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@CodyHoward wrote:
Give your customers a reason to use you.
And along this line, don’t ever give your exsisting customers a reason to stop using you!
Guys, one of the great commercial account would be: LEVY HOME ENTERTAINMENT LLC. They have huge buildings and 1000s and 1000s sq.f. of carpet and I know that, they have locations in different states too.
I like the “I was in neighborhood ” and “free demo” ideas. Definitely I’ll practice that 🙂
thank you
When cleaning for commercial accounts I leave little candies and business cards at each desk when I’ve finished the office. I can’t count how many times I’ve cleaned the residence for people after cleaning their offices.
thanks Don R.
Does anyone clean Public Library? If so, how much do you charge per sq.f. and how often do you clean it?
Adrian
Public Libraries are most likely city or county government jobs. It has been my experience government jobs are awarded to the company with the lowest bid, usually of three. They dont clean the carpet that often and can go years in between. Especially these days with state and local budget deficits. Last year I bid the county DA’s buliding. While doing the walk through I asked my contact when the last time they cleaned the carpet and she stated in the 6 years she had been there it had never been cleaned. Your price will be dictated by the size of the area, but really more by your competition who may be in the bid process and ultimately your desire to have and want to do the work. You should also ask your contact who may be in the bid process and perhaps what they paid the last time they had the carpets cleaned. Do not be surprised if it is single digit pricing. Another issue you want to clarify in your bid is payment terms such as Net 30. I would not carry them longer then 30 days but then again these days they may send you and IOU. Government jobs are a tough call that only you the operator can make. I will always bid the work. The scope of work, price, time and ultimately profitability will determine if I compete or intentionally price myself out by a few cents. Good Luck!
I clean about 10 librarys, all at about .20/sqft w/ protector. They are normally small town librarys in good shape.
thanks guys,
10 librarys at .20c? nice job Brian, I need to come over and talk to you :). How often do you clean them?
Actually I just cleaned one library,(very dirty) it was 13,000 sq.f. for 0.08c sq.f. 🙁 and he wants me to do it once a year. I said never again and when I tried to explain to him that we should clean it at least three times a year because it’s a public place and high traffic he said that they will buy own machine and do it them self.
I think I quoted him to low (my fault) 🙁 , I don’t have any experience with public librarys, that’s my first one, but I’m already working on other one :D.
What do you guys think. Would you clean 13,000 sq.f., very dirty carpet public library for 0.08c sq.f. once a year only?Adrian
How much per square foot does it cost you to clean carpets? Product costs? pads? laundry? gas and insurance to get there? Equipment doesnt last forever. The cost of the money tied up in your business? Labour? This is pretty important to know before you set a price. at .08c you might be loosing money? i don’t know what your costs are but I can’t work and make a profit at that price. The fact that it was 13,000sqft is not relevant.
as always, YMMV
I would not. I just lost a bid today with the county fire training center. My bid was $0.10 sq ft and I was told someone else came in $0.05 sq ft. You simply cannot make a profit at that price. No way, now how! My thoughts were…knock yourself out
thanks guys,
yeah I know, that was a pretty s….. bid, unfortunately, sometimes we learn on own mistakes 🙁
Adrian
I’m not trying to suggest that you screwed up. lots of operators do not know what their costs are and only are looking at the total at the bottom of the invoice. And the quicker you figure that out the more solid the foundation of your business will be.
my vision was Public Library and 13,000 sq.f. and I heaven’t put all numbers together how I supposed to.
You right, we shouldn’t look at the bottom of invoice only.
We always learn something new.Adrian
Does anyone had any job from Overland Supply ?
I have very bad experience with them.
Adrian
In regards to the post from my Canadian friend asking “what is the cost per sqft?”, I would like to add my 2 cents.
I realize that the cost of doing business from one operator to another will very greatly so my numbers are not yours! I found that it is hard to determine your cost per sqft because of the variables involved. For example, if I clean 10,000 sqft in January and 20,000 sqft in Febuary, my per sqft cost will be greater in Jan. (common sense) What I have done is figured what my cost of doing business is per month by first adding in all fixed costs and then using my history of the percentage of variable costs compared to my sales. For example: if your sales for the previous year totaled $100,000 and you purchased $10,000 in cleaning products, your product cost will be 10%. You can do the same with all other variable expenses. My fixed cost of doing business forces me to do approx $6000 per month($300/day) for my business to break even. When you pass the break-even mark, you will still have a percentage of cost of doing business. These costs that are past the break-even point should only be product, fuel and vehicle/equipment wear and repair(the more work you do, the higher these costs will be). My costs beyond my break-even point are 20% of the sale. Looking back at these numbers, I can tell you how much my profit/loss was at the end of each day. Now you need to set a goal as to how much money you want to profit per day. Don’t get discouraged if you lose money a few days per month, you need to look at the average at the end of the month. My goal is to profit $250 or more per day. To achieve this goal, I need to have sales of $300 plus 120% of the $250profit or $300. My gaol for gross sales per day is $600 or $12,000 per month. Now back to the question. How much will it cost to do a job? Too many variables to answer. It depends on how big it is!! Seriously, you need to estimate how much product and time you will have in it and then relate that to your fixed costs and your goal. In a nut shell, I don’t have an answer to the question. I just wanted to share how my twisted brain works. 😉
Don’t forget factoring employee costs in there too if you have any.
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