Spray Lining review: Professional Scam Artist At Work 9

Note: For the full story and additional evidence go to http://www.texliner.info

My Name is Eric Marsh. I own Mermaid Waterscapes, LLC and Durable Coating Systems. My businesses specialize in the application of polyurea elastomeric coatings.

I was first contacted by Julius Lupowitz in May of 2009. He introduced himself as Jules Edwards. Lupowitz said that he is a salesman who has been employed by Texliner for twenty eight years. (Note: he later identified himself in a court document as the owner of Clearline, Inc.) He explained that his boss had told him to solicit a new dealer for his coatings in my area. Lupowitz has provided me with or has used the following phone numbers:

[protected], [protected], [protected], [protected], [protected], [protected], [protected], [protected], [protected], [protected], [protected], [protected], [protected], [protected], [protected], [protected], [protected], [protected], [protected] and [protected].

Lupowitz said that I could offer his epoxy coatings as a lower cost alternative to those prospects who balked at the cost of polyurea. Lupowitz told me that his company has an on-going marketing campaign and refers prospects to their certified applicators. He also said that they stand behind their applicators with one of the best warranties in the business. If I would buy in with a modest investment I would be given exclusive sales rights to the San Antonio/Austin area.

I accepted his offer to examine samples of his materials. He shipped me a package containing a variety samples along with some promotional material. The samples were very interesting. The dozen or so pieces included semi-clear flexible materials, thick coatings that consisted of rubbery aggregates held in an epoxy bonding agent and decorative items suspended in a clear coating among others. The promotional material included a bumper sticker and some literature. The artwork was second rate.

Lupowitz provided me with referrals to other Texliner applicators at [protected] and [protected]. (Other "referral" numbers he has provided include [protected] and [protected]. See Connecting the Dots to see why this phone number is significant.) I contacted these individuals and they provided me with positive references. All in all the proposition seemed to make good business sense. I also examined the Texliner web site. I didn't find the site particularly impressive and noted that there are some photos on the Texliner site that had originated elsewhere. I discounted the fact that the web site was kind of cheesy since I have seen many small business web sites that are less than stellar.

I had some concerns but all in all the business proposition seemed to make sense. Lupowitz had provided me with samples, referrals, marketing material and even a list of prospects in my area. The offer of a solid warranty was appealing. Most of all, Lupowitz sounded convincing. In our conversations it seemed clear that he knew the industry. He didn't sound like a hustler, just a sales guy who had made a career working for this company. With the economic slow down I thought I would take a shot at picking up a few epoxy jobs to help pay the bills.

Certification

There is a certification process that I needed to complete before I could apply the Texliner products. This was to give me some experience with the material as well as to demonstrate that I'm competent to do the work. The certification consisted of applying epoxy and aggregate materials in a variety of different combinations to vertical automotive hoods. Photos of the completed coatings are then sent to Texliner and if the work is deemed satisfactory the applicator is then certified.

I carefully followed the certification instructions that Lupowitz provided. They were oriented towards applying installing epoxy truck bed liners. The materials needed to be mixed in small batches, allowed to start to react and then spray applied to the masked hood with hopper guns. I found the process to be difficult and tedious. The coating wanted to sag and it was necessary to apply many thin coats in order to achieve a proper build. Even though it was a 100 degree Texas day, in between coats it was necessary to warm the material that I had applied with heat lamps.

If I was interested in doing truck bed liners that experience would have been enough to make me abandon Texliner. Once cured the epoxy broke under hammer blows. In my opinion it is an inferior material to polyurea or polyurea/urethane spray coatings because of the difficult application and also because of the epoxy's fragile nature.

However my interest was in doing floor coatings and these are not significant concerns for that application.

Here is the "certification" photo that I mailed to Lupowitz.

I emailed photographs of the coated hoods to Lupowitz and he returned my certification as a Texliner applicator

Janet's Floor

Janet and I live on a ranch in central Texas. Next to our house we have a large shop. It is divided into two sections. I use the front section to work on my cars, motorcycles and other projects. Janet set the back section, which is a metal extension, as a studio and for social use.

We had the inside of Janet's room lined with spray foam to insulate it and then remodeled it into a tiki bar. When completed it had turned out beautifully but still had a cement floor. I decided to use the Texliner epoxy system to coat it. This would give me additional hands on experience with the system before doing any commercial work. I discussed the job with Lupowitz and he initially told me that it would cost $1000 in materials to coat 1000 square feet. Later that turned into $1300 for 800 square feet. That cost was higher than I had anticipated. Epoxy was supposed to be the low cost material but at $1.65 a square foot for a 60 mil coat the cost was much higher than I had anticipated. In contrast polyurea would cost me about polyurea $1.20 a square foot for a coating of the same thickness.

For $1300 I received about eight gallons of epoxy and 100 pounds of ground rubber.

Lupowitz claimed that this would cover 800 square feet of concrete at a thickness of 60 mils. By my calculations this would cover that area at a thickness of about 20 mils.

At this point I was less than impressed. I began to do some research into other epoxies. It appeared that Texliner was not giving me a low cost alternate to the polyurea that I had been using. At this point I decided to use up the $3000 worth of materials that I had purchased and from that point forward if I were to do epoxy work I would buy my materials elsewhere.

The Emile Hardy Job

Early in October of 2009 I received a call from someone who identified himself as Emile Hardy. He gave me two phone numbers, [protected] and [protected]. Hardy told me that he is doing work for the Susser Holdings Corporation and as part of the job it is necessary to coat 140 Styrofoam blocks with 70 mils of light colored anti-stick epoxy. This would amount to approximately 4760 square feet of foam that needed to be coated. Hardy said that Susser specified that Texliner epoxies must be used. He said that Texliner had referred me to him as the certified applicator in the Central Texas region.

Hardy said that the last contractor to do this job had charged $16 a square foot. That is a premium price. This looked like a good job with the potential for repeat business so I offered to do the job for less. No sense being greedy - I would still make good money and hopefully develop an on-going working relationship with a new client. Hardy said that he was acting as a representative of Susser and would provide a check for 50% of the total at the time when the blocks are delivered to my shop and another check for the remaining 50% when the blocks are picked up. He said that he was not authorized to make a deposit before delivery. This is not uncommon when doing subcontracting work. So I had the choice of covering the cost of materials myself or refusing the job.

I contacted Lupowitz and was given a price for the materials. Again, they were expensive but that cost is just the price of doing business. Hardy had faxed me a purchase order from Susser and Lupowitz said that while he could not advise me on legal matters he thought that was adequate.

It would cost me about $10, 000 to purchase enough materials to coat 4000 square feet of which I had to borrow about $8000. Lupowiz said that he would fly in and bring with him the remaining material that would be needed along with the equipment to do the job. He would assist me in applying the epoxy. I ordered the materials. The plan was that upon their arrival I would contact Hardy and he would deliver the foam blocks. Once the blocks were on the way Lupowitz would fly in.

Things Start To Go Bad

Lupowitz sent me emails saying that he had flown to one of the Texliner factories to expedite the epoxy formulation required to meet the job's specifications. The epoxy was shipped from one location and some filler from another. When it arrived at my shop I was surprised at what I was shipped. I had received nine gallons of epoxy and one fifty pound bag of black SBR rubber power.

For $10, 000 I received nine gallons of epoxy and a fifty pound bag of black rubber powder. This is less material than I had previously received for $1300.

I assumed that a mistake had been made. The last time I had done a 3500 square foot coating job it took about 200 gallons of polyurea. There is simply no way that nine gallons of epoxy would coat 4000 square feet of anything at 83 mils. I called Lupowitz and sent him an email saying that I thought a mistake had been made. He assured me that the material that I had received were sufficient to do the job. I spoke to him on the phone and asked how that is possible. His response is that the epoxy would soak into the Styrofoam and create a hard layer 85 mils thick.

At point I received a phone call from Hardy. He said that Susser wanted to double the size of the job from 140 to 280 blocks. I told him that we should complete the first batch and then do the second. He agreed with me but did not schedule delivery of the first batch of blocks, saying that things were delayed for a bit.

I Learn The Ugly Truth

At this point what had been a nagging feeling that things were not quite right really started to bother me. It was the fact that Hardy had doubled up on the order that really did it. I suspected that I was being conned and that the guys doing the conning were looking to lighten my wallet even further. I started to do some web searches to see what I could find about these guys.

My first big hit was an article from the Nebraska BBB. That led me to more articles. See the links page to check them out.

Up to this point I thought that I was dealing with a man named Jules Edwards. It turns out that his real name is Julius Lupowitz. He has also used the name Eddy Lupe. On the Ninth of June, 2005 Lupowitz pled guilty to first degree felony charges that he defrauded 14 body shops. An Automotive News article states:

1.

According to prosecutors, Lupowitz used an alias to induce auto body shops to buy his product. He would pose as a fictitious owner of a fleet of trucks that needed to be sprayed specifically with Ocean Spray's product, said Dillon. This fictitious company would enter into an agreement with the auto body shop and based on this agreement, the shop would then purchase Ocean Spray's product. After receiving the product, the shop would never hear from the fictitious truck owner again. Ocean Spray would then refuse to refund the auto body shops.

This sounds very similar to my experience with Hardy, though he had not yet disappeared. I decided to play these guys and see what else I could discover.

So What About Emile Hardy?

I had Janet call Hardy and probe him for more information. He said that the address of his business is 8980 Shrimpers Row in Dulac, Louisiana. However, according to google maps there is no such address. The only buildings nearby are a pair of small houses.

One of the contractors that Lupowitz had previously defrauded said that the "customer" had provided him with an address that turned out to be an amusement park. On the surface it appears that Emile Hardy is a fictional customer just as other one had turned out to be.

I next contacted Susser Holdings and provided them with a copy of the purchase order that Hardy had provided me with. A representative of the company got back to me and said that the purchase order was a fake. The Susser representative contacted Hardy who in turn left both him and myself a long voice mail about how the real customers wanted to remain anonymous but had previously been Susser executives, thus the Susser name was used on the phony purchase order.

Shortly thereafter Hardy faded from the scene and stopped returning my calls. This is consistent with what Lupowitz's previous victims experienced.

What About The Materials That I Received?

In essence the epoxy that I received to coat the Styrofoam cost me $1100 a gallon. At Janet's suggestion I contacted UPS and asked where the epoxy had been shipped from. They replied that it had been shipped from Topaz Industries (ph. [protected]). Topaz will sell "private label" products, i.e. they will put your label on their product.

I contacted Topaz and Craig, the owner, told me that he had told Lupowitz that they don't make an epoxy suitable for salt water immersion. When I asked what I had been shipped I was told that it's a 100% solids epoxy, suitable for application on concrete or metal. I don't know what the unit price for this specific epoxy is, but I found one epoxy on their web site for about $36 a gallon.

Even though Craig from Topaz Industries sent me an email saying that he told Lupowitz that they don't make an epoxy for salt water use, the material they shipped me had a label stuck on that says "ANTI STICK SALT."
Julian had been told by the manufacturer that they do not make a product that meets my job requirements, but he shipped me material anyway under the pretense that it did and evidently instructed them to to label the epoxy "ANTI STICK SALT". He also lied when he claimed that he was flying to his manufacturing plant (he said that they have three) to mix me up a special batch of materials that meet my requirements.

Next I did some research on the rubber filler that I had been shipped.

The filler had been shipped from Ken Kohler, Clearline Inc., 460 Georges Ave. Palm Bay, FL. Looking at Google Maps I discovered that the 400 block of Georges Ave. is a residential area. I have been unable to located a Ken Kohler in Palm Bay Florida.

The bags were marked SBR so I started there. Turns out that SBR stands for styrene butadlene rubber. I found a manufacturer who will sell me this material in fifty pound bags for $0.50 a pound.

Assuming $36 a gallon for epoxy and $0.50 a pound for SBR, the material Julian charged me close to $10, 000 for cost him somewhere in the area of $350 plus shipping. That's about a 3000% markup.

When I pressured him, Lupowitz then started to change his story about what I had been delivered. At one point he claimed that he had intended to provide me with "aliphatic fillers" because they are "cheap." (Aliphatics are actually quite expensive.) He then said that the epoxy is only intended as a primer rather than as a coating material and that there is no way that it would cover all that foam with a thickness of more than a mil or two. Of course this asserted use of aliphatic fillers flies in the face of the fact that this is supposed to be an epoxy coatings job.

He had originally told me that when he flew in to assist me he would bring enough additional material to cover the two hundred feet of so that I couldn't afford at that time. He subsequently told me that he had intended to rent a pickup and bring all the filler with him. When I pushed him on how much filler he had intended to bring he was somewhat vague but seemed to indicate that it would be somewhere around 100 gallons (still not enough to do the job).

My belief is that Lupowitz knew that Hardy would disappear just as the customers had for those big truck bed liner jobs that he had been previously convicted of fraud for had disappeared. That implies that Emile Hardy was either involved in a conspiracy or that Lupowitz himself was posing as Hardy. (For additional evidence supporting this implication, see Connecting the Dots. Again, this is what Lupowitz was charged with in his previous conviction.) If this is the case then Lupowitz would have known that the job would never arrive at my shop and consequently it is not necessary for him to provide me with enough materials to do the job. I can think of no other reason why he would provide me with nine gallons of epoxy and claim that it is sufficient to coat four thousand square feet at 83 mils.

Trying To Get My Money Back

I have sent Lupowitz several emails and left voice mail messages requesting that he either provide me with the materials that I have paid for or provide me with a refund. Of course I would like to receive my money back but I believe that's unlikely to happen. Lupowitz has alternatively claimed that he would try to find a buyer for these materials and send me the remaining materials that he owes me. At the point of this writing he has done none of those things.

One thing that is not open to interpretation is that Texliner has not provided me with the materials that we I paid for. Lupowitz has sent me an invoice and payment instructions that state the following:

1.

1- 4760 SQ FT X $2.50/ SQ FT @ 83 MILS= $11, 900 LESS CREDIT OF $1, 667= $10, 233 LESS CARRIED MATL 819 SQ FT X $2.50/SQ FT= $2, 047 IN TRANSIT ( BILLED AS EXCESS IF NEEDED )= $8, 186 TOTAL

Even though payment has been made the materials that were specified and paid for have not been delivered.

Regardless of appearances, I do not have proof that Lupowitz is working with Emile Hardy or that he might even be Emile Hardy. Thus, I have little leverage on that account that I can use to demand my money back. However as I can demonstrate that I have not received the product that I've paid for I still have a powerful claim against him.

There is a simple formula used to determine how much material is necessary to produce a particular coating thickness. It states that one gallon of a 100% solids material will coat 1604 square feet, minus wastage, at a thickness of one mil. Thus, to determine how many square feet a gallon will cover at a particular thickness one divides 1604 by that thickness. Using that formula, 1604/83 mils tells us that one gallon will cover approximately 19 1/3 square feet, excepting wastage.

It follows then that to coat 3941 square feet at 83 mils will take 204 gallons of epoxy.

I did some research and discovered that when SBR aggregate is added to the epoxy it reduces by about 50%. So if equal parts of epoxy and aggregate were mixed to achieve a 83 mil coating it would still take 135 gallons of epoxy. However mixing that much SBR could make the epoxy unsuitable for salt water immersion.

So regardless of the Emile Hardy question, Lupowitz has not provided me with the materials that it takes to do this job. I've been asking him for several weeks now provide that material or to refund the money that he owes me. Again, so far I've received slow responses to my emails, double talk and promises but no materials.

I finally told Lupositz that I am aware of his past and that I believe that his actions constitute crimes. I explained that I am putting together the web site that you are now reading and that I will document his future actions. Consequently, what I write about him from this point forward is in his hands.

So What Now?

I intend to bring this matter to the attention of law enforcement. I also intend to sue Lupowitz in small claims court. I will not rest until I have received the proper materials that I have paid for or been reimbursed.

I believe that Lupowitz is a scam artist who is repeating the same crimes that he has already been convicted of. It is my sincere hope that he will he will again be convicted and this time do hard time for those crimes.

If anyone else wishes to document their experiences with Julius Lupowitz please contact me and I will add those comments to this web page.

Stolen Images

I recognize a number of photos on the Texliner web site as having come from other sites that I had previously visited. In some cases Lupowitz has even failed to remove company labels from some photos. A good case in point is a photo of a truck bed liner at http://www.texliner.com/about.asp. (Note: this image was subsequently deleted.) Looking closely one can read the text "super-slide." The photo was actually stolen from http://www.superslide.com/ a company that manufactures drop in liners for large trucks.

It is also worth noting that there are a number of photographs of equipment and coatings being applied using equipment that can not be used to apply epoxy. Clearly these photographs were found elsewhere on the web and are intended to mislead the viewer.

I have contacted the owners of stolen images whenever I am able to identify them. Consequently Lupowitz had to remove photographs from his web pages and the quality of those pages have suffered as a result. Subsequently he has started to just leave the stolen images on his page despite demands for their removal by the copyright owner.

New Information

As I learn more I will post that new information here.

Most recently, doing some web searches I discovered that MultiFlex Coatings, another Lupowitz company, is listed on Merchant's Circle as being located at 3200 West Airfield Drive. Once again, according to Google Maps that is a nonexistent address. MultiFlex Coatings was listed on HotFrog as being located at 5775 Yonge St., Canada M2M 4J1, ON. In this case Google Maps shows an office building but there is no business named MultiFlex listed on Google as being in that building. (HotFrog removed the listing after I contacted them and then later restored it.) In both cases the phone number that is listed is the same one that Lupowitz provided me as the Texliner number.

More About Topaz Industries

It is worth mentioning that Craig at Topaz Industries has been contacted by a number different people about Lupowitz's activities. I have been told that he often reacted by yelling at the caller and hanging up.

I have explained to him that by selling epoxies to Lupowitz he has facilitated the victimization of those whom Lupowitz has scammed. On more than one occasion I have explained to Craig that he may be aiding and abetting a criminal activity and requested that he consider halting those sales. His response to those requests has been to imply a threat of legal action against me should I continue to contact him. Eventually he made good on his threat and had his attorney contact me.

I explained the situation to her and asked her to please explain to Craig that his actions are enabling Lupowitz's activities. Having had that conversation, I sent a couple of subsequent emails to her asking if she has done so and I have not received any replies. I can only assume that Lupowitz continues to obtain materials from Topaz Industries.

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