Ask the Experts

The Meaning of Materials

My dad is a contractor back in our hometown, and he’s been having trouble lately with his expenses. One issue that my dad has is that he keeps using materials that, in my opinion, are just too pricey. The guys using the cheaper materials can undercut his prices, and customers don’t know the difference (until it’s too late). My dad is losing business to cheapskate contractors just because they have lower prices, a few billboards, and pop-up on Google.

Of course, my dad won’t budge on his materials, and he considers this a moral issue. How much difference do materials really make? What can my dad do if he refuses to cut costs?


Do materials really matter? Well, experts say, that depends on the material in question, what it’s being used for, and how well it’s being used.

That may not be a satisfying answer, but materials experts told us it’s the truth. Part of the challenge that contractors face is explaining choices to customers. Better material is always better, of course, but the lumber you use for your home matters more than the lumber you use for your shed, say home improvement professionals.

But materials can matter a lot in certain circumstances, of course. The wood used to make a deck had better be strong and properly treated to handle the outdoor weather, lumber experts told us. Cabinets and countertops in a kitchen renovation are going to be visible every day, so they had better be of top quality.

As your father is well aware, one of the major problems with materials comes when companies quote prices without properly accounting for materials. Experts say those low quotes that are taking your father’s business may not stay so low when customers demand the cabinets or countertops they really want. By then, of course, it’s too late.

Too late for that customer, anyway–but not necessarily for your father. Your question includes telling mentions of marketing and search engines. How well is your father managing his online presence? If he’s one of the few contractors in his region offering honest estimates that account for quality materials, he’s likely to be faring pretty well on review services like Yelp and Angie’s list. Your father’s challenge is to raise his online profile, helping those uninformed Googlers discover that he really is the most reliable in the region.

If your father doesn’t want to get cheaper on materials, perhaps he should be less cheap in another department: online marketing. Hiring someone to improve his website’s search engine optimization (SEO–the techniques experts use to get Google’s attention), or to design a website if he doesn’t have one, is a good start. Getting active on social media will help, too. If local search engine queries (of which there are a lot–43 percent of all Google searches are local searches) show your father’s business in the results, and if the related reviews on Yelp and similar sites endorse him, he may find that his honest estimates and great materials are a boon to his business, not a liability.

“If you build it…you may still need Google AdWords.” — Jennifer Mesenbrink

Martin J. Young is a former correspondent of Asia Times.