AN INDEPENDENT REMEMBERS
“He’d had enough of those cowboys... they had embarassed and humiliated him in front of a shop full of customers”
good smirk at their expense; I was more interested in learning what sort of mistakes not to make myself. Apparently, the shop had set on a couple of school-leavers and was training them in how to buy at the right price, leaving them to haggle and barter with their suppliers. In this instance, whilst customers waited to be served. Well, he wasn’t having any of it, so he left. “And, in future, it’ll be your details the manufacturer forwards to people asking about a local stockist.” Time was going quickly by and I felt that we should be ordering some high-ticket items for Christmas. Getting in some early orders for Black & Decker products
meant we had a better chance of having an impressive stock display in time for December.
A handle on Stanley The autumn promo packs with free attachments and accessories were still available, and we also took in chainsaws and other tools. We bought in a Stanley dump bin of gifts with all items under a fiver, including tape measures, knives (yes,
well, handle – and they didn’t roll away when put down.
they weren’t a behind-the- counter item at that time), small spirit levels, scrapers and bottom- end screwdrivers (which conjures up a strange picture). In creating a higher-level selection bin of our own (using, of all things, an actual dustbin), I stocked it with more expensive Stanley items, with an offer of free gift-wrapping. These included PowerLock tapes and screwdrivers. Speaking of which, at my school all the screwdrivers in the woodwork room (modern translation: “resistant materials”) were from the Stanley Magnum range. Blue handles were pozidrives, red were slotteds, all with hardened tips and cabinet handles, so more comfortable to,
It just so happened that I bought a two-point pozi with a 10-inch blade for my own use, which lasted until three years ago. What caused its demise was – I must be honest -– misuse. But I considered that it had lasted a few decades and owed me nothing, so I set about replacing it – or not, as it happened, because the latest hardened two-point pozi at the time no longer had a cabinet
handle, and it still rolls away at every opportunity. It is so annoying. I have no idea what Stanley was thinking when they allowed some bright spark to believe he or she was qualified to redesign an otherwise faultless and time-tested tool. Now the emphasis on quality seems to have shifted to the Fatmax range, and even here the screwdriver handles aren’t described as cabinet. It could be another 30 years until I need to buy one and find out.
www.diyweek.net
23 NOVEMBER 2018 DIY WEEK 13
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