Remember the Seinfeld episode where Jerry takes his car to the mechanic who is fanatical about the car, thinks Jerry ain't doing a good job, and kidnaps the car from Jerry?  Welcome Sean of wood and laminate flooring installs...\n\nTHIS is a guy you want installing your floor.  Some contractors are really owners who do the bids, and the day the real work is starting, you get some young hires at the door (not that they aren't qualified).  Sean is an owner operated biz, and he talks about floors like they are living and breathing organisms... \""acclimating\""... \""resting\""...\n\nHe lets you order the floors thru his wholesaler (went w/ Consumer Reports top rated Armstrong laminate), and since I paid the company direct, I bought at cost which was definitely cheaper than the retail (I shopped retail first, narrowed my choices, so I knew what I wanted by the time I went to the wholesaler's showroom).  He also accommodated my budget conscientiousness (to put it nicely), allowing me to buy my own baseboards and paint before he installed.\n\nBut let's talk about dedication... Sean really wants the floors to be installed right.  When we noticed a flex in the floor b/c of different levels of concrete where the 2 seams meet, I left him in the house in the morning for a quick tear down job and lay in some filler to remove the flex.  Come lunch time swing by the house to drop off my first Costco groceries for the new place, Sean is still there... he took it upon himself to GRIND DOWN the concrete, causing him several hours of addtl work.  He just wanted to floors to not flex and using filler wasn't working.  Later he calls me and chides me about the temp of the house, and how it's drying out my floors... fanatical devtion I tell you... and I mean it in a very complimentary way.  \n\nYou want a contractor who loves what they do and does what they do well.  I have full confidence Sean stands by his work, he's been over several times working around other contractors and we've had several discussions re: any concerns (or maybe his concerns...haha).  He was recommended to me by a flooring company whose installers were couple x what he charges, so the nice mgr whispered she'll email me a contact on the side who she has referred alot of biz to... I'm glad she did.