Pricing Advise

[A.K WINDOWS]

i picked up a new house last week worth £7 and flyered the whole area got nothing else its about 10mile from my house so ill just let it go not worth it i only want compact work 3-4 houses per street min or if a house is worth £15 ill do it,thing is half people are out so that works out 40 miles for £7 if there not in or left the money out cant be doing with it.

i have a min £5 charge not worth getting ladders off van for anything else.

 

[rugbywolf]

Hi all, quite new to site and window cleaning but some great advice to help me on my way so thanks all.
My queery is that i am out this wednesday for the first time trying to drum up some business and i have a figure in mind that is my min (£10) but there are so many east europens in my area offering as little as £2 a front should i take what i can get whilst im starting out for a year or should i stick to my min fee?

Sounds to me like those east europeans are probably on benefit and not paying tax. £2 a front is not a realistc price. A firm to run with low prices has to continue with all the low prices, so it's not a very sensible route to take. I would try another area.

 

[Hunty]

C what ir saying rugby im gonna tout close by first on wed nd c what response i get, if i get everyone saying i get them done at two quid im half tempted to say well if u want a two bit job then stick with them as someone who is charging that wont be around for ever or i bet they r not legit which means theu have no insurance so i hope they dont fall off there ladder nd try nd sue u, still if u wamt a pro heres my card give me a call when two bob goes home.

Or do u tyinl that a bit strong lol, i havnt done this before so do know how hard sell to go lol.

 

[Newbie123]

See where you are going with the post hunty would keep it mild mannered and polite to keep it professional defo leave a slip rather than an expensive card as the east euros may be waiting for work from agencies or better offers so may well disappear eventually

 

[Hunty]

Thats what i thought, what so no cards just some homemade thing off computer you think?

My plan was to go on the really im a pro one rather than your bog standard type thing do u think the slip would stil put the same point across?

 

[Newbie123]

Spend a bit of time on the slip make it like a compliment slip with the necessaries on print plenty ask em to stick in front of yellow pages on the fridge etc when I was self employed as spark would ask for card to be left on mains board still get odd call

 

[beaver0_15]

That is a cracking idea sticking card to mains board, i wanna be a Sparky now jus so i can do that, saying that iv always liked idea of being a Sparky there's just no way in without spending 8 grand on a course. How come ur not sticking with the sparkying?

 

[A.K WINDOWS]

dont go down the fancy card route ive still got 4000 in my bed room i have yet to get one job of them i got all my work with homemade black and white flyers i made on the PC.

you can look too expensive.

 

[Newbie123]

That is a cracking idea sticking card to mains board, i wanna be a Sparky now jus so i can do that, saying that iv always liked idea of being a Sparky there's just no way in without spending 8 grand on a course. How come ur not sticking with the sparkying?

Unfortunately being a spark means people think your too expensive and don't ask for a price and just get an handyman kitchen fitter or local builder shame really very competitive market again depends on your area lots of competition in my area and took on the big boys on price and got battered

 

[Hunty]

Thanks all, going to drop the card idea then nd work on the slips!

 

[david247]

I have bought six rounds off family well established ' date=' but I stay in the west of scotland, I paid 5,000 for my six runs they take in 1500 per 4 weeks, but most are bread n butter 4.00 per house , but have some nice work £15-£40 per house ....depends where you are cleaning for the high end of my market I must drive 15 miles min , the £4 stuff I could fall out my bed to clean.[/quote']

Hi richard, im in london so i was looking at £1.50 per window with min 10 the point im more making is that where i am starting i have no custies and i see what newbee is saying but where i have none yet i was thinking would 1 x £10 job and 5 x £4 jobs is still £30 for now until i have more custies nd either slowly up the prices or ditch low payers as by the advice here the more windows im cleaning the more chance i have of new custies approaching me to clean there wondows?
See what trying to get at here?

i total agree people still dont pay for the services of good quality workmanship. its a dog eat dog world any body with a ladder sponge and rag can window clean not to a high standard but they can do it for 1.50 per window or 2 quid per front and 2 quid for the back then how are you to compete.

well you can live on a basic wage of 300 quid a week take out fuel etc then you left with say 200 quid its not alot but when your name is passed along and start earning more and more money along i can not compete against 2 window cleaners that are charging 3 quid a font yeah they do clean window with proper equipment. but in reality its most likely benefit fraud.

and if any one thinks that they are high and mighty in the world of window cleaning let me just say this all your custes are at risk from lower bidders or offering lower cost to your customers just imagen there relay good you can lose up to 80 prcent of customers in one week. if they target your patch just think no one safe its a dog eat dog world.

 

[Richard]

David247, residential customers are different from commercials, I think commercials do go on price more, not all residential customers base it on price alone.

I have many residential who have had the chance of having there window cleaned for a half of what I charge them, they haven’t changed. You do lose 1 or 2 customers sometimes, but it hasn’t happened to me in the past couple of years.

Richard

 

[Doo]

I think its important to build a good relationship with customers , a smile a bit of banter all goes a long way , if your customers get to know you they trust you and would be less likely to move to one of these fly by nights

 

[Hunty]

Fair one doo, i agree with you there and good customer service goes along way nd retaining custys is just as important as gettimg them.

So really ots about get what i can how i can and do all i can to keep it.

 

[Richard]

It’s really just about increasing your net profit; your profit margin is more important than turnover.

The amount of customers you have means nothing, you can have less than half the number of customers as the next window cleaner and achieve double the net profit and have reduced operating cost.

Richard

 

[A.K WINDOWS]

i just want 100 houses and ill be happy.

 

[Gmeister]

i just want 100 houses and ill be happy.

Do you mean 100 more, or just 100 houses in total?
I would certainally want to get another 100 more houses thats about £600 or more and I would be happy with that for the time bein.

 

[A.K WINDOWS]

100 total mate come summer i havent time for anymore windows too much business going on with the landscape side but 100 will keep me rolling all year round instead of sat in the house for 4 months out the year watching jezza kyle and xhamster all day:0

 

[Gmeister]

Yeah nice one mate, am planning to do garden clearance sort of thing, eg, grass cutting, hedge cutting, maybe weeding goes mad in the summer, I need a van and equipment to do proper tho lol

 

[david247]

well i aiming for customers that can pay regular but seen people in from European countries walking around with ladders and **** shammy and **** unger green belt two of them all they doing is wiping the glass

 

[A.K WINDOWS]

well i aiming for customers that can pay regular but seen people in from European countries walking around with ladders and **** shammy and **** unger green belt two of them all they doing is wiping the glass

this is what your up against thing is some of them are not cheap as they rope custys into every 2 week cleans.a easy way to double the amount of earnings,personaly i dont know how they get people to agree i have all hell on with most getting them to do 4 weeks!