Clean It Up
UK Floor Cleaning Forum => Carpet Cleaning Forum => Topic started by: The Carpet Cleaning Pro on February 28, 2011, 09:15:54 pm
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18 years ago I started out with a Kirby and 40 own made leaflets. I bought the Kirby from myself as I realized that people wouldn't spend all that money on a vacuum cleaner but would pay to have there carpets cleaned. I used it for about 3 months with Kirby shampoo then went to Prochem Foam Shampoo, made my money back, then after learning more I purchased my first HWE machine from Ace Janitorial in Sheffield... A Prochem Steameasy 400. It was a great machine and I run it for about 3 years before selling it on then buying a twin vac Prochem Cheyanne. I now run a dual operatored truckmount a multi van operation with various twin vac portables for wet and dry cleaning. I am now also putting my son through a carpet and upholstery cleaning apprenticeship.
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most people know my story, got a bum clean off a local, so sold me house and bought a truckmount, the end. ;D
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Mick,
Interested about the apprenticeship you're putting you son through, have you got any details on it that you can email across?
Regards
ian@lionheartcleaning.co.uk
Me, I was made redundant just over 8 years ago and started carpet cleaning till I could find a "proper job" again.
Just took on employee No 19 today to run our new "Wheelie Bin" cleaning business, if it takes off like I'm hoping then No 20 won't be far behind.
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After leaving a 'good job' in my youth which I had to go through college to get my A levels, to a labourer on a site and snooker table fitter and selling commercial kitchen equipment at the age of 18 and went to work for a ServiceMaster franchise then went to WE Franklins and then a Commercial floor laying company that had an add on cleaning section which maintained the newly laid flooring I then set up on my own 19 years ago next month.
Shaun
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Saw an advert for earn Ģ30k being self employed doing carpet cleaning.
It was a con really, unless you worked 70 hours a week and selling hard too.
The company name....Chores and there's a few others on here who have started via them.
Basically we got 25% of each job we did so it didn't take a brain surgeon to calculate that if I could get jobs at half 'their' prices then the customer would be getting it 'half price' whilst I would be getting twice as much as before.
So I suppose I have got to be grateful to them for showing me how you can make money out of this game ;D
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Hi Guys
Spent 5 years window cleaning and a custoemer who was a carpet retailer who did carpet cleaning as a add on to his business asked me if i wanted to take over from him, i spent a year with him learning about cleaning and most importantly carpet construction, never looked back he had to nag me to do it though, cant belive it took him as long as it did to convince me to dive in.
Fist job on my own was the most nervous i have ever been.
Regards Oliver Collins Rise & Shine Cleaning
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Same as Mr Williams, bought into the Chores franchise, complete rip off lasted 2 months before went off to work for someone else. Don't regret it though now 11 years on, can't beat working for yourself.
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we both worked for and trained with a rainbow franchise.
parted ways and went to work for another so called fire and flood company, didnt like the way they operated and treated clients so used life savings to set up on our own.
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Started off last September after 5 years of being an IT account manager and various jobs before that.
Got into it purely to run my own business.
I was looking for some sort of trade or idea when a local carpet cleaner did my carpets one Saturday, he was here for 40min and I paid him Ģ50, he moaned that he had 4 other jobs that day... and then it clicked
So careful what you say onsite while working, you could be getting yourself some competition ???
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Was a fully qualified mechanic (I love cars and anything to do with them) but got disillusioned so got some summer work at a Yacht builders laying concrete in their yard and got taken on, eventually being in charge of building the 80ft Oyster, later learning guys I was in charge of were earning more than me. Friend of a friend was looking for someone to help in his cleaning business so I went along to meet him. Did not really see it as a career move but we got on really well and I wanted away from boat building. Worked for him from 1989 to 1993 when 2 heart attacks and a divorce forced the govenor to retire and he gave me the carpet cleaning side customer lists as redundancy and sold the contract side so had to rename the company. He moved in next door to me and we were the best of mates until another heart attack took him 4 years ago. We had a 3 year old and another due in July but the wife backed me all the way and I started in May 1993 with a Princes Youth Business Trust loan as I was still 25. Not always been easy but still here 18 years later and would not change a thing.
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Back in 1984 I was married with 3 young kids & working in the motor trade in Doncaster. We'd just sold our little terraced house to move to something a bit bigger, we came down to visit the outlaws for Christmas & my brother-in-law said that the Carpet Cleaning company that he worked for wanted to take someone on. Met the boss between Christmas & New Year, said yes to the job, went back, handed in my notice, completed on the house sale and 4 weeks later we all moved in with the outlaws and I started out spending 2 weeks with a fitting team from the largest local carpet supplier, learning about carpets, underlays, fitting etc. Then spent 18 years with the company, both out on the tools and later in a management position. The owner sold the company in 2003 to a large national cleaning company and it seemed if the job didn't have 3 noughts on the end, they weren't really interested, so I left at the end of 2003 and set up on my own. So I've now been back on the tools for the past 7 and a bit years, still enjoying it, no plans to become a millionaire (unless my numbers come up), but happy providing a good service, at a fair price, meeting different people in different places every day.
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Derek
How did the local clean ya bum?
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I am a fully qualified chef,back in the day's of city and guilds,did a 4 year apprenticeship at Pembroke college in Cambridge.
Have worked in just about every type of catering establishment from hospitals to my dads pub.
Did win the N.H.S Employee of the year back when I worked at Papworth hospital,as I laid on a buffet for Lady Di ,when she came to open a new ward there.
Last job was as head chef at a new motorway service station,was head hunted by them,started off ok,as they wanted to be the first to do real food,all freshly prepared with local ingredients ,lasted for a few months like that,then the frozen stuff started coming in,managers were all twits,company was French,say no more.
Meanwhile my wife had started up a cleaning agency,she was constantly on at me to leave,but I kept saying I was sticking it out for the redundancy pay off,as I knew they were going down.
About 8 months later I got the letter and the pay out I was expecting,so put the money into a machine and all the other gear,I am in my 7th year now,and love my job,when I am busy,not so much when it's quiet.
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Derek
How did the local clean ya bum?
with a crevice tool, what else. ;D
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Saw an advert for earn Ģ30k being self employed doing carpet cleaning.
It was a con really, unless you worked 70 hours a week and selling hard too.
The company name....Chores and there's a few others on here who have started via them.
Basically we got 25% of each job we did so it didn't take a brain surgeon to calculate that if I could get jobs at half 'their' prices then the customer would be getting it 'half price' whilst I would be getting twice as much as before.
So I suppose I have got to be grateful to them for showing me how you can make money out of this game ;D
There was a Franchise Company in your area called Chores They cleaned peoples homes and charged Ģ15 an hour nearly 20 years ago.
I understand they were taken over by My Home which was part of Uniliever but then sold on again.
PS did this company teach you how to upsell.
About Me.
I do not Clean Carpets i have been winding you all up for the past 8 years.
;D ;D
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Bought first Chem-Dry franchise for 5 grand in Late 92, aged 23 , bought and sold several until 2002 when I had got bigger into water damage and fire work. I developed a drying trailer which CD head office tried to claim was thier intellectual property , so sold the remaining 2 franchises for 70k and set up on my own doing water damage all over europe , dip into carpet cleaning when I want to , building business , then selling them on as I get bored with them.
Will prob do the same till I keel over.
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When I left the Navy for the first time in 2001, I cleaned carpets and upholstery for "Raysons" (Taty) in Cockermouth for 12 months. I decided to rejoin the Navy as an Aircraft Mechanic and in 2008, I was booted out on a full war pension for having a cyst in the bone of my knee.
I decided that carpet cleaning would be a good thing to get into after I rang 2 or 3 local carpet cleaning companies to come and clean my carpets who said "We can come round sometime in the next couple of weeks" I decided that I could at least offer a better service than that, so I invested my lump sum of money on starting up.
If I'd rang Goron or Neil47, I'm pretty sure they'd have offered a 1st class service ;)
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From school worked in engineering for just over 10 years in ceramic capacitors, camshafts and heating elements. Final 6 months in a proper job, as a buyer for a marine window manufacturer.
July 1990 - Jan 2001 owned 2 Chem-dry franchises (yep another one ;D )
Jan 2001 - now, independent.
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Colin I thought you were a WAFU? ???
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It was my destiny!!!!!
I am 4th generation of my family in the cleaning industry.
In my school days one of our contracts was the cleaning for Littlewoods stores and I would manage the carpet maintenance in the evening after school (at the age of 14) picked up at the gates in a van, work all night then back to school in morning.
Stayed til my 6th year at high school then took up the admin job at the now Cleaning Systems UK but would still be out on site until finally becoming contracts manager.
At 34 I have been cleaning carpets for best part of 20 years.
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Colin I thought you were a WAFU? ???
All of us in the FAA (Fleet Air Arm) were known as WAFU's. (Weapon and Fuel Users) or (Wet And F*ing Useless ;D)
I am a fully qualified Aircraft Technician.....
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I thought that you had said you were fleet air arm, that is why I asked, I know about the wafu bit from fish heads I served with in Stanley.
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I was a "Fish Head" in my first stint, 10 years Radar Operator, Power Boat Coxswain and Nav's Yeo.
I almost ended up in The Falklands in 1996, but I had an hernia op, so they cancelled my draft. Once I was mended, they sent me to Hong Kong to Join HMS Plover catching Illegals and Smugglers instead, the best part of my Naval career by far....
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Afternoon guys,
I had a chemical company which sold to all the different train companies and we used to train their staff in how to clean with our products. Soon we started to employ guys to clean the trains for them as well. One day they asked if we would look at carpet cleaning on a 3 year contract. So we went to buy a Truckmount from Prochem (which fell thru) and ended up buying one from Hydramaster. Ended up buying a few from HM and 3 years ago I sold my half of the business and moved to Majorca. Now cleaning yachts which is great when you have work, but itīs the same for me as everyone else, when itīs quiet itīs a pain in the t+ts!
The biggest thing I have learned is look after all your customers even when they are a pain, because one day they will bring you more work. Oh and dont scrub too hard on wool/silk carpets...
Dave
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I thought that you had said you were fleet air arm, that is why I asked, I know about the wafu bit from fish heads I served with in Stanley.
Were you a Boot Neck, Pongo or a Crab?
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Similar to Warren A...
Worked at Nissan UK for 13 years and just finished another night shift.
Some local guy came and cleaned my carpet. he was in and out in under an hour and I handed over Ģ50...he "whinged" that he had another 3 jobs to do that day.
I thought " I could do that" ?....so I bought the equipment, went on a training course, and started part time between my shifts.
That was 10 years ago, I'm now full time and wish I'd started 20 years ago !
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well i left school at 16 and started working for my father on the farm the day i turned 18 i went to nz and worked on various farms out there mainly dairy farms then i found a job live catching deer in the southern alps was awesome. Stayed for 1 year then extended my visa for a further term . then after two years i moved onto australia worked in a shearing gang before moving onto asia where i worked in yes mcdonalds in hong kong lol i spend 4 years away from home navigating the globe, getting in lots of trouble .
When i arrived back in the uk at the age of 22 i worked for the old man for 4 more long years before setting up in cc . was going to do a franchise but decided to go it alone and 3. 5 years on am going from strength to strength . Very passionate about my business and enjoy it 95 % of the time really enjoy the marketting side which in my opinion is vital .
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From the moment i left school it was decided that i would go into the family busines that my father set up when he left the police in the 1960s he ran a firm of private investigators for over 35 years i spent over 20 years in this line of work.
When he retired i was working alongside my step brother, to cut a long story short we rarely saw eye to eye, the work involved unsociable hours so i was rarely at home with the family, the type of work, which included commercial debt recovery, process serving ( serving court documents) and surveillance it could be exciting at times but they were few and far between, the last job i did was for the local child protection services, basically sitting in the back of a van for 12 hour shifts pi..ing in a bottle and watching a front door, the object of the job was that a suspected paedophile ( the father) was supected of visiting his kids. jobs like this were a huge responsibilty, the consequenc's of missing something were dire.
Anyway many factors made the job so stressful that i was hospitalised for 5 days with pheumonia i also had a bit of a breakdown, during which i did not receive any wage from my stepbrother >:( i took a couple of weeks off and went back to work but during my time off i found you guys and a light at the end of the tunnel, i did the NCCA training got a loan 18 months ago and started my business shortly after walking out of a job i had done since i left school.
Its not been easy but a huge weight has been lifted off my shoulders because i have control of my life at last,my job fits in around what i want to do, if i want to spend time with my family i do, i am no Richard Branson i dont want a carpet cleaning empire with 20 plus truckmounts just a small successful business which i am well on the way to achieving, its a good job i no longer meet the dregs of society , but people i choose to work for and earn good money too :) without this forum and you guys i dread to think where i would be now.
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Left School joined Police,left to be Pro cyclist for five years,worked on a Golf course to Deputy Head position and cleaned carpets as a side line.
Now full time Carpet cleaning,Window Cleaning and Mobility equipment with both sons and wife.Both Sons can run Business now, so last year had ten weeks away in our Touring Caravan(one week per month during holiday season) ,shall do same again this year if Health permits.
Regards Rob
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Were you a Boot Neck, Pongo or a Crab?
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Was called a Percy by the skates on my shift, but then it was the skate shift with a PO and LRO in charge. worked with the crabs as well though.