Clean It Up
UK Floor Cleaning Forum => Carpet Cleaning Forum => Topic started by: M.Acorn on July 27, 2010, 03:10:37 pm
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It`s as good for me now,as it was on the run up to last xmas,not sure what is going on,getting lot`s of repeat work,all 3 agency`s are now giving me bookings,it`s great,just hope it continues.
Due to the fact i have adjusted the pressure bypass thing on the machine i am now using half the amount of chems,and solution,think it must be bypassing at about 100psi ish,carpets are drying much quicker,and still getting great results.
Would rather that than have it over pressuring,and possibly blowing the seals out the pump,like it did last time !
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Manic for me also Mark just having a quick break before going out again been on the go since 6:30am ..Booked solidly for the next few weeks . Got in with a few cleaning companies and doing maintenance cleans for kiddies nurseries and office blocks every 3 months .What with that and the letting agencies being very busy it's been quite profitable for me .
Dave
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Warning new customers now when they ring, busy for nearly three weeks ahead ! Whats going on?
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Another thing I've noticed is that everyone wants a clean NOW! ..... Had a very unfriendly sounding woman on the phone an hour ago who asked my price for a single dining room. When I said I'd like to come and take a look she barked "it's clean it just stinks of dogs as the bitch has had pups. I want it done in the morning" ......... Told her it would be a week on Thursday... ;)
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Great that some of you are so busy, even at my busiest times ( excepting past Christmas periods ) i was NEVER booked up three weeks in advance and that's when we got through 5 - 6 jobs per day.
Be interested to know your marketing methods
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come on bob, this is CIU ;) ;D
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Great that some of you are so busy, even at my busiest times ( excepting past Christmas periods ) i was NEVER booked up three weeks in advance and that's when we got through 5 - 6 jobs per day.
Be interested to know your marketing methods
Ditto
come on bob, this is CIU ;) ;D
Umm the evidence is in the recorded timings of some posts ;D
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My best ever cc only year was 2001, I turned over 190k in carpet and upholstery cleaning only.
(LM LOL).
The longest a customer had to wait for a job... ie the farthest ahead I was booked was one week.
odd jobs were sometimes booked severel weeks ahead. If it ever got to the point that I was booked solid for 3 weeks I would decide whether to raise prices or add another van.
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My best ever cc only year was 2001, I turned over 190k in carpet and upholstery cleaning only.
(LM LOL).
The longest a customer had to wait for a job... ie the farthest ahead I was booked was one week.
odd jobs were sometimes booked severel weeks ahead. If it ever got to the point that I was booked solid for 3 weeks I would decide whether to raise prices or add another van.
Was that just you with a portable?
Must get timimings taken off ;D ;D
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I had 2 vans , 4 buffers , and a crappy Chem dry portable.
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I remember the small chem dry upholstery machines and the rainbow vac jason ;D
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Hi
Snowed under as of today, not booked up weeks in advance though.
Doing a lot for my LA clients, got 3 tomorrow, got a paint and clean thurs/fri
Got a paint on the 9th of Aug but an LA told me today that I now get all they have, it's student season and I have 3 extra LA clients for Carpets, EOT cleans and painting.
Having a web site built and an editorial coming out in August.
Long may it last
Regards
Martin
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I remember the small chem dry upholstery machines and the rainbow vac jason ;D
I still have one more left!
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Not solid 3 weeks in advance either !
Only the 1 job today,booked a big rug while there,for one neighbour,and also quoted the new place the people from the first job have moved into.
Next week is also pretty good though
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Now fully booked this week and have 26 jobs ( staggered ) booked for next month at the min
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i'm booked up for the next two weeks (including weekends) but thats the first time in 10 years!
Always been booked up to a week in advanced at the most. For me its not a fun postions to be in as i have 2 letting agents i work for and they always want them done yestarday!! so have to squeezin in a few late nighters! :(
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O.K only my first week of trading but i have got 3 bookings today and an eot on friday, so fairly chuffed to be up and running.
Spent a day with Philip last week, and he gave me some great advice. So thanks again for letting me come out with you last week.
As regards to being booked up for next week or 3 weeks, its all relative, whilst one cleaner might do 5 jobs a day and only be booked up for that week, another might be happy with 1 or 2 jobs a day and hence spread the jobs out over a longer period, hey each to your own.
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If you get a truckmount you are rarely booked up more than a week as you can just go through the work like a hot knife through butter. I think some guys like to finish fairly early in the day which is fair enough.
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O.K only my first week of trading but i have got 3 bookings today and an eot on friday, so fairly chuffed to be up and running.
Spent a day with Philip last week, and he gave me some great advice. So thanks again for letting me come out with you last week.
As regards to being booked up for next week or 3 weeks, its all relative, whilst one cleaner might do 5 jobs a day and only be booked up for that week, another might be happy with 1 or 2 jobs a day and hence spread the jobs out over a longer period, hey each to your own.
Well done Richard, keep it going!
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I wouldnt say I am manically busy but this last few days I have seen an upsurge in inquiry's, most of which have become bookings.
What we need to do is find the person with the switch and zonk him/her before it gets turned off. ;D
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Have had a word with the guy with the buton joe and its getting turned off today ;D
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we deal with a few carpet fitting shops and they are saying that they very quiet at the min and have been for a time, so I guess that at lot of our new clients are just not willing to make a big spend on new and opting for a clean.
1 of the suby fitters we used for the 1st time yesterday said he was down by 23k last year ( com work and domestic )
So it means its going to be good for us in the cleaning industry.
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What we need to do is find the person with the switch and zonk him/her before it gets turned off.
If you could Joe,that would be nice !!
My logo tops have paid for themselves this week,had 2 different jobs from being grabbed in the street this week !
Just booked a sofa clean off someone i used to work with ,through Facebook !
Got a reg custy this morn,my 2nd visit this year there,one for the agency tomorow,Fri arvo free at the mo,then one Sat morning.
Then 2 jobs every day next week,apart from Wed,month ahead with my outgoings,need to try and keep it like that,as i was way too close to going under this year,one of us usually has cash,if the other is broke,but my wife has also been very broke too,and have had to bail her out.
Not really doing any advertising either,tiny cut down basic add in yellow pages,yell . com,all the free internet listings etc etc and my website,that`s it
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Not a chance!!, just nipped home between jobs, had three calls today from previous customers, three more bookings!
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If youre not busy July/August you never will be!
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I dont find that to be a true statement Emclean.
July and Aug last year were below average months, Sept was a good one for a change.
School holidays are part July-Aug-part Sept.
Who wants carpets cleaned when kids are running in and out or its holiday time.
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If youre not busy July/August you never will be!
anyone wanna buy a truckmount and van.
all though theres still august, flingers clossed, sorry eating a chinese.
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I reckon some people will be busy and some won't. For everyone it relates directly to what they do to get work in the long run.
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We too are fully booked for 3 weeks now, Its good for us but the customers are not taking kindly to the wait, Not lost a job yet from it but its only a matter of time, I also agree that people seem to be wanting the next day alot more now ???
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I've had the call I've been waiting for... I have a solid weeks worth of work booked in too. I have been told I can do it in my own time to fit domestic custy's in too.... Result :)
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I guess it depends on how many jobs you do in a day. If you are doing 1, then 3 weeks in front aint such a big deal, and vice versa.
Me, I have got 21 jobs booked in to do.
Dan.
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Its Winter here in Cape Town so things are slightly different for us. Having said this, I remember having a meeting with my accountant in May 2009. We where raving about the growth in the business at +- 50% year on year for the past 3 years.
Xmas 2008 I had 4 teams consisting of a driver and technician running portable machines and 1 team of 3 guys running our Prochem Everest. Thats 11 guys. I had to hire 2 vans.
I walked out of the meeting with my accountant feeling really chuffed about life. I got back to the office and it was as though the phones had been switched off.
I now have only 2 guys working for me and had to retrench the rest. I still have all the machinery. It's month end now, so we are doing about 5 jobs per day. We have about 6 jobs booked for next week.
having said all of this, I can see that the economy is improving but have lost so much ground, I can see me catching back up to previous years for a while.
So the message to you single operator cleaners. Don't try to expand to quickly.
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Have always found that July/August just ticks over. As Joe said school hols, people away etc etc. We class "manic" as being fully booked every day for 2 weeks with calls coming in that we can't fit in. Haven't been like that at all this year, but it will come back one day and we'll be ready ;D
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July/August have been our best months by far for over 10 years. It must be down south, I know Neil Granger is always busy now as well. I call busy 3 Vans, 3 men 3/4 jobs a day each. (I am one of the men though)
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We are busy. But we dont just do carpet cleaning. If we did just carpet cleaning, I think I would be very poor indeed.
I know people who have purchased TM's for huge amounts and even after years later they have had to go into presurewashing, other types of cleaning just to get by.
We are lucky to have contracts, tied up from 12 months to 3 years. So its different for us. I would not want it just on bookings alone as that is not stable enough, especially when you have a work force to find wages for each month.
People either need to diversify into other areas like we have done or be extremely talented and lucky to do just carpets or one type or work.
For us we were seeing a downside a while ago and im not afraid to say it was worrying. But we got through it and have grown considerably in the last few months by winning more work and taking on a few more staff.
Dave
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Hi Guys
I am nearly always busy and thats not meant to be flash but it did take a long time to get to that position.
The internet changed things for me as I could create a massive advertising campaign for a fraction of what it would have cost in the print media.
Up until then I had a team of leaflet distributors which worked quite well but was quite expensive and time consuming.
I was not adverse to doing other cleaning in my earlier days as this helped me survive.
Cheers
Doug
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If i only had 2-3 weeks work booked in i would be seriously worried.... ???
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Sherco
Dont take up carpet cleaning then ;D
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I was not adverse to doing other cleaning in my earlier days as this helped me survive.
Same here,when i first started i was doing domestic and office cleaning,as the work picked up,i dropped them,have 1 left,a nobel prize winning professor of economics,5 hrs fri mornings,they are never there ,so brekfast,papersand push a vac round for a bit,get paid in lump sums every few months,this has got me out the shizzle on a number of occasions !!
Did have tomorrow arvo off,but got a last min job from the agency now,then one more on Sat at 8.15,2 job Monday and a quote,wed is free at the mo,but work booked every day..
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Sherco
Dont take up carpet cleaning then ;D
I do a bit...if I'm asked. Think i would struggle to survive just carpet cleaning.....
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Well only my second week of trading and I am now fully booked for next week which I am really pleased about, although I am limiting myself to one job a day to start with as only time will teach me how long each particular job will take. I know its not always going to be like this but its boosted my confidence no end as its always a leap into the unknown when you start a new business. Two jobs from parish magazine type mags, one from google search and one from leaflets. Bit disappointed with the results from the leaflets as I delivered 2000 of them over the last week and a half and only one reply.
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Keep going with the leaflets Richard when you are not cleaning, sometimes the call does not come for weeks or months afterwards!
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Being busy is dif to determine one person may say they are flat out but they may only want to do 2 jobs a day nd the diary soon fills up on the other hand someone with tm may be quiet if he is only a couple of jobs a day its a case of scale i guess.
I found this year somewhat of a treadmill tha just keeps getting faster.
been doing 3-5 job on average a day for weeks now ( depending on size ) this month has been the best so far. I am actually hoping things slow up slightly because to be honest i am knackered and feeling like i live to work.
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been doing 3-5 job on average a day for weeks now ( depending on size ) this month has been the best so far. I am actually hoping things slow up slightly because to be honest i am knackered and feeling like i live to work.
When the last three words get in the wrong order, is when the problems can start