Multi mats

[Kitty]

How many mats do you own?

[Jes]

Can we add a zero? I'm sure there are a few people here who are interested and learning from this board.

-Jes

[Kitty]

Jonathan add a zero to the poll, maybe interesting to see how many are seeking the biz.....It doesn't seem I can do it.....

[Anonymous]

Interesting, but as they say "liers figure, and figures lie". Not to say anyone is lying but what do these figures tell anyone. As we have heard in certain areas "THEY" don't let you have a mat bigger than say $80K gross, while in other areas there are no such thing as mats that small. So, does the person that owns three mats that gross $80K know or do something better than the person that owns only one that grosses say $400K?

If you are trying to garner insight on experience maybe you should multiply the number of washers a person owns times the number of years they have had them to get equivalent washer*years or maybe pounds of capacity by years.


The point I'm trying to make is that maybe rather than put these polls up it would be a good idea to first post a thread saying what you would like to measure and then get comments from everyone on how to construct a poll to gain those insights. Just a thought.

[Kitty]

Its unfortunate that the Polls do not get many voters. But, it does seem there are several out there that have multi mats. What do you store owners do to get a break? Things do not run smoothly 100% of the time and many times you must be on hand. Changer problems, customer situations, and many other issues can put a damper on your plans. Some add extra changers or try to foresee potential problems before the arise, however, how often are you needed to immediately do whatever is necessary and you find it necesary to put aside your plans until you handle a store issue?

Vacations and weekends, do you guys take these needed breaks and what do you do to take care of your stores in your absence.

[pete f]

Sometime I wonder why polls do not get better response. I would like to mention to all those reading this that have not responded that all polls are strickly anonymous and your answer is only known to you.

As for multi store owners, I have to assume after you get to 3 it becomes more of a full time job, you really do not have time to work for a living somewhere else. At least that is my experiance. I am on call 24/7, most days only work a couple hours, but when a problem happens if I can not solve it on the phone and it is "code red" (water, electric, alarm or changer) I drop everything and go and deal with it. Many times I deal with lessor problems, and go anyway depending on what I am doing at the time. I plan my weekends to be around, ie, within a 15 min drive of home base. This works out fine becuase the beach bars are only a 5 min bike ride from my house :) and weekdays I am more apt to go out of town or offshore fishing. I know many single store owners do something else for a living, the mat supplements, kind of like owning a rental property. But like rental property, when you get so many, it becomes the job. There are probably people who have family who help out, or close friends who will watch a store for a few days so you can take a vacation. I rely on my mother and her neighbors. I do not take to many extended vacations like I used to before I got my second, third mat. This is one of the big trade offs running your own show or working for someone else.

[Lar Hylobates]

You should check out the record setting poll, "Homeless Sympathy" if you want to see some quality votes.

[Anonymous]

Actually "Order of a thread" had the most votes at 87!

[Rondo]

What's up? I can't vote, It's only showing the results.

I did own 3, now I own 2. I believe there is no differents in owning 2 or 5, same amount of work. If you want a life own only one.

[Anonymous]

You can only vote once, so if you already voted that you had three it won't let you do it again. Let us know and we can correct your response.

[Rondo]

Never mind, I see this thread was started back in Nov and I must have already voted. Sorry