For you Tony:
Who is an Environmentalist?
Everybody is an “Environmentalist”! However, how one interprets that is usually based on how it affects their “economic revenue stream” (income, wages, business revenue). This also includes Contract Cleaners.
An Environmental Regulator brought this information to my attention. Example: A large segment of the “Coin-op car wash industry” believes that home owners should not be exempt for car washing discharge to storm sewer as this creates a large source of pollution to our storm sewers. This also holds true for charities (churches, girl scouts, boy scouts, etc). Because of Political Activity by the Coin-Op Car Wash Association (with a $500,000.00 budget) the San Diego Regional Water Quality Control Board banned charity washing during February of 2001.
Robert, you are taking the absolute worst example of business leadership and holding it up as an example that is the norm in this industry.
Allow me to rephrase what you said above in a way so that even your audience of cartoon students can understand what you have said:
"Everybody is an environmentalist as long as it doesn't cost them anything" then you go on to lump
"contract cleaners" into this "fake" environmentalist group.
Shame on you. That may be the way you do business, but it is certainly not the way I, nor anyone I associate with does business.
As far as I, personally, am concerned, I couldn't care less if we have to vacuum up every drop of water. I have streamlined my (and my son's) business, to the point where anything short of an all out ban of powerwashing would leave me virtually untouched. Even if powerwashing were completely banned I have a backup plan for that! We have the income to deal with any BMP's you can throw at us and already own the equipment to deal with it should it be necessary. Debt free, I might add.
My time working on this here is for one purpose only - to pay back all these contractors who have had roundtables and had an open ear on the phone and spent time posting on this forum that have helped me with the answers I needed to make my business bulletproof.
I don't have an "economic revenue stream" the comes from promoting or fighting against these regulations like you do sir. Neither does Ron.
We want these contractors to succeed.
I want the new guy with a strong back, a good moral compass and a desire to build a business that serves others to succeed.
I want the American who lost everything he had in the real estate crash to be able to pick up a home depot power washer, give it their best shot, and if he has the determination and the wits to succeed, and the open mind to learn from others in the trade, and the discipline to upgrade his equipment to do the right thing.......I want him to succeed.
Robert, I want the guy who does a better job than me, for a better price than me, to put me out of business if I slack off and can't compete because of laziness or an unwillingness to change as needed.
On the other hand I would love to see the "coin op" car wash industry completely fail for the backhanded crooked way they chose to "force" consumers to buy their product. If they could make their product compete with a front yard wash, then by all means they should succeed.
I haven't washed a car in years. I won't even go through one of those nasty neglected coin op cesspools.
I'd much rather pay a lot more and sit back and read a newspaper while four guys clean my car like new. I don't have to wish anything on the coin-op industry, they are going the way of the blacksmith anyway. They brought it upon themselves if they are guilty of what your "regulator" reported to you.
Crooked business only looks like success for a while. Eventually the ugly face of failure comes from behind the mask.
Maybe you could learn more about this if you asked some of your associates in the PW#A why they are suing each other all the time?
We don't need to "force" customers to use our product. Most of us could make a great living at this work if we weren't being bombarded with regulations based on nothing more than some remote chance that what we are cleaning might do some harm to the waterways when 90% of the time what we are cleaning is completely harmless and 100% of the time (in my case) is dealt with in a responsible manner.
No one I know would ever dump anything anywhere that might harm our environment. It is you and your wacko followers who make claims like "one drop of caustic will kill all the organisms in the sewer" and who plaster picture after picture of "worst case scenarios" in cleaning to try to make it look like we would all be polluters if only given the chance.
WELL YOU ARE WRONG MR HINDERLITER.
Maybe you should quit drawing on your own business experience and stop projecting them on to others. We are not like that.
Do you know how many guys have been to wash water control seminars just to learn how to deal with contaminants using sensible and effective measures? These guys aren't so much concerned about getting fined as they are concerned about JUST DOING THE RIGHT THING!
Do you know how many of us have flown thousands of miles to learn how to control any pollution we may be called to deal with?
I'm not talking about guys coming to your class for $500 because you've scared the bejesus out of them and claim you've got the magic formula to keep them from getting fined out of business.
I'm talking about guys who have voluntarily traveled across country to learn how to more effectively keep the environment clean!
If disgusts me to hear you claim that we, as an industry, only care about the environment to the point that it doesn't cost us any money to protect it.
Keep that junk to your own little group that subscribes to that kind of thinking. The same little group who would turn in any other contractor who is doing a good job cleaning and a good job keeping the environment clean, but happens to disrupt YOUR "economic revenue stream" by doing a better job than you!
This has become sickening.
