Chapter 51

Day Fifty-one - Tuesday

I awoke, spooning with Sue, hugging her round pooky bubble butt into me. The clock said five thirty, so I should go back to sleep. Sue's still having her monthlies so I need to take it easy on her.

A rush of thoughts ran through my mind.

I kissed Sue's neck and shoulder while moving my hand up to cup the under side of one of her breasts. After a few more kisses, I said softly, "Time to wake up my little wife, a new day is here."

"I know, I was awake probably doing the same thing you were doing, letting your mind go a hundred miles an hour. I'm hungry, what about you?"

She turned over in my arms facing me giving me a few kisses, "If you keep doing that, you know what I'll be hungry for."

"I'm always hungry for you, honey." She then added, "But right now, I'm starved."

We got up and did our usual. Sue went to sit, while I started the coffeepots and came into the bathroom, pausing to unload, before getting into the shower to wash my bride.

Sue started a couple of pounds of bacon and sent me to the Seven-Eleven for two more pounds, a couple of loaves of bread, a couple of gallons of orange juice, a couple gallons of milk, and at least four dozen eggs. The trip only took me five minutes, but two loads to carry into the house.

Glenda was helping Sue, saying that Martin had woken up hungry as well. She said since we had a couple of boxes of Bisquick that she would use one big box for biscuits and the other for pancakes. The only problem was that the stove wasn't big enough for more big pans. Sandy was over early, took one box of Bisquick, saying she would make the pancakes.

Tiny came into the house with his coffee cup. He sat at the counter and said, "I could smell the bacon from home. Man, am I hungry this morning."

Sue and Glenda looked at each other as Shawna came into the kitchen rubbing her tummy and licking her lips, causing Sue to say, "Sure hope we have enough, everyone's hungry."

I set up the third large coffeepot out on the patio and started it, thinking that this day was kicking off early. It was barely six and the activity level was already in high gear. The light wasn't even on.

At six-twenty I turned the patio light on but it wasn't necessary to attract people. Ruth was talking to Joan and Betty while Martin, Charlie, Jim, Al, and Tom were talking to Hank and Debbie.

Two more patio people. Wonder if Abe can get another table extension.

Glenda and Shawna began bringing out food and putting it on the big table, telling those who were hungry to save some for the others. Sandy and Mandy came back, carrying two giant platters of pancakes and a bottle of syrup with them as well.

Phil and Judy arrived with a big box of Danish rolls, saying they were starved this morning when they woke up.

Funny, all the girls were dressed ready for work this morning, even Joan and Betty. No see-through, sexy stuff for us to enjoy this morning.

By seven-fifteen there was one lonely pancake left. Even the big box of Danishes was empty. Glenda said we needed to consider a way to feed everyone in the morning in the future, so everyone began his or her day with a full belly.

Everyone hustled to get going so they could open the shop by eight.

Sue said she was staying home again today as there were too many new items that they were trying to get made as well as a couple of magazine ads they were working on. She said she had another girl starting that was going to do nothing but check orders and credit card transactions. Sue thought she could use another designer so they could have another perspective on design, but was going to wait for the right person, rather than jump at someone.

Tom and Al were re-hanging the now painted frame. Abe was standing next to a small sized mobile generator with the side panels up, showing the control panels. He said he chose this one, as it was the least popular, because it was smaller. This one had a control panel that looked like it had never been used. Al said he wanted to put a set of sheet metal on a frame and have Shawna and Hank paint it. He thought it would look good hanging from the ceiling as well. I told him to do it, as we would probably be getting several customers coming by in the next few weeks to check us out, to see if we were for real.

An engine would be nice up here. Wonder if we could find one that was a junker and clean it up for show. I'll ask Gene if he has one.

Debbie was entering orders, saying there was one that she didn't understand. She handed me an order from Gene. He wanted six frames constructed with the eighteen percent stainless. I figured out what the material list would be but made the order for thirty frames and ordered the steel to construct more racks for the stainless tubing materials.

Tiny and Phil wanted me to meet the two new road salesmen they felt would do a good job. Both men were in their thirties, single, and enjoyed traveling. They both wanted to drive instead of flying, as they said it didn't matter if they stayed over a weekend at a motel or hotel, if the company didn't mind paying for it. Juan was from Miami and Mark from Mississippi.

I asked Phil if he thought two guys could handle the entire territory. He replied, "Absolutely not, but these are the two I have right now, and I will let one start at the north end and the other start at the south. Juan is bilingual so he will be especially good for south Florida. Mark didn't necessarily want to work Mississippi. He said he would prefer to work from Georgia north to include the two Carolinas. Jim said they were not going to be moving very fast as there were so many customers that had not been seen for so long, and many, many prospective customers that he wanted to develop.

Phil said he thought cars would be good for both guys or four door pickups with a bed cover could be good too. They could be painted with the S&S logo giving them a little more creditability.

I told Tiny to get it done.

Judy said she thought the six girls that she had right then should be able to handle orders and customer service questions for a while. As they became more knowledgeable of the various types of equipment, the customers were going to be kept happy.

I told Al that when he had opportunity, for him to take a frame from the staged frames, and install sheet metal on it as if it were a real car. The only outside part we might want for looks was a set of those web things for the windows. When it was done, he was to put it on some dollies and give it to Shawna and she would have Hank paint it. Shawna would do the sponsor lettering when it dried.

Shawna was finished with Gene's forty-five cubic inch flat head engine and the three speed with reverse transmission, saying it is probably a lot better than new as she didn't think there were any flatheads with ported and polished heads, and that were totally balanced.

I needed to take Gene's two motors to him so we loaded the forty-five motor and tranny and headed out. On the way we went by Best Buy to find a digital camera. The salesman was pretty good. He sold us a Sony that took CDs to record the pictures. That seemed like a good idea.

It seemed that Gene is always happy to see me. We unloaded the two motors, the forty-five engine and tranny. We put the bike engine and tranny on a bench next to the basket of parts that he was assembling. Shawna looked at the rear axle from the Servicar and grimaced. She turned to Gene, "Are you going to have someone rebuild this. It is in really rough condition. I'd bet all the bearings are bad and the main shaft needs to be trued after being rusted."

"You can see that from just looking at it for a minute?" Gene asked.

"Easy, see all the rust marks on these gears, watch when you turn the wheel, this is a differential so the gears should mesh perfectly. See these little marks, the gears aren't meshing when you turn them by hand. Imagine the mess you would have with weight and fifty miles an hour. You'll probably wreck when the axle trashes itself."

"You know, Shawna, I'm not making any progress on this thing and I'd really like to show it off by riding it around at the races. This thing would be a real showstopper. Could you take all this junk and make it into a machine I would be proud of. Can you paint it up to look like one of my cars? Give it my old number seventeen. Maybe put my name on the tank. Could you do that?"

"I would love to build your trike for you. I will make you proud. Give us a hand and let's get all this stuff into the truck. I'll work on it as fast as I can and maybe Jim will help me, he loves Servicars. Do you care how much I spend on chrome and fancy parts?"

"Keep the total under twenty if you can, I don't think I could convince the IRS that something too expensive would be worth the advertising dollar."

Shawna grinned, "It won't be anywhere near that. It will be a show winner when I get done. Do you mind if we take pictures of the cars you have here so that I can have some ideas when I do the final painting?"

Gene waved his hand, "All you want kid, everyone takes pictures of the cars every race day anyway. I'll go get you some old promo literature of my old car."

We took a hundred or so pictures of all the cars at every angle. We even convinced one of his drivers to put on his suit and pose by his car. I thought I would blow that up and put it in the showroom with a bunch of the other pictures. Gene even agreed to pose with a wrench in his hand and grease on his face propped up against a car he was working on. We got another of the crew chief sticking his head out from under a car. The last was almost a joke as one of the mechanics was inside the car trying to do something by the seat. His body was inside the car and his legs were sticking out at a forty-five degree angle. It was funny looking.

Shawna and I took off for the shop with a new project for her. She was excited, as she loves building bikes. While we were going back to the shop I asked Shawna what she knew about electrostatic painting. She said that it was also called powder coating and that the equipment was relatively inexpensive but the quality depended on the prep. The item painted should have an electrostatic primer first then should be water sanded till perfectly smooth. Only then will the paint go on perfectly smooth. I asked what her opinion of the end result of the process was. She was all for it in some cases such as frames or large panels like the rebuild shop does, but she thought traditional paint was better for car sheet metal.

She said it would be easier to paint just the metal for items in the rebuild shop. There is less overspray.

I told her to investigate some decent equipment and for some training. She was happy I wanted her to learn more.

When we unloaded the pieces of Gene's Servicar, Sandy and Mandy were oohing and aahing over Shawna getting to do something like that. They said they would help as she went along if it needed to get done right away. Carl and Kurt were not into bikes but said it would be fun to see how it turned out.

When I left the motor building shop I was instantly in front of a car, or at least a frame with sheet metal added to it. "We might need a few pieces of other material here and there but not much more." Al said he only tacked and screwed on the pieces as on the NASCAR specifications and prints. He thought that if we wanted to remove the panels in the future, it would be easy.

I told Al to put the car on a good dolly and give it to Shawna for Hank to paint. Shawna would have to do the fancy stuff with her airbrush.

We needed more frame stands and finished product dollies. It wasn't feasible for us to build them ourselves so I headed to my office to order some.

Debbie had a stack of orders she was entering. When I asked what they were for, she replied, "Everything, two types of frames from the standard metal, the standard NASCAR frame of the eighteen percent stainless steel, loads of sheet metal and now a total of eleven more engines."

Eleven more engines on top of our existing orders were going to take up to three weeks at the minimum. We needed at least one more team of quality motor builders and at least two more good sheet metal people. This was going to require more equipment too. The sheet metal people can't take time to share equipment.

I asked Debbie to make a list of all the companies that had ordered sheet metal from us. I wanted her to go out to the sheet metal area and write down the numbered description of each piece of sheet metal and the number that we had assigned to it. She was to get Dan and Al to give Tiny the quantity or percent of a raw panel that it took to produce each finished panel along with the estimated time of each panel if created individually. Tiny could then assign prices to each piece of sheet metal.

We needed to get them to our customers to give us an exact list of what panels they were using to repair damaged vehicles and what panels were left over that they were scrapping. We needed to be able to fill in panels that were being used instead of them buying a full set.

We might not sell as many full sets but we could mark up the individual panels more than a full set just like any manufacturer.

I told her that this was a priority and I wanted to get a price list to our customers by tomorrow.

Upstairs, Tiny agreed that it was a great idea to divide the cost of each piece so we could sell just what the customer was using. I suggested that in the beginning, we would give them credit for any returned panels in unused condition. This way they could maintain full sets, but only buy what they were using.

Once we had a pattern of what was being bent and trashed the fastest, we could manufacture extras of that part and have it ready to ship immediately. Any extra we would charge would be more than acceptable if they didn't have to buy a full set all the time.

Back in my office I made a collage of the pictures we took at Gene's. I put several pictures on a new CD to take to a photo shop to get printed in 8X10's for the show room. I made Shawna a bunch of prints so she could paint our car and use the pictures as a guide for the Servicar.

I checked the material orders with the finished equipment orders to find Debbie was right where we needed to be on inventory. I called the Parts House to ask them how much lead-time they needed for the crate engines I was buying. I told them that I needed twenty right away but was not willing to pay too much toward fast freight. They said that for twenty motors they could probably get a dedicated truck if I really needed them that fast. I told them to split the order up into three shipments of seven each. That way we shouldn't get too backlogged. I asked about a larger discount and the order guy said it was automatic. With as much as we had been buying, we should be darn near the max.

I got a call from the car builder that had blown me off because I wouldn't reduce my price or build the frames at his shop. He apologized and said he would be willing to pay seventy percent of what he had originally paid but that would be all. Again I thanked him for the opportunity to bid on his work and said that at this time our price was not negotiable. He started to get huffy over the phone and I asked him why he would be mad at me if he could buy the product elsewhere. He wouldn't answer; all I heard was a 'click.'

Everything seemed to be moving along smoothly today. I called Sue and asked if she had time for the gym and perhaps some sun. She was all for it, with lunch between the gym and the sun.

I told Debbie to call me on the cell phone if it was an emergency; otherwise I would be back about three.

My lovely wife was dressed in her workout duds, dangling her Mustang keys, when I walked in the door. I changed quickly and we went to the gym for a solid hour and a half of work.

We ate at home before putting on swimsuits and walked up to the pool for some baking. We basted each other with lotion and stretched out while discussing our day so far.

Sue said she had talked to Phil, Judy, Abe, and Tiny on a conference call about brochures for individual products and services as well as a big brochure that included everything. They also wanted to create catalogs both printed and on the Internet for products that we could update ourselves as far as pricing or modifying terms. She said that she was having her site builder and the commercial artist she used get in touch with Phil. Sue said she told both of those people that Phil wanted immediate action, as that was the way he was.

I told Sue about my thoughts concerning my sister and brother. She said to bring them on as we always had room for a few more. She said, "Besides, if they get in our way, we'll just get them a room at a hotel and passes to Busch Gardens and Disney."

We only did fifteen minutes a side before swimming hard for about ten minutes. That was enough after our previous workout, but it was cooling and relaxing.

At home we showered quickly and she went back to her group and I went back to the shop. It was only two-thirty.

A quick trip around the place was all it took. Everyone was busy with their projects. I asked my four motor builders if they could think of anyone they would like to work with. Kurt, who seemed to have assumed a leadership position among the four asked, how many? I told them that teams seemed to be the most productive and so far had turned out the best work. So I would say our shop could handle two more teams, max.

The four huddled together acting as if they had already discussed this eventuality. Kurt said he had two teams in mind but would talk to them first and have them come in if they were interested. He asked if our health insurance covered pre-existing conditions and I said that Ruth had assured me it did. The policies should be here today.

Shawna heard me and said, "That's going to fill this place up. Two more motors or whatever it is at a time is going to take some equipment and a ton of supplies."

"Buy what you need Shawna, so far orders are outpacing our production. My only concern is that every product we turn out is better than the last. Any innovations your folks can come up with that stays within the specs for the motor is going to make you and your shop famous. Can you imagine Gene riding around on his trike with your name on it as well as the signs on the trike and on his cars, motor by S&S Enterprises."

"That is exciting Steve, I've got to get this bike done quick. I wonder if Gene will let me put our sponsor tag on his cars. I think it should say in a very small heart, 'Mill by S&S Enterprises.' Sometimes the small logos mean the most."

"Call him up and ask him, I'll bet he'll tell you to get your little butt over there and paint it right now. We need to take another motor over there to him so he can leave for this weekend's races. I need some blueprints anyway so let's load up the engine Kurt and Carl are finishing, get your paint equipment and we will make a run."

At Gene's, he said his Busch car and one of his Winston cars were running our engines. He told Shawna to only paint those two. The third car had an engine built by the old company. They were guaranteeing no problems with the motor. Gene said the dyno machine already told them it was over two hundred horsepower below ours, but he was going to run it. The other company had even offered to repay him for our cost of rebuilding, saying there was no way that we found all those problems. Gene said it was the first time a vendor was paying him to fail.

Shawna painted our logo and shot it with some clear on both cars in about fifteen minutes. We packed up and left, thanking Gene for all his business. He had given me another two sets of the truck blueprints. I wanted to start working on those frames and sheet metal as soon as we were caught up on back orders.

Tom and Al said they had been busy going back over every item their people had produced to make sure that it was perfect. They had several shipments to get out and they were a little apprehensive about it. They were confident the work they were shipping was as perfect as they could make it.

I was happy they took the extra time to triple check. Our customers were going to be surprised at our quality. That was the idea. I congratulated them on such fine work ethic.

Abe said his group was producing equipment faster than our existing orders were coming in. I told him that as soon as his men were in the field and our road salesmen were out selling, any overstock he thought we might have would be gone. He said it was really nice to have so many happy workers making good equipment.