than haul tile for $10 an hour. What we need is to raise the pay for tile installation. The flooring stores have destroyed the pay. Most guys have to pay cash to their help because they can’t afford to pay more. Tile guys don’t usually have nice trucks or huge bank accounts, but the sales people always seem to have Lexuses and live well. Gee, where is the labor pay at? It’s in the salesmen’s pockets. Most tile guys I know drive crap trucks and have dilapidated tools. Only a handful of us have nicer things, and that’s because we don’t let stores control our pay. Darin Shocker, Dutchess County Tile, Hopewell Junction, N.Y. – I respectfully disagree. You can make a great living being a tile contractor. And the difference is you start at $10 a hour but learn a valuable trade in which you can always make a living. Most cold calling type of jobs are dead-end jobs. SteveBrace,SBFlooring,Machesny Park, Ill. – Darin Shocker, I agree that those are dead-end jobs. Tile work is one of the hardest jobs. Then add the pay from a flooring store and it’s a dead-end job too. The only way to get ahead is to work for yourself. But that being said, tile still doesn’t pay well any- more. I can install [luxury vinyl tile -LVT] for 50 cents a foot cheaper than tile. Goes much faster and fewer tools. Way more profit. That’s why wood guys and LVT flooring guys make more than tile guys in my areas. Cleaner, lighter, easier, and fewer tools. Darin Shocker, Dutchess County Tile, Hopewell Junction, N.Y. – I guess it’s different in all areas. Where I am you can still charge a decent amount if you do a quality job working for yourself. If a young guy goes the union route (if you’re lucky enough to get in), they start out at $27 per hour and go up $6 a hour after every 600 hours they work. That’s really not too bad. I’ve been fortunate enough to make a good living over the years in the tile industry and hope future gen- erations do as well. Steve Brace, SB Flooring, Machesny Park, Ill. – I make more than most tile guys in my area. I am constantly telling others to raise their wages, but people don’t. So I’m left bidding against people that charge half of what I do. I get several bad reactions a year from people because my price is so much higher than others. The stores keep wages low, and most installers think that the store’s labor pricing is the highest they can charge. I had a guy work for me after he worked for a contractor from a store. He told me that I am not a contractor; I’m just a tile guy. The stores brainwash these guys so they don’t think they can do HOT TOPICS –––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––– 70 TileLetter | October 2017