One great tool to increase your profit margin on a per-client basis is the technique of upselling. We get upsell offers every day – and many of them are highly effective. Would you like to super-size your Big Mac meal? Would you like the large tub of popcorn for just 50¢ more? Would you like to tack on an all-day meal plan with your theme park ticket? Yes, yes and yes, please. Upselling allows you to add value for your clients while increasing your bottom line. It should be a win-win, so you can check out some tips for upselling here. For many commercial painting clients, anti-graffiti coatings are a great upsell.

Anti-graffiti coatings can be a great benefit to your clients
Image source: Zyada via Flickr Creative Commons

Who benefits from anti-graffiti coatings?

You may think strictly of businesses when you think of who’s plagued by graffiti, but in fact, many homeowners deal with this form of vandalism frequently, as well. Despite the fact that many now refer to graffiti as “street art,” unless permission is granted by the property owner or it’s applied on a legal graffiti wall, it’s a crime – plain and simple. But once a home, apartment building or business is hit, even catching and prosecuting the perpetrators doesn’t help with the mess that’s made.

How to know if anti-graffiti coating is an appropriate upsell

When you get a call to first assess a project and make an estimate, check out the area to see if there is a prevalence of graffiti, if there are occasional tagging sites or if there is no evidence at all that this is a concern. If the last instance is apt, suggesting this particular upsell isn’t strategic or good for your customer. If you notice there is graffiti in the area, however, be sure to inspect the exterior thoroughly for evidence of prior graffiti, even if it’s been cleaned up. If you see no evidence, be sure to ask if they have had any issues with tagging of any sort.

How to upsell anti-graffiti coating

A survey showed that in the greater Los Angeles County area, graffiti clean-up costs more than $28 million per year. Of the tagging that’s on private property, businesses and homeowners must decide if they want to clean it themselves, hire a company and pay out of pocket or file a claim with their property insurance. Out of pocket cleaning is costly, while filing insurance claims still comes with a deductible to pay and can result in higher insurance premiums. All of these factors can be presented as financial offsets to the added cost of applying an anti-graffiti treatment. As for your commercial clients, Rutgers University has found that consumers avoid graffiti-ridden businesses because it creates fear. Graffiti-proofing a business can actually prevent revenue leakage – this is a huge upselling point.

Types of anti-graffiti coatings

There are two main types of anti-graffiti combatants that can be applied to exteriors – sacrificial coatings or permanent coatings. Sacrificial coatings are so named because they are clear coatings applied over exterior paint and when graffiti is applied, it adheres to this coat, which is then washed away (or sacrificed) along with the illegal paint. These coatings do have an initially lower cost, but must be reapplied after graffiti removal. These are more appropriate on surfaces where repeated graffiti vandalism is not anticipated.

Permanent coatings are more cost-effective for exteriors that have a likelihood of being hit repeatedly. When taggers try to vandalize treated exteriors, their paint won’t adhere. Some treatments make it so the paint simply doesn’t adhere to the substrate and still others encourage paint to bead and run so that the tagger will likely give up when he sees his “work of art” isn’t forming properly. Permanent coatings allow business owners to clean graffiti easily themselves for no added cost.

There are many different anti-graffiti coatings to choose from and recommend to your clients. For other special need clients such as marinas and marine-related clients, check out this recent article on choosing anti-fouling paint.