Your idea of compact work

What would you guys consider compact work? Obviously a full street where you can park up and don’t have to move the van for morning/afternoon is the holy grail but at what point does a round become “uncompact”?

Over 5 mins between jobs? Over half a mile? Thoughts

These days i would say the same neighborhood is compact, if you can get a days work with 20 or so houses in the same neighborhood i consider myself lucky.   

16 out of 22 in one cul de sac is my most compact round we do them in around 2ish hours  and don’t move the van. 

I would say most of my work is compact a little different when we are working the villages as we do so massive houses. 

I think everyone will have different ideas about what is compact , we sometimes move the van 4 times in a day and sometimes 10 times but it’s on one estate and travel distance is a maximum of a few hundred yards 

My compact residential work is 4 houses with out moving the van.

Same as above really, the least amount of movement of the van the better. I often say to myself that time spent in the van is money wasted, unless of course you have to get to another cluster of houses on your round. Clustering is obviously very important in boosting your returns. There is a company near me last year that used to park their three vans on a newly built estate, one at the entrance to the estate (so people would see them as they drove in) and the other two at the entrances to various cul de sacs within it. Double crewed, they would pitch up about 3 pm and wait firstly for all the mum's and dads to come back with their kids from school then pounce to get the new business and stay there until about 6:30 to 7pm to make sure that they spoke to the rest coming home later. (This was in the summer months) They were intent on getting everyone they could signed up, especially in the cul de sacs on the estate so that they didn't have to move their vans so as to maximise their time/profit. It makes perfect sense if course and to be fair they pretty much achieved it. 

So yes, compact work with little or no van movement is the goal. 

I have a road (Hayes lane, Bromley) that takes us three and a half days to do (been doing it for over 25 years though) ?

steve garwood said:

I have a road (Hayes lane, Bromley) that takes us three and a half days to do (been doing it for over 25 years though) ?

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25 years and still not got to the end lol seriously that sound good ?

Ive had to branch out of the town and into remote villages (well, not that remote but 10 miles, 20 minute drive away) but this aint as bad as it sounds. A) not much traffic etc out there and no traffic lights etc to hold you up. B) often big country houses which can be £30/40 or more so you still get your hourly rate C) makes a nice change, beautiful surrounds etc ( Also, tends to be not much competition out there.

If I were buying work that was described as compact, then I would expect it to be all on the same estate and not to have to move the van for many single houses. And I'd want to be able to do at least 4 houses with each van move with only a minute or two driving.

On my main rounds, I have streets where I do 90% of the houses and can keep the van with 100m hose in one spot in the morning, and another spot all afternoon.

The longest unbroken row of houses I have is 22 houses in a row.

I do have a 'round' sorta that consists of all the randoms that call from finding me on Google. These are all spread around the local 1 Sq Mile nearest me. Lots of stops for single houses, also many with 2, 3 & 4 houses in one place. I wouldn't class this as compact work, but some windys would. I'm not sure if the definition of a compact round is slowly changing over time or if people are preferring having the work spread out a bit. 

I did 14 houses yesterday morning without moving the van once, some estates I am on for 2-3 days with small blocks of work from 1 house upwards, I am very area specific and won't drive out of the way into another town or village for one house the furthest I drive from my house is around 2 miles to the far end of the next town for 2hrs work on small estate. 

The most I have on 1 street is 8 houses. I’ve got bunches of 2-5 houses but I’d say over 50% of my work are single houses where I have to move the van even if it’s just a couple of streets away

I have a static home park that takes 2&half days. The van gets moved about 250 metres in all. Only problem is it’s half an hour away haha 

I consider myself lucky to get 2 houses next to each other! You established guys have no idea lol

Tango said:

I consider myself lucky to get 2 houses next to each other! You established guys have no idea lol

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Stick with it you’ll get what you want  eventually 

My round is probably 90% rural and 10% in my village and surrounding. All of my calls (bar about 10), I have to drive to after every completed clean. Adds lots of mileage and driving time on to the day but I used to be a rural postie, so don't mind it really. 

Would love to have some compact stuff though. 

Wind o kleen said:

Stick with it you’ll get what you want  eventually 

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I'd like to agree but had a naff day today, wrote it off in the end and went home. No matter where i knocked all i got was "No". One woman old dog even came back out to tell me the next two houses have a window cleaner and so the other others on the other side of the road. The next two houses windows were covered in dust the ones over the other side i didn't even take notice of. I can understand it if you don't want a window cleaner but why the hell would you try to put them off offering their service to your neighbours too? - That's just plain nasty.

Didn't get a single job today.. well.. i did kinda get one fronts only for a fiver on a "here, now" basis... she thought about it and said come back friday when i've got cash for you. Screw it, for a fiver? In a petrol auto? No. My offer was "here, now" and you're taking the P luv. I ain't going across town for the sake of a fiver in a 1.8 petrol automatic which is horrendously thirsty - even with engine braking to shut down the fuel injection (doubled my MPG using that). Anyway like i said not a single job today so i stuffed my face with chocolate and then P'd off home. To be honest after that old dog that came back out at me i was tempted to jack it all in completely - felt like the most hated man on earth but i'll sleep on it. This is supposed to be the time of year everyone wants their windows done.. yet i keep hitting "no" everywhere...

Tango said:

I'd like to agree but had a naff day today, wrote it off in the end and went home. No matter where i knocked all i got was "No". One woman old dog even came back out to tell me the next two houses have a window cleaner and so the other others on the other side of the road. The next two houses windows were covered in dust the ones over the other side i didn't even take notice of. I can understand it if you don't want a window cleaner but why the hell would you try to put them off offering their service to your neighbours too? - That's just plain nasty.

Didn't get a single job today.. well.. i did kinda get one fronts only for a fiver on a "here, now" basis... she thought about it and said come back friday when i've got cash for you. Screw it, for a fiver? In a petrol auto? No. My offer was "here, now" and you're taking the P luv. I ain't going across town for the sake of a fiver in a 1.8 petrol automatic which is horrendously thirsty - even with engine braking to shut down the fuel injection (doubled my MPG using that). Anyway like i said not a single job today so i stuffed my face with chocolate and then P'd off home. To be honest after that old dog that came back out at me i was tempted to jack it all in completely - felt like the most hated man on earth but i'll sleep on it. This is supposed to be the time of year everyone wants their windows done.. yet i keep hitting "no" everywhere...

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Have you considered getting a small loan and paying a window cleaning canvas team to get you started?

RWCleaning said:

I have a static home park that takes 2&half days. The van gets moved about 250 metres in all. Only problem is it’s half an hour away haha 

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That aint a bad number. Ive got loads of those parks near me, might be worth giving them a try. nearly all ground floor too.

Tango said:

I consider myself lucky to get 2 houses next to each other! You established guys have no idea lol

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Same here bud, takes time.

Tango said:

I'd like to agree but had a naff day today, wrote it off in the end and went home. No matter where i knocked all i got was "No". One woman old dog even came back out to tell me the next two houses have a window cleaner and so the other others on the other side of the road. The next two houses windows were covered in dust the ones over the other side i didn't even take notice of. I can understand it if you don't want a window cleaner but why the hell would you try to put them off offering their service to your neighbours too? - That's just plain nasty.

Didn't get a single job today.. well.. i did kinda get one fronts only for a fiver on a "here, now" basis... she thought about it and said come back friday when i've got cash for you. Screw it, for a fiver? In a petrol auto? No. My offer was "here, now" and you're taking the P luv. I ain't going across town for the sake of a fiver in a 1.8 petrol automatic which is horrendously thirsty - even with engine braking to shut down the fuel injection (doubled my MPG using that). Anyway like i said not a single job today so i stuffed my face with chocolate and then P'd off home. To be honest after that old dog that came back out at me i was tempted to jack it all in completely - felt like the most hated man on earth but i'll sleep on it. This is supposed to be the time of year everyone wants their windows done.. yet i keep hitting "no" everywhere...

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As steve said above. Good reports from people who've signed up with green pros lead generation. these leads will be people who are actively looking for a cleaner, and willing to pay home counties prices too. Stick at it.

ks789 said:

That aint a bad number. Ive got loads of those parks near me, might be worth giving them a try. nearly all ground floor too.

Same here bud, takes time.

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Yeh it’s ok, Cleaning them is quick. But there’s a lot of talking time as they’re all always all in. So that slows me down a lot.

Plus at least one or two are always having gutters cleaned or cleared out etc.

But it’s ok, not my best paying round, but it’s a guaranteed bag of cash there & then, don’t have to book any of them in all open access. Pro’s & con’s.

And yeh I can clean all the windows or gutters on the whole park with just my clx10 so pretty easy work.