The Truth About Acrylic Showers | Bath Fitter Fam Podcast Ep. 3

Video transcript

Does my bill need to go up? The bill? Yeah, it's a little bit. How's that? Hold on.

Man, he looks clean on that screen over there. All right, welcome back to another episode of

Yeah, what do I do with my hands?

All right, everybody welcome back to another episode of Bath Fitter Fam. Is that what I'm saying? I think it's just another Yeah. Just Thanks for joining us on Bath Fitter Fam. There we go. That's good. For another episode and we're going to talk about I'm going to get that in by the 30th of February. I don't want to crack this acrylic. All right, welcome back to another episode of of So stupid. Just pause after welcome back and then we'll go. How about Thanks for joining us.

Yeah. At Bath Fitter Fam. Thanks for joining us for another episode here at Bath Fitter Fam. Today I got two lovely guests with me, Kell Chapman. Tell me a little bit about yourself, Kell. Um I'm from Spartanburg, South Carolina. Okay. So, kind of a local guy, I think, from around your parts, maybe. I'm from the East side. Yeah. Um lived in a lot of homes, seen a lot of bathrooms. Uh climbed and worked in the cellular industry early on, right out of high school.

Climbed cell phone towers, built them. Um shout out to the tower dogs. And uh then did some other things, went to school, traditional route, college, a little bit extra. Um really enjoyed project management. Um did a little bit of account management side as well. And uh stopped upon you guys here about uh 4 or 5 years ago. Okay. And uh I've I've learned a lot since then. And uh I enjoy what I do. This is it's fun to take care of customers. And uh um you know, help them make this decision and this transition, which can be tough.

Got you. And Aaron Aaron Bishop from Columbia. Uh yeah, grew up in uh Lexington, South Carolina, so local to to my area as well. I was in the Navy. Uh did um two tours on deployment and did shore duty. I was in for just under 8 years. And got out, went to school, got my degree, uh did uh some construction work. And then I worked for a couple other companies doing management. Then I came over when I finished my master's degree, I came over to Bath Fitter. Uh obviously uh had a lot of construction experience, kind of seen a good bit of stuff.

And then uh I mean, I shower every day. So, the bathroom experience was there. That's not what Buddy said, but So, so these guys are both our operations managers in two respective locations. So, two We have six locations as a family. These guys are responsible for two of them each. Or one of them each, I guess, but um and between the two of you, you got about 12 installers that you're responsible for. Pretty hefty budget every month. Um a lot of customers that we deal with.

Um I think sometimes one thing we don't really speak about is like we do as a company, as a our franchise, we're doing about 50 to 60 units a week. You guys are responsible for probably a third of that, at least. Uh between the two of you. So, um we do a lot of tubs and shower remodeling, right? And these guys are the ones that make it possible. So, you got the reps that are out there that are going out into the homes, making promises with the customers. You guys are the promise keepers.

You got to help um work with your respective teams to make it happen. So, today, we're going to talk about the truth about acrylic. So, how's that sound? Let's dive into it. There's a lot of misconceptions out there. There's a lot of different, you know, dirt that gets thrown on us for certain things. And I just kind of want to talk about some of those things. So, first question I got is what are the biggest complaints homeowners have about acrylic shower systems?

Uh I think if you dive into like complaints, we're we really have to get into the pre-install complaints. What do they hear that that they read on Google or a competitor told them about acrylic. Um because once it's in the home, the you don't see a lot of complaints. You don't see a lot of issues. Um so, I think, you know, diving right into it, one of the biggest thing is we offer a one-piece wall. Um it is kind of our staple, if you will. And that one-piece wall allows us to not have to silicone up and down our water intrusion.

We have a sample, don't we? Over here? We have one bent. Oh, awesome. And so uh this isn't a secret. It's not a you know, this isn't a reinvention of the wheel. It's this is what we do. Uh we know it, our competition knows it. Um and a lot of There are a lot of misconceptions that float around out there. I mean, what what ones have you heard, Kell? Uh traditionally speaking, our uh most of the uh uh competitors in the industry, excuse me, are going to put two individual panels together like this.

Right. Or a third one. Yeah. Or a third one. Really? Yeah. And then just silicone the the B behind, which allows for when it does fail, which it will, silicone fails. Uh it water gets behind there. It's a similar, you know, effect with um backer boards and tile. Um how do you how do you really seal that back section right there? And um a lot of our our the the bath fitter solution in the end is to was to come up with a you know, proprietary heating system, um so we can heat and bend these corners here.

Um and what's the this is not just acrylic. It's has a hard back to it as well. backing, which allows us to heat without really damaging the acrylic, absolutely. But you can see, like grab that thing there, Aaron, and pull on it. Um I mean, that once those bends are made I mean, this is supposed to crack easy, but I'd imagine as the sheet gets bigger in a wall, that it it has even more Yeah, it's not it's not going to He's flexing those guns. I'm trying here.

And if you notice He's showing off. I think he's I think he's trying to Give it to me now. I'm just kidding. If he hadn't worked out this morning, you know, he wouldn't have been able to break that. Um but you know, some of the things that customers hear is this process can, you know, there's degradation here. It's weakness. Possibly could be cracks um or just a you know, a heating issue. Um but with you know, with skilled labor, I mean, you go through training.

If something did happen like this, hello, you know, we're going to get it fixed to make it right. But customers do hear about that. And um I personally, I've never come into a cracked wall that happened like that. Right. That's a good lead in. I get that Uh the other folks will say they crack. The walls crack. Yeah. In the corners in here. So Yeah, I mean when when do they crack? Yeah, they do. Absolutely. They crack in the corners when you have a a new guy learning how to how to bend a wall and it gets overheat and it and it breaks.

But as far as once it's installed and it's bent and heated correctly, I don't see that happening. Mhm. I mean, it's just not it's it's such a a I don't I've never seen one. And as soon as the new guy cracks it, he calls immediately and we can get an uncracked wall to put back in the bathroom. Yeah, And and to back with Kell's point with the three-piece wall system, I mean, um there's nothing proprietary about this. You pay I mean, it we're talking about a very expensive This is a lot of money for a lot of people.

Um you know, and we want you to make the right choice, but if the panel system is something you're looking at where it's three different sections, you can get it on Amazon. It's not hidden from the world. cut this up. Yeah, yeah. We could put it in We could put it in in three pieces, too. you want to look at a silicone line and risk some some water damage, yeah, we we can definitely cut it. Does it Does it cut? Does it break? Absolutely. We have to be able to cut it and break it to do what we need to do.

Yeah. But once it's installed and it's sitting on a backing and it's been heated and everything's kind of set in place, acrylic has the ability to expand and contract. It's not It's not rigid like a fiberglass unit. It cracks because it can't move, right? Your house does. It expands, it contracts. And the acrylic move can move with that, which also keeps that cracking from happening. Yeah. And to not hide at all, you know, one of the complaints is that, you know, our walls are limited by height, which is true.

We can get them super super long, but we can only get them so wide because of this bend feature here and we don't chop it up. If you took a long piece like this and you turned it this way, you could go up as high as you want. 130 in. Yeah. Especially if you're doing panels like this, right there. But so from our standpoint, you know, that is that's true. Like we can only go so high with it with the same wall. How we get around that Aaron? It well if you have I mean yeah, we have a multi first off most houses are 96 inches.

If you get a regular stand go to the ceiling almost anytime. Almost anytime we have a 90 inch wall, a 6 inch base or a tub, 90 we've made it. We've hit the 96 mark. But let's say in the scenario Kell mentioned, let's say you have a 103. All right, and we get to that 96. Yeah, we it's it's a very simple process of we can get another we get another piece of acrylic and we have a process where we install this to essentially allow that we we create the seam, but at that point the seam is so high if you not getting water up there, yeah.

Yeah, if you're if you're getting water that close to the ceiling, you could do that with the Simmons handheld and the pressure but You'd have to intentionally do it. Yeah, it's not something you're really going to see and even then in that seam process, we still secure that from water and warranty it for life as well. And a lot of this is is you know, we go over this at you know, the point of consultation so there is no surprise. You know that 96 may be our limit here and if your ceiling goes over that, we have solutions as well.

But like you said, that's such a minority of the time. It's like Yeah, it doesn't happen a lot and especially even if you go into low threshold where you're getting 3 inches and you know, you're 2 inches shy from the ceiling. Most of that 90%of the time is we're hitting the crown, right? You have crown molding in your house, we're going to get there. We're buttoning up to the crown, absolutely. Makes sense. Um So we're talking about cracks on the walls but like what else what else like on the basis Can can the acrylic scratch, crack, stain, fade?

Yeah, it's it's not bulletproof. Right? It's not a it's not a made of vibranium. Is that what a Captain America shield is made out of? It's not a vibranium shower system, right? It's not it will if you if you want it to, it will break. It will crack. Um does it happen often? No. Um has has it happened? Absolutely. And have we covered it under our warranty? 100%of the time. And the warranty, too, is when you dive into it, uh it is everything. It is everything that we touch.

If it's down to the silicone, and it's not a warranty where you pay a deductible, it's not a warranty where we need you to go find your original contract. And go it's a manufacturer's warranty, and none of that's Yeah. Yeah, no mailing nothing in. It's a It's a phone call to us to say, "Hey, my silicone isn't looking as good as it used to." Or I was in the bathroom fixing a light and dropped the hammer and it smashed into the tub and it cracked it. It It is a simple phone call, and we order the material, and we stand behind the warranty.

I mean Yep. Now, granted, if you get mad one day and you decide to go into the If you're washing your sledgehammers in the bathtub, we might have to talk about a little bit of negligence here. Yeah, yeah. You're usually taking a shower naked, you're not going in there with your steel-toed boots on, you know, it's things like that. I I do remember years ago we had a warranty claim where somebody had done a drive-by shooting on a house. Oh, no. Oh, my god. And we went in and there were bullet holes in the acrylic.

Did we warranty it? I can't remember. We probably did. We probably switched it out. I've only had one warranty claim where we didn't warranty it, and the entire house had burned down. Okay. And the insurance was paying for it to be rebuilt. In that instance, we we It was I mean, obviously Yeah, the insurance handled it, so we did we were able to take care of the customer, but we did upgrade all of their fixtures to the new the newest stuff as well. So, Yep. um that is the only warranty claim, I guess, was denied because it was covered by someone else.

And I know we're kind of joking about that stuff, but like what are some examples of things that will actually hurt the acrylic? If you're not washing your sledgehammers in the shower. Yeah. Uh I mean, I'm a big My house I have two dogs, um and clean I am a clean freak. So, for me, I had a cast oven, and the easiest way to clean that was bleach, right? Just fill it up halfway, dump a little bit of bleach in there, let it soak. Uh you know, you really don't want to put A-An acrylic doesn't need bleach.

It It just does not need that and the scrubbing I've done that on the grout and the tile and scrubbed with bleach and scrubbed with foams. Um, obviously if you get a real something real porous in there and you start scratching away, yeah, it'll scratch especially with a chemical attack like bleach. Um, so that's something I would definitely avoid. Which there is an approved cleaners list. Yeah, it's I want to say it's uh, 200 and some products that are It's a lot, yeah.

Yeah. So, I mean as far as I've seen uh, the only staining I've ever seen from my experiences maybe hard water which in South Carolina is an issue. Uh, and in that instance, you know, once a week with Tilex, you know, it'll never amount to anything that you can't just spray and rinse and walk away type deal. You seen anything? Um, I think candles are a no-no. You don't want to be burning candles next to acrylics that may not have bothered the steel or the cast tub, but it may leave a little uh, little mark on the tub.

Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah. If you put your light, you know, your candle next to the acrylic and I think it's up there. Um, but like kids with crayons and you know, you know that what I'm talking about all these little you know, things that they use when they're taking baths or bath bombs and stuff like that. Yeah. There's very few things that I have been able to when a customer calls and says, "Hey, you guys made the promise and here's what I'm having."

There's not been a situation where I've been able to go out there and not resolve it with just Yeah. bit of elbow grease. Maybe, you know, they tried a few things. I tried some different things. You know, there's a long long list of things cleaners to use. Um, and a little bit of elbow grease and pretty much everything even even restoring a little bit of that glow cuz you take a shower long enough you're going to get soap scum and things of that nature. Um, and if it looks a little dull, just a little 409 on there and hard scrub and it's back to looking exactly.

And I mean I can't tell you how many times I go into a home where we've um, it's been in there for 20 years and it looks like we just did it last week. Mhm. And I know that sounds fantastical, but it's it's real. Yeah. Well, and you can go into some I mean, to piggyback on what you're saying, you can go into a job that we did a year ago and it looks like it was done 100 years ago because people don't take care of it. Yeah, it's it's uh It's all is it's kind of relative, right?

If you buy a brand new car and you keep it clean, it'll smell like a brand new car in a year, right? But if you don't do a little bit of maintenance, a little bit of cleaning here and there, cuz it could we've gone to many service calls. I mean, you guys are responsible for all the warranty work, right? How many times have you gotten a call where it's like it's stained? Yeah, and it really just needed to be cleaned. Yes. Yes. It's it It's just a little bit It's not a It's not a product you can put in and forget, right?

Right? It still takes a little bit of you you know, it's like glass. I've explained it before. It's like it's literally like uh you know, your car window or your your mirror is the acrylic and if you let it build up over time, it'll get dirty, but it's relatively easy to go clean it off, right? Absolutely. And if it gets really dirty, what does it take? A little bit of extra elbow grease to get it off there? It's kind of the same thing with this. Mhm. Um especially like on the floor, when you're stepping, soap scum, dirt, you know, all that stuff over years of doing it, it will build up.

Oh, yeah. But just a little bit of some, you know, I think yeah, preventative maintenance goes a long way. You know, once a week you hit it with one of the approved cleaners or I mean, my me personally, I just spray mine with Tilex, let it sit for 4-5 minutes, and then I'll I'll rinse it down. If there's a little spot or something, you know, I might take a rag and wipe over it, but that that'll really keep anything from from building up in excess. And I wash both my dogs in my shower, you know, haven't had any any issues as far as scratching.

You know, I was a little weary myself. Yeah. You get a 70-lb lab inside of a bathtub, you know, if something's going to break or scratch, that's when it's going to happen. Yeah. So, but I haven't had any issues. So, you want to hear about some products, some other things in your daily life that have acrylic in them cuz maybe most people don't know this, but so, most football helmets, the top layer are acrylic. Okay. Um that's how they keep that nice shine.

Okay, cool. Um aquarium glass is usually made out of acrylic. Airplane windows, hockey rink barriers, so that that clear glass that goes all the way around. push on. Yeah. Um dental products, um fake fingernails, so if you're in the market for some fingernails, Mhm. they could match our walls, you know. White marble. And bathtubs and showers, so Ivory marble for me. The pearl with the Mhm. Yeah, that'd look real nice. But you got, you know, and then bathtubs and showers.

So and there's many, many more examples, but It's pretty cool. All of these are, you know, you talk about dental products, staining, you talk about hockey rink barriers, I mean those guys are getting slammed in there, you know, airplane windows, aquariums, so fake fingernails, Yeah. you know, for you, Aaron, but um anything else on the the it doesn't fade. I mean, Bath Fitter has been around for 43 years. We've been doing this for 23 years. I've never had one that's faded.

Never seen the acrylic fade, not one time. Um staining, usually, I think we covered that. It's usually just coming down to it's got to be cleaned or whatever. Yeah. Um cracking and scratching, you can definitely that that would definitely happen, so Yeah, it it I would say it would definitely happen in in it if you create an environment where it can. You know, normal shower activities, you know, getting in there, taking a shower, getting out, washing your dog, whatever you got to do.

Even I know a lot of people, you know, hats and stuff letting, you know, putting hats or pillow cases in the bathtub and soaking. That's the way to clean them. Uh I know cuz the internet told me. You can't put anything on the internet that's not true. So, but you know, that's how you clean like hats and stuff when they get real dirty and Yeah. all of that stuff day-to-day is going to clean out. It's going to clean. It's not going to crack. It's not going to scratch.

And if you even even if you manage to get a good scratch in it, 99% of the time, we can come out, we can buff that spot, you won't even know it happened. Mhm. So, I mean, it just rolls into how easy are they to clean? Oh, yeah, that's it's a simple spray, rinse, walk away. So, regardless of what your shower is or your wet area is, if it stays wet, you're going to it's it's you're behind the eight ball already. So, you got to find a way to keep that area dry, whether it be a window, a fan, wiping it down, squeegee, Whatever you need to do.

Um whether you've got tile, cast steel, whatever it may be, fiberglass, if water sits there, it's mildew's going to grow. There it is. And we leave you a little squeegee at the end of your install, too. Yeah, and I think Or if we don't, you call us call Aaron and he'll bring it out to you personally. Call Aaron, yeah, yeah. Uh I think a lot of it too is like what do you compare to what, right? Is it easy to clean? I mean, it's not as simple as, you know, running a robot vacuum over your floors, but if you look at the bathroom materials you have the choice from, tile, the grout lines have to be resealed.

It might look clean to what you see, but what you don't see is very, very, very dirty. Um So, you know, does it is it faster than resealing grout lines every year or every 2 years? Yeah, absolutely. Is it better than having the scrub brush and the wand? I mean, we've all been there, all hands and knees cleaning the corners? Absolutely. And then the fiberglass units, again, those are relatively easy to clean, but that's when you're going to start to see that faded, loss of color, stuff cracking, things settling.

So, as far as what you're looking at as how to clean, it's a simple maintenance cycle of just investing that extra 5 minutes once a week to spray it down, or if you have a stain, not letting that stain sit and build up, just knocking it out. Preventative maintenance. Absolutely. You mentioned earlier you have your shower. Mhm. What do you use to clean it? Tilex. Is it the Tilex mold and mildew? Yep, Tilex mold and mildew. I spray it on, wait 4 or 5 minutes, rinse it down.

Never I haven't had any single issues, stain. That's the ticket right there. You know, when Louis started this thing 20 some odd years ago, we still I still go back to a lot of these original customers and the ones that have always kept it clean tell me the same thing. We spot clean it. We'll spray it, let it sit for 5-10 minutes, rinse it off. We never have to scrub it. Yeah. That's cool. And I think that and that's it's the same scenario for my mine. I mean, I think the if I'm sitting here critiquing like what is the hardest thing I've ever had to clean out.

I have a double shelf that has the little groove lines for the soap and where the soap bar, you know, kind of leaves some soap left behind. I think just getting that soap to to rub off is more than it takes to clean the entire shower. Yes. Makes sense. And you can probably do that when you're taking a shower. Oh, yeah, yeah. I mean, it's just, yeah, it's a product of just sitting a wet shower of soap bar up there and, you know, it makes the little indentations to meet it.

But I normally hop out, spray it, you know, by the time, you know, you're dried off and dressed and ready to go, grab your handheld or your shower head, turn on, rinse it down, it all goes down the drain. Yeah. Kind of like the old Scrubbing Bubbles commercial where they'd spray it and all the little scrubbers would go down the drain. It's it literally works like that. Almost. Just spray it on, rinse it and down the drain it goes. So, some comparisons that our listeners really care about is first one we're going to go we're going to go over two different types of applications.

The first one is tile. So, um often people will say it's just like that traditional remodel like just tile, you know, and so Absolutely. Yeah, so you want to I mean, I I do as well, right? I love the look of a of a tiled shower. It looks great. And I think it's kind of the this a good analogy is you see a the guy who's walking look at looks at the guy on the bike and says, "Man, I really wish I had a bike." And the guy on the bike's looking at the guy driving the car and says, "Man, I really wish I had a car."

But if you ask the people who have a tiled shower, they cannot stand it. They hate cleaning it, right? It's everybody's looking at the next thing And yes, they look good. It looks great on Pinterest because the Pinterest in image or the AI image or I think it's SI now, the SI image SI, huh? Yeah, it's a super intelligence. They renamed it yesterday. Okay. Yeah, so AI is trying to fool us. Yeah, yeah, I think I've seen it on somewhere, but They're going to break in then Yeah, they uh Where did they come from?

But I think everybody's like, man, that just looks so good. And it and it does. And uh you see a lot of opal open concept where the entire bathroom is a tile shower. And that looks great. Like the YMCA? Yes, but some Yeah, like the YMCA, but also on Pinterest, you see this stuff. And these are images, but could you? Who is going to be the person that's going to get down there on their hands and knees and scrub those grout lines with a toothbrush, then let all that dry, and then run this It almost looks like fingernail polish and run that through all those grouts, and then let that cure.

That has to happen with those tile showers. Or you can get a white marble wall with a tile pattern in it that doesn't have any grout, and you still get that look without all that effort. And to be fair, without all the price. I mean, you're you're comparing Time, too. That's a month to do something. a huge Yeah, yeah.

What Speak of time. Like we're we're in and out of a day. We talked earlier in another podcast. We do this in nine Nine out of 10 jobs we're in in a day, in and out. 90%of the time we can do them in a day. It's a question we get all the time. Yeah. Tile uh You could do it in a couple days, like realistically. Like if we're being real, like you could do them in a couple days, but it also could be applications where it's going to take you 2 weeks. Yeah, or or longer.

Yeah. There's drying and curing times as well with the products that you use. you you got to you got to take out what's in there. So, you got to go in and demo what's in there. Yeah, and to have a plumber to come in and do plumbing work. Then you got to put everything back together. And lining all these things up doesn't It ain't always easy. Yeah, and I mean, I think that's one of the scenarios. If if that's that It's a very expensive scenario. It's time-consuming.

Um and you know, and if that is what you choose to go with, by all means, you know, uh I would just recommend you go to your local grocery store, grab some snacks, cuz it's going to be a while. Snack guy. Good one. The uh And again, obviously, we're a little biased to this, right? So, we're giving you our take on tile. Um What else with tile? Anything else? I think the repair process for tile, too. Um because just like acrylic can break, it's not easy, same with tile.

Tile can break, it's not easy, but for us, if your acrylic wall cracks, we are going to come in, and we are going to replace that wall. Uh it'll all be new. Whereas, if you crack a tile, and it's been 5 years, and you can't find that tile, or you don't have an extra tile, what are what what are the options here? You can have a mismatched tile. Um do you re-tile the whole bathroom? Or are we Have we now circled back to you call Bath Fitter, and we can put up our acrylic wall.

Yep. If there's a plumbing problem, you got to get that wall. You going to have to break it. I mean, I I know you've seen it. go behind it, yeah. Yeah, the mud-set tiles, where there's six a row of, you know, three by three, you know, those nine tiles are on the plumbing, are all a different color because they've been busted out, and they had to fix some plumbing, and put that That's all they could find, yeah. Yep. I mean, we've even, from a compare contrast, like I can't tell how many times we go into a home, million dollars plus, and they have I mean, it's absolutely gorgeous, architectural, um and then we go into the bathroom, and uh we see beautiful tile, and they're like, "We want the acrylic over it."

Yeah. always It's always a little bit of a head-scratcher. I'm like, "Are you sure?" Like, and they're "Are we making the right decision?" And we kind of have this conversation that we're having right now. And as we continue, and we find out what their needs are, we're like, "Okay, you know, tile served you at some point, and now it no longer serves you." Yeah, and and tile, I think it's uh it has a shelf life, right? It's It is uh there is a a certain culture built around having that tile shower, and I think it it it does look good, but the maintenance, um and the cons very quickly start to outweigh the pros.

And on an expensive project that that it has to last a long time. It just has to. But our but our acrylic colors aren't going to match something that some, you know, design consultant at, you know, tile company can come up with. Oh, yeah. For sure. We have our standard and our stock colors. So, if you're looking for something vibrant, obviously tile is going to give you the most variability. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah, you are right. So, tile you're going to have a lot more customization, a lot more options, way you know, call everything you just said.

So, um with our acrylic, if you don't mind grab that one just one of those over there. Um with ours, when we when we extrude our acrylic, it comes in a flat sheet like this. And then we have about 20 different molds that is like a simulated tile pattern. So, we stamp this with grout lines in it that makes it look like subway tile. Yes. Or 6 by 22 inch tile. Yeah, we have big chevron, offset, chevron, 10. Yeah, we have all kinds of We have the ones that are that new one that's up and down like this, the big tiles.

And they got the vertical tile. Yeah. And they got texture to them some of them. So, like and all we're doing is taking a big mold and stamping it to make it have that appearance. Yeah, and with the the customization goes let's say you have a tile bathroom and you're like I'm not worried the floors are fine. The the I just the the shower area is really where you're really paying the price. We have acrylic walls that have stone inserts that sit over top the acrylic.

And we can we have a couple different color options. We can get pretty close to the tile color you have in your bathroom. And that literally that stone sits inside that acrylic. So, even if water were to get behind the stone, it's not damaging your wall. But we can kind of bring tie the two back the two concepts of the bathroom together if tile is something you're really set on. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Cool. And the other comparison would be uh well, if you go on Facebook or social media, right?

Mhm. Folks are watching this on YouTube. If you spend more than 10 minutes If you If you any kind of bath searching at all, which chances are if you're watching this you have, and you're going to get fed with so many acrylic companies that are out there. Mhm. All kinds of ads. Click here to find out how much a shower costs in pick your city, right? In Columbia, South Carolina and wherever. You're going to get all these ads that are telling you click here, click here.

And then you go through all the prompts and then all you're really just you're going to get blown up on your phone. to just get destroyed. Yeah. But I think where I'm what I'm I I don't want to call any one of them out, but they're all dealers. Yeah. Yeah. They are they are a dealer. Mhm. So they are all buy a lot of them are buying from the same company. And a lot of the other ones are buying from acrylic shops wherever. Mhm. I don't want to make any assumptions, but I do know for a fact a couple of them are buying from the same people.

Mhm. Uh they kind of act as a middleman, right? So they're they're you have a couple things going there. Your your costs are going to be higher because they're going to somebody else to buy it. Mhm. And then when you come when you talk about a lifetime warranty is it really are they going to be around? Yeah, and I think you're it's it's a middleman concept, but also it's it's who you're doing business with. Right? So if you if you call I mean I'm not going to name a company, but you call um we're not a small company.

We're a big company, but we're a family-owned franchise. It's a family operation. Yep. Um that's Bath Fitter has over 200 locations across North America. Mhm. And we are a franchise that has six of those locations. Just to piggyback on what you're saying. Right. And it's it is at its core this is a fam I mean the commercials um you know, you see yourself and the rest of your family on TV. I mean uh I'm located right there at on 401 Huger and or Huge and however you want to say it, right?

from around here. Um but it But you are though. Yeah, but yeah. I still I still say you're from around here. Yeah. So uh actually it is it's right down from the local boy local boy is on the same street, so Yeah. But, the big thing is like we see we're going to we're going to run into you again. It's going to be at Walmart. It's going to be at Food Lion. It's It's going to be at the park or wherever. And when you have that family aspect of it, we genuinely care.

And when we control the process, we know how it's made, so we hold ourselves accountable to is this is this product undamaged? Has it been tested? Right? We know the testing was done because we did the testing before we sent it out. And then the drivers who bring the material, they're still part of that same process. It's not somebody else. Yeah, we call Yeah, he calls us and lets us know when he's when he's on the way cuz you know, he wants to go home to his family.

And it's all a it's all a thing where we're all kind of intertwined, and it really does allow us to keep our cost lower than the competition and offer a superior product. If you could get the product that we have, whether you look at the bases or the walls, if our competitors could get it, I don't think that that it would change at all. The markup for them would be the same because at the end of the day, this is a family operation, and we're all in we're all streamlining.

We don't have to pay this guy to make this product and then ship it overseas to here. We get to cut out all that steps, which saves the customer value. And you know, at the Headache if they Yeah, headache, money Warranty work, service. We are in a business of like with our one-day installs, we've we've figured out this process to make it happen, and our goal is to you know, we want to help 10 to 12 families between me and Kell every single day. That is our goal.

Uh we don't want to help one family and make the same amount of money that those 10 would. Right? In a business perspective, you're like, "Oh, well, that's the way to go," but it's not the way to where we can kind of meet, see people out in a grocery store, and know we took care of them by giving them a good product and a good price, and then standing behind that price with a lifetime warranty. Because we know our product's been tested, right? So, if you're comparing the acrylic Excuse me, the acrylic same day um install kind of world, you've got some companies that specialize.

They do the wet area. That's kind of where we sit. Absolutely. Um and then you've got other guys that do the swing by Home Depot thing. So, it's just truck and a trailer, and they swing by Home Depot; they get the regular products, and then they go to their warehouse, and they might grab maybe one or two things that they've procured from this same, uh, acrylic company, and then they're at your house for a couple days doing a little bit more than the wet area, maybe.

And then you've got other guys that want to do everything. And so you're have this kind of you need to decide who's going to do this for you. Absolutely. And I think, to your point, if if you're looking for something that's local, reliable, um, where, you know, you can reach out to us and we can help you, and you want to be a part of the family and, once again, a little biased that's the people that I think are shopping us. That they want something quick; they want a good warranty; and they want it from somebody that, you know, they're not afraid to run into at the grocery store and say, "Something happened on this project, but Aaron made it right and we got it fixed."

And you know, not every renovation is perfect, but they found a way and we got on the other side of it and it looks good now, and I wouldn't mind getting a second unit or recommending my friend. That this is kind of the world that, you know, you're kind of choosing from. And and that's nail on the head there and I think a big thing too is we we are not perfect. We are a fam-we our biggest um you know, I would say our biggest talking point is we are a family and we do care.

It's a family owned operation and but in that same sentence um we are family owned company, we make mistakes. We don't have all the answers. We're not this major, you know, billion dollar operation that can just write something off at the drop of a hat. We make mistakes, we own them and we take care of our customers. And uh Louie did that for years and grew this into something and uh there's countless times where I walk into a home and they you know, they know Louie by name.

You know, and I want them to know me by name and Kell wants his customers to know him by name and it's because the if you need it, I mean we have we are all have work cell phones. We all do and I we all have our personal cell phones. And I could tell you that probably more customers have my personal phone number just because it's I have we have nothing to hide here. If you need to call me or text me and it's 9:00 at night and you just don't want to forget, it's okay.

Send me a text. We will follow up. We're not going to You don't have to email a certain email that someone's going to check, you know, 2 weeks from now. If we say we're going to do something, we're going to do it. And if you need something, we're going to take care of you.

Makes sense. Um I think sometimes with the warranty work on what these other guys are like they're buying it from somebody else. So, it's like if you go to if you go to Home Depot and you buy that oven Home Depot's going to carry that warranty for a year or two. Absolutely. And then once that's over, you're having to call the manufacturer directly. Well, do you got your receipt? Yeah. You got your proof of purchase? course not, right? You have to sign up for your manufacturer's warranty.

We had a unit um a lady it was a broken corner shelf. Uh I believe they had uh someone had like slipped and basically elbowed hit this corner shelf. And we had went out we we could not find the original contract. We could not. Um we tried the the name. They didn't buy the unit originally. Mhm. We tried the house. The address had changed. That's how long ago this job was done. I walked in there, the shower looks beautiful. It's been very well maintained and they said, "We don't really know anything about it."

But the second I walked in and saw that it was our product it was maybe a week later we replaced it. Tuesday. Yeah, see you next Yeah, right back to the see you next Tuesday thing. Um we went out there, we replaced it and they're like, "Do I need to sign a form?" Nope. You don't you know, that's it. When you are when whether you buy it from us or you inherit a you're still covered under that. And And to talking points for the you know, the Mullican Group and being part of that family franchise, I can find contracts that are 25 years old before the Mullicans were even here.

And you see where it a silicone used to cost 50 bucks. Which 50 bucks isn't a whole lot of money to have your you You know like a charge, you talking about Yeah, a charge, yeah. And um Louie came in and that is no more. There is no charge for anything after the fact. If you need a silicone, it is it is free. If you need uh if your tower shelf broke or your grab bar finish wears out, it is a free every time, you know, as again back to the not wearing stiletto boots in the shower.

But we really stand behind this product and I think that that's a big rarity in any business. When you hear warranty and you kind of think, "Oh, yeah, what's the catch?" And if we're if we're not giving fair, you know, due diligence to the competitors out there, I would like to know. Um I've been doing this long enough to hear things from customers and it's just not the same. So, I think when you're shopping and trying to compare and contrast the various groups, I think that needs to be something you definitely consider.

Yeah, definitely look into that warranty. Yeah. Who's where they getting it from? Who's manufacturing it? Mhm. White today, you have a you an add-on or you you break a wall in 10 years, like is that white still the same formula? Is it all going to match? So. Yeah. Uh all right, good good stuff here. So, the warranty. Which is kind of a good segue. Um what does our warranty cover? I mean, really it's everything in the wet area. Uh obviously anything that we touch or replace.

Um again, I think we're kind of circling to the, you know, where our competitors might want to use that as oh well, they say it's under warranty, you know, but that's only the the truth is is it's under warranty. There's no form to fill out, there's no proof of purchase. We know what our product look like, our competitors know what our product looks like. Um and you know, just like a acrylic wall cracks, I'm sure that they say, "Oh, acrylic cracks." Yeah, it will.

I mean, everything will will break eventually if you if you really, you know, make it do something it's not intended to do, but does it really crack on a day-to-day use? I don't see it happening. Um and even if it does, it is covered under warranty. And I think some of our competitors'warranties might not be as good and thorough as ours, so they push to warranty. Because they know that it doesn't mean that much. When actually here, it literally means everything we touch for life.

To be specific, so corrosion on trim kits and hardware and things like that inside your shower. When you see those things, we're going to come out, we're going to make sure that there wasn't any harsh chemicals used on it that are prohibited in the area. Mhm. Um and get that replaced. Um if there are issues on the acrylic where um maybe there was a a control issue or something of that nature, um and and it's acrylic based, we're going to take care of that and get it swapped out.

Um silicone breaks, that's something we've not really talked about. Um as you scrub silicone, mind you, we are using primers so that the, you know, silicone stays Yes. um on the acrylic as best as possible, but with time and years, that may be something you, you know, you definitely want to give us a call about if your silicone breaks. trying to clean it. Over scrub. Yep. So instead of doing the spray it, let it dry, rinse it, you kind of think you need to scrub it, it may pull away.

And when it does, that's, you know, that's an entry point behind there. And we want to avoid that. So when you see those, that's something that's covered under warranty. We're going to take care of that silicone as well. Um I think uh drips, also that's obviously a product failure of the cartridge. Maybe the water's changed in the area, water tank or something. Um and I mean I have seen times before where, you know, there may be um something that starts to show up on the shower on the acrylic here or there, and it's a spot that everyone is scrubbing and we can't find out what it is.

Um that would be a situation where once we've given our good chance to kind of fight this thing and get it fixed, if it's not resolved, we're we're going to that's covered under warranty as well. Yeah. But we definitely want to get a shot at trying to fix and resolve the situation. Absolutely. And we're not a uh you know, we're not immune to things happening. Um but we're also there is a uh kind of reality point, too. You know, we come out and your shower's dirty and hasn't been cleaned in 5 years.

We 100%are not going to clean your shower. But it might just be an educational point where you know, we you're using over the wrong material or you're trying to rinse it off with water and your water is, you know, hard water and that's that's not the fix here. So, I think and even like with Kells uh analogy earlier with the corrosion on the stuff and let's say it's because you were using the wrong cleaner. We're still going to warranty it, right? We're still going to replace the trim kit, but at that point it's kind of like you know, it's kind of like you're not getting a ticket here.

This is just an educational purpose, right? So, and that's uh and and that's just comes from being a family-owned company and everything is um I won't say everything is yeah, everything's not black and white, right? We will bend the rules to help the people who are part of this family. Makes sense. So, if something does go wrong, what do they what's the customer expected to do? So, years down the road, they've done they've made this purchase, something goes wrong.

What's their steps they're supposed to take? I I think and it's um we do this every day. Most, you know, we do it every day. We see bathrooms every day. We see problems every day. Most of the time we're the solution to a problem. I think the biggest responsibility for the customer is just call us. Call us first. Don't, you know, that you're you're more than welcome to get a second opinion uh if you think that something's not right. Not by all means, we have nothing to hide, but call us first so we can get out there and get it fixed as soon as possible.

Yep. I mean, we have websites, phone numbers. You've probably lost the contract by now. That's okay, you know, it's on us as well to have one. So, um go online, Search for the 1-800 number. Get us on the phone and uh make sure you have your address. Um if you got the house from someone else, that's okay. Just, you know, try to get as much information as you can whenever we try to locate this thing for you. Mhm. Makes sense. Um In closing, your honest review of Bath Fitter products working here, employed, you know, the guys, the the installers, like what's your honest review?

Not to put you on the spot, but Right. Right. I'm a little biased. Uh, I mean, honestly, if you're looking for a bath, you, you know, if you're looking for to have your bathroom redone, your wet area, you need a new shower, anything accessibility wise, and having the versatility of not being something that you're going to find on your next trip to Lowe's that, you know, sells for a thousand bucks. Um, you know, having something that's going to give you quality it's going to be useful, it's going to be durable, it's going to be easy to clean, and it's going to last and you really can kind of have something that's really nice that you pay for once instead of continuously having problems.

It's something you don't have to worry about. I mean, this is this is it. You have found it. You have stumbled into the podcast. You have stumbled into the place. And if you have any doubt, by all means come and see me or Kell, and we will show you pictures before and afters, you know, start to finish. And I have no problems getting on the phone with a customer, and you can ask them, you know, how much this changed their life. I mean, it's in our You think it's just tubs and showers, but for some people, you know, they need something reliable to so their family member can come home.

And it'll give you it'll give you goosebumps thinking about it. But, um, we can answer some of those people take it for granted being able to bathe themselves alone. Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah. I think, you know, there have been, you know, times where I've run into situations where someone's had a bathroom in their home and they haven't used it since they've lived there. Oh. Yeah. Mhm, yeah. I've gone second generation, right? Mom and Dad bought the house, and there's a bathroom that didn't work when they were a kid, and it still didn't work, and they've called us, and now we're turning their closet shower in their bedroom from a closet Yeah.

That's literally what junk in into a usable, functional Absolutely. Um, I know this hasn't been like the This has been more product based in comparison everything, but, um, you can just go to the reviews. We have some of the best people that work in the industry, hands down. They know what they're going to do every day. They don't have to know how to do 15 different trades. They can do one really, really well. And if you go to those reviews, it's going to use their names.

Everybody's on there. I mean, it's it's crazy, um, how successful these guys are in that time period that, they that they know what they're going to do and they can get it done and. and I mean, that's something that I'm very proud of, is to say that the team here I mean, they're so good, that I mean, it's going to eat the competition up. But their guys are trying to come here because they may be a little frustrated with doing the 15 different things, and they can be successful in the one thing and come work for the family.

I get it all the time. Anytime there's a job posting, it's guys like dying to leave our competitors and coming to us. Absolutely. I mean, we're we're a primarily shower and bathroom remodeler. That's what we do. And we we have a lot of good customers, we have great installers to Kells' point, but we we stay very busy doing that and helping people and our reviews don't lie. We haven't had to um get into doing doors and windows and gutters and whatever else we can think of, right?

Yeah, we don't we don't do that stuff and it's because we have perfected this craft and this is the best experience we can. I mean, no offense, if I took one of our lead installers and said, "Hey, I need you to install a window." We'd run into problems. We can't we don't do it all, right? But when it comes to doing bathrooms and and the remodels there, we we have perfected this process and we have a wonderful team of people doing it from start to to finish.

So, I think that's where we really really excel. Cool. Well, I think with that I appreciate you guys all everything you do for us. Thanks for having me. We wouldn't be able to do what we do without you guys. Thanks for having Aaron. Yeah, thanks for having me. Aaron kind of sucked up the oxygen. It's kind of nice because the light's over it head of us, so I'm not in Kell's shadow for once, which is really nice. Got

Like like he does in all the meetings and everywhere else, he talked the whole time, you know. Killed it. Proud you're part of the team. Uh what do you what do we need everybody to do? Like, subscribe Compliment. I'll give it to Kell. I did all the talking. Kell, what do you you got it. Oh, of course. Yeah, check out all the content we've got here. Subscribe so when the new stuff comes out, you can kind of see where we're at. Follow us everywhere from the Instagrams to the to the YouTube's to all of them.

Yeah, I get That is true. And if you want one of these fancy hats, H A T just leave a compliment below. Leave it Put hat in the in the compliments in the in the in the comment section. Just put hat in the comment section. Aaron's going to hand deliver it to your house. Oh, there we go. Oh, hey, if that's what it takes. If it's in Alaska, Oof. You know, we'll we'll see if Billy will let allow it, you know. Yeah, you do what you got to do. You got to. With that said, thank you so much for joining us and we look forward to seeing you next time.

Thank you.