Q&A / 

October 5, 2010 AsktheBuilder Tips And News

What's in This Issue?

Rugby
Pink Tool Belt
Bathroom Mold
Desperately Need Your Help
Business Survey
Latest Columns
Fire Pit

I do product reviews frequently. Please read my Disclosure Policy to understand the relationship between me and the companies that make the products or offer the services I review.

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Friendly Question Reminder!

If you have a question for me, don't hit the Reply button just yet. Go immediately to my web site and type in the keywords about your problem into my Search engine. The search box is at the top of every page of my web site. You could have your answer in seconds if you do this! Please pay attention to all links you see at my web site. The exact products and services you often need are right in front of you, and you might be ignoring them.

On Sunday Kathy and I drove to Burlington, VT to visit our son up in college. He's playing rugby for the Champlain College Rugby Club. All I can say about rugby is that it's the best mashup of soccer, hockey and football one could ever imagine. It reminded my of some very physical games of touch football I played back in high school with no pads and on hard ground with bodies flying into one another.

We're in the final stages of selecting new kitchen cabinets for our home here. This winter there's going to be a boatload of new videos going up documenting that project. Speaking of new videos.....

Pink Tool Belt

Three months ago, I got a great email one morning from John Davis who subscribes to this newsletter. He was passing through Meredith, NH on the way to pick up his 11-year-old daughter Christine from an island camp nestled out on Lake Winnipesaukee.

For years, I've extended an open invitation for you to visit if you're in the neighborhood. John pulled that trigger. He and his daughter came over and we sat on the deck chatting drinking some iced tea, I believe.

Somehow the discussion moved indoors and involved my website and tools. Christine was amazed that I used the Dvorak method of typing. I showed her one website I'm familiar with that sells tools for women - Tomboy Tools. She pointed out that she'd love to have a pink tool belt. My response was, "Christine, that's easy. Let's email my friend Cindi Dugger."

Cindi is a rep for Tomboy Tools and is another subscriber to this newsletter. She's reached out to me for years to look at tools and we've become virtual friends as I may be with you. I've been blessed to have quite a few friendships that have spawned from this newsletter.

While Christine was still at the house, Cindi replied saying the tool belt would be shipped the next week. When I announced that Cindi had replied, the look on Christine's face was one I'll never forget. She was stunned it happened so fast and that she would get the pink tool belt.

But before sending the tool belt to Christine, I told Cindi I would do a video about it extolling its virtues! I'd appreciate it if you would pass this video around to all the friends on your email list. It would be interesting to see if this video has what it takes to go viral.

Finally, if you're looking to acquire some great pink tools as Christmas gifts, now's the time to act. Who do you know that might want the tool belt or any of the pink tools you see me show in the video? To get them or any TomBoy Tool, just visit Cindi's TomBoy Tools page. You can navigate quickly to see all the tools in the line.

Bathroom Mold

As you might imagine, I get many questions about mold issues in bathrooms. You may be waging a losing battle with it in your own home. Mold needs three things to grow: the mold spores, a food source and water. That's all.

Guess what? Two of the three things are around your home all the time: the spores and the food. You can control the third component if you work at it. Starve the spores of water, and the mold has a very hard time growing.

In your shower and tub area here's how to really cut down on mold growth. After showering, you must get rid of all surface water. This means using a squeegee to make the walls and shower floor free of water. Shake all water off the shower curtain and wipe down any glass doors. Leave the shower curtain open and the same with a shower door. You want that area to dry rapidly.

Towel dry the surfaces if possible. Use rags if you don't want to use your towel. Leave the bathroom door open to get air with lower humidity into the room. Use a bathroom exhaust fan that exhausts the humid air to the exterior of your home, not the attic space.

Bottom Line: Get the bathroom as dry as you can as fast as possible.

Desperately Need Your Help

While on the topic of mold, if you're new to the newsletter, I've sold my Stain Solver oxygen bleach for years. It does a fantastic job of cleaning mold from grout and surfaces. It also removes stain of just about any type from any water-washable thing.

About two weeks ago, we started selling Stain Solver on Amazon.com. It turns out we've tilted one of their algorithms. We got an email today telling us that we've sold TOO much in too short a time without having enough user feedback.

As with many websites now, they look for customer reviews. If you're a Stain Solver fan, can you please go to Amazon's home page and type stain solver in their search engine.

When you see the product in the search results, select the size you purchased in the past and go to it's page. About halfway down, you'll see a button to leave a Customer Review. Rate the product for me and leave a review, hopefully with a story about what you cleaned.

Speaking of Stain Solver, there's huge news about it very soon. I can't leak any details now, but when I do, you'll be blown away.

Business Survey - Stay With Me on This

Last week, I did a neat survey about moving a business to New Hampshire. The response was through the roof! Wow! Thanks if you were one who took the time to respond. The big winner in the survey was a 15-year tax holiday on the property taxes for the business. That didn't surprise me one bit. That's a fixed expense that anyone would love to scrub from the accounts payable side of the ledger for over a decade!

That survey showed me that you either work for a small or medium business and/or are the owner. I've also discovered that you may get sidetracked or flummoxed from time to time with computer or technical issues because you don't have what you need. Large companies have access to computerized tools that allow them to analyze data, grow faster and be more productive.

A really good friend of mine is developing web-based tools to give small and medium businesses the ability to quickly do the same kind of business concept and competitor analysis that large businesses have teams of people to do. These tools could really help grow your business in these tough times.

My buddy and I have talked about some of the rough concepts and I can't wait to use them myself. Please take this NEW quick one-question survey if you want to impress your boss or grow your business. It'll take you about 30 seconds to complete.

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Tim Carter's Fire Pit

If you're new to my newsletter, you may want to know about one of my hobbies. Let's just say my Fire Pit website has a little to do with tea and everything to do with preserving our great nation.

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