Mark et all,
Firstly let me say that we are neither in the £50/house bracket nor the £400+/house bracket. We sit somewhere in between.
However you will find that a lot of people (potential customers) look in their local supermarket or DIY superstore and see a Rug Doctor to rent for the weekend for £16 + chemicals, all in for around £30. This is what they therefore perceive as the going rate for cleaning their house carpets, they do not appreciate or comprehend the difference between a Rug doctor and a TM machine, all your doing is cleaning a carpet, aren't you?
?? What can be so different?
In a lot of areas this is the market you are competing with, often council houses, low income, cleaning is secondary to living, priority is not in having a clean carpet, priority is about paying the essential bills, if they can get the carpets cleaned within cost then fine, if not then we'll hire a machine.
Susan may not be charging big prices but I'm sure her diary is constantly full and her staff can probably knock out 3-4 of those every day. Why? Because people can afford her and she can still turnover £150-200 per operator every day.
Remember the saying:
"You need income to make profit"
There are a lot of people out there who believe they are worth £xxx per hour but who are sat at home waiting for the phone to ring, there are others who think it's better to be working for less than not working at all. Again I sit somewhere in between.
I'm off back to my glass of Shiraz