David, you wrote “I wouldn’t get near an employer using his
system. Piece work is for hacks.” I wasn’t going to respond to
this here because you obviously have a lot of anger from having
worked in the “sweat shops”, no doubt. Apparently, this is
influencing your personal assumptions. But IMHO, you are also
incorrect in your mathematic and retail management assumptions
and I would like to try to set the record straight based on what
I know about the book. It is basically a way of thinking that
can give retail management a handle on their repair expenses.
But, the real benefits for most stores (as someone else
mentioned) is that they now realize that they can charge more for
the very same work and do it more efficiently. Most importantly
it is a system which allows the sales person to take away most of
the burden of job estimation from off of the shop. The
percentages are dependant on the individual situations and up to
the individual managers. Geller’s shop has shop foremen and
polishers, so the only thing a jeweler has to do is do is the
workparts supplied. If I remember right he pays between 18%-22%
( net dollars plus benefits, gross with benefits 24%- 29%) of
retail to the jeweler, depending on skill and quality level. You
wrote " Now I make buckets of money for my employer. I make him
2 dollars profit to every 1 he spends for me (that includes S.S.,
medical, workers comp., the works) " If this is true, I assume
you are talking about gross dollars for your employer and net
(before tax) dollars for you here. Iif that is correct you are
probably doing much of the estimating, all the work, and
polishing for 33% of the gross including benefits or somewhere
around 25% after your employer’s share of SSI, vacation, Health,
sick and personal leave and paid holidays. (actually your
employer is probably only making 5%-10% on his gross after total
expenses, which would make it one dollar for every 3-7 dollars
that you make.) Based on this comparison you are only making
about 13% more than Gellers best jeweler and you still have to do
the estimating and polishing. Personally I would rather be able
to concentrate on just doing the work for this small difference.
In our shop we have a polisher, but if there is a question that
isn’t covered by the book ( which is very little) then the
jeweler who is most likely to do the job has to field the
question. We pay up to 40% of the gross including benefits and we
probably charge a lot more for the same work than your employer
does. That means if you were working for us you would get at
least a 21% raise in pay on the Geller system, and you wouldn’t
have as much estimating and only the polishing you wanted to do.
So, David …when do you start? ;-> your orchid-bench pal, John