Customer Service Week celebrates those serving and supporting customers daily this week. The window film industry is due for applause as it has generated solutions in the residential, commercial and automotive sectors for decades. For Gabe Fletcher, owner-operator of Ceramic Pro Pottstown in Pottstown, Pa., customers create more than revenue.

Building Connections

Ceramic Pro Pottstown PPF Installers working on a Tesla Model Y Hatch

“The best part of growing this business is meeting new people, learning their likes and dislikes and how we can help them,” says Fletcher, whose company’s sales jumped by more than 2000% from 2020 to 2022. “I’ve met friends as clients in the last three years willing to go above and beyond to show they were good people. I’ve met more of those people as paying clients than I have my childhood friends.”

WINDOW FILM magazine and PPFMag columnist Mike Burke has been in the window film industry for 33 years and the paint protection business for 26 years. His company, Sun Stoppers, has more than 68 locations in 19 states and offers residential and commercial tint and decorative film services as well as automotive tint, paint protection and ceramic coatings.

“Some of my customers are still my best friends today,” Burke says. “They’re car people, and they want their car taken care of. Their car is their new baby, so you have to treat it like you’re the babysitter of their new child.”

The Golden Rule

Sun Stoppers’ Mike Burke has interacted with customers for decades.

“It goes back to the age-old adage—how would I want to be treated in that situation?” comments Matthew Sandherr, owner of Naples Tint Company in Naples, Fla. “Nobody’s perfect, and something is going to go wrong. But it’s nice if the person who caused that mistake or damage actively pursues correction.”

Naples Tint Company recently encountered an aggressive customer following an installation error. Sandherr and his team went above and beyond to make things right.

“We cracked a window on a car, and the customer [lost it],” Sandherr says. “Screaming on the phone and at the staff—just boiling hot. But we dove right into it. We called Cadillac and got with the service advisor … We didn’t charge for the tint job. Once the window was replaced, I tinted a window in his garage. We did all we could to calm the situation.”

Selling Solutions

Ultimately, the road to a satisfied customer is paved by multiple successful service segments. For Fletcher, it starts and ends by putting the ball in his client’s court.

Naples Tint Company Matthew Sandherr (far left) with his team.

“We’re not here to hard sell anybody on any particular service,” Fletcher says. “Most customer service surrounds a few key components—sales, follow-up, education and remediation if there are any issues. We very much [implement] solution-based selling. That’s listening to a client’s needs and concerns and then supplying a solution to their problem.”

Fletcher and his team created a terms of service agreement to set realistic expectations for all clients.

“It covers nearly every scenario when it comes to ceramic coatings, window tint, detailing, paint protection film, pickup, drop-off and warranty management,” he says. “All of those things are laid out in black and white.”

In July 2021, Fletcher founded Detailing Growth, a marketing and growth agency for detailers. The agency centers on website design, pay-per-click advertising and search engine optimization.

Terms of service agreements are one of the agency’s most requested services.

“It protects you from being abused,” says Fletcher, who believes agreements need to be standardized. “Clients need to check a box that says, ‘I understand XYZ.’ They have to check it for each individual point. It goes a long way towards [laying out] what they can expect.”