I Pit My Employer, The Cheap Millionaire!

The BBQ Pit
1

OK. I run a pair of carwashes in Cincinnati for this guy, who is a multimillionaire many times over, and so are most of the members of his family.

Carwashes like mine utilize a large moving chain (the conveyor) that have “rollers” spaced every three feet along the length of the chain, which runs along two large sprockets at either end.

It is the single most important piece of equipment in the carwash…the chain is what slowly propels the cars through the wash, so no chain…no business.

Recently myself and a couple of guys that are employed as our consultants/installers/chemical suppliers have been advising the owner that the chain needs to be replaced, as do both sprockets and all the rollers. This is a very expensive and time-consuming job, as we’d be shut down for a day and the total bill just for the parts is something along the lines of about $10,000.

I recently replaced the sprocket at one end, which is the easier and least expensive to replace as it has no hydraulic motor attached to it like the sprocket at the other end. The sprockets wear over time and the gear teeth become “cupped” which starts to ravage the chain because the links “pop” off the teeth of the sprocket.

So, over the last couple monoths the chain has been breaking, I’ve replaced several sections of it, which is a dirty, hard, time-consuming job.

The pitting is this: the boss man consistently underrates the time it takes to repair this fucking thing. He calls every five minutes as I’m attempting to get us back online. He sits in his chalet office with internet-connected security cameras watching me fix this shit and is constantly trying to advise me (by calling me every five minutes while we’re down) even though he’s never done it himself, and says stuff like “why isn’t it fixed? It should only take twenty minutes!”.

Well asshole, the chain is almost four years old, it’s rusty and the rusted cotter pins that help hold the links together are fused to the links and so rusted that the often break off, which makes it nigh impossible to get them out to remove bad sections of the chain, for starters. Spend an hour fighting a rusty cotter pin in a filthy environment in 100 degree heat with the boss calling every five minutes and customers constantly berating the fact that we’re not open. It isn’t fun, and I AM trying to fix this as fast as I can.

The kicker was today. The chain broke twice. It is obvious to everyone but him that we need a new chain. He tells me “The chain is supposed to last for 360,000 cars, and we aren;t even halfway there yet!”, to which I reply “Dude, we have washed 300,000 cars since we’ve been open…how is that not halfway to 360,000?”

Insiders tell me our biggest competitor (Mike’s Express) changes their chain every 200,000 cars as routine maintenance. Meanwhile my boss keeps clinging to this notion that he heard somewhere that our chain has lots of life left. And he’s cheap and doesn’t want to spend any money. The stores cost 3.5 million dollars each to build and equip. He can’t spend 10k to replace the single most important piece of equipment that everyone but him believes needs replacing?

This is not to mention that I just got home from repairing the chain for the second time today, and I identified several other areas of the chain that need immediate replacing, and I have no more chain to put in. I just worked from 7:00am until 10:45pm and now I have to get up at 4:00am, drive out to Indianapolis to pick up new sections of chain, be back at my primary store by 7:30am and put in the new sections and am expected to be open for business by 9:00am, when we usually open at 8:00am.

This doesn’t even mention that my family was asleep when I left this morning, they were asleep when I got home, and they will be asleep when I leave tomorrow. I love my kids and I didn’t get to spend a single minute with them today, because my boss is ignorant of reality and cheap to boot, when he’s literally swimming in money.

I’m pissed. Sorry this is lame as a pitting, but I get upset because my boss is actually quasi-intelligent but won’t listen to others if he holds a differering opinion, even when the evidence smacks him in the face, and then he has the nerve to get mad at me because fixing the problem that has been obvious all along “shouldn’t be taking me so long” as if inferring that I don’t know what I am doing or how being shut down during business hours affects our customer’s perception of us.

Grrr. More wine, then off to bed for my three hour round trip and then back into the pit (the name of a carwash trench, filthy and mucky, also where the chain is located) for more fun and games. With the phone ringing every five minutes to interrupt me.

Asshole.

2

If you like, we can put him on the Running Dog Jackal of the Ruling Class Straight to the Wall Come the Revolution List.

3

He is a staunch Republican. He actually approached me during the not too far in the past Indiana gubernatorial elections and said “You’re going to vote for the good guys, right?”
:rolleyes:
I tend to lean Republican only in that I want less government not more, less spending, less intervention in other countries’ affairs and not a lot of increase in taxation. These beliefs haven’t worked out so well for me the last eight years, because the “Republican Party” isn’t really “Republican” anymore.

Anyway, it irks me that he is so tightfisted in these situations. I get paid pretty well to oversee this operation of his (he has his fingers in a lot of pies, local restaurants, minority owner of the Reds and Bengals, and so on).

His family’s money is derived from shares of stocks held in majority from companies like Batesville Casket Company (the largest manufacturer of cremation urns and caskets in the world…steady supply of customers and all…Ronald Reagan was buried in a handmade Batesville Casket made of maple…a fact he likes to bring up, as if it means anything) and Hill-Rom, the largest manufacturer of hospital beds and related medical accessories in the world.

Shit, this guys Dad is worth somewhere north of 800 million dollars. It’s frustrating, especially when he fails to see reason and sits in his Ivory Tower making decisions for me when his “hands-on” knowledge of day-to-day operations of the facility are practically non-existent.

4

You’re funny!

5

Dirve safely, FoieGrasIsEvil, you’re going to be fatigued as well as emotionally stressed.

P.S. Start collecting testimonials from customers who’ll say they won’t go there again until the chain is replaced, and they can count on the machine being reliable.

P.P.S. If he does agree to replace the chain, is there any way to schedule the activity for a rainy day (when the shop would be closed anyway)?

ETA: P.P.P.S. see if you can ditch this guy and go to work for his dad. :wink:

6

To be fair, all those things are what Republicans claim or are supposed to be for. Except for the “less interference in foreign affairs” thing, none of the things on that list are stereotypical Democrat planks. So who’s left? :slight_smile:

7

:slight_smile:
Just me apparently! These are governmental ideals that I honestly believe in, so I have no idea whom to vote for in this current climate. Neither of the parties partiularly appeals to me anymore.

8

The CEO/president of my company drives a 2008 Mercedes S550 (a $90,000 ride) and lives in quite a large home with a similar internet-connected camera security system as your boss has hooked up to the facility, and which he can monitor from his office desk (a.k.a. the Ivory Tower, which is more elaborately and lavishly furnished than any of the other offices in the building by several orders of magnitude) … all to make sure nobody’s breaking in to his house during the day, I assume. He’s on vacation more than he’s in the office, he’s always nicely tanned and wearing the best clothes money can buy, and has probably visited the project estimating department that I work in about half a dozen times since I started there in January.

Meanwhile, our I.T. manager can’t get things working to their fullest potential because they refuse to give him a realistic budget for implementing hardware and software, and I had to make a business case and essentially beg for a new workstation just to be productive with my CAD work, which was nearly impossible on the off-the-shelf piece of HP garbage I had been using. Did I forget to mention that it was this same stretched-thin I.T. manager who implemented the president’s home-monitoring internet camera security system … on company time? The only reason they ever approved the purchase was because I persuaded one of the higher-ups that it would be necessary to complete some of his upcoming projects. Cost? $2,500. Probably not far off from the president’s monthly car payment. Nobody else in the office has a workstation of such a caliber because my position is the only one requiring heavy CAD work, but Heaven forbid any other employees be given the tools they need to do their job at anything more than the bare minimum level of productivity. I mean, we can’t have the boss driving around in, living in, dressing in, or working in anything less than the most excessive accoutrements available while the peons toil away on their stone tablets now, can we?

Needless to say, I sympathize.

9

As you can tell, I’m still up and will need to sleep soon. If this motherfucker actually expects me to pay for my own gas, he’s sadly mistaken! Queue up the company AMEX!

Red Bull will be my breakfast in four hours.

10

Ha, thanks. While my boss, to his credit, isn’t very flashy with his mode of dress or the cars he drives (he has a 2001 Lexus GS400 with 150,000 miles on it), he certainly vacations a LOT. He is gone on vacations more than he’s in his office. His Dad owns homes in Naples (replete with yacht), Michigan (their fishing getaway), the family owns a thousands of acres compound where the “company” entertains “guests” (read: potential investors/clients)…they also have a family helipad and private airport…it goes on and on.

At least he isn’t flashy. He dresses like it’s still the late 1980’s. Polo shirts, pressed khakis, nice shoes and a belt with either race cars on it or American flags.

My employees think he’s secretly gay the way he carries himself. I just shrug it off and remind them that he has several millionaires-in-waiting as his offspring.

11

Well, bon appétit, then, I guess.

12

Block that thought! Yes, he does expect it. You already know he’s an asshole, that makes him predictable. And there’s nothing like inherited wealth to bolster a man’s belief in rugged self-reliance.

13

I guess what’s funny to me about all this is that suddenly the guy shows up at his business because we’re having problems, decides that we’re in “emergency mode” (no shit, sherlock…been telling you for months this is coming) and nominates me, his “right hand” to make this venture to Indy for parts that I’ve been trying to get him to allow me to order and ship for awhile now. And he acts like we “suddenly have a situation” when I’ve been apprising him of it for a couple months now!

Ahh, the oblivion of the rich. I wonder sometimes if this business of his (we are barely profitable after three plus years) is just something for him to mention to his Dad at get-togethers as a way of telling Daddy that yes, in fact he IS doing something productive with his inheritance.

14

Had this buddy, smartest sumbitch I ever knew, specially for practical or mechanical stuff. We got jobs together in a printing place. Inside of about a week, he knew every machine in the place, what to do, how to fix it. Anybody called in sick, he could fill in. And such a peach of a guy, nobody ever resented it.

The boss/owner was a total dick and an ignoramus. Kind of guy liked to assign extra work for no extra money like he was doing you a favor, he would actually stand there waiting for your gratitude.

So anyway he walks up to Smitty, beaming like the pig that missed the luau, claps him on the shoulder and says “Smitty, I’m thinking of making you my right hand man, what do you think about that!”

Smitty blinked, said: “Is that the one you jerk off with?”

15

“That guy was born on third base and thinks he done hit a home run!” I believe that the late great Molly Ivins said this of Bush.

16

Actually, it’s “Born on third, and thinks he hit a triple.”

And i believe it was that other great Texan, Jim Hightower.

17

I really like that one. I hope I never have to use, but if I do it I want to use it.

18

I worked for a guy like that, and after nine years finally told myself “if I stay here for ten years, it’s my fault, not his.”

Just consider that you and you childrens’ welfare is no more important to him, or even less so, than that chain. Back in a 100-level college business class these guys are told that labor goes in the debit column, and no matter what you do for him, that’s all he sees you as.

(At the interview for my next job the salary offer was half again as much as I’d been grudingly paid before.)

19

Ah, he belongs to the Susanita school of thought. Susanita was a boss of mine whose greeting to a new employee was “let’s see how long this one lasts,” who started her workday with death threats, and to whom I once said “if you want me to go faster, I suggest you stop interrupting. I’ll have the results in half an hour or, if you prefer, in thirty minutes.”

IOW: I’ll be able to do my job if you let me, shitbrain!

20

So why do you stay there?