[Simon Moat]

Two very well established firms near to me have recently stated quoting their prices in a monthly magazine thats delivered free.

Bear in mind these firms have been going years:

Lounge £22

Through Lounge £34

Double Bedroom £22

HSL £34

3 P/S £46

With discounts given on two or more rooms cleaned.

The companies are within a pound of eachother on all prices quoted.

The area is relatively affluent.


Makes you wonder if their chasing any job they can get, or trying to cut eachothers throat!

[justin 88]

unreal................if i had to price that low to get jobs all my stuff would end up on ebay!!

[craignozza]

Might get them to do my lounge 

[David_Annable]

Hi

If this is the first time you have seen advert with prices like this , were have you been.

If it was all about price, we would all live above a chippy!

Dave

[Len Gribble]

Think it’s called volume  as for 3 p/s no way unless vac only. (I really need to get into the domestic work) 

[Adam Fearnley]

Maybe they're willing to work a full week, in which case could earn a decent amount.

[Adam P]

you sure they're separate companies if the prices are so similar? say customer is looking for 3 companies to get quotes from, 2 with low prices, 1 with high prices, they'll think the low price is the normal and high is just taking the p, and then chose eithe one of the 2, but it's one company so they'll get the customer no matter what

[Carpet Dawg]

^^ That  idea is a big FAIL when the customer gets the same guy on the phone 

[Adam P]

why would they need to call both, they've got the prices in front of them.

[Carpet Dawg]

I tried a simliar method to this a few years ago, infact it was when I first started. Low prices in newpaper ads and normal price in YP, leaflets etc

It does work if you dont mind working cheap as you get alot of volume and I was not/am not shy of hard work. But customers soon relise whats going on, they anit stupid. I got found out on more than one occasion and the face soon turns red!

[John Kelly]

Consumers who purchase services on price have no loyalty to the service provider. Why flog yourself to death for a basic wage when there is good money to be earned. Doesn't matter where you live. We live in a so called depressed area, I get Chem Dry technicians in every few days buying sundrie items and they are taking between 3-5 hundred pounds every day and thats only off 3 or 4 jobs. They don't do any better clean than you although they may disagree, its all about marketing.

[Simon Moat]

The two companies in question are seperate, both sole trader, one of the companies has just launched an 0800 number which is being the promoted.

In terms of volume you'd have to book in 30 lounge carpets per week to even contemplate being viable, how many guys can honestly state they have six jobs a day week in week out?

Even though the town is about ten miles from where we are based we advertise in the same magazine and get a worthwhile responce, thankfully!

[Clare.w]

Hi all!

We are putting our biz plan together at the minute and are finding the pricing alot harder than I thought it would be.
For domestic cc I like the idea of keeping it quite simple and advertising our prices, but whilst looking at other company's in the area the ones advertising prices are similer to those above.....?
As we are newbies i guess we would have cheaper rates for a while -untill we have a bit more experience and better equipment.
I know no one is going to tell me what they charge! and im not asking you to but any advise would be very welcome Thanks

[Tony Rowley]

Clare

Some of us do advertise a price guide on our websites you can see mine aandmcarpetcare.co.uk

I dont think when you start out you should have low prices because you may then get stuck within that price structure and find it difficult to increase them.

A couple of years ago I advertised in a local newspaper and it was"Carpet Cleaning from £12.50 per room"
Now that got the phone ringing but when I told them the price for the lounge for instance they would tell me that i am advertising at £12.50 PER ROOM, I would then have to correct them and tell them that it was FROM £12.50 and that would be the price of a box bedroom for instance. I realised that i was giving the potential customer the impression that carpet cleaning was a cheap and thats what they was expecting. Once I realised this I stopped advertising at that price. Its part of our job to educate the customer on what they can expect to pay and I think honesty is the best policy.

I advertise my prices because I think its important for the consumer/customer to have an idea what they can expect to pay, many people still think that the cost of carpet cleaning is prohibitive and therefore dont even consider having it done. I am reluctant to call a tradesperson unless I have some indication of what costs I am looking at so treat my customers in the same way.

All just my own opinion and you will get a different one come along in a minute but I hope that helps you.

Tony

[Clare.w]

Thank you Tony.

Yes I agree with you. If I need a trades person of any kind I always call the one that advertise the price -partly cos I don't want to look stupid on the phone! and when looking for the right service the price is part of your reserch.
That's what we do with our domestic cleaning, we even give prices in the yellow pages and customers always say thats why they called us.

Just need to get our prices right!