Choosing an Atlanta Painter can be a daunting and frustrating chore. With the high volume of Atlanta painting companies, all claiming to be the best, how do select a reputable one?
Before I started GreenWave Solutions, I worked as an independent contractor for several of Atlanta’s larger paint contracting companies. I will not name these companies because disparaging your competition is not a positive way to do business. While I worked with these Atlanta paint contractors, I witnessed practices that weren’t just bad business practices, but completely unethical.
One company, which had been in business for fewer than 2 years, would train its estimators to tell perspective clients they had been in business for 7. I wasn’t sure if there is any way to verify how long a company was in business, but either way it is wrong.
Several large paint contractors in Atlanta offer a 5-year warranty. None of these companies have been it business for five years, however. The warranty was seemed wide open and to good to be true. I asked one of the owners what was going to happen in 4 years when warranty work became relevant, how he was going to service all of the warranty work. His response was, “You don’t. You close down the business and open up another company with a different name.” I was stunned. I didn’t work with either of these companies much longer after this.
Another contractor that I worked with was a master of deception. He spends outrageous amounts of money every month for search engine optimization(SEO). SEO is getting your website to appear as high as possible on Google, Yahoo, etc. He spends more money a month on SEO than he does on paint. He has no knowledge of paint and simply collects leads from his internet marketing campaign. I have to compliment his SEO because he is consistantly the 1st or 2nd result 0n all “Atlanta, Alpharetta, Roswell painter or painting” keyword searches. This company doesn’t even carry insurance for his company. He requires his subs or estimators to carry general liability for themselves. When customers ask for Workers’ Comp, he has some rhetoric about how workers’ comp is not really important for residential work. I worked with him for nearly two months and I don’t think he saw one job that his company completed.
Other painters do things like tell the customer that they are getting Duration ($40/gallon) and really use A-100 ($16/gallon).
Here are a few steps you can take to protect yourself from “shady” paint contractors:
1. Get a copy of their insurance certificate. They should have General Liability and Workers’ Comp. Call and make sure that the policies are real and up to date. Many guys forge these documents.
2. Don’t assume that positive reviews and testimonials are real. If you use Kudzu.com or read Google reviews, read several reviews and look to see if there is very similar verbage in many reviews. If you hire a search SEO company to help your website rank in the search engines, they actually will go to Google, Kudzu, Yahoo, etc. and write fake reviews about how great a contractor is. Look at the reviewer and how many reviews they have written. Most of them have 1 review only for that company.
3. Ask specifically what coatings are going to be used on your project. If you are unsure that they are using the products they say, ask to see invoices from the paint store.
4. Don’t be shy to ask for references. Remember that references can be faked.
5. Ask the contractor how/where they were trained on paint coatings and the application of these coatings.
6. Trust your instints. If you have an uneasy feeling about any part of the estimating process, listen to your gut and get another estimate.
7. Call GreenWave Solutions. We are proud of our crews, estimators, and work. We are honest, hard working, and strive to provide Atlanta with a “white-collar” painting contractor.