Fix your car with BEER!

"Grindintosecond" (Grindintosecond) 10/02/2013 at 12:08 • Filed to: beer stories

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(submit your stories) There is intrinsic value to beer. Not all things need to be paid for with money when a proper volume of beer is offered in it's place. Problem: we don't know how much beer will pay off the laborer. This means you are about to give too much beer and probably the good stuff! Here's the formula...

(2003) I bought a trailer hitch for my awesome zq8 packaged '97 S-10 (before the extreem. it was low and had Camaro wheels stock!) as I was about to move 1500 miles across country and the U-Haul place had what I needed to do that. The gentleman business owner said he could put it on for a price...or... we could work out a deal. This is where I became aware of an importance greater than money. Beer. (Yes even more so than I realized it in college)

If I bought him 2 six-packs from the gas station up the street, he would let me use the lift and install the Hitch myself.

+

=12 ($11)

I brought them back in a brown bag and he told me to put them in the fridge in the back of the shop because his wife (who worked at the front of the business) didn't like him drinking beer anymore. I did as instructed. He then marshaled my truck onto the lift and put it up for me. I unpacked the hitch from the box and got to work. I even got to use his tools!!! He sat and talked about weather and really unmemorable things.

I found out the normal shop rate and did some mental math. In this scenario, beer was worth 3 times what it cost to get. Beercost x 3* = value to laborer/shop-keeper (*multiple is a variable based on desire and type of work done. you cant expect a beer to be worth $4 to a hari-dresser, but you can expect that for a concrete worker or a roofer-even intelligent ones.)

I was very lucky in this scenario. He only drank Budweiser and that is a very inexpensive beer. I didn't have any but it was very close to get. Net result was I didn't loose anything more than I expected. If beer was not near and easy to get, and you had other kinds, you might have to give that beer on hand and then you would be out the expensive stuff and probably more beer than anticipated as the bargaining happened after services were rendered and the labor was looking at your beer while negotiating. Bad situation. You probably would have been better off with cash. So be careful. Have beer that you can afford to give away in enough volume to still have some for yourself. You just got your car fixed for 1/3 the price!

Nibbles > Grindintosecond 10/02/2013 at 12:12

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My friends pay me for work in beer all the time. Latest job - replace downstream O2 sensor on an Isuzu Rodeo for a 24-pack of Coors Light. Two sprays of WD-40, a breaker bar, and 5 minutes worth of work? Worth it.

Grindintosecond > Nibbles 10/02/2013 at 12:18

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Yep. What's the regular shop labor rate? something near $70 or alot more in most places so a half hour of billable labor compared to the actual cost of that beer? Yep worth it! Good business! If only you could save up the beer and pay rent/mortgages to the international brew-bank.

505Turbeaux > Nibbles 10/02/2013 at 12:26

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for both of you...

Mattbob > Grindintosecond 10/02/2013 at 12:42

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I am on the other side of the issue. Last time I did work on someones car, they wanted to pay me, so I just asked for beer. Replacing a serpentine belt on a Mercedes e320 in 5 degrees for a 6 pack of Hopslam. I am a nice person.

Grindintosecond > Mattbob 10/02/2013 at 12:51

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How long did that job take? I hope you liked hopps....

Mattbob > Mattbob 10/02/2013 at 12:52

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this

for this

Mattbob > Grindintosecond 10/02/2013 at 12:56

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maybe an hour and a half. Had to be careful with plastics in the cold, and my hands weren't working well. It was in a parking lot. I love hopps.

Mazarin > Grindintosecond 10/02/2013 at 13:33

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My dad's 69 Pontiac Catalina had previous bodywork that comprised of bondo, and lots of it. As we were pounding it out of the panels, we came across some rust, then a hole. Then a GIANT chunk fell out.

It was a flattened Busch beer can bondo'd in to patch the hole.

Remember dialing "popcorn" for the time? > Grindintosecond 10/03/2013 at 13:55

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As a participant in the exchange under discussion, I, under advisement from a partner in crime, wanted to add that, regardless of the cost of the beer, it is important that the brand and/or type of beverage be what the laborer desires. Some people prefer "the Champagne of Beers" while others (myself) prefer unsweetened iced tea (not a beer drinker).

So getting some fancy beer to either of us will not endear the customer to the laborer, and could result in all kinds of tomfoolery during the repair ...