[james roffey]

I received a phone call from a local carpet cleaner yesterday asking if i had heard about another local carpet cleaner that is charging £15 per room and advertising this on Google, the guy was quite upset and irritated, so much so that he has contacted the NCCA to complain about this guy who is a member. he is also a member of this forum.

The guy asked all the usual questions that have been asked many many times on the forums but i think he was taking it quite personally as he had has lost a customer  directly from this guy and he is struggling after many years in the business, he is now off work because of illness, tennis elbow i think he said it was.
I have only been going for three years now and i have mixed feelings about this, my average price for a room is £50 and i do discount on further rooms but £15 for cleaning a room would not cover my overheads let alone make a profit, my overall feeling is that it devalues what we do, i understand its only carpet cleaning but i honestly think i provide much more than that, i go above and beyond to be thorough and do the best job i can and i think i am worth at least what i charge.
If i am honest though it does depress me as this guy i know is highly qualified, and could easily command a higher price,  what he is doing is not only cheap prices but a "cheap shot" and the easiest marketing tool to use.
listening to this guy i imagined that could be me in a few years and i felt quite sorry for him.  

PS The NCCA said unless he is "Bait and switching" they can do nothing

[AshWhite]

If he's capable of doing the job and has decent equipment and insurance what can you do?

There's a guy who has started advertising locally to me: Individual rooms for £20, or whole house for £100 - Using Rug Doctor Pro Machine & Chemicals. I've seen people ask how long does it take to do? Answer is 1 hour for a lounge! Asked how long to dry? Answer Dry in 1 hour! That's barely manageable with my TM, let alone a bloody Rug Doctor!

Fact of the matter is that there is always going to be people who sell on price, I suppose you just have to find your own angle to get customers.

It's not nice though!

[james roffey]

The laws of physics are the same throughout the universe, unlike overheads for  carpet cleaners for the rest of us diesel is £1.40 a litre this guy must be paying 40 pence a litre, van and public liability insurance must be a fraction of what the rest of us pay, the same for repairs and maintenance of our machines and vehicle, chemicals, NCCA membership : tax for this tax for that we all have to pay vast amounts to keep going and hopefully make a profit at the end.
I suspect that the £15 a room applies to an extra room which is misleading, maybe he can enlighten us mere mortals who have to make a living.
I am just thankful that in the last three years i have built up a small but loyal client base because if i were starting today i would be f.....  

[M.Acorn]

Had same thing last week,flyer through the door 70% off lounge £15 etc etc,still booking jobs at my normal rates,in the areas he has flyered,people are not stupid well the type of customers I want aren't..

[Helen]

Did a little search and found the advert you are on about.
The price £15 per room is a from price and is based on how many rooms the customer wants cleaned. It is very specific in the website details.
I would think that if the custie only wants 2 rooms cleaned then they aren't going to get the £15 per room rate, but would do if it were considerably more rooms. There is also the opportunity to upsell, so I really don't think this is a cheap and cheerful leggit after a boggit job but is a good way to catch the potential custies eye on a web search

[derek west]

how come when someone does a groupon offer, everyone says good luck, your so brave for trying it, well done that man, yet when someone cuts out the groupon rogues and does the cheap offer themselves therefore cutting out the middle man and getting all the proceeds for himself (less overheads of course), its classed as cowboy esque.  

[Colin Day]

how come when someone does a groupon offer, everyone says good luck, your so brave for trying it, well done that man, yet when someone cuts out the groupon rogues and does the cheap offer themselves therefore cutting out the middle man and getting all the proceeds for himself (less overheads of course), its classed as cowboy esque.  

Yeah, I was thinking that...

[Russ Chadd]

This i common all over the UK, some firms cotton on to the fact that the public love a deal!
There is a Sunday market not far from me... a guy on the back of a lorry gets people to pay him £50.00 and in return he gives them a black bag full of items which are supposed to be worth considerably more than the £50.00... Its amazing watching this guy at work... he could sell sand to the Arabs!
My Point it this... its simple human nature to want more in return than what you are prepared to give...

I will never de value my service, my prices are based on the time i spend and the materials used! If im too expensive then customers can either call me back when they have enough money to pay for a quality service or call the guy on the crappy flyer!

[Colin Day]

Don't ever believe that someone who's cheaper is gonna give a bad service...

I cleaned a carpet 3 days after another carpet cleaner did, because they weren't happy with the results he achieved.

I came to the rescue and cleaned the small living room carpet with excellent results and the customer was over the moon. The water in the waste tank was black from soot....

Giving the customer the invoice for £50 I said "There you go, just remember that you should avoid these cheap carpet cleaners like the plague!"

Looking at the invoice she smirked and said "He was £10 dearer than you....."

I felt a proper idiot....

[AshWhite]

Don't ever believe that someone who's cheaper is gonna give a bad service...

I cleaned a carpet 3 days after another carpet cleaner did, because they weren't happy with the results he achieved.

I came to the rescue and cleaned the small living room carpet with excellent results and the customer was over the moon. The water in the waste tank was black from soot....

Giving the customer the invoice for £50 I said "There you go, just remember that you should avoid these cheap carpet cleaners like the plague!"

Looking at the invoice she smirked and said "He was £10 dearer than you....."

I felt a proper idiot....

 

[Mike Halliday]

i think some  people just look for an excuse for their own failures and see the low priced companies as an easy answer, you should have told the guy to stop being a cry baby and go out and find the people who will pay the price he wants to charge.

its easy to say you don't have any work because that nasty carpet cleaner down the road is £10 cheaper than you, rather than say you don't have any work because you sit on your Bum watching Jeremy Kyle.

 If that guy had a full diary of customers would he be complaining about the £15 a room cleaner?, its only the people who are struggling that moan..... the busy guys just laugh at lowballers

the best way to beat the £15 a room companies its to have a diary full of £60 a room  customers

[Helen]

Don't ever believe that someone who's cheaper is gonna give a bad service...

I cleaned a carpet 3 days after another carpet cleaner did, because they weren't happy with the results he achieved.

I came to the rescue and cleaned the small living room carpet with excellent results and the customer was over the moon. The water in the waste tank was black from soot....

Giving the customer the invoice for £50 I said "There you go, just remember that you should avoid these cheap carpet cleaners like the plague!"

Looking at the invoice she smirked and said "He was £10 dearer than you....."

I felt a proper idiot....

 

[john hunter]

mike is right. i am find it hard some times, but will not clean any room 4 £15 .

[Allan Simmons]

Unfortunately it doesn't do the industry as a whole any favours but if the guy is desperate and needs to eat he needs the work so bad he has to take it at any price.  At best he is covering overhead and will eventually either go bust or pack up and get a job without the hassle.

When I quoted a client £80 for a HSL probably 15 years ago the woman went mental and said she had been quoted £11 and virtually threw me out of the house.  You jut have to be proud of the service you provide at the price you charge and not everyone will pay your price.  There is a great phrase about whatever price point you decide to charge and that is  "Some will pay it, some won't, so what! Next"

Two weeks later she called and booked in.  When I'd finished cleaning the carpet for her she said she'd called the other people and they had done the cleaning last week.  She said that when she opened the door to them they asked i they could have a cup of tea straight away, she said yes, showed them the carpet and went to make a cuppa.  When she brought the cuppa through they were just packing up.  She said if they were there 11 minutes for their £11 that was generous.  Carpet looked no different and was soaking wet for two days.  She apologised for throwing me out of the house and gave me a tenner tip!  And that as when a tenner was worth a tenner, you could get four pints of beer and Fish and Chips on the way home for that.

Sadly when you have bills to pay the temptation is to go really cheap, but it always leads to pain eventually, seen it so many times over the years.

If the guy is doing a great job then fair play if that's what he feels he needs to do to survive right now, but it will end in tears long term.

Al.

[Allan Simmons]

i think some  people just look for an excuse for their own failures and see the low priced companies as an easy answer, you should have told the guy to stop being a cry baby and go out and find the people who will pay the price he wants to charge.

its easy to say you don't have any work because that nasty carpet cleaner down the road is £10 cheaper than you, rather than say you don't have any work because you sit on your Bum watching Jeremy Kyle.

 If that guy had a full diary of customers would he be complaining about the £15 a room cleaner?, its only the people who are struggling that moan..... the busy guys just laugh at lowballers

the best way to beat the £15 a room companies its to have a diary full of £60 a room  customers

Love it! 

[Craigp]

He won't be making any money, it's desperation.

The cheap carpet cleaners are in and out pretty quick and don't do as good a job despite what people say on here. Sure there's the odd exception.

I recently had a landlord who used a cheap truck mount c/cer (advertises half price all the time) last year he said they did a 2 bed flat in twenty mins! he was also not at all impressed with the result. So they get no repeat custom.

Nice website James but use your selling points better!

[Kev Loomes]

i think some  people just look for an excuse for their own failures and see the low priced companies as an easy answer, you should have told the guy to stop being a cry baby and go out and find the people who will pay the price he wants to charge.

its easy to say you don't have any work because that nasty carpet cleaner down the road is £10 cheaper than you, rather than say you don't have any work because you sit on your Bum watching Jeremy Kyle.

 If that guy had a full diary of customers would he be complaining about the £15 a room cleaner?, its only the people who are struggling that moan..... the busy guys just laugh at lowballers

the best way to beat the £15 a room companies its to have a diary full of £60 a room  customers

As harsh as this comment is lol, I have to entirely agree Mike

Kev

[Colin Day]

I know one guy who is cheap and the job will take him all day if it has to. He does a cracking job and has plenty of referrals. He can't earn too much because the dole will be on to him.... Surely that's proof that people are in this game for a whole wide range of different reasons. Some NEED to make the money to survive where as others NEED the work to keep them out of the house. (I'm somewhere in the middle ) There are obviously many other variables of course...

There's nothing any of us can do about carpet cleaners offering a better/cheaper deal than ourselves, so instead of being all bitter and twisted, it's far easier just getting on with your own business and letting others get on with theirs...

[Dennis]

Amen Brother Day. 

[clinton]

Brother Day

Am sure we have these guys are in all areas advertising very low rates,i just try and sell the benefits to the client and some just will always go with the cheaper option.