Higher Ed and carpet cleaning

[Ron Werner]

Had a call yesterday. Lady had a beige berber, a Dyson vac, asked specifically for TM HWE. All she was after was a quick clean, low budget. I started to explain about soil removal and she said she knows how to vacuum and that no one vacuums better than her, after all, she used to clean at Wayne Gretsky's house. Her last comment was that she knew clean carpet; she had a masters or a Phd in Sociology.

I referred her to another cleaner. I still need to phone him and ask if I need to apologize.

In hindsight, felt I should have said that I had a BSc in Marine Biol and realized how much I didnt know about carpet cleaning once I got into this business. Among other thoughts of what I "should have said".

What would you have said?

 

[dealtimeman]

you did good, unless your biz is real slow i would not want a headache for a hundred bucks.

 

[Ron Werner]

I hate when someone pulls their "higher" education on me as if they are better "because".
Guess they don't teach humility at university an more.

 

[topnotchman]

Yeah, dont blame ya.

Had a customer today on a small water damage tell me she didn't know why she needed turbo dryers to dryout the carpet and the walls. She told me when she had her own water damage in her home, she just used a Bissel to extract the water and let it dry on its own!!

Yeah so I had to walk away from that one, couldn't reason with her.

 

[The Great Oz]

Had a call yesterday. Lady had a beige berber, a Dyson vac, asked specifically for TM HWE. All she was after was a quick clean, low budget. I started to explain about soil removal and she said she knows how to vacuum and that no one vacuums better than her, after all, she used to clean at Wayne Gretsky's house. Her last comment was that she knew clean carpet; she had a masters or a Phd in Sociology.

Geez Ron, you're way too serious. At least you could have drug the call out for awhile and had some fun.

"So, Wayne Gretsky taught you how to vacuum?" "I've seen Wayne vacuum. He doesn't know sh$$."

"Hold on a second. People that get sociology degrees are the ones that can't hack any courses that are useful. People that get Masters in Sociology are the ones that KNOW they don't know anything useful." "Cool, I'll be right over."

"If you pre-vacuum with your mighty Dyson, I'll give you a discount. If you pay cash I'll raise the discount to 3%"


PS: Shorten the soil removal spiel to under five minutes and you'll get fewer calls like this. 8)

 

[sweendogg]

You also could have sweetened the deal.. you should have said.... If I can't get anything out while I vaccuum, I'll give you a fifty percent discount. But if I remove more dirt before wet cleaning, then you pay full price and for an additional add on service.

 

[ACE]

Are you really that busy this time of year that you didn’t want a job? If you didn’t vacuum, I’m sure you could hit your $80-$100 average even if you discount your rate 50%. Why give it away? I pretty much assume half of my customers look down on our profession. If you want respect you are in the wrong line of work. At the end of the day, it’s about making a living.

 

[Desk Jockey]

"So, Wayne Gretsky taught you how to vacuum?" "I've seen Wayne vacuum. He doesn't know sh$$."

LOL

 

[juniorc82]

ron , Im dissapointed you didnt dispute her title as best vacuum person. I think spending 2 hours vacuuming 800 sq ft pretty well gives you the title my friend lol.

 

[Bob Foster]

Hell I would have kissed her ass and taken the job. Should have referred her to me.

 

[-JB-]

Bob you seem to have a thing for posteriors lately, care to explain?

Ahhhh, on second though, lets jus leave it alone! :roll:

 

[sweendogg]

Good call JB... we don't want to get Bob anymore excited than he already is!!

I think my picture in my signature is too pig.. I mean big!

 

[daniel@procarpet]

Ron I vacuum my carpet atleast three times a week. The other day I vacuumed very slow and thorough and was amazed at how much soil I pulled out. I was confident I got all the soil out. Recently I picked up a used kenmore with a dirt sensor that lights up when soil is picked up. I just assumed it was broken because the light never came on. I took that vacuum on a couple jobs and it lit up constantly. I could vacuum an area pretty good and then go back over it and the light would still come on. So yes the vacuum works great, but no I am not going to spend 45 minutes per room vacuuming. I only have about 300 sq ft of carpet at my house and the rest is hardwood. It took me about an 30 minutes to vacuum it and I did a thorugh job.

Back to your potential customer. You should have told her to vacuum real good. Then you could have discounted your price to what ever you feel the job is worth minus the vacuum time. Essentially you could have just sprayed and sucked her carpet and then collected the check. She would have been happy, the capret would have looked good, and you still could have made 100-150 per hour.

 

[Lee Stockwell]

"Rectal thermometers have degrees, and you know where they stick them".

 

[GeneMiller]

I with you Ron, I always seem to regret it when I take a job from some like that.
I will give her a short spoof about value for your money and if that doesn't work I send her to a friend.

Gene

 

[daniel@procarpet]

Ok I changed my mind. Ron you did the right thing. You provide the best service period and you do say your service isn't for everyone. If you did discount your cleaning, others would expect the same service. I hope you were smart enough to sub the job out for 50% though.

 

[Guest]

do you really thing I'm going to pay some carpet cleaning Savant to vacuum my carpet for hours on end because he has some kind of super maid fetish

 

[ACE]

Try to look at it from the customer’s point of view. Ron basically told the lady she is too incompetent to do a good job vacuuming. How is that helping his reputation?

 

[Studebaker]

"Rectal thermometers have degrees, and you know where they stick them".

Thats one I'm going to remember

 

[Ron Werner]

I could have gone and cleaned it without vacuuming myself. I have done that before. But it was her attitude that she knew better than I about how to clean. I've learned that if someone is like that I'm much better off to just let it go. Its a real pain to walk into a job where the customer is the "professional". My minimum is $150 and even that was too high for her as well. Sometimes its worth the peace of mind to just let someone else have the fun.

 

[Nate The Great]

I could have gone and cleaned it without vacuuming myself. I have done that before. But it was her attitude that she knew better than I about how to clean. I've learned that if someone is like that I'm much better off to just let it go. Its a real pain to walk into a job where the customer is the "professional". My minimum is $150 and even that was too high for her as well. Sometimes its worth the peace of mind to just let someone else have the fun.

Amen!

 

[GeneMiller]

My minimum is just 50. i want in the house for additional sales plus referrals. i think of it like getting paid for a demo. i'm one of the lowest in town. just a thought.

might be a good topic.

gene

 

[Luis Gomez]

Gene my minimum on new customers is $135.00 no exceptions. However on repeats, if I am in the area or I can hit them on the way
home at the end of my day. I charge a 65 to $85 for a service charge. But it is not for wall to wall cleaning, usually a coffee, wine or dog spot. Ron I am with you on this one, not worth the hassle. Luis

 

[daniel@procarpet]

I wonder what the lady would have done if Ron said something like this. "Mrs. Piff I actually own another carpet cleaning company. I have hired help that I pay 8 dollars an hour. They do not prevac and can clean your entire home in less than 1 hour. They use cheap rented portables and have a few months experience. We can guarantee you a cheap price. My other company I personally do the work. I take my time and guarantee a thorough job. I charge a fair price and use the best equipment available. Just let me know do you want me to personally do the job or let the other company do the job for a cheaper price."

 

[hogjowl]

A couple of times over this past month, I have come across some amazing and unusually soiled carpets to clean. The vast majority of my customers live rather clean lives and vacuum well ... at least well enough not to load my filters every three feet, but these two jobs were noteworthy. I have a pos Sanitaire 888 that Mikey recommended, cuz I didn't fill like dishing out $500 on a new Dyson. (My old one finally died.) On both jobs, I emptied around 12 dirt cups of soil before I was through vacuuming and then STILL had to empty my TM filter twice during the job because of lost suction. The filters were packed full.

If I'd spent the money on a Dyson, I wouldn't have had that problem.

I'm going to WallyWorld tomorrow and get me another Dyson.

 

[Ron Werner]

its the carpets that don't look like they need vacuuming that are the ones that get you.
No insult to the home owner about their vacuuming ability but even if they have a Dyson or Cleartrak, a professional will still be able to pull significantly more soil.

 

[daniel@procarpet]

its the carpets that don't look like they need vacuuming that are the ones that get you.
No insult to the home owner about their vacuuming ability but even if they have a Dyson or Cleartrak, a professional will still be able to pull significantly more soil.

I am going to start pushing bagged vacuums with dirt sensors on my customers and tell them to vacuum till the light doesn't come on especially before I come out. That should work.

 

[-JB-]

someone explain how a "dirt sensor" works, and yes I don't buy it for a second.

 

[Chris A]

someone explain how a "dirt sensor" works, and yes I don't buy it for a second.

I'm with you JB, had an old powerflite with one, wasn't worth a darn.

 

[Lee Stockwell]

A microphone and a timer, in a microchip. Similar to the "popcorn" setting on some microwaves. The timer is set for perhaps five or six seconds and resets every time it hears a "pop" or in the case of the vacuum the noise of grit coming thru. Five or six seconds without will turn it off.