This summer, the Sharp Shop’s motto for customers is ‘Work sharper, not harder.’ The mobile sharpening service will help families sharpen outdoor and indoor equipment blades and even bring their services to a nearby neighborhood.
Owner Caleb Potter said he started the business to educate his sons on the practical skill of sharpening and replacing blades while teaching them business operations.
“My boys are growing up with kind of a farm lifestyle, so they’re always just looking for hard projects to conquer,” Potter said. “It is a regular practice for us to take the mower blades off as I’m trying to teach them about maintenance of our equipment and caring for the mower blades during the cutting months.”
After teaching his sons, he casually asked people he would interact with if they knew how to sharpen their blades and was often met with nos or that people hadn’t sharpened in years.
Potter then excited his sons to join the business and began taking calls to their workshop. After some time, Potter took the workshop to the road with the sharpening equipment and trailer hooked to their truck.
Now, they travel to customers to bring their tools to be sharpened. Potter said they can sharpen any tool that needs a sharp edge, meaning lawnmowers, shovels, garden hoes, axes and others.
“A lot of times [for the lawnmowers], we get under there and scrape off any built-up grass and stuff to clean everything. We balance the blades, sharpen them, reattach them and send people on their way,” Potter said.
While they do set up in different neighborhoods, Potter said they can also come directly to a customer to help them wherever they may be.
Providing this service goes beyond a business aspect for Potter, though. He finds his chief responsibility as a father is to train his children how to navigate the world, which this enables in various ways.
“One of those aspects is learning to treat people with respect and dignity and how to be winsome to them. Then it teaches them how to navigate business, how to make sure that you’re giving the absolute best service you can, and not just trying to collect money the easy way but to do hard work for a reasonable fee,” he said.
Potter said people can request their services through their Facebook page. They also list all prices.
