The Importance of Good Design - A Remodeler’s Perspective - 8/9/2004 - Home Remodeling Interior Decorating Design

The Importance of Good Design: A Remodeler’s Perspective

Clients might ask for an expanded family room, a new kitchen that lets them cook together without bumping heads or a spare bedroom for guests so their teenage son doesn’t have to sleep on the couch when grandma comes to visit.

Good Design Makes Clients’ Lives More Comfortable

Good design enhances traffic flow. It lets people live more efficiently. This is especially important as more and more home owners telecommute from home offices. Chances are they have also have to keep an eye on the kids, toss laundry into the washer, prune the rose bushes, fetch grandma from the airport and…you get the idea.

Good design makes their lives more comfortable. It adapts to the client’s needs. It persuades them to think outside the box and outside the living room when they are planning for the future.

Good Design Won’t Stretch Clients' Wallets

Your clients may have Mercedes dreams but a beat-up Chevy in the garage. Good design accommodates their bank account so they get the best of what they can afford. It means knowing what suppliers and products are out there, and how best to fit them into what your clients want.

While you may have to steer your clients from the top-of-the-line washer and dryer so they won’t have to take in laundry to pay for it, the best construction crew can’t save a poor design.

A good design saves your clients money by getting their wants and needs right the first time. That way, your subcontractor doesn’t’ become a permanent fixture in their home and you don’t earn a reputation around town as “the guy who built that really ugly addition.”

Good Design Preserves the Character of the Original House

A well-designed project may be innovative, but it always preserves the character of the original house and site. A remodeled Victorian becomes an improved Victorian, not a modern horror that neighbors point to and snicker.

Good design means finding a place for a piano or a treasured antique. It gives an old house new life and preserves what the home owners already know and love about their house.

Good design is a good neighbor that considers easements, codes and the community. It helps your clients keep up with the Joneses, not thumb their noses at them — unless that’s what they want.

Good Design Brings Referrals

Finally, good design can bring you more work. If your clients like your work, the whole neighborhood will hear about it. And that’s the best advertising you can hope for.

Doug Sutton, Sr., CGR, CAPS, president of Sutton Siding & Remodeling in Springfield, IL, is the 2004 Remodelors™ Council chairman and active in his local, state and national associations. He was the first remodeler to be elected president of the Greater Springfield Home Builders Association and president of the Home Builders Association of Illinois. Sutton is a past chairman of NAHB National Representatives and was the first individual to be named National Representative of the Year twice. He is also an NAHB life director and served as chairman of the Remodelors™ Council in 1998. For more information, e-mail Sutton.