more manual checking

for temperature humidity or even dupoint no need for base stations Wi-Fi or

external power sources simply scan the QR code on the front of your sensors and

you're up and running with the most accurate and Innovative sight monitoring system in the flooring industry dispatch

your Crews with confidence and reduce your climate related installation issues

floor Cloud now you know yeah that's pretty cool man I love

I love the fact that a they were Innovative enough when they came up with floor Cloud to you know not need some

base station or some big device on the that they it's ran on cellular so the

fact that for most if you can get a sales service you can get and the data

draw down is is uh dealt with as well so if you can get a a a sell signal you can

have floor Cloud on your job site so Kudos yeah that's pretty cool you guys distribute uh floor Cloud um and and how

does the subscription and and things like that work do it still just set up you just get the devices from you

guys yep basically you can just purchase the device from us and everything else is just ran right through floor Cloud

that's awesome pretty simple nice we'll probably have it on our first job here in the next couple

weeks yeah that's about staying Innovative and and and staying on the front line you guys so who's the tool

nerd that goes to the shows to find the new tools or is always talking with Roberts and Taylor and all the people to

to determine what goes on the site uh there's a few of us I'm probably

the leader on looking in adding stuff um

you're thead definitely not not the expert that's used them uh Kevin's our guy that's still installs on the side

and was installer in floring Justin installed ceramic forever so they're the they're the guys that we

bring stuff to and say you know hey what do you think of this or they even bring tools to us and say hey guys you need to

look at this tool look at that tool there's a lot less and less side installation going on I'm getting too

old for that yeah I feel you every once in a while

still get out there but Hey Kevin to or CLE to answer your question is it basically for commercial sites no if you

have a house that you're putting wood in and you have that device and you go stick it there it's it's for residential

and Commercial now obviously ly uh you still need to test your your substrates

and things like that on a residential site one cool thing about floor Cloud on commercial is you can pair it with your

moisture your insu probes uh Wagners and

it'll talk and you can get the your uh substrate moisture RH readings and

temperature readings um right through floor Cloud now we don't you don't put

RH tests in wood so you still have to do something of that uh site measuring but

if your job site conditions the temperature and the the ambient humidity

and those things are all in line you're much likely much more likely for uh say

a wood product uh a wood flooring to um you know be within specifications and

pinwell pinwell I mean you know the moisture pin so so cool what else um do you two guys

have to say Daniel and Jose about uh as you were coming up and building your

tool repertoire up I was just going to ask them like what what are they seeing right now what are the hot items what's

going what do we need what do we need to be looking out for um I think uh floor prep and

grinding is getting to be a lot bigger it is um we've sold the wolf Neo 230 I

mean they just we just sell and sell and sell those that's probably one of our

biggest moving pieces of equipment right now and I don't blame that I mean we

have two of them so it's a it's a good it's a good tool to have in your Arsenal

tell us need a third Jose you need a third we no we have three of them well you might s we have two

NEOS tell us about the Neo the wolf Neo uh well it's a 7inch grinder floor

grinder that basically gets you off your hands and knees you know doing all your hand grinding uh it takes four segments

it's got a head that swivels left or right to get half inch to 3/4 of an inch away from the wall um you can grind you

can get glue off I mean there's array of segments that you can use on it it's

it's a sweet machine you can basically I thought we had three but we

didn't have three we had the original Neo which had the enclosure full round

without the um the flat opening to get closer to the wall so um we had to try

to convert that one no it's opposite it used to be have a flap now it doesn't yeah what

I have the national uh 10 inch but it's a single head so this is a segmented 7

inch yep yep and it's got a like a flex head too so it'll Flex with the floor

you know if you got a high spot it's still going to kind of flex over that spot instead of grind in unless you want

to grind you can sit on it but it'll Flex with the floor as well man wolf is

really Innovative that way a seven inch basically a seven inch planetary

grinder yep um I it's planetary yeah did you say 11 no I I know it's not

officially but it works the same it sounds like the same setup as say uh

Lavino 20 inch like the large Grinders I mean they're segmented they move with the floor those kind of things okay I go

you yeah for your grinding and polishing needs although I'm sure this is not a

polisher my point is no no so so what is one of those things go

for uh $424 and you guys Daniel and Jose you

guys have had uh well you got three of them so I think this is a real stupid

question question but you've had great luck with uh with them right

we we were so impressed with the with the first use that we did end up getting multiple ones and yes we have had really

good luck um especially when you're working in a situation where you have to carry it upstairs this

is a lot lighter than bringing one of the uh planetary Grinders a larger unit that runs off of phase power right um

You can hook this one up to to 110 uh um you don't need an overpowered vacuum

with it as well I mean I will advise dual hea a nice plugin and all that with it because it is a lot more aggressive

than just the standard hand especially if you're running PCD on it and stuff like that I mean that's really what we

bought it for was for our control joints and adhesive removal where our ride on machine wouldn't fit um with the pcds

that was the selling point to be honest um just that that aspect of it I mean

it's got a lot of different uses but that was our main purpose for purchasing them right and since we're on the the

wolf train right now we can talk about like their their other tools their hand tools that we use for vinyl since we're

resilient guys by trade so they have their Lino cut and their green cut I

mean that Leno cut is amazing it cuts down the time on that you would unders

cribe tremendously and the the cut is just so clean once you get it set up the

rail Cuts become very popular too yeah I was uh they tried to talk me into buying

one of those Cory tries to talk me and buy one of those every time I see him probably every

time I can't believe you don't own one yet well I'm to give my my my brother

Danny give me one of the oh yeah they say that uh Paul and Danny look like

brothers hey I have an question for you guys um right now I'm I'm the the let's

just go for tools is are tool sales uh greater on the commercial side right now

or the residential side um the reason I'm asking is like I know that it's going to be uh based off of your area

it's regional but like who's busier right now uh in your area residential or

commercial commercial is definitely busier right now um residential kind of

slowed down we do see it coming back a little bit um and as far as who's buying

it's kind of a it's a different mix um just because they're not buying the same tools I mean

commercial obviously they're more expensive tools you're talking the Neo grinder things like that residential you

know with lvp and everything uh 100 pound rollers all of a sudden started

flying off the shelves um you know lvp Cutters things like

that but with commercial it's all about floor prep right now yeah we we see the same thing up

here so we have a little bit of a unique uh perspective so Kevin is our branch manager in in Greater De moin Land Dylan

and I are up here in Minneapolis but you we service the Upper Midwest in Six States so depending on which location

you were to pose that question to you know depending on the month you may get a different

answer but but I think what Kevin just said as of right now that kind of holds true uh throughout our entire footprint

right now interesting as far as the lvp Cutters you see guys actually like

buying them and loving them or I think that's like you either love it or you hate

it that's kind of one of the tools uh they look at it as a necess

necessity um so they're they really don't give you opinion whether they love it or they hate it they just need

it well if you're doing click you almost have to have it you can get away with if

you're doing glue down um a lot of guys will still just you know we're in

commercial if you got a good eye and just a small square you can score and snap a heck of a lot faster than lineing

it up on a piece of equipment and cutting it so I think it depends on which floor from our crews standpoint

Which floor they uh they're doing if they're doing a you know a solid core or

a a floating floor they'll typically want a de cutter or something but if it

comes down to you know 2 and a half uh mil millimet uh glue down even 5 mm glue

down they're gonna they're gonna score and snap it unless you got to make a Precision

cut out in the field or something then you the choice again but the key guys uh

to the audience is uh follow follow the lead and and invest in yourself in tools

uh give the floor tool store some love love the QR code still up you're going to get 15% off of uh any order between

now and Friday and uh yeah take advantage of

that Mr Daniel and Jose or you guys got anything else to say this gonna be a

shorter episode you can only talk about how awesome tools are for so long uh

without getting into specific tools but yeah it's starting to get the itch I'm G to have to go swing by Home Depot out

here in Georgia just at some tools just it dude and do what your brother does

just order online just order something you

know I I do have a question um uh being the size that you guys are do you guys

offer maintenance on some of the equipment that's purchased through you guys or is that something you prefer to go through the

manufacturer so website we wouldn't unless you can get to us but we do have

a repair center at our headquarters that anybody if they can get it back to us if

we sold it to you we we have a guy that's trained and he's trained on all the wolf products you know National

Equipment stuff we're getting into the Bartell guys now he'll be getting trained on that so he he is trained to

repair pretty much anything it's one of those where he'll he'll take a quick look at it if he

feels comfortable and can diagnose it quickly and the answer is yes um if he's not comfortable over something over his

head then we would kick it back to the manufacturer to rely upon their big picture warranty I

believe yep gotcha we just where would they

take it depends on the product like you know W if that would go back out to Denver you know it all depends your

guys's headquarters is in Minneapolis yeah so any of our locations

we can ship it back from or they could ship it into us you know UPS however they need to get it here yep but I mean

we he fixed staple guns to Wolf mambos the national Commander machines I mean

it's array of tools that come in that he takes care of not the ryons though

right ryons no um ship

that right yeah we that's uh that's that's manufacturer there for the most

part do you guys sell batteries for the Rons perhaps yes not on the website

there's none on there but our locations we do

sweet all right guys well I want to thank everybody for joining us thank you Justin Dylan and Kevin for jumping on

and chatting a bit about your uh website the floor tool store and uh offering

this great discount for everybody it was cool just hanging out chatting about tools um if there's anything else that

we need to know right now before we end let us know we're all about the tools man we're about to take advantage of

this uh this discount I know that I GNA say well someone someone in the uh

audience should buy one of those NEOS alongside me because I'm I'm definitely

gonna get one of them so it's best tool you Al you won't regret it awesome all right everybody

well thank you for joining us today uh audience I know it's a shorter episode

but hopefully you take advantage of the discounts and remember that uh you know

the floor cloud is not just commercial it is residential it help you out a lot on either uh site but man on Commercial

sites it's really a can be a big game changer um just to drive home the point

one uh one more point on the moisture testing is when you are doing the uh

moisture testing the Wagner meter um that is maybe one of the

biggest timesavers because you have to go back and and and read it after you

set the test after you set the probe and when you can do that remotely that's a huge timesaver so if you're in the

commercial World um you won't probably find a more timesaving tool than that so

shout out to the four Cloud Brothers uh Scott and Patrick and

uh Justin get on the get on the floor floor tool store and buy those pries

brother that that's definitely one of the must haves for everyone in the industry is get yourself a good pair of

knee pads because you only got so many miles on your knees man yeah don't don't be like us don't be like us when we

first started and just be like no I don't need any knee pads trust me too

tough to wear knee pad I do buy a $50 pair of knee pads every three months

yeah it's an investment invest I'm the guy that didn't wear knee pads and I'm I'm 48 probably 15 years removed from

daily install and I still have ugly ass knees from it so get yourself some Pro

knes boys you'll look better in shorts 100% you'll save your knes for

later we bought uh every installer in the company new Pro last uh last

Christmas gave them all a new pair for for Christmas so we're big big Believers in that

too nice 100% all right boys well thanks everybody for joining and uh if you guys

ever want to come on and and uh and chat with us uh join the Huddle if you guys

like what you um the content the deals just the information we bring to you

please give us a like And subscribe or comment give us a thumbs up thumbs down we don't really care just interact with

us let us know what we're doing right and what you would like to see more of uh thank you to the audience and thank

you to our guests for the day we'll catch you guys next week appreciate it guys thanks everyone yeah