Les Schmutter reflects on 50 years selling flooring on the Border

But when you know as much about floors as Les Schmutter, it's easy to understand why.

The 76-year-old recently ticked over 50 years in flooring and more than six decades in retail.

Mr Schmutter, who has worked for Choices Flooring Wodonga the past three years after he was approached for the position, started his career in department stores in Melbourne in 1962.

After the best part of a decade working for EC Hattam, he was asked to move to the Border to manage shops in Albury and Wagga.

What was meant to be a six to 12-month stay saw him fall in love with the region and he didn't look back.

"I got into flooring by default and never found a way out of it," he said.

"I had an appointment to go back to Melbourne with a promotion and that was very tempting as a career move, but I liked the environment up here."

A former school connection convinced him to take on a position with Candace Carpets, and despite having no knowledge of what he would be soon be selling, he accepted the offer.

It didn't take Mr Schmutter long to find his feet and he stayed on as sales manager for more than a decade before becoming a franchisee at Solomon's Carpets on Townsend Street in the mid-1980s, where he remained until the early 1990s.

"They went belly up and took about 120 franchisees with them, which included ourselves," he said.

"I said after that I'd dedicate the rest of my career to working for other people."

Mr Schmutter had stints with a range of Border carpet stores before landed at Choices Flooring at the age of 74.

"I've tried a good number of things, but in my 61 years I've only ever had two job interviews. I've been approached for everything else," he said.

"Product knowledge, it doesn't matter what you're selling, is vital.

"The most important thing to remember is we're in the people business. We all sell basically the same stuff at about the same price, but people buy from people.

"There's been numerous generations of families over the years. One family I've done four generations of work for.

"We're not selling socks and underpants, flooring is a big investment. We're dealing with people's homes and their money, so it's very important to take the time to make sure we, and they, get it right."

Mr Schmutter said he'd experienced numerous changes, including the switch from imperial to metric measurements and the introduction of decimal currency, while there had been a gradual shift away from wool carpets.

"In the early days, everything revolved around wool as the fibre and synthetic yarns were considered to be lesser. These days it's entirely different," he said.

"Every house was also predominantly carpet, but hard flooring represents a much bigger proportion of the house nowadays.

"The people skills are the things that never change."

It's clear he's been asked once or twice about the most effective way to remove a wine stain from carpet and it drew a simple answer from Mr Schmutter.

"You shouldn't have been wasting red wine by spilling it in the first place," he laughed.

Mr Schmutter said working in a supportive environment made it easy for him to turn up each morning and also helped keep him in a good frame of mind, particularly after losing his son to suicide eight years ago.

"What I'm doing now is not to generate wealth. It's played a fairly significant part in keeping what's between the ears active and positive," he said.

"I do Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays and every second Saturday.

"Saturday is a great day because people who walk through the door have got a coffee cup in their hand, they're relaxed and they're usually in a buying mood. During the week they're in during their lunch hour and you get the phones ringing with manufacturers and carpet layers.

"What I've really loved over a lot of years is the people who started in the industry, especially those I've had some involvement with, are still in the industry."

Even after half a century in the flooring game, Mr Schmutter isn't planning on slowing down.

"It's my intention to work again next year. When I started, I said that I would give it a couple of years and we'd revise it," he said.

"I'm very fortunate to enjoy pretty good health for a guy who eats and drinks far too much.

"I don't do things with computers, if the computers go down I can still work. The only thing that stops me is if I lose my pencil sharpener."

Outside of his job, Mr Schmutter volunteers for Carevan and Friends of Nolan House and is a supporter of Albury's Winter Solstice.

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