What's was your biggest add on or system change failure?

BIG WOOD

MLPW
Joined
Feb 4, 2016
Messages
13,157
Location
Georgia
Name
Matt w.
Was your biggest regret..

Switching to another method or machine?

Adding additional steps that no one noticed?

Changing up your pricing from SF to room or vice versa

Hiring or not hiring techs?

Going green or anti allergin?

Trying to get bulletin board prices in Pecan Falls Georgia?





I'd love to hear from @CJ-FL on this...
What was your biggest failure?
 

Acp

Member
Joined
May 15, 2017
Messages
1,093
Location
Seattle
Name
Bjorn Marshall
ETM, although it made me lots of money it was a constant pain in the ass.

BMW, whats the point not even that nice of interior

Ozone machine, lol real money maker right there...

thats about it... I got all my dumb moves out of me when I owned my landscape construction company, ran 4 trucks and made plenty of stupid moves that wasted time and money. Came into the cleaning biz with a good point of view knowing that I wanted to streamline, no 3 month long jobs for huge tickets. Love getting paid every single time the truck moves

I do miss the exercise, the sun tan, and running bobcats though
 
  • Like
Reactions: BIG WOOD

adamh

Supportive Member
Joined
Oct 7, 2006
Messages
1,533
Location
Nampa Idaho
Name
Adam Hale
Dryer vent cleaning is a pain and not worth it.

I spent most of my 22 years thjinking I was the only one that could do everything . It's so hard to let go.
I just hired a secretary two weeks ago. I was running like crazy doing all that myself plus cleaning plus running guys plus doing all the maintenance .........
I hope to have a business running mostly on its one someday. I am learning to let go
 

steve_64

Member
Joined
Aug 11, 2012
Messages
13,371
Switching from per room to sqft, made a huge difference. It made me measure!

Per room I'd just make shat up, ohh this looks like a 35$ room. Noooooo!

Now those rooms are often 50 plus.
I'm $50 a room two room min.

Just cleaned 7 rooms and a set of stairs that I count as a room for $500 with protector on stairs and entrance 4 hours. Moved most furniture too.
One room I counted as two.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Cleanworks

Ron Werner

Member
Joined
Nov 25, 2006
Messages
8,725
Location
Sooke BC, Lower Vancouver Island
Name
Ron Werner
Stainless steel cleaning/resto

Buying a used Big Red over a new Steamway , though could have been a regret the other way from what I've been hearing. And I learned a lot running/fixing/modifying that old red.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Mikey P
Joined
Jun 20, 2016
Messages
6,242
Location
Bc
Name
Jeff T
Switching from per room to sqft, made a huge difference. It made me measure!

Per room I'd just make shat up, ohh this looks like a 35$ room. Noooooo!

Now those rooms are often 50 plus.
I know a guy who put a bid in on pressure washing a parking lot... 450$.... he wants to split it with me , 60/40..... I would make 180$. I went and looked at it, the fookin thing is the size of 2 football fields... I called him back, told him I’m NOT interested.... and that I’ll see him in a week.... maybe, that’s if he’s working 10hr days.... moron... probably bid it at 1-2 cents a Sqft.....
 
  • Like
Reactions: jcooper

steve_64

Member
Joined
Aug 11, 2012
Messages
13,371
I know a guy who put a bid in on pressure washing a parking lot... 450$.... he wants to split it with me , 60/40..... I would make 180$. I went and looked at it, the fookin thing is the size of 2 football fields... I called him back, told him I’m NOT interested.... and that I’ll see him in a week.... maybe, that’s if he’s working 10hr days.... moron... probably bid it at 1-2 cents a Sqft.....
We have a street sweeping company here that charges less than I do. $75 an hour.
 
Joined
Jun 20, 2016
Messages
6,242
Location
Bc
Name
Jeff T
We have a street sweeping company here that charges less than I do. $75 an hour.
Problem is Steve, he bought his pressure washer at a discount store. I think it’s rated at 2000 psi. The one I’ve got is a 13 hp Honda motor rated at 5000 psi... who do you think is going to end up doing most of the work?
 
  • Like
Reactions: steve_64

Papa John

Lifetime Supportive Member
Joined
Aug 19, 2013
Messages
6,587
Location
San Francisco, CA.
Name
John Stewart
biggest failure was Air Duct cleaning.

Becoming a Certified Indoor environmentalists had its personally rewarding moments but was a financial bust.
This skill enabled me to determine if your house was making you sick. I figured it would be a good add on considering the name of my business and I thought it would set me apart from other CC.
I saved some lives, whereas doctors couldn't figure out what was wrong. This family had three emergency room visits before hearing about me.
I took 20 minutes to figure what was wrong and 1 hour to fix it.

A GM of a local hotel was sick for 2 months. I told him he should have me inspect his house.
He didn't think a carpet cleaner could help him so he waited another 2 months and was still sick.
He finally had me check out his house, took about 30 minutes to discover the issue and correct it.
Years later I was visiting his hotel and discovered the early stages of legionaries disease. I educated the new management of the importance handling this issue quickly.

The requirements to stay certified was a Moneymaking bonanza for the certification firm and was too time consuming to justify this add on service.
 
Last edited:

Mike Draper

Member
Joined
Jan 13, 2008
Messages
4,402
I went to room pricing instead of my normal sq ft pricing. I’m a numbers guy and know what my truck cost to run down to the minute. After 2 months our gross revenue per hour was down 19% which means at the end of the year our net would be down much further because now we had to do far more work with more overhead to reach the same numbers. I went back to sq ft and the money came back in. Yeah, its harder to explain over the phone, but we stay busy and the money is so much better in sq ft pricing.
 

SamIam

Member
Joined
Aug 9, 2012
Messages
11,094
Location
California
Name
sam miller
Resoil portable

Not going out on my own earlier

Working for Sam's dad


MikeyP on Radar's computer


Mike worked for me! Or Gary Taylor!
Bill signed the checks!

I went to room pricing instead of my normal sq ft pricing. I’m a numbers guy and know what my truck cost to run down to the minute. After 2 months our gross revenue per hour was down 19% which means at the end of the year our net would be down much further because now we had to do far more work with more overhead to reach the same numbers. I went back to sq ft and the money came back in. Yeah, its harder to explain over the phone, but we stay busy and the money is so much better in sq ft pricing.
Ok here’s the thing your room price was to low!

At sq ft price your job avg is higher!

You do less work, making more spending less!

We recently boosted our per room price

December January February seemed slower, less work! But our job avg was up $20 per job.

We worked our guys a lot less, my sales for the same period was down 1k.

But I spent less on chemicals and gas and payroll!

So I was ahead on the P and L.

And March we’re way ahead of last year now!

If I were to go back to one truck I would keep one helper and go .50 a foot and work less then Mike!
 

Latest posts

Back
Top Bottom