Westwind Digital Communications

Although I have never personally done a remodel, I know people who have had to endure that grueling chore. I’ve been told that a remodel is slightly better than building a new house, to which I have heard that fun task called a divorce maker. In other words, it’s no fun. The other aspect to both that I have heard is the budget is a starting point, and not what you are going to spend on the project.

Recently we were called out to replace the phone system at a hotel that was going through a remodel and name change. Not that he was very excited to spend the extra money on a new Toshiba phone system near the end of an 18-month remodel; although he was lucky we got the 24-year-old Mitel to work as long as it did. Our techs are the best in Oklahoma, but they stopped making parts for the beast in the late 80’s. There comes to a point when you get past bubble gum, duct tape, and prayers to keep an electronic device working. The boys had gotten there about seven service calls before, and I’m not joking about the size either. Imagine a square version of R2D2 that’s less mobile.

Before the Mitel system finally died, he had asked us to come out and evaluate where to put video surveillance cameras. Morton’s Salt and Murphy were running the gambit on our poor customer and I do not fault him one bit for dropping the camera job to replace the phone system. He was ready to get the whole remodel behind him.

The only problem was part of the remodel was installing nice new Panasonic 42” plasma flat screen televisions. I say it was a problem because those TVs started to walk out of the hotel. Unfortunately, it was not hard. This is a huge hotel and it has multiple exits spread out all over several buildings. Had he decided to go ahead when he first called to have us put in the video surveillance system, he would have actually saved money by not replacing the televisions. I guess this way it makes for a better “lessons learned” story.