Some ldeas for Helping Ex-service Men Make Money Along Building Lines

Bv Jack

It has been well said that the most unexplored place in the world is under your hat.

The men of the building and lumber industry should be lying awake nights right now, putting that unexplored territory to work in the world's most worthy cause-creating profitable employment for returning service men. And when I say that I believe hundreds of thousands of good men just out of uniform can secure highly profrtable employment in various ends of the building business, and at the same time confer services on the public that said public will appreciate and gladly pay for, I mean just that.

Let me tell you of trvo highly profitable lines of employment that ex-service men are doing right now in a couple of cities I am acquainted with. With these in mind the natural inventiveness of the building folks will go ahead and dig up plenty more. For you can multiply these two activities alone into thousands and thousands just like it all over the country. And every new idea thus developed can be thus multiplied until the profitable employment thus devised will stretch out to fill the pockets and the lives of a great army of service men.

A man recently quit a mighty good job to become a painting specialist, and an employing partner of a whole group of ex-service men. He has gone into the painting business, specializing in homes and home surroundings, in a brand new way. He bought four trucks. He equipped them with all the paraphernalia needed by a group of painters. He is hiring ex-service men only for his workers. They do not have to have painting experience. He is teaching them, and will follow up their work to see that it is done right. There will be a crew of men on each truck, probably either four or six to a truck.

He solicits paint jobs, quoting flat prices. A truck goes to the job, the gang goes to work all over the house, and the job is done in a small part of the time it usually takes for house painting. It is right-now service. You want your house painte-d, you agree on a price, and the next thing you know the job is done, and the truck goes on to the next job.

This man's offrce is painting headquarters. Today if you want a paint job done, you go to your local paint store, they find a painter for you, and in the course of time you get some painting done. This new idea tells you just when the job will be started and finished, and tl-rere are no long waits. It's paint service, this fellow has in mind. And he is already at it with four trucks, and four crelvs ef exservice men. If you will stop to think, many good reasons why ex-service men will have advantages over any others, will occur to vou, in addition to the rvorthy plan of finding veterans good jobs.

The whole country is woefullv crying aloud for paint.

Dionne

There isn't a place in the country where this man's idea cannot be put into permanent practice, to the great advantage of the citizenship, who will get paint service they never dreamed of before. In the city where these four trucks are now operating, it would probably require fifty such trucks for years on end to catch up with the salable painting needs. And it pays in a big way. Every man on those trucks can share in the profits, and all of them can make more money than they ever did in their lives before. And how they would improve a town !

Now the second one. I saw two men with a pick-up truck, a small concrete mixer, and the sand, cement, and tools needed for the job, going from house to house, ringing door bells, and offering for sale concrete work, mostly sidewalks, largely repairs and small replacements. It impressed me so much that I talked to them. They will do anything in the line of small concrete jobs-RIGHT NOW. They will replace a worn split or defective piece of sidewalk. They will put in a new walk if desired. But they do all the rvork themselves, they do it as soon as they take the order and in a few minutes they have made the repair or replacement and gone next door asking for more work'

T}IEY TOLD 1\{E THAT THEY SELDOM PASS A HOUSE WITHOUT A SALE OF SOME SORT. Everybody needs a little concrete job done. The home owner may not realize it until the salesman with the concrete mixer comes along, but when he looks around he quickly discovers'some concrete needs. And so these men go from door to door with their right-now concrete service. And they can go on for years and years in that town ancl never begin even to scratch the surface of the possibilities. Just as a wild guess I would say that several hundred men doing the same thing could find profitable and permanent employment in that city just that way. And do they make money ? They told me just enough to make me realize that those two men with their little piece jobs at a flat price are making a lot more money than the local bank presidents; and not over-charging anybody. Just giving service, right now.

Those are the two I have seen operate lately. I have another idea of my own that would be a sure fire success. Two men with a truck equipped to do little jobs of every kind around the home, could go from door to door offering their services. Do you suppose there is a single home in A,merica today that does not need the services of some handy men with some handy materials that they are expert in using? Carpenter work, cement work, fixing windows, painting, papering, a bit of plumbing, a bit of shelving, refitting doors, replacing small wooden things here and there, fixing locks, fixing anything on the place that was out of fix. Don't you know the house wife would thank the,:Lord for such service? I know a handy man in our neighborhood who does all such work, on call. It takes several weeks to get him after you put in your bid for his services. Think of a couple of much handier men, with materials, tools, and right-now service, knocking at your door. E,very town, no matter how small, would support at least one such truck. Big towns could use a battery of them. They co.uld be profitable and permanent, and be real town builders.

How many more can you think of? Write me some of the things you have in mind, or have seen done. The building industry could easily employ half a million men doing things not usually listed as building activities; and make good money for good ex-service men. Let's make these plans only for ex-service men. There are many good reasons.

Buys Pcrtner's Interest

Paul L. Matthies of P. L. Matthies Co., wholesale lumber dealcrs, Los Angeles, returned recently fronr visiting Northern California mills. His trip was interrupted by illness that caused him to spend a few days in a hospital in Nevada City, Calif.

Mr. Matthies purchased the interest of his partner, E. R. Zielke, June 15 in the Matthies-Zielke Co., and is carrying on the business by himself. The company has its yard at 3060 Andrita Street.