Tools Disappear – Paint Mark To Protect From Friends, Neighbors, Relatives

Your tools will be gone if you let family, friends, relatives and neighbors borrow them. So protect yourself by tagging them with a mark of paint to identify them as yours. Save your tools from them.

As a carpenter in the 70’s, my co-workers and I exchanged tools by accident. We had tools that were identical because we all were doing the same trade. We had extension cords, screwdrivers, chisels and ladders that at the end of the day were picked up and put into our respective trucks.

After a few arguments over missing tools we started marking our equipment with different colors of spray paint. I was blue, Bernie was green, Tony was red and so on.

50 years later I still use blue on my tools, but not because of the other trades I work with. It’s because I occasionally discover a blue tool at the neighbor’s garage.

Imagine the fun I have when I discover my post hole digger (with blue on the handle) in my neighbor’s garage. The harassment starts, the bs flies (Oh, I forgot), some laughs happen, but of course I go home with my post hole digger with no harm done.

So pick a color, purchase a can of inexpensive spray paint and mark your favorite tools and see what fun you can have when a friend, neighbor or relative asks to borrow one of them. And then be confident that you may get them back at a later date.