That time a homeowner asked me to "match the brick" with a piece of dried mud

Was repointing a wall in Boulder last spring when this older guy comes out and hands me this crumbly lump of dirt off his driveway. Says, "Can you match that exactly?" I told him that's not brick, that's just mud and dog hair from the gutter. He didn't laugh, but his wife did from the window. Anyone else have clients hand you something ridiculous and expect you to work with it?

2 comments

2 Comments

grant_hart18d ago

The real issue here is that homeowner was trying to skip a step in his own head - he wanted mud to be brick because admitting he needed to actually find a matching brick felt like too much work. People do this all the time when they don't want to pay for the right material, they'll hand you anything vaguely brown and hope you can make it work. That dried mud would've turned to dust in two weeks and he'd be blaming you for his own shortcut.

jamesf2618d ago

Honestly, I've had guys hand me a bag of someone's old fireplace ash and call it "color matched mortar." You gotta inspect everything they give you before you even let them start, especially if they're acting like they're doing you a favor bringing the material. If they push back when you check it, that's your red flag to walk.