Ben Osborne Hardwood Floor Sanding and Refinishing Expert

Ben Osborne

Ben Osborne is a well-known internet entrepreneur in the floor sanding and refinishing space. His websites and YouTube videos have a combined total of over 10 million views.

 

My Work Story

After leaving school all I wanted to do was work and earn. I didn’t have many qualifications to my name so the work was slim picking. At 17 I was working in a call centre, trying to sell double glazed windows and conservatories.

At the time, I was going to the gym 5 days a week and I was looking fairly buff. The manager of the call centre had a partner who ran a business in wood floor sanding and refinishing. He was looking for someone who looked like they were in good shape and wanted to earn a bit more money. That turned out to be me!

I had a short interview in the backroom of the office, in which the work and pay were described. I couldn’t believe my luck at £40 per day. I jumped at the opportunity and started sanding floors in October of 2004.

Ben Osborne working on hummel floor sander

Unfortunately, unbeknownst to me, my new employer didn’t have the experience he claimed he had. He had been sanding floors for only 3 months, not the 7 years that he said.

We learned all sorts of wrong ways to prepare, sand and refinish floors. It seemed we just had non stop issues with jobs and I couldn’t figure out why. Luckily, the boss wasn’t afraid of trying new things and we just about tried everything and anything until we were somewhat competent at sanding and refinishing hardwood floors.

However, it was a long 3 years, the first 3 years of my career. Learning how not to do it wrong is great, but it’s just not quite as good as being shown the right way.

Starting My Own Business

In January 2012, I started my own wood floor sanding business. I managed to scrape together enough money to buy some floor sanding equipment and a van. Scrabbled together a website and off I went.

Running your own floor sanding and refinishing business introduces you to a whole new swathe of issues that you hadn’t really run into at this point. Dealing with customers directly drove me to push my quality higher and higher. I still own and operate my floor sanding business and to this day I have never stopped pushing quality and speed up, and costs down. You can see my website at https://www.osbornewoodcare.com (please only get in touch if you are in the UK and would like a quote for restoring your wooden floors)/

Helping homeowners Do It Themselves.

The great thing about sanding and refinishing hardwood floors is that you can earn and learn at the same time! I began listening to audiobooks, podcasts, even university lectures whilst I was sanding floors. You wouldn’t believe how much you can learn while digesting that kind of content for up to 8 hours a day.

I was learning about internet marketing and internet-based businesses when one day it finally struck me. While listening to a podcast about people selling their own expertise, I decided to buy howtosandafloor.com. I figured, if I can help people do a better job on their wooden floors, cheaper and faster, that’s got to be worth something.

I recorded my first YouTube video in October of 2013. Little did I know just to what degree it would take off. It sputtered around for 2 or 3 months with a hand full of views per day. Then all of a sudden it rocketed up to the 20-30k views range and has stayed there ever since. That video is about to cross 2 million views. It didn’t take long for my website to ramp up to 20k visitors a month either.

My Goal

I hope to make this resource so universally comprehensive that anyone around the world can find all the information they need to resand and refinish their own floors. Full information on the tools available to them where they are, the products that are available, even information about their specific floor.

I am still very much pre-occupied with my own floor sanding business. However, I do intend to spend more and more time filling out this website. If you have read this far, thank you.

<

I recently posted in my blog about a UK tool hire chain called HSS tool hire. That post wasn’t the most flattering to HSS and unfortunately this brief post isn’t going to be too dissimilar.   I have no experience with Home Depot, but as I was writing my blog post about HSS, I suspected … Continued

HSS Tool Hire is a UK based tool hire chain that hires out all types of power tools and machinery, they are one of the biggest tool hire chains in the UK. I want to go over some of my experiences and findings with HSS, so this post is mostly focused on UK readers. I … Continued

The very first video I posted on youtube went viral. In it, I talked about how to refinish a wood floor without sanding and when this is possible. One important distinction is whether your current floor finish is oil or lacquer. Naturally, I get countless emails and comments on my youtube videos from people wanting … Continued

Whenever someone calls me to get a quote for floor sanding and they have engineered wood flooring, they often ask me if it’s even possible first. To be fair, it’s an understandable question, you only have some 4 to 8 millimeters of real hardwood to work with. You might sand straight through to the plywood! Can … Continued

Click here to learn how I sand and refinish wood floors. I recently had the pleasure of sanding and refinishing a bamboo floor which I have not done for a few years. Believe it or not, I get a lot of questions about refinishing bamboo floors. So I took the opportunity to create this blog … Continued

What is Hardwax Oil? I do get asked this quite a lot. It is a relatively new product or concept so it does need explanation. Most people are familiar with Waxes, often associated with furniture, which you rub in to the surface of the wood. Most are also familiar with Oil, such as Danish oil, with … Continued

I recently had a call to go and look at a floor that had been sanded by a builder… Straight away I knew what to expect; old varnish left on certain parts of the floor that dip down slightly, drum marks all over the place from where they have stopped with the sander before lifting … Continued

Should you sand your own floor or hire a professional? For anyone renovating or redecorating their home, deciding which tasks to take on themselves and which to hire a professional for can be difficult. Cost is often the driving factor, but there are many other things to take into consideration; the level of skill required … Continued

how to refinish a wood floor without sanding

Many people would like to revive and give a fresh new look to their floor without actually sanding the floor. This is ideal for floors that are not significantly damaged. This means there are no deep scratches or dents, things that can only be removed by taking off a millimeter or 2 from the surface … Continued

Copywrite © 2024 How To Sand A Floor | All Rights Reserved | Powered by Ben Osborne