[Craigp]

I think it's just bravado from Susan, in an attempt to look 'successful' she's just came across as show off, attention seeking, and obnoxious.

Susan, if people 'discovered' you were successful you would have respect. If you tell them.. Well this is how you come across. That's how it works.

[wynne jones]

I'm not feminist friendly usually, but there are lots of blokes on here who do that Craig, but when a woman does it, it's suddenly and issue. 

[Stephen Callinan]

How long does it take to clean a carpet ?
survey/?
test/?
price/?
Bodger / scarper

not me  crac on big fella

xx

[Doug Holloway]

Hi Guys

Coming back to the concept of a price war, there are loads of cheap CC's offering cheap work, another is hardly going to make a difference.

There are a much smaller group offering good quality, properly priced cleaning and I know where I want to be.

Cheers

Doug

[Gary Longley]

Hi Guys

Coming back to the concept of a price war, there are loads of cheap CC's offering cheap work, another is hardly going to make a difference.

There are a much smaller group offering good quality, properly priced cleaning and I know where I want to be.

Cheers

Doug

There are also loads of cheap carpet cleaner's offering quality work and those are the one's you need to watch! The public (not all) today buy on price and all they are looking for is to have their carpet's cleaned, by whom, what method or which machinery is irrelevant in their eyes, they just want a clean carpet.
 

[Ian Gourlay]

I often wonder what is cheap

I know my calculaton is not very scientific. But I recon that if you employ someone on say £300 a week , cost of equipment , van advertising admin etc you need to take £1000 a week to make a reasonable margin

[Gary Longley]

I often wonder what is cheap

I know my calculaton is not very scientific. But I recon that if you employ someone on say £300 a week , cost of equipment , van advertising admin etc you need to take £1000 a week to make a reasonable margin

That's very true Ian BUT the majority of the public are not business minded and don't see it like that. They just see us as cleaner's doing carpet cleaning and nothing more. Cleaner's in their view, should not be earning £1,000 per week, as you suggest, BUT we know that it takes alot to run a business but try convincing some member's of the public that!!

This is a very difficult line of work we are in. We want big bucks but the customer wants the job done cheap. Cleaning, historically, has always been an industry which is at the lower end of the scale for wages etc and that's what some member's of the public believe we should be on cleaning = min. wage, they don't realise the cost, even running a one-man-band operation!!!???

[markpowell]

good for you! go for it, i do enjoy a good war!

The English always win too!!!   

What a laugh ..............the English have won very little in their lives and would have been wiped out if not for the Americans coming in when the Germans were poised ....with advanced technology to rip the UK apart.


For those who don't know.................Susan Dean had been running a very successful carpet cleaning business using small adverts in local newspapers and several operators with Extracta machines.

If you wonder what constitutes success...........consider the fact that she has or had a couple of years ago around 20 properties all rented out and bought from the profits made from a very efficient business.

A couple might look up " autistic " to learn a little more about this young lady.

many thanks , long gone are the extractas my friend , running three tuckmounts now well just two as ill be giveing one away to hubbys bother in law , as for me being a man sorry i dont think so ,

 yes i do run cheap but ive tryed uping the prices for five years and i just lost the faith so went back to what i know and what works for us  , loveing the coments about cheap houses but sorry wont have any of them rubbish min here is a three bed semi , and mark julians not doing the haulage now sold that , and is back into doing up the houses and drawing pictures on people for alot of money ,

just cant see how you think 70 is too low , right today my cleaners been out and done 200 pounds worth of work  

60 wages
30 fuel
10 chems

i am happy if that trucks goes out and earns me 100 pounds a week clear profit  , so it down to being in and out quick  nope thats not true , maybe i am holding people bacl here buy pulling up with top end gear and chargeing little but its the way i am going to move forward at this time works for me i dont care if i put people out of buissness because they wouldnt care if they did the same tome

  

£10 WORTH OF CHEMS ON £200 WORTH OF WORK?

[garyhumphreys]

My perception of carpet cleaning before I started in the industry was that it wasn't cheap and most of my customers also.
I think most carpet cleaners think that because they wouldnt pay the price others wont which is soooo wrong.

And yes how much chems for £200 of work.

[Robert Watson]

That`s not your best post Wynne. What were we talking about again? Oh yeah, price war. What ever floats your boat. But not for me.

Edit, I don`t like him either.

I'm not with you Robert, if you thought I was suggesting all jocks are like that I wasn't, it just reminded me of him and that he recommended the tactic to one of his partners.

Sorry Wynne. Not my best post. I`v had a word with myself about posting with beer goggles on. 

[Doug Holloway]

Hi guys

Our customers are a bit more discerning than some give credit for and will definitely pay for a quality job, some of course will buy purely on price,

Cheers

doug

[wynne jones]

Everyone is different but I've lived here ten years and when I wanted a plumber, electrician, roofer etc. I asked neighbours and work colleagues.

And I'd ask 'do you know a good, plumber? etc etc I didn't ask do you know a cheap plumber? In fact, quite often someone would say, he's not the cheapest but we've used him for years. That gave me reassurance and I was happy to pay what they were charging. 

[Timmy Boy]

Hi all
Susan operates in a very similar demographic to us where your competition comes more from the 'hire a rug doctor' type customer than appointing a carpet cleaning company. I agree the price is cheap BUT if the property is empty you could clean a 2 bed property (pre spray, envirodry, extract) in less than 2 hours but I would want more like 90.

[Mike Halliday]

are we all missing an important point.

 for there to be a price war you need more than 1 company, Susan going into an area with low prices doesn't make a war it just makes another cheap company

what if the other companies doen't give a monkeys about her brother-in-law and just laugh at his low prices

[Shaun_Ashmore]

Mike that's a valid point to add to this there are many price scales and to have a price war everyone would have to advertise in the same medium and that would attract the same customer I would suspect that higher priced cleaners would find other ways away from the norm to find a different type of customer.

Shaun

[Gary Longley]

are we all missing an important point.

 for there to be a price war you need more than 1 company, Susan going into an area with low prices doesn't make a war it just makes another cheap company

what if the other companies doen't give a monkeys about her brother-in-law and just laugh at his low prices

The point is by doing that she is starting a price war.

[Mike Halliday]

starting it with who?

[Shaun_Ashmore]

It takes 2 to have a war what happens if the other decides not to bite?

Shaun

[Gary Longley]

starting it with who?

With another carpet cleaner  (you're not thick are you)

[Craigp]

Gary, say there's a carpet cleaner in your area that charges less than you ( I'm sure there is) it might be that it's because they have started a price war with you.

But they might not even be on you radar, or you may have took no notice. So they can't start a price war if they other person does not partake, and probably just carries on with their business.

So Susan might be left making a price war with herself, hahaha.