Dear Listmembers,
I'm doing my utmost to stay out of the discussions about bike painting and restorations. There have been statments made by both points of view that I feel need to be clarified so that the perspectives of the participants can hopefully be more clearly understood by those who are looking for useful advice and benificial information within this discussion. Thus far, there have been specfic positions established, which I want no involvement in. I intend neutrality; my only purpose is to sort of "referee" the situation regarding things that either side might say that are things I know from my own personal experiences to be true, or not true about the nature of the painting business. The reason I feel the need for this is that I don't want everyone to think things about the painting/restoration business that are not true. There are quite a few painting outfits out there; and it is of benifit to all of us to be clear on some basic aspects of the business. Within that, there are specific differences and specialties that each painter will have. The "mission" of the consumer is to get the specific job to the outfit best suited for the job in question.
The first thing is that there are several types of painting outfits. From large to small. Some prefer to be a "one stop" company where every possible option is available. This requires a sizable staff in order to do that many different jobs; which in turn generates the neccessity for extensive paperwork in order to function. Jobs go through multitudes of steps from beginning to end. Each one must be done in the proper order. Organizing that is a big job in itself. Within an organization like that, nearly anything is possible, as long as you are willing to pay for it. Our hobby NEEDS a company like that to cover the relatively small fringe aspects of collecting bicycles. Availability of graphics is about the only real problem encountered during restoration. Of course, if a small speciality outfit formed to specifically do only that type of decal production, they would probably have plenty to do if it was effecient to the point that custom authentic decals for bikes were affordable and available to everyone. Lloyds could probably accomplish this if they had a mind to. Otherwise, it's obvious that those who require that sort of restoration would be out in the cold. These people are probably strong supporters of CyclArt, I would imagine. I also think Sainthood would be bestowed upon someone who could solve this one and only bottleneck in the Vintage Bicycle interest.
A medium sized shop will have to specialize in a smaller segment of the market. This is where it becomes more important to choose the right shop for your job. If the bike that you need to be worked on is fairly common and does not have some unusual type of damage, then almost any bike painter can do the job. There are a wide selection of classic and modern decal sets available to the bicycle painting community. Once you know that the decals you need exist everywhere, you can focus on who specializes in the operations that are most important to you. Some shop by price, some by brand specialist, some by the nature of a certain type of finish or exotic repair that may be required. Some may prefer to deal with someone local, others go by reputation, or personality, or time of the backlog. I'm sure thare are more reasons.
The one person outfit is generally the most specialized in terms of the types of finishes offered and the type of work they accept. Most customers sending work to a small specialist already know what they want; don't expect any surprises, and frequently have specific needs that are within the speciality of the proprietor of the business in question. In such places there is a minimum of paperwork or neccessity for extensive options. Each case is handled like it were a patient requireing specfic treatments. A single surgeon does the whole procedure and gets instructions directly from the customer as to what to do. It's like seeing any medical specialist for an operation. If you need something they can't do, they send you to someone else.
Having read the discussion from both sides; I would like only to point out a few things.
Frames arriving damaged from shipping are VERY rare. I have been recieving and shipping frames for about 30 years. I have seen some frightful packing jobs,( but never on anything even moderately valuable), including loose frames bouncing around in a box. In my time I have seen only one bike damaged by a shipper that was more than a 5 to 10 minute "repair". A Colnago arrived at Medici for repaint when I was working there that was completely destroyed, except for the fork. A new frame was built to go with the surviving fork. UPS covered it; it was clearly run over. Otherwise I may have seen a total of 3 or maybe 4 bikes that had a slightly flattened head tube or slightly bent closed dropout, which takes all of 5 min. to fix on a bike that is going to get painted anyway. In those cases there is no need to charge anyone anything. Just fix it and get on with it. If you really feel like getting some brownie points, mention that you took care of it for them N/C and tell them to be more careful in the future. Never seen a BB shell ovalized in shipping. That usually happens if someone drops a frame, usually a bike shop Mech. I've seen and fixed maybe two in my life. I've never seen a frame arrive with a fork damaged. Never seen a frame come in with a dented tube, anywhere, from shipping. I've seen maybe one or two bikes come in with stays bent in a bit; but that is packer error there. No one should but a frame in a box without something between the stays. So, from my experience, frame damage from shipping is nearly non-existant. If you want to put a dent in frame damage; outlaw roof racks and garages.
Someone mentioned that there are ALWAYS surprises once a frame arrives for painting and/or has the paint stripped. I heartily disagree. Of course, this is only from my experiece, but where you get the surprises on a frame is WHEN YOU BUY IT OFF E BAY, or somewhere like that. A less than knowledgable or unethical private party; that's where the surprises come from in my experience. My customers look very closely at their projects before they come to me. I frequently stand in a group of my friends as we all check out someones' latest exotic catch; and within a few minutes we have looked it over with an eagle eye and everyone can see exactly what is there. In 30 years I have never encountered "a surprise" that wasn't obvious after a close look at something, with very few exceptions. So far, the only two surprises I've encountered involved chrome plating; and the damage was done by the original process over 25 years ago in both cases. Replating exposes the problem which you cannot see, but it was there for a long time just below the surface. I got a surprise once, and only once, from my chrome plater. I still feel bad that it happened, but I could not afford to absorb this particluar problem. It happened on a Bianchi that John Barron set me several years ago. The chrome was pitted, as these particular ones often are, but it didn't really look that bad. Once the plater stripped the chrome and super heavy copper, the pitting was significant. He went ahead and went the extra mile and fixed it up. I always tell them "do whatever it takes" and in this case the plater charged me double the normal amount. It was just after the new owner had taken over the operation and we were forming a relationship; we had not reached an understanding yet and his system was different than the previous owner who would give me a price and stick to it. The new guy likes to tell me what each job costs AFTER he does it. So I quoated the regular price and the new owner saw fit to go ahead and charge double for the extra work. We worked out a deal, NO MORE SURPRISES! As he learned what bikes cost to plate he became comfortable with giving me the price up front. If your business does the same operation all the time it shouldn't take too long to not surprise your customers. We look at the thing and we can both see the situation and we agree on a price. Done. That's how I operate. If I encounter something after I have established a price, I just deal with it. I've never run into anything major that I feel I shouldn't just take care of as a jesture of "I appreciate your business". It's the little guy approach to service I guess. So I've only once in my time had to call someone and tell them that somthing has come up that will require more money that I had expected. I'm sorry it had to be John Barron that got caught in the middle of the plater ownership change. But at least it never happened again, I made sure of that!
Beyond this, the painting discussions are off limits for me. Those who have differences of opinion with any particular painting outfit will have to work that out on their own. I understand both points of view and I do NOT want to take sides. If there are questions of a technical nature regarding how the painting business works or how the painting sequence goes, I will assist with neutral information. But I advise people to select a restorer who "says what he does, and does what he says" and stay within a speciality whenever possible.
Brian Baylis La Mesa, CA Fortunate to have a painter that always does exactly what I want.