[tomh]

just ready to start trading now & have some adverts coming out in several parish/town mags & have put on a typical price guide as cheaper than printing leaflets & delivering them somehow.
i have put a price of £40 lounge £55 through lounge if they want it protected £60 - £78ish which is not printed, but how do you go about pricing odour control & alergy treatments ? as a guide please

[BRSL]

It's always good to charge for sloutions man power to get the job done all included or you will come across as bait and switch (is that the corect phrase  : )  we offer packages

James

[tomh]

ok yeah i see where your coming from there James & thanks !
but say you or i have been asked to clean someones carpets get the job & a week later phone rings it's them & they spilt a glass of red wine which has stained no chance of complete removal on there wool carpet
they go but it say's stain protection on your advert ! or something simlar that you have not been invited to price for.
of course we are going to sell our add on's but really most are just going to want clean carpets & if you price for all these chemicals & there aplication's you would be priced out of every market.
if we were a plasterer's & were asked to skim a wall we wouldnt be able to say ok well i've price to chase back to brick work & damp proof as well !
Tom

[carpetclean]

not sure if i am reading it right. but surly you would have it on the survey report. what you are doing exactly. it would state if it was guarded or not and signed by the customer and you

[tomh]

the question was as a guide how do you price for add on's like odour & alergy treatment ?
as a guide i have been told to add half the cost to clean a room on top to protect it too ! so my prices would be lounge £40 clean only & £60 clean & protect !

[Ian Gourlay]

If you work out the price of protector I do not think you will leave yourself enough profit.

Dont forget the people who told you to add half the price for cleaning a room could be charging more than £40.

[Liahona]

As Ian has said you really need to be charging more for the protection. I know I deal in a higher paying

bracket but that shouldnt make any difference.  The cost of protection to us is very high compared to

that of any normal cleaning chemical so why would you want to give it away so to speak. As for

 cleaning a room for £40 I think you need your head read anyway. As Ian suggested to give the

protection away at half price would only work to a degree if you were charging considerably more in the

first place. I.E. if you charged £80 or £100 and then £40 or £50 to protect you are then somewhere

where you need to be to make a profit. £20 to protect a lounge and then may have to provide free spot

 removal isnt going to make you any money. I have to admit that sometimes I do only charge for half

the cleaning costs but my cleaning costs are shall we say a wee bit above 40 quid for a room, of any

size. Anyway a through lounge if done correctly will cost you more than £20 to do if you are using a

good protector and most important, applying it correctly Best, Dave.

[craigp]

ian and dave are right, cus your price is low, (same as mine) when it comes the protect i charge just a nats ass under price to clean say 35 for lounge, so 40-45 to clean 35 on top protection.

using prochems flouroseal costs about £15 to protect average (15-20sqm) lounge,  so 20 s not enough.

[andy roberts]

Dave

I know Tom would seem to be pricing on the low side, but I've noticed that your charges are considerably higher than most (not knocking that). I know your using a t/m but my question to you is How does your prices compare with other professional cleaners in your area? Do you struggle to compete sometimes or have you got a strong client base that will support your pricing policy?

Regards,  Andy

[tomh]

ok thanks maybe double the prices for protection ! as i am just starting out many would say charge as you mean to go on, but at £40 & £55 there is some money to be made & plenty of scope for word of mouth !
maybe as i gain confidence in cleaning & more importantly selling myself & services, put my prices up ! dependant on how busy i am

[stains-away]

ok thanks maybe double the prices for protection ! as i am just starting out many would say charge as you mean to go on, but at £40 & £55 there is some money to be made & plenty of scope for word of mouth !
maybe as i gain confidence in cleaning & more importantly selling myself & services, put my prices up ! dependant on how busy i am

In my opinion its better to start as you mean to go on, if you offer a service at a price now then get called back by a customer a year down the line to do a repeat how do you explain a hike in prices, a lot of people appear to sell protection at half the price of the clean, but when you look at the costs involved in materials the clean is considerably cheaper (material costs only).
If the protection was sold at the same price as the clean then the profit level taking time into account for both clean and protection would balance out better (ie more time on the clean, less chemical cost, less time on protection higher chemical costs), Andy

[Liahona]

Tom, if you are just starting out then why would you start charging only the 40 or 55. Believe me it is not enough and

you would be best to start higher. I think most people would agree and as above Andy thinks the same thing. For

 those who only pay 40 or 50 only would be glad to pay 30 or 40 to the next person..... As for the word of mouth, you

might be absolutely right but do you want to do a lot of lounges for 40 quid? If you do then thats fine but as you are

just starting out you have the perfect chance of charging say 75, getting the job and then getting referrals for 75.

Again as Andy has said you will find it harder to charge more a year later to the same customer as opposed to the 75

 now. Hope that makes sense?................... Carpetmate, for the record it has nothing to do with the truck mount as I

charge more for using a portable. Just that the truck mount is a far superior machine........... I dont compare my prices

with anyone but having said that I work all over the British Isles and I also have a job to do back in California.

Therefore who would I compare too?..........I do know though that near where I live most cleaners try to be price

competitive both the fast trackers and non fast.......... As I dont compete with anyone I dont struggle........... My prices

 only appear high compared to the "norm" ...
........ But I do work on some hideously expensive textiles so in fact the "norm" charge more than I do on a percentage

 as to the article being worked on............. My client base as you would cal it compiles

of just 4 people. My client base in California is just 17 after 13 years in business there. Best, Dave......

Tom, where are you looking to find your customers?       and I meen location not advertising........

[andy roberts]

Dave

If you've got to travel to clean carpets all over the UK and to California, its no wonder you got to charge those prices!   

Regards,  Andy

[stains-away]

As someone said to me when I started out in my previous job (subcontract welder/fabricator), why be a busy fool?
You can work cheaply and work a lot of hours or you can work at a decent rate and work less hours for the same income, whilst it is sometimes hard when you are quoting work and getting some knock backs on price it is easy to lower your price to land the job but,

a) If you feel a job is worth x amount then why do it for y?

b)Once you have lowered your price any prospects you have been recommended to will have price expectations given to them by the recommending client.

c)Once you have lowered your price to land that job, what do you do when the next job comes up, lower your price by a further 5-10% to land that as well?

Better to set your stall and stand by it, if everyone in the business did this then maybe the trade would realise the prices that it deserves.

Although fairly new to carpet cleaning I regularly see customers who ask why I charge what I do when there are some local cc's working at  less than a fifth of my prices,and I'm not what I would consider expensive, its all about finding a market for your service at your prices, not chasing the herd, Andy

[tomh]

hi dave, looking to be based in & around berkhampstead & surrounding villages redboure harpendon hertfordshire inc. parts of hemel ! there is money in these areas but as always getting people to part with it is another thing !
there was a post on here where a guy put up his prices by half & lost his client base yet still managed to make 24k more in that year by doing so.
so will be looking to gain experience as well as make a few £££ then assess the pricing side if things go well with it for me !
people around here are very price sencitive & think nothing of having round 4-8 people price on any job !
i have a small house removal co & work 3 day's max aweek & make a resonable living just but quoting over the phone as most move thusdays- saturdays so this would fill in nicely
my guess is that you work for insurance companys who are more than happy to save a few grand on replacing a carpet whilst still paying you a large amount of money for your front to ask for it or for national trust who have a money to burn & do & people like that ! am i right ? as there really the custy's we should be looking to get  

[andy roberts]

Andy

I know what your saying BUT the price some cleaners will charge to clean a lounge carpet, the customer can have a brand spanking new one for that and fitted. There's prices & prices. Too high and you lose for a new carpet. Too low you don't make money. A well balanced sensible pricing policy is all that is needed.

Regards  Andy

[stains-away]

Andy, I agree, its about a well balanced pricing structure, one that allows for all of your running costs, not forgetting that you dont clean for 8 hours a day, 48 weeks of the year and you dont get paid holidays etc, also there are thigs such as machinery and van costs/depreciation/replacement to consider, and hopefully at the end a bit of profit, Andy

[John Kelly]

Do you think insurance companies would pay Dave's rates? not likely

[Liahona]

John is actually quite correct. There is no way an insurance company would pay what I want to clean, if

there is I havent met them yet. Specialist stuff is a different subject but cleaning on the whole...not a

chance in hell of me getting what I would want. So I dont touch them with a barge pole..... Carpetmate,

I charge the same wherever it is that I clean. A lot of cleaners wont travel more than a few miles to

clean which is fine whereas I may travel to Edinburgh as I recently did but came home with £3,000. For

a fuel cost of about £120, bed and b for £75..... and all for two days work. That is why I travel so much

and dont have a problem doing so. Remember I am a yank so to travel a few hundred miles for what I

can charge is never a problem. I would love not to have to travel as much as I do but where I live the

average house to clean would be maybe 250 or 300 if you could clean everything. Best, Dave.

[Martin S]

I know what your saying BUT the price some cleaners will charge to clean a lounge carpet, the customer can have a brand spanking new one for that and fitted. There's prices & prices.

That's true Andy, but it depends on whether you're cleaning a Carpet valued at £4.00 sqm or £40.00 sqm or whatever, that determines whether the customer thinks you're expensive, and therefore cheaper to replace the Carpet.