The Huddle - Episode 121 - NAFCT Event 10/2024

In this special episode of The Huddle, Daniel goes live from the NAFCT Heat Weld & Flash Cove event, while Jose and Paul join in remotely to experience the latest techniques, education, and hands-on demonstrations from afar. They’re also joined by special guest Sonny Callaham to dive deeper into the insights from the event and discuss the future of heat welding and flash cove installation. Whether you're new to these skills or a seasoned installer, this episode is filled with valuable takeaways!

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!

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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 welcome back to the Huddle where you we Playbook get

everything in your flooring career on the right path for you newcomers welcome

to the team for everybody else welcome back with

me this week and usually is Mr Daniel and Jose Gonzalez preferred flooring out

of grand rap it's Michigan also with us today is Mr Sunny

callaham hello hello we are on site for a sheet vinyl training I think it's heat

welding training I'm gonna let the guys talk a little bit more about that but uh it's an exciting day anytime you can

kind of Deep dive into training talk about the the um well obviously probably

end up talking about how this impacts our industry So Daniel Jose sunny how's

it going my man good Jose watching Daniel

work about time this dude's been out in the field

working for the last uh several weeks so you should be in good practice

Daniel uh I only did one Flash Cove job between uh I don't know it's probably

been a couple years and then I did one job and then came over here but everyone says that it looks like I know what I'm

doing so I should be fine I think one time you learned a lot yeah

just don't shake yourself no we've got a great group of guys here man uh a lot of learning going

on uh there's a couple pretty experienced guys here so that's uh that's great that way uh because I'm not

only here to teach some of these guys man if some of these guys know something that I don't I'm here to learn too and

that's what we constantly preach right it's not all about um me or us giving our knowledge away it's all about us

learning as much as we can at the same time so I'm learning here at the same time as these these guys are learning so

it's been a great time um we're actually working onto the The Flash C portion right now and uh they're they're cutting

out some some of the vinyl we just got over the the pattern scribing on the

flash Co so a wealth of of knowledge going on over here that's awesome you

know I've heard it said that if you really want to learn something teach it like driving at home that's probably

just as true in flooring as it is teaching other items you know you get down and you start teaching someone you

you almost learn little tricks yourself and teach yourself little things maybe pick something up from another guy I

think that's what's pretty awesome about our industry um is that that knowledge is

it's out there if anybody anybody on this podcast wants to get trained there

are so many people that want to pass on their knowledge and teach um I think

it's uh you know pretty special part of our industry in general and and they ask

me you know why I do this right they're like why why are you here teaching and and the answer is I'm not trying to get

Keep information like the previous generations have it's like I'm only going to be here for so long I need to

start getting some of this knowledge out of my head if I don't get it out of my head and pass on to the next person then

I really didn't do the industry a favor yeah it's one of the more honorable things you can do as an installer is

teach other people any skilled trade really I mean we're talking about flooring obviously but uh any skilled

trade I believe passing on that knowledge that's how our that's how we got where we were when installation was

really good is that we had kind of an apprenticeship uh atmosphere in flooring

and gaining that back a little bit and and getting the knowledge from guys like you and others in the industry to share

it is uh pretty special I want to uh I've got to jump off here early so I'm

gonna let Jose Daniel and sunny run the the rest of the podcast I want to come

on and thank everybody if you're catching us on any of our socials please you know comment like subscribe to us if

you catch us on YouTube later and for our live audience I I think you're in for a special treats today just kind of

getting a um inside view of of what a training um in our industry looks like

this is very specific and kind of an advanced training but um it's pretty special so I want to thank everybody for

being here sorry that I cannot uh stay the entire podcast but everybody enjoy

and uh yeah fellas you guys gonna take it from here I appreciate you guys all right Paul thanks foring on for a little

bit thanks guys all right gentlemen so so walk us through a little bit of of what we can expect today during today's

episode with uh Paul jumping off and and Daniel kind of playing both sides doing

the instructing and the podcast same time so so right now I think the the big

goal is to just give people an Insight on what happens in these trainings and how um how they run right because not

everyone actually goes to these trainings because they think something can't be learned

and we just need to get over that right away because uh I'm learning here people

that are have uh 15 20 years of experience are learning over here U one of the things that that I went over was

um the quick fix on how to uh get an inside and outside corner to look good

before your vinyl goes on because none of these jobs are perfect and people just looked at each other and

one of the guys was like that right there is worth this this class like just learning that one tidbit of information

that small idiosyncrasy that someone learns it's worth it right because we can all learn can all learn yeah 100% I

know what you're talking about already D and and yeah you're right I remember the first time that that was presented to us

and we were like what the is that easy huh something so simple that easy something that you wouldn't even think

about but then once you see it it's like that would have been the best thing to know you know 10 years ago when when I

was on this project that was that was from a a roofing aspect right from a roofing um the roofing section in a

store they asked me where I learned it and I was like man I don't even remember all I know is that we've been we put it

in practice right away and been using it ever since it was from a roofing guy wow

very nice yeah I'm looking at the comment here where Rollins said teaching make me happy couldn't agree more

couldn't agree more and you know he's probably like me you know I like doing it for selfish reasons because it makes

me feel good right I love passing along information that that I have stored in

this melan of mine that you know if I don't give it away Jer if I don't give it away now then you know who's gonna

have it right so I'm gonna just going to walk over here I'm going to switch my camera around so you guys can see get a

glimpse of what's kind of going on in the background as soon as I figure out how to do it we'll let you do your thing

and then we'll let Sunny uh kind of paint a picture of what led us to to this moment right here that sound fair

yeah works for me so we've got everyone over here um we

like I said we just went over the pattern scribing so he's over here cutting his

his piece out um showing everyone how he does

it and this this training facility is amazing man it's like look how we've got

all this room over here some tables out here if we need to over um Sunny's

actually sitting in the the presentation room where I mean we go in there and we have lunch he gives his lunch and learn

type of of stuff going on yeah we're here at America's Floor

Source in Columbus Ohio and uh honestly I've never seen another place like this

it's beautiful over here man they're so committed to we got all of our stations set up um this station right here with

all the tools is the one that we kind of congregate at and this is where um we do

the demonstrations hey this is how we do this and then they move on to okay we

learned how to do it let's go do it we have some practice welds going on over here with some circles a bunch of uh

straight lines and it's just the amount of progression in this little area from

starting on the first seam and then you get comfortable with with a straight

seam and then you start doing circles and just the quality from the first one to the last one is amazing and just that

I mean we probably this was just this morning I mean it was probably the first couple hours and people are already way

more comfortable than than when they started yesterday that's good get hands on get a

little bit more comfortable that uh and that's where being able to set yourself apart

by going to a class like this and you should be wanting to make a mistake here in front of in front of your peers right

you you want to absolutely and and I told Lear yeah that's the whole goal for for trainings like this I'm not here

telling everyone that they have to be 100% perfect on everything I said this is where you want to make a mistake I

don't want you to make a mistake on a job site I'm trying to hey let's make the mistake here let's learn how to fix

it so that way when you're out in the field you're not in a in a panic right and that's the thing like like Sunny

said earlier too it's like I'm gonna give you my number call me whenever you have any

questions that's right you want to learn something new you want to try something new this is the time to do it we we one

of the one of the more talented guys who were there is a really good installer he was trying a new tool and guess what

that last inch it went off a little bit it's like he never used that tool before now and I'm trying to talk into right

now and just make it's still one of the best tools to use yeah and then we we actually have uh Winkleman Don winlan

here from Winkleman sales um they I I tell everyone over here they take a

bunch of our money throughout the years so definitely make sure you give them a visit Donna is is going to do some

demonstrations for us um he's going to be taking off tomorrow afternoon so first thing in the morning we're going to come here and we're going to do some

demonstrations on some of his tools that way uh guys can the the biggest thing is getting using a tool now so that way you

know if you want to purchase it and use it fulltime right it's the best time

when you don't have to pay for it but you can still use that tool yeah you can listen to everybody

until you're blue in the face saying what one they like the best but you know the best tool for you is the one that

you perform the best with the one you're comfortable with um but this is a great opportunity to see some other hand tools

at work so that way you can find find out if you're comfortable or see if you like the outcome right that's that's exactly what

we were saying that everybody's got their way to do it you know and this is the time to try new things and see what

works better you make you're going to pick up something that uh Daniel does that some of the other guys they don't

do and it's going to make your bet make you better right that's what we're all here for right and I mean and I and I

told them the guys right and it's all these are our our personal tools that we use on a a daily basis on job sites and

the these guys are taking great care of them I'm really happy with uh the turnout that we have here oh yeah we we

have some tools out there today don't we this week oh yeah I mean this right here is a every that's all the stuff that I

brought say we do we we have a good mix in the class though we've got uh folks

who had never done it before we one guy this is first week we have three at

least three guys who do this for a living and they're super talented um we have some manufacturer reps we

have Don Winkleman with the tools I mean it's just a good mix that we can have these conversations about how do you do

this why do you do it that way and everyone seems to be picking up on

it that's awesome you know and when you guys are problem solving and or troubleshooting or explaining and

there's that many people there that are either for one showing a bunch of Interest or to have the experience I'd

just love to be a fly on the wall just to listen to the feedback that everybody is getting from all different facets

like someone who's been doing for 15 years versus 10 versus five and just to see the information and teachings

bouncing off one another and everyone having an aha moment I know we've said that a lot of times too but I just I

love listening to the way everyone interprets the training and the process

and and that's where the learning comes in yeah and and it's great when we get to see those aha moments but there's

even more of those aha moments that people don't communicate right they Clicks in their brain we don't even know

about that's what makes it so great when you're doing training like this because you know they're they're taking it

in 100% The Quiet One are the ones that having the everything's going click click click click oh man I want to say

this but I don't want to sound dumb hey there is sound dumb right now yeah there

is none this the time when you when you get it out because it might it might just make someone's uh final

installation one day right that well that's the thing it's if you have a question in your head that means more

than likely someone else in the class has that same question so no one's asking it no one's getting the answers

that they need and uh I told one of the gentlemen yesterday I said uh I would

say that there's no dumb question but there's absolutely some dumb questions but if you have that dumb question get

it out of your head now because we need those questions answered regardless no for sure for sure it's only classified

as a dumb question if the answer has already been given three times in three

ways no um there there's been plenty of questions here and I we try to do our

our best to to answer them and what I like best about um this group of guys is you know you you do have that range in

there and if if I'm giving an answer I'm like this is the way that we do it hey guys how do you do it that way you know

gives people options and then gives you um a way to to get your own way to it

hey I kind of want to combine these two and that's what needs to be done sometimes because like some of these

guys are like hey I want to do it the way that you do it well I was like how how how do you guys do it and they're like this way and I'm like all right it

doesn't matter which way you do it because um and I explained it in terms of you and I I say it's a we learned

together you know you started you then you taught me and then what I did was I took it and I was like all right I'm going to start doing it this way and I

said but the the main thing is is that what what's going to end upen happening is we're going to if you were in a a

room over here and I was in a room over here we would do it completely different but that end result would be almost the

exact same like you wouldn't be able to differentiate who did what room and that's really the goal right I don't

care how you do it just get it done and make it look the best that you can and

what I've been really driving home with these guys is is that it's it doesn't matter about anything other than what

the the client or end user thinks and we're trying to give them the best product that we can I think well not to mention that

every job is going to be different right you may have to use a different method to get something done and more tools you

have in your tool belt the better it's gonna go and that's why we're focusing on pattern scribing right now um there

was some newer gentleman that didn't know how to pattern scribe flatlay and that's not that wasn't going to be one

of the focuses that I wanted it to do but it's one of the focuses that we had to do in order to teach these guys the

right way to do things sometimes you you know you you get thrown a curveball and you just roll with it it's okay you guys

don't know how to do this this is what we're going to focus on today so that way later on when we're working on the

the stuff that's even harder to pattern scribe you already have an idea of what's going on well not only does it

help the people who need to learn it a little bit but it's also a quick refresher course for some of the other gentlemen who who might not have done it

in a while um I mean some of those guys you said they do it every day right so that's probably like right on their mind

but that's a great opportunity for them to chime in and give some advice and some pointers during that process too

and there you know there we like he Sunny was saying we have some manufacturer reps here that are are

taking the class and they have done they have done you know some resilient over

the years and then you get into that role and it's like sometimes you do you end up getting a little rusty or you

just want to come to the training and say hey what is the new stuff that's going on right now what is it that I

don't know and it's awesome to see these these guys here doing that and

being open to um not only new tools but new techniques and that's what it's all

about it's all about constantly learning I everyone here knows that they don't know everything and that's been made

clear by myself and and even all the other guys that have experience the best kind of class

whenever there's some great guys how many how many attendees you get for this class total 14 14 14 oh so a pretty big

pretty big uh classroom then with all their on and yeah so and one other group that we failed to mention is we have a

couple of salespeople one that's taking a class and multiple that pop in and out during the week so they can understand

what they need to do when they're bidding these jobs they go out to a job what they can talk to their customer

customer about managing their expectations I think it's great it's just it's it's really a testament to how

Jason does things here at America's world yeah and I was talking to one of the salesmen right he was like he's down

there working in the box and then uh you know we go to lunch and he was like dude this I had no idea this much went into

something that I thought was so simple it's it's a lot simpler on paper

than it is when you're getting down to the nitty-gritty um especially when you're having to flash cove at hospitals

with fixtures already hanging off the walls and you know it's a renovation and they're not moving anything anymore and

you got to start doing the belly method like upside down and that's where the pattern

scrib is going to come and and help out but there are still some instances where you are in the most awkward most

uncomfortable positions uh to get that done and where doing installer of the

year we have pictures of me laying on my belly and we just say that that's the The Flash

Coan stance right that's that's what we do crystal as well

system I have a I have a picture of my camera roll of her laying I mean spread out like

Superman excuse me that's hilarious there's sometimes there's no other alternative sometimes you just got to

figure it out but if you look at this group right now through Daniel's phone look at them all they're all engaged they're all

committed they all want to see what's going on and it's just just a great class now who else is instructing there

with you Daniel so that young man in the box works here um his name is Chris he works

for America's Floor Source and he's got some crazy hand skills he knows what

he's talking about he's been a great um helper for the uh for Daniel to teach

this class because he certainly knows what he's doing and he's teaching it the right way I see he knows how to do that

Flor guy Shuffle yeah the Flor guy Shuffle yeah yeah

yeah no he he definitely um we we've talked a few times and I was like hey um

when I was at a certification one time uh it was you know with

uh William thoron and he looked at me and just the knowledge that I had and he

was like you know what you're not going to take this class you're going to help me and uh we kind of needed some help

and I asked him and he was like yeah man I'm I'll help you with whatever you need and he's been doing a great job he has

different techniques than than we do and uh like I said I'm learning at the same time he's teaching me um just as much as

I'm hopefully teaching him yeah you talk about people with a lot of knowledge William Thorton is one and he's more

than willing to share it with you but when you talk about old school that man is old school so I've only I've only had

the pleasure of talking to him on the phone a couple times here and there about some some projects I never really

talked to him in person or or had the pleasure of working with him but great he did uh he did uh men Daniel's name a

lot and we we did a little bit of Daniel bashing hilarious Good Humor of course more more about how tall he was

but then anything else but hey look we don't talk about how tall people are around here all right tell them you know

what as long as that stack of Milwaukee isn't taller than you we're good that is probably is taller than me I cannot I

cannot confirm or deny that [Laughter]

statement so Mr Sunny what what's what what led to to this where we're at right now what what part of um the industry

struck you as this there was a hole um in the the industry needed to be filled and this is where you're at now I know

that we could go down a long road and there's a lot of different ways but I just want to know like C you know from

from installer to installer what led to this point right here and you could take your time or

shorten it up I know that's putting you on the spot but I apologize that we Paul

and I realized this before we even started in afct as a nonprofit um we saw

the shortage of people who knew how to do it quite frankly that that's what it was you know we were finding in the

larger markets there were people who would just go around and do the flash cove and heat well that's all they would

do because the the new people coming into the industry just didn't know how to do it and like anything else we just

didn't want that that art to die right we wanted to make sure that the Next Generation knew how to do it uh we did

the first class Daniel and and Mike pigeon taught the class it was in February of 2020 so what happened in

March of 2020 we all shut down so we weren't able to do it remember do it again there pretty quick but what it did

allow us to do was go through the class and make it even better now that we had done it one time you know we picked it

apart we all put her input in and we made it better and here we are

now gotcha and then so is there um I mean I kind of know some of the answers

to this but for people watching is there a progression that is expected in order to be able to take the training portion

or certification portion because it's my understanding that this is not only just a training but a certification right but

it's based around certifying individuals who have some prior experience but it's still open to others who want the

training portion as well the education portion of it well that's what makes it it's so great with the folks that we

have here because the first three days are training right we're showing people how to do it the last two days are the

people who have been doing it for years and they want to show off their skills and get certified right so the first

three days has literally taken people who haven't done it before or done very limited number of of flash code jobs and

teach them how to do it will they all necessarily be certified at the end of the week probably not but it's it's

training and certification mixed into one and we have some just coming for 3 days we have some that are just coming

for the certification it just depends on what level you are in your

experience but of 14 hopefully the turnout's pretty good man I never never

go to a class hoping that uh you know oh hopefully I'm the only one that passes no way always go take a take one of

those classes and hopefully everyone you know what hits their goal let's think about our classes not everybody passes

some people get mad about that but if everyone passed then we're not doing it right right yeah you have to make it

challenging right and that's right it's got to be challenging everyone can write a piece of paper that says you're

certified but if you don't know what you're doing that certification doesn't mean anything right essentially you're

putting your stamp on on these individuals that passed at the end of the the course and if someone's gonna

carry around your brand you want to make sure that they're carrying it around that's right in the manner in which you

uh we intended created the class yeah and intended correct yeah so we have eight folks that are going to stay for

the certification um out of the 14 so that that's a good turnout we'll get them

certified and have them go through the process and hopefully they'll be certified I should say no I think the guys that are going

to stay have a have a great chance they've been asking the right questions um they've been you know when something

doesn't look right hey can you come and look at this what should I do here and that's the biggest thing is that I like

to have my trainings be as real world as POS possible and I said I'm not in here looking for Perfection I don't want you

to go in here and be like this is a oneand done this this is we're we're

learning ask the questions I want this to be like all right I'm on a job site

um I just messed this up what am I going to do to fix this and have it pass for

the client that's really what we're looking for like if if you mess something up let's talk about it let's

go over our options um real world scenarios well that's why Paul and I

built the assemblies there's nothing Square on those things so they got to really work

around you guys tried your hardest and still failed and that's what we needed that's right we need a certification

course on how to build assemblies well you like he said real world problems right you can't you can't

have a perfectly square one and even if you guys did make it perfectly Square chances are that by the time you're ready to use it you know the the wood

products are going to warp and move and it won't be square anymore anyway that's right

they have these uh America Flor Source buckets that I'm trying to to get my hands on because they're super

sweet so I um another question for for you guys is uh through the certification

process are there is there anything that that you guys are learning that that can be adopted into the next class do you

guys feel that there are some items that the students offer that are very educational informational that that

could be incorporated into future trainings I know this is only a couple trainings in but yeah I mean we're we're

learning just as much as they are I mean we're going to take all these things that we hear and the questions that we ask and we'll incorporate it I'm sure

Daniel's ran into a lot of things is like yeah you know what I need to cover that more same with the PowerPoint same

with what we're doing for the lunch and learns just what what else can we do to make it better because you know we can

always get better just in flooring and then our training and everything else and when we got here this morning too

right that the guys are like are we going to go in the and do another presentation or anything I said no sir

I'm uh I'm mostly hands on like you got the introduction we talked about the things that we were going to work on out

here and with the the tools that we were going to work on and what we kind of expect now it's mostly handson and the

biggest thing like I said earlier is um knowing where our skill levels are at

and that's what I kind of started with um first thing yesterday morning I'm like this is who I am this is um you

know kind of my credentials and and how long I've been doing things I want to go around the room so I can gauge what

we're working with and that's kind of when I knew we were going to have to add

a little bit more than we thought we were but that's the versatility of this class is if there's people that don't

know what they're doing we're going to make sure that they know what they're doing before we send them out of here um whether they they pass or fail the

certification that that's irrelevant because they're going to get out of here knowing more than when they came yep

that's awesome and then uh you had mentioned that some of the sales team that that are popping in and out now are

they just popping in and out um sporadically or do you have any is there

any literature or any kind of guidelines that you have that is specifically Geared for them um as far as information

or or questions they might have or is they just popping in absorbing at what

point you guys are are are at the the class I think we have we have two taking the class right I know at least one here

full time I think there's two actually taking it Monday through you know Monday through Wednesday the others are just

kind of coming in and watching Daniel uh when he's doing his thing to kind of just pick up a tip here and there

because you know we can't have all the sales people in there right right got Somebody's gotta be selling something

that's right the guys that are in here you know um one of them is doing everything the other one is in here just

taking it all in because he does have some knee problems and um he said that

he was in the military he's got some knee problems he's like man if I get down on my knees I'm going to be on walking with a cane for the for a few

weeks and that's just not something that I'm trying to do and I was like I totally get that man but that he he's

been walking around he's been asking questions um the Gent yeah the gentleman

that's actually doing it um he brought his computer this morning because I mean we all know how you can get behind

really quick so he brought his computer in he was working and then once he was was got to a point where he felt he was

comfortable he was like all right I'm going to get down here and start welding some stuff now and that that's the one

that you know he was like I can't believe how much actually goes into just something that's in this little box um

now I know that when I'm selling these jobs how much labor actually goes into I

mean you're you're looking at you know a surgery room as opposed to this little box and this little box is taking you

this long to well you know 12 feet yeah I mean there's a there's a lot

of um there's a lot of different parts and pieces when it comes into getting the from start to finish on an

installation of flash Co um now from you're looking from the sales side you got to get all the components um and and

then from the installation side is you got to have all the techniques and the proper tooling the tooling is huge right

because we we came in here with all the tooling and one of the the guys was saying earlier too he was like yeah they

they don't understand how much these things actually cost and when you're only want to pay x amount for heat

welding and then he he looked at the table he was like just look at your tools there's like 20 $30,000 there and

these are the things that we have to invest in and I said yeah but you have to realize that it took a long time to

get that 20 to $30,000 worth of heat welding equipment and it didn't just

happen overnight and that's where why we have um all the tools and I tell the guys you know you can start with this

entry level stuff and work your way up just like anything else yeah it's one of

those things where you can't invest your the most money in the top dollar in something that you don't know is going

to take off for you or not um I mean you may not like that tool you may want a different tool yeah that's the biggest

thing about these trainings and having Don here using Don's tools um I come

here using my tools hey I've never used this tool before I've only heard about it this is your chance man start getting

the hang of it that's right um we got fr's new Grover here we got turbo tools

um was generous and gave us a bunch of stuff on the last class we we're using all that stuff today um we talk about

Leo one of the the manufacturer reps here was like yeah he goes over to Leo's shop and just talks to him all the time

and I'm like yeah Leo's got some great stuff man we've been using all his stuff for years and we'll never stop using

them yep I got to shake that man's hand in it doesn't mean that that's the only

tool out there that you can use um like Crane's new

groover like I I got to get a hold of Darwin because a lot of these guys here are like I love this groover and I'm

like I got just gotta let Darwin know hey man people love your groover keep on selling

it CL this this three-day class could easily be five days because it's all

about repetition it's trying the new tools what works for you what doesn't work for you um but I mean it's like

anything in life the way you get better is just keep doing it over over and and I was talking to Chris earlier and he's

he's just looking at the boxes and he was like man this is a lot to cover in five days you can like you said I said I

know and you really don't think about it in those terms because you're you're so proficient at it but to teach someone

from zero how to be Prof like somewhat proficient at it in five days is a challenge and these

guys are are up to that challenge though and they're doing a great job I can't wait to see what some of these test boots look

like yeah I'm very curious on that are you gonna are you gonna take pictures and document the process to to share

later on oh yeah I'm pretty sure everything is going to be up on ncts uh social medias and stuff like that not

too long after everything is done that's right that's good one day

you know mess something up that you'll learn real quick oh real fast like the last certification we did when we were

down in Georgia and Andy was like hey are we gonna go over repairs and I was like oh there's going to be stuff to

repair don't worry we have plenty to go over you know what I will I will say

that I will say that the the reason that that I think that that we got really good at um resilient and shine and

Welding was the amount of repairs that we came in behind installers and and ourselves to do learning how to

deconstruct reconstruct and try to put it back together that's that made us

better um at in the resilient field and only because we learned what we learned

how to mitigate that right by deconstructing some of the the failures from from ourselves and other installers

and also um we had to get better at hand skills and hand techniques and and other

outside the box thinking to um I say hide mistakes right but let's just say

mask make it look like it was an intentional design I had a great moment out here

with one of the guys e the first three inches of his seam was just completely

burnt so I'm looking at him he's down there and he starts a little bit past it

I I pointed to I said what happened there he goes well I'm having trouble with getting it in here and and starting

with it you know without burning it and sure enough he asked somebody else they came over and helped them and he figured

it out you know he screwed it up he asked the question how to fix it and I haven't seen him do it ever again right

everything else has been great and there that's you know it's those Comfort

things too like you're if you're afraid to burn yourself you're afraid to cut yourself you're afraid to do a lot of

things you're gonna you're G to be a little apprehensive on trying new techniques that's right um and I think

after a while you you become so used to the motions that become second nature

like you know the heat gun's GNA or the the welder is going to be there for a second if you can bear the heat for one

second you get there and start it against the wall with no you know instead of starting away from the wall getting that Cur like anything it is

muscle memory you learn what different uh welds and materials you're able to

manipulate before you stick it in the gun uh to go ahead and get started um you learn a lot of dos and don'ts the

the more you work with certain materials and I think that's that's where Daniels had the luxury and where

it comes in handy where he's been able to work with many many different manufacturers over and over again to

learn little shortcuts for himself here and there but then also uh meeting like

Mike pigeon and taking other classes with other people and and adopting some of their techniques and their their

information to make him a better installer as well like that's that's where you learn a lot that's where those

moments come into play yeah what one of the things they had to do today was was do a circle heat weld a circle and and

Daniel was just awesome with it he said look you're gonna burn yourself get that mindset out of the way you are gonna

burn yourself but this is what we're gonna do and you know what everyone was able to do it so yeah as long as you're

prepared I guess is this is going to hurt a little bit guys like right here this part right here you might as well

kiss it gone or you know or put some tape around it if you have just to to bear that heat a little bit more but

doing enough times you'll be okay with it yeah yeah you develop a little bit of a callous so it it's good times and I

miss uh I I miss getting down to the nitty greeny being being able to do that

fulltime um some people are like oh I don't want to be on the floor my whole life like you're right you don't right

your body can't withstand that type of abuse but at the same time it's if you learn how to do something efficient

proficient when it's your turn to teach and it's your turn to look at it from a sales perspective there's a lot of parts

that you won't miss that somebody else will and you can appreciate from start to finish the sales part and the

installation part yeah and when we get to meet those people all the time that

you know they're not going to install forever right I'll give you the perfect example Andy McWilliams we met at an

nfic event with PJ um and the day I met him I knew you know

what you're going to be a manufacturer's rep and you're going to do training and we made it happen right and he's one of

the best that's out there right now but you can just tell that people want to

share the information some people don't but the people who want to share the information and their passionate about

flooring they can make a difference right that's all we're trying to do and you talk about hand skills you know what

I what I tell people is you know I kind of liken myself to Bobby Cox right Bobby

Cox was not a great baseball player but he was a really good coach and I'm kind

of the same way I'm not going to get down on the floor and out install many people right my skills were average at

best right but I can teach anybody on how how to install the floor right I can

read a book you know but I still have experience behind it to teach people how to install the floor and when you enjoy

that there's nothing better there's nothing better well that goes to the the

point where um you know somebody had uh you could take this for what it what it is uh those who can't do teach right

yeah get the time I don't think that that's the case at all it's um you

know sometimes you can understand something from a scientific perspective you can understand it from uh start to

finish on the process but your your skill set that's required Hands-On just

can't achieve that level right but you can definitely explain it to someone who has better hand skills um and that's the

coaching perspective is someone might have the someone's abilities will supersede yours but they

might not have the the ability to absorb the the knowledge um the way you do and

if you can somehow click uh and find that common ground to help their ability

match your your knowledge man that's teaching just watching someone learn something that that you can never take

away from them and achieve it and then at a higher level than what they've done before that's that's one of those

fantastic things that you can't you walk away and you smile when when you do it for selfish reasons it makes you feel

good yeah well I tell you one one example of that and and by the way I just noticed where I can see people

chiming in so you guys have been saying hi so I I I forgive me for not answering

you but hello to everyone that's out there but I I used to wear khaki pants when I would go do demos and talking to

people I realized I couldn't do that right I had to wear jeans because there

was always that one guy in the back who would call you out and say you can't do it you can't I'd get on the floor and do

it they're like oh okay this guy knows what he's talking about he's just not a Salesman or a guy who knows nothing

about it sometimes you just got to put your money where your mouth is and that's it too and we got a couple

comments on here too um Ryman it always depends on the person you are teaching

is ready for the knowledge and you know what what I mean he's right but uh there

there's a if you if you are able to get people excited about the learning process and

help them understand that this is something that they'll take with them for the rest of their life and they can pass it on to whomever they'll be

excited they'll be ready to learn yeah even Sunny lunch and learns that we've been going you know we're eating lunch

and um he's going over presentations that he has and like I'm learning stuff

over here from Sunny to even today he was talking about adhesives like it's things that you

don't even realize that the the science behind everything and that's what I'm always going to push right there's still

salesmen that are like no our project managers handle all the science behind everything and they don't need to know

the installers don't need to know about this which is it sounds good in theory

but we're your last the installer is your last line of defense on that project they're the ones that are on the

ground running so if they don't know that hey this is what um what

moisture will will possibly look like this is what e florescence is you know

just simple things like that then they're not set up for Success we need

to know as installers the science um basically start to finish behind

everything in order to to have a successful project because if anything

goes wrong wrong we as installers know what do they say we are the professional

we're the professional yeah yep so it doesn't matter who sells the material at the end of the day the installer is like

Daniel said the the last line of defense right and and sometimes you're right sometimes a salesperson does they do

have an extensive knowledge of the science science behind a a product um

but their knowledge might stop at at X and you got to explain Y and Z to them

um and and that where uh working with um companies where

they're they're not as reluctant to listen to the installer right they listen to your information they take

their information they go back and and they put it together uh to make sense of everything and those are the people that

I want to work for um the the companies and individuals that understand like

Daniel said earlier they don't know everything and sometimes you do have to listen to the installer uh sometimes you

do have to listen to the salesperson put your heads together you know make sure you you are doing your best possible um

the best make sure you're doing your best that you could possibly do to for a successful installation um and that

might be being that that thorn in the sight of the the salesperson or the

installer and say hey this is what I'm seeing man what can we do to find out

what's going on here I'm just a little nervous that we're missing something okay yeah so so today we

talked about adhesives like Daniel said we talked about all the different types of chemistries the wet set PSAs modified

whatever you want call it well but yesterday we talked

standards Oh I thought so it it just amazes me when I talk to these groups of

people and I bring up ASM standards how little of them even know what they are much less be a member um you know I

always say that when when there's a problem on a job site and the manufacturer comes out be it adhesive

underlayment mitigation the flooring itself whatever you're going to be judged by one or three ASM standards on

day one the first thing they're going to look at ASM f710 1869 or 2170 which those two are

for moisture right and if you don't know what those documents are and how to make sure that you abide by those guides or

practice I should say and test method how you going to win right you're not going to win the game you're to lose

because you don't know the rules so every manufacturer is going to have that in their literature that you need to

abide by these standards and they'll spell it out for you and that's where you have to start looking hey if you're

reading manufacturers instructions you should be seeing these standards and you should be you know at least getting them

so you can start having an understanding of what they contain right every one are going to say ASM

f710 and people don't know what that is they just go okay I'll sweep the floor yeah so I wanna I want to break it down

for some individuals who who might not understand what that is that the ASM standards that that um sunny and Daniel

are talking about are pretty much the foundation in which the specifications are built on top of uh from these

manufacturers so let's just call it a starting point right like it this is a a

requirement in order for these specs um to to be properly adhere to the uh

product in which you're working with so like I it took me a while to understand that years ago once somebody broke it down to me and

said look this is the foundation of what these specs were built on if it doesn't pass this right here

this is this is your ground zero and and we we've built on top of that that's right this is you should pay attention

to this bottom line right here because that's GNA let you know yeah ASM f710

how to prepare a concrete substrate to receive resilient floring that should

tell you right there there's going to be a lot of information in there right what do you need to do

I'll let you know I was a copy paste King when it came down to some of that on a couple projects recently where they

were trying to have us go outside of that if you bid work it's going to say

in that bid packet to prepare the job site install according to asmf 710 and

you're bidding jobs and you don't even know what that means when when in reality if you come to a job site and

there's something that doesn't con uh conform for to ASM f710 you've got that

document to take back to the contract say look you're the one who told me to do it this way but now I don't have it

on the job right here's a change order this is what it's going to cost it's an advocate for the installer right it

helps back you up it's not just you saying no to somebody here's why right

and that that's what we've been through plenty of times where it's like they they're like hey just do this and you're like no in your contract you spelled it

out what I have to follow yep and that's that's when I touched um yesterday too

when I was like doing our introduction and I you know Daniel from preferred flooring this is what we do um a lot of

what we do is you know with with these standards and what you need to realize about the standards is that's the bare

minimum you should be doing there's always things that you you can do better and that's why our our slogan is setting

the standard one installation at a time it's we we take those standards and then we're like okay well what can we still

do better what what can we do that's on top of these standards that will make this last longer for that client that's

right it's all about adding long-term value Mr Churchill it's much more than

clean dry flat and sound there's a lot more to that's a starting point yeah exactly

I do know that we're getting pretty close to our time guys so if not if we've already exceeded it but yeah um

I'm GNA I just want yeah we can keep going forever but absolutely man this training and the

the feedback that we've gotten so far is um is great and I I'm loving

it no I think it's going really good man I appreciate you being here um if you

guys haven't seen Daniel install he's just phenomenal so and he's a great instructor so I appreciate you man no I

appreciate you Sunny for uh for putting this on and definitely America's Floor Source for for letting us use this

beautiful space and uh you know the the vendors that we have here that are Don

Winkleman you know he's he's got a bunch of tools here he's like use whatever you need um that's that's amazing uh and

then you know our our other vendors that are not necessarily here but we have tools here that that are from them wolf

turbo tools um crane thanks for generously you know giving stuff to us

um and and letting us use these tools not necessarily just for this class I mean I'm using them on job sites too so

thanks for that yeah we get the we get a demo tomorrow as a matter of fact for for a machine from Wolf so yeah Cory

Dickerson is gonna be on one of our job sites um demoing a their ride on demo

machine so thanks Wolf for for being able to do that if if you guys don't

know yeah if you guys don't know contact your reps there's plenty of sources out there where if you need something

they're more than happy to provide it um are they going to sell you a tool probably that's the whole goal yep

there's plenty of Technical Resources out there for manufacturers that you as an installer need to develop those

relationships that will make your life a lot easier Daniel Jose and myself I call

people all the time right to have those people on speed dial in your phone saves a lot of time and money and that's where

these associations come in to play right the cfis the FCI nact all these groups

you get to meet these technical based people for the manufacturer for the products that you use every day right

it's just it's it's Priceless and a huge shout out Sarah do you mind being on camera do you mind being on camera you

don't want she don't want to be on camera but she's been taking a great care of us these last Sarah's the goat

she's the best she is absolutely the best she's

shy but thank thanks guys I think uh we're going to end it there we're going to finish up today and uh get ready for

tomorrow over here and then I mean tomorrow like they thought the these last couple days were were something but

once you get into that flash fold welding it's a totally different know I can't wait to hear

about that well stay tuned on on social media we'll have more pictures and Det details and we'll keep you up to date

and hopefully we'll see you at the next class don't just follow the Huddle on social media follow nfct follow

America's Floor Source all these people are in the industry to to not only help

you be better but to help the industry be better as a whole so let's all be part of that progress if you guys like

what you hear let us know uh share it uh like it dislike it whatever you want

check out the other platforms um share that like it dislike it whatever

whatever floats your boat you have if you have anything else that you want to add or you want to hear something um as

far as content that we haven't covered please chime in let us know we're we're all ears but I think with with that

we're going to take off we really appreciate you guys' time Daniel thanks for taking time away from the class uh

to talk with us today and sunny you as well we really appreciate both you guys thanks for having me on I appreciate all

the support from the Huddle all right thanks guys we'll see you guys next time and we'll see you next Tuesday at 4 p.m.