Thursday, 11 March 2010

  • How to look for a cheap and good locksmith

    I am actually living in Plano, Texas and I have been here formally since a year and a half, I used to live in New York City (yes I am a big city guy) and when we had problems with our house door locks or with our car (jammed ignitions and that kind of auto locksmith problems) we used to google for “New York City Locksmiths” and that’s it, usually we didn’t have any problems with our locksmiths and all of them usually charges you the same fees, but since we've lived here we haven’t experienced any kind of lock problems until last week when I got locked out of our home (yes, it can happen to everybody).

    We decided to basically follow the same process that we used to follow back in New York City, but the thing is that we are no longer living in a big city as we used to do, so we were confused about what to google for, at the begging we were going to search for “Plano locksmith” on Google but then we decided to go for the “safe” way and we googled for “Dallas Locksmith” and we found plenty of options to choose from, we decided to go for the first ones.

    So we called to the locksmith company in Dallas and yes they were insured, certified and fully bonded and they were also members of ALOA (Associated Locksmiths of America) they came to our house in an hour or less and they seems to be very professional.

    In thirty minutes or less the job was done, I checked the door lock and everything was Ok and worked fine, but the price for the service was more than I was expecting but he did the work so I have to paid him.

    I ask for my coworkers about what I paid for the locksmith services that day and I found out that if I would look for a local locksmith here in Plano the fee would have been cheaper and the response time would be also a lot better.
    Yesterday I got lockout again (yes, again, my fault) so I decided to give it a try and search in google for “Plano Locksmith” and I found a very good looking website http://www.planolocksmithandsafe.com they claimed that they have a very response rate, after I checked that they are fully bonded, insured and certified (and yes they are members of the Associates Locksmiths of America) I decided to give it a try.

    I called to the telephone number that they show on the website, I described the problem and in less than 15 minutes they were on my house, they solve the problem very quickly, and I got a surprise when I see the fee for all the service, my coworkers were right I was a lot cheaper than the Dallas locksmith and the response time was excellent.
    So I recommend to you to look for local locksmiths in your area and remember to check if they are insured, fully bonded and certified and that they belong to an accredited organization like ALOA (Associates Locksmiths of America)

Tuesday, 23 February 2010

  • Dedication key to locksmith's initial success

    Jim Tinder opened his locksmith business out of necessity.

    The year was 1978, and he came back from a vacation to find that his job working for a locksmith no longer existed.

    So he started a one-man shop, working out of his house and his truck, without a formal business plan and with word-of-mouth his only marketing tool. Today, Tinder Co., owned by Jim and his wife, Mary, is a 15-employee, $1 million-a-year business.

    "It gets easier over the years," Mary Tinder said, "because repeat customers start coming back. You have to get past that first hump. But it's a lot of hard work and you're answering the phone 24 hours a day for a while - coming in early, leaving late. But it definitely gets easier."

    Tinder Co. specializes in access controls, security equipment, locksmith services and door hardware. Their clients include security companies such as ADT, churches and school districts including Hamilton Southeastern and Indianapolis Public Schools.

    St. Luke's Catholic Church has been a client for at least 10 years, parish manager Patrick Jendraszak said, using Tinder Co. for security systems, re-keying locks and more.

    'Their regular service is perhaps more than one would expect," he said. "Whenever we've had an issue . . . they were always over here right away to take care of the problem."

    The locksmith business has changed remarkably over the years, as keys and deadbolts have given way to computerized key pads and card readers. Jim Tinder used to make house calls to open locked car doors. Now, opening cars and making new keys is a specialized area of the locksmith business.