The Dick's Quick Story
Dick Parke Spent 33 years in the Forest Products and Corrugated Packaging industry. Starting in the 70’s, with the advent of mass merchandising, he focused on high-end graphic packaging for corrugated. In that time he became one of leaders in converting hundreds of consumer products companies into using 4, 5 and 6 and even 7 color litho, flexo and gravure printed and pre-printed packaging as opposed to traditional plain brown boxes, printed with “This Side Up”, and “Handle With Care”. He left the business in 1995 as the National Graphics Sales Manager for one of the worlds largest packaging companies.
In semi-retirement Dick found himself looking for interesting and constructive things to do. He had developed an interest in remodeling stemming from all the homes he had bought and worked on, moving about the country throughout his packaging career. One thing led to another doing a little woodworking and minor house renovations for friends. But the most frequent need was for painting and the work tended to grow in that direction. He took on a couple helpers when offered a larger project. He realized he a small business going when that project led to more job offers and eventually he had to increase his crew to two trucks and four men.
In business, time is money. So he named the nascent enterprise, “Dick’s Quick Fix It”. But the name was a curse. Anyone seeing it concluded it was a ‘Handyman’ service rather than the name of a painting and remodeling contractor. Therefore the name was shortened to simply, “Dick’s Quick”.
Dick knew that, to the public, all painting companies were pretty much alike; with few significant differences. He also wanted to run his little painting and remodeling company on the same principles he ran his corporate business units; with the premise that a quality job was dependent on meeting customer expectations. Combining these two ideas yielded the tag line “We fix it before we paint it”.
The idea of making all the necessary repairs first, so the resulting paint job would be the final step in a larger process, was an idea waiting to happen, at least in Dallas. Until ‘Dick’s Quick’ came along, folks would have to contract for a different company or individual to fix a leak or install a new fan or add a shelf or fix cracks in the ceiling or repair termite damage. Dick and his crew do it all – before they start painting.
By far, most of the work came, and still comes, from direct referrals. We at Dick’s Quick strive to complete every job as though the house we’re working on is going to be shown for sale the minute we leave.
Somewhere, somehow, someone or more people let D Magazine know of our different way of doing business and we were subsequently named Best House Painter in Dallas in the August 2003 issue.
We are different. We don’t hire day labor from the corner 7-11. Our crew of four has been with us a total of 18 ‘man-years’. They are salaried, not hourly. We routinely work 5 1/5 days a week. We start our jobs when we say we will. We finish them on schedule. And, we take care of the ‘Oh, by the way’ nuisance repairs often not specified up front. And, we never change the price unless the customer expands the job significantly beyond the original bid.
Do we get every job exactly right? Does every customer believe we’re the best? Does everyone want to refer us to friends and relatives? No. In the nearly 10 years we’ve been doing this, two people suggested that their experience had been less than happy, and three failed to express satisfaction or emote in any discernable way. C'est la vie.