"It's good business, because everybody buys a vacuum"

Carlos Bresciani’s business hinges on providing service and repairs for the product he sells

We’ve been in business for 40 years, and in this location for 23. When I moved here from Peru, I started doing direct sales door-to-door. I was working for someone else in the beginning, for a short time, and then I opened my own store.

It’s a good business to be in. Everybody owns a vacuum, every hotel has vacuums, and if they have a vacuum they need supplies and repairs. That’s what’s different about us—we do the service and repairs. A lot of stores come and go because they don’t know how to fix vacuums. They come here, we open it up and, Oh my god, it’s a disaster inside.

It’s different now than it was 40 years ago. Now every department store has vacuums, and there are a lot of what I call one-way products: you buy it, break it and throw it out. It’s cheaper to replace it than to fix it. It’s frustrating for me to see, because there’s a lot of waste. In the past, most vacuums were fixable.

We make sure that if we sell it, we also service it. If we get a company who won’t give us the service for the warranty, then we don’t sell it. We sell high-end and lower-end brands, but we do try to specialize in the better ones, like Sebo and Miele. We have all kinds of customers, from businesses to households, and we also supply a lot of hotels. We supply all the Fairmont Hotels and quite a few Holiday Inns in Vancouver, Richmond and Whistler.

People come to us because we do good service and we have good staff. We have three employees who have been here for years—one for 40 years—and we just hired one more. Everyone who works here stays for a long, long time. We treat them well, and they are happy here. It’s simple.

I have no plans to retire. I love my work. I like dealing with a lot of people, and everyone’s happy here. Like I say, it’s a good business, because everybody has a vacuum. If you buy it, we keep you happy.