A FIRST PERSON ACCOUNT OF RUNNING A SMALL BUSINESS.

IT'S often easier -- and cheaper -- to simply replace a broken item than repair it. But niches remain where craftspeople make their living doing just that. Matthew Fleming runs Clock Masters out of an 800-square-foot storefront among the antique shops on Magnolia Boulevard in Burbank. Jennifer Smith spoke with him about working in one of the few remaining industries that still makes house calls.

"I started the business myself, going on about 10 years ago. Before that I was working for the world's largest clock retailer, who was based in L.A. I got a part-time job at the warehouse through a friend while I was studying music in college, and I went up the line from inventory to shipping to delivering grandfather clocks. Then they trained me in further clock repair, promoting me to service manager once they realized I had phone skills.

"When the company went out of business, I realized that I had talked to just about everybody in the clock industry as part of my job, so I had all these contacts. I was fortunate, because I could let my clients from the previous job know that I was still fixing clocks. I worked out of my home for a couple of years, then I got caught by the city and was forced to go legitimate.

"I've had a couple of storefronts since then and I've now got a retail establishment selling both antique and new clocks. The rent's reasonable, but I've got a lot of overhead. So I charge a fee for storage -- you do a rush job for someone, and then you won't see them for months. With one case, I got an emergency call from a woman whose boyfriend had beaten up a beautiful old grandfather clock, broken the beveled glass and messed up the workings. I fixed it. Then she disappeared for a year and a half. At the end of it, the storage fees were more than the clock itself was worth.

"After the Northridge earthquake I got a lot of business from people whose grandfather clocks had fallen over, because they're really top-heavy. Some clocks go back into the 18th century. You'd be surprised at how well the wood can hold up. We do porcelain clocks from the 19th century, which are exceedingly rare because they're so fragile.

"On one house call I was out working on a grandfather clock, and it just stopped all of a sudden. I later learned that my client's spouse passed away that day, at about the same time that it had stopped ticking. That was a little bizarre. But it was ready for servicing anyway."