Considering lowering my prices

[Iron Giant]

Their is a firm that operates in my area they clash them off in no time and one day I saw a lad drive around the estate with a loop of about 10 meters of hose trailing out the back of van doors [emoji33]

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[Dave B]

I can understand the whole minimum price ideology, and getting rid of messers, this is very easy to do when you are doing 25+ hours a week and earning enough money to live the lifestyle you want. It becomes difficult to stick to when some weeks you have next to nothing on and struggling to make ends meet.My business plan has always pushed me to commercial work rather than residential and my philosophy on this is get it at the best price you can, but first and foremost get it. When I've got an 80% full schedule then I can pick and choose jobs and prices.

That is nothing to do with pricing

When you have days or weeks with nothing on you spend the whole time knocking doors..leafletting and on fb and you will soon get the extra work you need without compromising your prices

 

[Part Timer]

That is nothing to do with pricingWhen you have days or weeks with nothing on you spend the whole time knocking doors..leafletting and on fb and you will soon get the extra work you need without compromising your prices

I know that but when you're new and have bills to pay it isn't so easy to try and maintain target prices.

In my area there is a long established trad cleaner that charges £5 to clean 3 and 4 bed semi's. He has 4 men helping him and they do a very good job. Wouldn't like to think how many houses he does. Only chance I've got is house's with conservatories, some of these pay me £10 to clean their windows, majority won't. I could probably get them at £8, but won't. But I'm making enough not to have to, some people might not have that option. 90%+ of my residential enquiries are lost because of what I want to charge.

 

[Dave B]

Those are the guys who mess things up

Charging those prices means he has to do so many houses to make a good living

He would have to do 40 houses in a day to make 200 quid..how does he also manage to pay staff??

Mental

 

[Part Timer]

I've always thought his men are working 18 hours and getting benefits. Might be wrong, all I know is he's very cheap and good.

 

[Green Pro Clean Ltd]

I know that but when you're new and have bills to pay it isn't so easy to try and maintain target prices.In my area there is a long established trad cleaner that charges £5 to clean 3 and 4 bed semi's. He has 4 men helping him and they do a very good job. Wouldn't like to think how many houses he does. Only chance I've got is house's with conservatories, some of these pay me £10 to clean their windows, majority won't. I could probably get them at £8, but won't. But I'm making enough not to have to, some people might not have that option. 90%+ of my residential enquiries are lost because of what I want to charge.

We have all been in the 'starting out' bills to pay shoes. What I would advise my younger self is not to compromise and knock more doors.

Years in. I still got bills to pay.

 

[Chelmsford Cleaning - Sam]

Very difficult for five of them to earn anything reasonable and stay under the vat threshold. Sounds like a dodger to me.

Window Cleaner Chelmsford Chelmsford Cleaning Services

 

[Cristian]

This is the main issue now where I live, teams of idiots running around doing any type of house for peanuts,, I have stopped doing Windows as there is no cash left in it anymore where I live!

 

[Cristian]

Very difficult for five of them to earn anything reasonable and stay under the vat threshold. Sounds like a dodger to me.

Window Cleaner Chelmsford Chelmsford Cleaning Services

90% I would say local to me are cash in hand with no signage on vans or uniforms etc etc

 

[adamangler]

You need to look at the long term goal when making a decision.

Firstly lets say @ £15 a semi you get 10% of quotes, at £12 you get 30% at 10 u get 50% well you have to decide how quick you need or want to grow.

Now if your end goal is to be a sole trader earning as much as possible in short a time as possible then you want to be pricing almost to the point no one is saying yes. If you want to employ and grow rapidly then you want to be towards the other end as much as possible whilst still making a profit.

At the end of the day the local area will determine your pricing to an extent if you want to grow really big.

In my area there is also the obstacle of competing with lots of cleaners doing it the old way of all cash and cheap prices and not declaring any of it.

I know first hand a cleaner who employed about 5 lads all trad work, all cash on hand and this guy wants pocketing over a grand a week and declaring minimum wage! Had cash stashed all over his house and paid his mortgage off cash. I know he use to clean houses for 5 and 6 pounds. He did work long hours and put the graft in but how can you compete with that as a legitimate business?

There's nothing wrong with dropping your prices to get a full round and then invest that money into more marketting to expand the top and disolved the bottom.

I've just got a load of leaflets banged out with slightly lower prices on than I really want because I want to grow it a bit quicker so I can drop the car valeting but prices will be going back up when I have a load more work.

I think if you look long term and at the end goal this will give you a clearer indication of what to do.

 

[Part Timer]

Very difficult for five of them to earn anything reasonable and stay under the vat threshold. Sounds like a dodger to me.

Window Cleaner Chelmsford Chelmsford Cleaning Services

The lads that are working for him might be costing him circa £50 a day, £30 legit, 4 hours @ £7.50 an hour, £20 cash in hand. Say They clean 20 houses a day at £5 a house, they're grossing him £100 a man, netting £50. Multiply that by 4 and add his £100 a day earnings on top then he's making £300 a day, 95% of which will be cash. Allowing for bad weather, costs, etc, he's probably still netting well over £1k a week. He's been doing my estate, approx. 250 houses which get done fortnightly and he will have 80% of them, for at least 10 years that I can recall.

 

[Dave B]

I never drop my prices from what i want to earn and have built up a good round

If they don't want to pay what i want i don't want them

Yes it would have been a struggle at first if i hadn't sold my west london round for a nice wedge but i would rather struggle than do work for less than i feel i am worth

 

[Green Pro Clean Ltd]

Can I just clarify, as you know I am quite a bit more than most in my area. And yes I do have a £15 minimum .

That does not mean I get every single quote I do. TBH I get perhaps 60% of the work I quote BUT - and it's a BIG BUT.... cause of this I only have work I want and am happy to do.

Yes it takes longer to achieve but having a 'happy' round is priceless.

 

[Rosewood]

If your serious about having a profitable business you don't have quite days. You work every day, some days your cleaning windows, other days your looking for customers. Invest the time and effort in finding customers and before too long you'll only have time for cleaning.

One other point, about quotes, people don't make the decision on price alone. If you quote correctly price is irrelivent, because you've already convinced them that your the man or woman for the job before you give them the price.

 

[Tuffers]

Can I just clarify, as you know I am quite a bit more than most in my area. And yes I do have a £15 minimum .
That does not mean I get every single quote I do. TBH I get perhaps 60% of the work I quote BUT - and it's a BIG BUT.... cause of this I only have work I want and am happy to do.

Yes it takes longer to achieve but having a 'happy' round is priceless.

So how many have you picked up in the area you've moved to green?

 

[Solarpanelcleanington]

I'm not sure people choose your service because of price.

 

[Damo]

I say go for it unless you clean in my area /emoticons/wink.png

 

[Clisty1989]

I'd never drop my price. I see it as I'm not selling the service, I'm selling myself, and I feel my time is worth what I charge.

 

[Green Pro Clean Ltd]

So how many have you picked up in the area you've moved to green?

9 in the past 3 days @Tuffers so that brings it to 27 in total. Will get some proper canvassing done this weekend when I have some time.

 

[Tuffers]

9 in the past 3 days @Tuffers so that brings it to 27 in total. Will get some proper canvassing done this weekend when I have some time.

Nice

 

[Iron Giant]

Unless you go out canvassing as already said you won't grow your rounds , But when canvassing be as professional as possible all out uniform with business name .

Spoke to a customer yesterday he said they had 5 window cleaners round since i was their 4 weeks ago they had either dropped flyers or knocked on their door and their line when he answered the door was do you need a window cleaner mate and their appearance wasn't very professional he said .

This is not unusual now 5-6 years ago their may have been 3 window cleaners on a estate now their is easily 6 , You have got to stand out offer the best service possible be the very best and in the end things will come good !!