Sarasota Paint Co. has been selling paint coatings in the Sarasota and Bradenton, Florida, areas since 1975. The company has grown to five locations, catering to both the professional and DIYer.

In 1988, current owner David Jasik and his father, the late Emil Jasik, bought the paint store from the previous owners. Today, three of David’s four children are involved in the multistore operation, including Jonathan Jasik.

According to Jonathan, one of the reasons the family business has done so well is its focus on building strong relationships with its customers first-and-foremost.

“I really don’t care about selling a gallon of paint, I care about building a relationship with my customer,” Jonathan says. “I might grab a meal with a customer, and I’ve even gone out fishing with a few. By building that trust and friendship, our customers are more inclined to come to Sarasota Paint for DIY and professional needs.”

Blue Mist Paint & Flooring hosted its first educational class in January 2023, teaching customers how to patch drywall. The class was led by owner Heath Peterson.

Education That Goes Beyond Paint
Steering into its construction and design roots, Blue Mist Paint & Flooring in Spartanburg, South Carolina, recently began offering educational classes to teach customers remodeling basics like tiling, painting and staining, drywall repair, flooring installation and more. The paint and design store opened when owners Ashley and Heath Peterson decided to expand their construction and home renovation company into a retail business, and the classes were developed at the their customers’ requests.

“The clients we were doing renovations for would ask if tiling was something they could learn; they even asked about simple things such as repairing holes in the walls,” Ashley says. “These requests got me thinking about classes.”

The store’s first class, a drywall patch class, took place in January 2023, and a backsplash class was added in March 2023. Ashley says they plan to expand the classes to cover a variety of remodeling topics.

“These classes are a great way to let our community know about our growing business,” she says. “We hope to build relationships with people in the community who will consider our small, locally owned store for paint and flooring and share our knowledge, skills, values and character.”

Saving Space
Taking advantage of what could be wasted space, Dick’s Color Center utilizes the wall behind the checkout counter to display products. The operation has four locations in Oregon—Portland, Lake Oswego, Milwaukie and Beaverton—to serve the needs of professionals and DIYers, and each store creatively takes advantage of unused space.

Employees rotate out different products in the space behind the checkout counter to highlight new items and deals for customers and create a talking point when customers are checking out.

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