[Jon Tweddle]

Hi

Can anyone give me details of a good company who make personalised labels to put on my cleaning bottles and sprays, also I'm after a supplier of the bottles and spray guns themselves. ( I'm based in the North East. )

Thanks very much for any replies
Jon Tweddle

[PremierPDS]

Hi Jon

Any relation to Beth??? Sorry, someone had to say it! Anyways... what do you mean by personalised labels for spray bottles? Company logos etc and/ or CoSHH symbols etc?

Nickie x

[Jon Tweddle]

Hi Nickie
No relation, but can do numerous cart wheels after 10 pints!!
What I mean is company logo and details of the chemical in the bottle.
Hope this makes sence

cheers very much indeed
Jon (no relation to Beth) Tweddle

[John Kelly]

Jon, I can probably sort them out for you if you let me know what you need.

[Jon Tweddle]

Cheers John
Will Ring you tomorrow, also want some of that toilet cleaner you showed me.

[PremierPDS]

Hi again Jon

Hey I'd like to see you do those cartwheels! It's more like Catherine wheels in my house after a few! Anyways...

You could do this yourself if you're any good with a computer. You could even just import a few pics to a Word document and wrap the text around symbols and logo's etc. It all depends on how good you are on the PC really but Photoshop is another option. You can then just print them out onto stickers and hey presto!!! This would save you a fortune in the long run and it's how I do mine.

Nickie x

[Jon Tweddle]

Cheers Nickie
Unfortunately I'm as much use on a computer as I am doing cart wheels SOBER!!! But thanks for all the info anyway.
Katherine wheels? show off!

[PremierPDS]

No worries you cheeky chappy!!!

I know you've been offered some help already but if ya get stuck give me a shout and I'll only be too happy to help! (can't resist a man that do cartwheels albeit after 10 pints). Cartwheels and fireworks uuuuuuuuummmmmmmmmmmm- don't sound half bad that!
Nickie x

[Jon Tweddle]

Cheers Nickie, it's always good to know that there's other people in the trade out there who are willing to help.
What kind of cleaning does your company do? 

[PremierPDS]

Hello again my supple friend

We do domestic and commercial cleaning. I have to confess that I'm a relative newbie to the business really. I've only been up and running for about 3 months although I spent a good few months researching and typing up things like staff manuals and client handbooks, designing my first flyer and ads and did a business course to boot.
Things are really slow at the moment but they are for everyone and I'm just hoping that they get better which I'm sure they will after everyone recovers from their Christmas debts. I've just written and copied a letter with a flyer attached to post to local businesses and I'm also making a shed load of phone calls daily to try to get some more business in- when it can't get any worse, it's got to get better eh !!!

Your firey friend
Nickie x

[Jon Tweddle]

My firey friend
It sounds like we're in the same boat, I've got a domestic cleaning co, and am branching out to the commercial side of things. I'm also doing carpet cleaning, but that's a seperate business. Where are you based? It would be good to compare notes with some one at roughly the same stage as me.

Cheers
Jon Tweddle

[PremierPDS]

I'm one of those plastic scousers- on the other side of the Mersey on the Wirral peninsula. It's kind of a weird place to live really- when I did my degree (in Public Health) I found out all kinds of weird facts... one of its wards is ranked number one for child poverty in the whole country yet we have a place named Caldy here that is the third most affluent place in the country outside of London so it's definately a real mix here.

I'm glad to have met someone in the same boat Jon. It's a lonely and dark place at times especially when you are surrounded by negative people as I am. Things are slowly picking up for me but it's been a long hard slog. I don't know about you but I am willing to give anything a go and phoned a few sheltered housing places the other day. They mostly have their own cleaners but they were really interested when I said I could supply extra cleaners should one of their staff go off sick and that I could take over the management of their cleaning staff and I have 3 meetings set up over the next 2 weeks out of it. They may not come to anything but anything is worth a shot at this stage in the game and I'm really glad that I spent the time I did before going live writing manuals etc so at least I can turn up at meetings with something in my hand that tells them I'm serious.

I'm mostly doing one off cleans at the moment because most of the competition here don't do them. It's really crap but that's how you get recommendations and anything's better than nothing.

What about you? Do you have any regular clients yet? How are you going about your marketing?

Nickie x

[Jan K]

good on ya both, i am 4 years down the road from you both, been running my dom cleaning business that long.............i still have my ups and downs, most recently a down unfortunately, but work has picked up in the last few weeks and things are roaring ahead again.

how are you both advertising............i use yellow pages, free line listing on yell.com and more recently my website has been added to google search engine...........getting a fair bit of work that way

[Jonny jones]

hi jan
how do you get on the google thing because i think it would be ideal for me because i think im the only floor sander that uses eco freindly varnishes on the floor i do, and i would like that to get noticed.
thanx jonny

[Jan K]

hey jonny!

well tbh i hadnt registered my webby with any search engines as i was paying for a site and listing with yell originally. i didnt have the time patience or know how to design one myself. Buuuuut with it costing me 80 quid a month i decided enough was enough and i had to get my act together and build one myself. Soooo i sihned up with easily.co.uk and used one of their templates, nothing fancy, does the trick cost me a total of £50 for the site for a year and 2 yrs on the domain name. my partner got the webby registered with google and in the last 2 weeks i have had 6 leads and they have all resulted in signing up customers, so i am quite pleased but it is early days for google so we shall see. i dont see why it wouldnt work for you either specially with your emphasis on eco friendly products

[Jon Tweddle]

Hi Nickie

I've got 10 regular clients (mixture of weekly and fortnightly), and I do one offs for a couple of letting agencies. Most of my work has come from my leaflets and some word of mouth. I have only put out about 2500 leaflets and still have bout 10,000 to go, if you'd like I could try and scan my leaflet and e mail it to you, as I find it gets the phone ringing! I'm not in yellow pages, as I missed it last year, but don't think I'll bother because I've heard too many conflicting stories about wether it's worth the money. I'm lucky because I've got another source of income wich keeps me going. I'm also starting off a seperate carpet cleaning business, wich I'm hoping will do well, but just like you did, I'm putting in alot of research before I go live with it.
I know a Gill Rimmer from the Wirrel, and she's a cleaner!

Cheers for the good advice guys and gals, keep it coming
cheers
jon Tweddle

[PremierPDS]

Hia again darlin

I'm afraid I don't know Gill although it's possible I may have rubbed shoulders with her somewhere along the line. What part of the Wirral is she from? Does she have her own cleaning business or does she work for someone else?

Great idea about the leaflet by the way. My email address is nickie1105@msn.com. I'll also do the same and email you mine over so you can take a look. It'll be interesting to see how they differ.

Nickie x