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Hey Bryan,
Just read your thread and was wondering, are we having a SO meeting while in Orlando?? That’s where your question should be discussed. What do you call a successful S.O.? I sold 3 last year and having a state of 18 million pop. I don’t call that very successful!!!!!!!!! I thought I had 1 sold starting this year, but backed out because it was a relocation to a different county and his wife could not find a teaching job. He wanted the business real, real bad but could not”pull the trigger” without his wife having an income. In these times, I guess I can’t blame him. Personally, I’m not very happy with our ad budjet through Corporate, has not generated many leads in a long time, What’s your feelings on Corporate advertising?
RonI think it is a good idea but, not only are we interested in what we have to pay for them but, where are they made??????? I would be concerened about giving out toys to my customers children that are made in china!!!!!!
The quality of people I have sold are more solid then the 2-year treasury note!!!!! Have you looked at the rate lately, 2%. I would much rather get people in my business, (paying royalty fees, buying product and paying monthly loan) then putting money in us bonds or treasurys. I failed to mention three important points in my last post, #1 I do strong background and credit checks before any financing is done. #2 I use the FULL schedule “A” and territory they receive, as collateral until note is paid in full. and #3 You must spell all this “stuff” out in your FDD, because it is different from what Corporate offers.
R
PS Glad to see you will be at International seminar, maybe we can talk in length about this subject.You, personally, My Last 5 sales have been 10-years @ 5%, I’m in the process of doing number 6 right now. He will train in Sept. I love them, Good income for the next 10- years, although I do have a no pre payment penalty. Nobody has taken me up on that yet!!!!! I even finance the commercial tile & grout unit.
Hi Dennis,
I had an operator who last week refused to honor a 10% discount coupon (he was doing a 3-room special), it was from Florida, but another part of the state. It is the same situation you were in, no details of areas served on coupon. The real bad part is now the customer threatens to run ad in newspaper, Heaven’s Best runs coupon discount ads and then does not honor them. This operator now has a lot of damage control in front of them. What if the coupon said 50% off instead of 10% ? With all the printers and scanners out there today, someone could eaisly make fradulent coupons that look real. I just watched story on TV where people are making counterfeit coupons for grocery store products and they are making a “ton” of money. After talking with Corporate about this problem, I think they are going to discuss the problems that are happening or might happen, in the next newsletter. Any other operators care to share how they take care of coupons?
PS
Hope to see you at seminar
RonI think it is a “must” that they get paid the same per hour, travel or cleaning. The easy way to do this is figure a percentage (both happy with) of weekly gross sales. I did not care how much time was in the van or on the job, only gross sales and keeping operator/customers happy was my concern. Also for anyone who might have an extra area for sale, you might just be grooming that operator into a buyer!!!!!!!!! That’s what happened to mine, he become a satisfied Heaven’s Best owner for almost 20-years.
Not sure about the leather but, many years ago one of the operators in Ca. used a vaporizer with Final Step Deodorizer to get cigarette smoke out of a motor home. It worked!!!!!! I remembered that thread on the B.B. and a few years back was asked to get smoke out of my friends ski resort room. He had some people smoke in a no smoking room, we used that Final Step Deodorizer in two stages and we did get the smoke smell out!!!!!!!!!! Maybe a call into Corporate would help.
I second that, what a great idea. On that same subject, many, many years ago when I started cleaning carpets in Vero Beach, FL, I was cleaning in an elderly womens home which had sculptered berber. As I was vaccuming, the vaccum stopped and when I checked it out, the beater bar was full of fiber, wound so tight it stopped vaccum!!!! Now with a good sized hole in the carpet and scared as************* I went out on the screen porch and asked her if anyone else had cleaned this carpet. She said yes, 6 months ago I had Father & Son steam cleaning, they sold me the carpet and said I had to use them when I needed it cleaned. (Advantage of owning a carpet store and cleaning co. I guess) After walking on water for 2-weeks she said, never again and when I saw your ad in paper, Dry-in-one-Hour, I gave you a call. I asked her if I could lift carpet from wall near where I pulled out fiber, she said sure, The concrete floor had so much black mold from that water that not only did it stink, but it rotted the glue off the jute backing, that’s why the fibers came out. I often wanted to go back and ask her if I could have a piece of that carpet, to show my future customers. I never did!!!!!!!!!!!! I ask all my operators in FL to please stress the importance of a Dry-in-one-Hour process in a high humidity state like Fl.
Brian, I liked your 3 night stay and plane tickect, but did not think my “guys” needed plane ticket so I went with cash. #1 Any Florida operator who gives referral for a new Franchise sale in the state of Florida
$2,500.00. #2 The operator who buys the most protector $200.00. #3 The operator who buys the most Hard Surface Cleaner
$200.00 #4 The operator who has the most customers turning in evaluation cards
$100.00 #5 Every operator who has at least 4-posts per month on the B.B. —$100.00.I’m not sure if any of you are having trouble getting your payments and reports on time every month, but I am. (Always the same ones). So I felt like I did not want to reward the ones who don’t do things correctly. I made all of the above incentives have a criteria. They FIRST must have all monthy fees and monthly reports in my office by the 12th of every month. I explained how this was a 7-day grace period from their contract. This starts April 2011 and ends Feb 2012. We can now only wait and see what happens!!!!!!!!!!
I’m staying at a Hilton in Ft Lauderdale next week. Maybe all Heaven’s Best owners could stay at a Hilton sometime in the future and when we leave, and they ask, how was your stay? our answer could be: How come the carpets were so wet!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Gordon,
I do have some thoughts and comments. First, I think you are moving in the right direction with a TV ad, and if it is totally generic with an 800 number and web site address for everyone, I would be willing to contribute to the cost of having this ad produced. My concern is if you are the owner of four states paying $800.00 a month to corporate for advertising and have not had a sale in three years ($28,800.00), then I think we need to rethink our advertising program with corporate. I have been trying for over a year to get corporate to make me a web site (I’m willing to pay) for franchise sales only. I’m afraid to go outside and have my own made because I’m sure at some point down the road, corporate is going to insist that all web sites are the same. (as they should) All our vans look alike, all our web sites should look alike!!!!!! If I have my own web site, I can target certain areas in Florida which I have not sold. I don’t like paying advertising dollars for areas already sold. I can honestly say over 1/2 of my leads from Corporate this past year are for areas I have already sold.
I think we all agree that the internet is here to stay and will become an even bigger force in selling our franchises in the future than it is today. Seeing as how I’m in my final stage as a state owner with Heaven’s Best I will take the chance of getting my head handed to me a second time, and suggest that some type of sounding board needs to be formed among state owners, that could work on advertising, with feed back to Corporate. It is a big job and to much for the limited staff at Corporate to handle without help. I can see three or four state owners on this board with business backgrounds being a great help to Corporate on this subject.
SHE MUST HAVE A SISTER IN JACKSONVILLE FLORIDA!!!!!!!!!!!! I can not believe how your story and the one I just got from an operator in Jacksonville is so much the same. Her final story was my steam cleaner did a much better job last time. My response would have been, then why did you not call him again instead of me??? Oh well my operator was “thick skined” and he just moved on. Thanks for the story, it helps everyone to know that we can’t always satisfy everyone all the time.
Ron
