With 25 years of service to the adult nightclub industry, Omega Pattern Works’ Kristin Messick explains why she has such a passion not only for club carpeting, but for the adult nightclub industry and its convention.
(NOTE: This story appears in the November 2023 issue of ED Magazine.)
A
t any adult club, any operating hour, lights bounce off the walls and talented performers shimmy a pole, directing patron’s and club workers’ attention upwards. Even their floor work is primarily performed on a lifted stage. But how often do you look down at your club’s floor, in appreciation for what has been grounding the gentlemen’s club industry for the last 25 years?
The relationships which Kristin Messick, the only sales representative at Omega Pattern Works Carpet, has carried with her through her decades’ involvement in the industry show that some recognition of her work has materialized.
“Some of my best friends ever have come from the gentlemen’s club industry,” shares Messick. “I have lifelong friends I’ve developed from doing business with them year-after-year, and from seeing them annually at the ED EXPO.”
Omega Pattern Works is one of ED EXPO’s longest standing supporters, and Messick personally has attended the ED EXPO for 23 years and counting — “since before Red Bull was invented, and they debuted at the EXPO,” she laughs, adding that the now $18.5-billion-per-year company offered her a job at the time, which she refused. “I didn’t need a job,” she says. “And I didn’t like the taste of it, honestly.”
The stories Messick has from her more than two decades at the ever-evolving ED EXPO are endless.
“Every year, I go up and tell ED Publications that, ‘This is the best show ever,’” she comments. “It’s just a fun bunch of really neat, nice people. You see a lot of new faces, but I know of two of us, or maybe three, that have been there for as many years as I have. And this year, I saw people that I hadn’t seen for probably 10 years.”
Besides meeting up with old friends and burgeoning new ones, the ED EXPO is where Omega secures most of their deals with the gentlemen’s club industry each year.
“I do about 12 shows a year, but if I could do just one, the ED EXPO would be the only show I would attend,” adds Messick. “It just brings me tons and tons of business.”
At a time in which so much of the country fights the existence of the gentlemen’s club industry, companies like Omega Pattern Works, represented by Messick, help to legitimize the industry with their staunch support.
“People for a long time have looked at the gentlemen’s club industry as taboo,” Messick sighs. “It’s a real shame, because it has some of the best food, hospitality and entertainers in all of the entertainment business.”
Kristin’s keen calling to carpet
Surely you recognize the name Kristin Messick if you’ve been to the EXPO over the past two decades — since, according to Messick, there are probably very few clubs she hasn’t spoken to — or carpeted — yet.
“Everybody that knows me, knows that I’ve been in the gentlemen’s club industry for as long as I’ve been in carpet,” Messick remarks, adding with a laugh, “I just tell them I got off the pole a long time ago!”
An interior designer by trade, Messick works in sales, marketing and design for Omega Pattern Works and their more hospitality-oriented umbrella company, Artisan. She is the only salesperson at Omega, and she likes the taste of it.
“I absolutely love the carpet industry,” she adds emphatically. “Every day, I just get up loving to sell carpet. It’s what I’m good at; I know about wool and nylon. I do blueprints, takeoffs and work with the installer. Carpet is a big investment, and it can be daunting for people who aren’t in the know, so I try to make it as easy for my customers as I can.”
“Chet Graham [of Omega] has championed me and supported me and the gentlemen’s club industry since I first started with the company. He’s my best friend and like a brother to me. I owe a lot of our success to Chet.”
– Kristin Messick
An international salesperson who works with the nightclub industry regularly, Messick can be found on the phone at most hours, day and night, to provide her educated insight. Her devotion to the adult entertainment industry brings carpeting to businesses which otherwise wouldn’t know where to begin. For instance, she shares that a customer just called a few days ago from a hotel she is working with in Canada.
“He said, ‘Kristin, I just don’t know about carpet,’ and I replied, ’That’s okay, that’s my job,’” Messick recounts. “He gave me the information I needed, and I got him 4,000 yards of carpet installed.”
Although sales are where she thrives, Messick adds that she has a team which works diligently in fulfillment of her sales with a special thanks to a few key coworkers.
“I’m nothing without the people that make the plant run,” she declares. “They just play such an integral part in what I do. Donna Carnes, in the Design Department, has been with the company as long as I have, and Chrissie Booth, our Customer Service Representative — everybody that places an order knows her better than they know me. Shane Rogers is the plant manager, a chemist, and is always pushing us toward innovation. The whole team knows that the Gentleman’s Club industry is the most important industry that we have, and so when one of those orders comes through, we take special care of it.”
With Messick as sales rep, and the whole team to bolster, clubs can anticipate a diligent and knowledgeable steward to the flooring of their club. Messick takes all factors into account and she holds onto blueprints of clubs’ flooring for decades until she learns that they’ve remodeled the dimensions. Her extensive record-keeping is useful for carpet replacement which shouldn’t be replaced more than every 7-10 years, according to Messick.
“Honestly, I’ve always said carpet doesn’t wear out, it just uglies out,” she explains. “Nylon doesn’t wear like that. Maintenance is the biggest ticket on the deal. It’s not like a self-cleaning oven; it doesn’t clean itself.”
She shares a story about a club she has been working with for many years, which she noticed was replacing their carpet far too often, as an example of the longevity of Omega Carpets.
“I like to sell carpet, but I just knew something was not right, because they were buying it too often,” recounts Messick. “So finally, I flew out to see the club myself. It was a simple fix: I bumped the face weight up to 42-ounce, I put an attached cushion on there and they went from changing out every 18 months to every seven or eight years. It saved them millions.”
“I just knew something was not right, because they were buying (carpet) too often. So I flew out to see the club myself. It was a simple fix: I bumped the face weight up to 42-ounce, I put an attached cushion on there and they went from changing out every 18 months to every seven or eight years. It saved them millions.”
– Kristin Messick
You’ll be floored by what’s new
Omega does everything it can to provide cost-efficient service to its customers, including operating its own mill with recent modern technological advancements almost unknown in the industry. Messick explains that when she first was hired, the company had a screen printer. By switching to a ChromoJET printer, Omega prints more cheaply, saving approximately $5/yard for club owners, and is also able to print at larger dimensions and in at least 15 different colors. According to Messick, Omega operates one of very few ChromoJET printers in the country.
“Printed carpet is a niche in the industry,” she explains. “There are just a few companies in the United States that can do it. We’re not a big mill whatsoever, but that alone sets us apart.”
Colors and styles are particular to every club, as the tastes of clubs are as diverse as the kinds of clubs in operation. Omega Pattern Works offers a large variety with customizable options to suit its many customers. Regardless of if the “life” of the carpet is up, clubs wanting an update know that an Omega carpet can freshen their look.
For those wanting to live out the full life out of their carpets, Omega Pattern Works is excited to share a new stain product developed in-house.
“There was always Scotch Guard and that kind of thing, but Rogers, our plant manager, has developed a fantastic product in stain prevention called ‘Infinity,’” shares Messick. “With Infinity, you can pour red wine, dye, Kool Aid, anything on our carpet, and remove it with just cold water. It won’t stain. The Infinity protection lasts for the life of the carpet, but it will, after about 40 hot steam extractions — which, if I could get anybody to do 10 over the lifetime of their carpet, I’d be lucky — drop to about 75% efficiency, where it stays for the remainder of the life of the carpet.”
This technology has been around for about four years and Messick is eager to put it in all clubs moving forward. In addition to Infinity, Messick has been adding attached cushions to most clubs’ carpeting to create a two-part “bulletproof piece of carpet that lasts for as long as you want it to,” she calls a “moisture barrier.” The cushion, made of a very dense urethane foam at the sturdy weight of 25 pounds, is especially useful for the club industry because it’s easy for the entertainers to walk on in their heels.
Also new at Omega is vinyl plank or tile hard surface flooring, which Messick recommends for dressing rooms or offices.
“It’s luxury vinyl, available to look like concrete or wood, and it has a slip rating on its so you don’t have to worry about the girls slipping and sliding, although I do not like to put it in a high-volume club,” she adds. “I can spill something on a piece of carpet, and I don’t have to pick it up until — I never have to get it, actually — but if I spill something on a piece of vinyl, or wood floor or concrete, somebody’s going to slip and fall on it. So even though people think the maintenance is more with carpet, it’s not. Monetarily, it comes out to be a lot cheaper for carpet than it does for a hard surface. A lawsuit would be the biggest expense. Also the noise: hard surface is very noisy, and carpet absorbs a lot of that.”
For more information, call Kristin Messick at (800)-554-7007, email kamessick@gmail.com or visit www.omegapatternworks.com.
