Showerthought: never realized how much waste glue adds up on big jobs

I was doing a 2,000 sq ft commercial job last week in Phoenix and ran the numbers on waste from my glue bucket. Turned out I was tossing about 8 pounds of excess adhesive per job just from overspreading near walls and seams. Found a YouTube video from a guy in Texas who measured it exactly with a scale. Anyone else ever weigh their glue waste to see what they're losing per month?

3 comments

3 Comments

perez.cole14d ago

Nah man I gotta call this one out. You're overthinking a few pounds of glue like it's some kind of crisis. That 8 pounds you're tossing is probably the difference between a tight job and a sloppy one. If you're spreading right to the edge and not wasting near the walls, you're gonna end up with gaps or thin spots that cause callbacks later. I'd rather toss 8 pounds than have to redo a corner because the glue didn't bite. Plus, that YouTube guy is probably measuring his glue waste because he's bored, not because it's actually costing him anything meaningful. Your monthly loss is maybe $30 in adhesive tops, which is nothing compared to the time you'd waste trying to micromanage every last smear.

simon_chen14d ago

And that YouTube guy measuring glue waste is exactly the kind of overthinking I see everywhere now. People obsess over tiny savings in materials while totally ignoring the bigger cost of their time or the quality of the finished job. It's like those guys who drive across town to save 2 cents a gallon on gas, burning through 3 bucks worth of fuel to do it.

kellyj2314d agoMost Upvoted

Eight pounds of glue waste? That's triple what I would have guessed. @simon_chen I get what you're saying about not sweating the small stuff, but 8 pounds a job adds up fast if you do a few of those a month. That's like a whole extra bucket of glue every couple months just sitting in a trash bag. I'm not saying you need to scrape every last bit off the floor, but that's real money.