[keith johnson]

Hi guys

Im in the Scottish Borders and i notice no one is offering an oven cleaning service. ( closest is 60 miles away in North East England - ovenu franchisee)

Perhaps the reason no one else is doing it is because it's been tried and there is no demand - or - no one has offered the service. The population is approx 100,000 in the Borders, largest town having a 14,000 population. It is a very rural area here, most town are approx 8k population but even though, it's still a lot of ovens !

However, it's possibly there is a gap in the market.  Any advice from the pro's ?

Thanks,

Keith

[paul macca]

Hi Keith,
              Ovenu  have a franchise covering Northumberland and i am sure they still have one in Berwick, both of these areas involve the Scottish borders but i would not be to concerned about them as they are very expensive.
I used to run an oven cleaning service in Newcastle but passed it on to my brother in law last year and he is still doing very well (in total established 5 years now)
If you market business and put the work in you should do ok, just dont expect to get rich on it and be happy with a decent weekly income.

If i can be of anymore assistance ,Happy to help.

Paul

[Graham Rogers]

HI Keith,

From what you describe the reason there isn't an oven cleaning business around is that any business is going to have problems reaching their target market. And also out of the population how rich are they? How many ABCs are in the population?

I have been running my own oven cleaning business now for six years and most of my business is where I can market the best. Rural areas are more difficult but it doesn't mean we don't get business in them. We tend to get lots of AGA cookers, range cookers in farm houses.

So you need to ask yourself how are you going to reach the people? Newspaper advertising is expensive and doesn't give us a good return. Internet advertising works okay for us.

Things like Royal Mail leaflet drop (leaflets delivered with the mail) may be successful in your area but it would be something that you would need to test to see if it gives you a return.

Best Regards

Graham Rogers

[keith johnson]

Thanks Paul & Graham for you replies.


Hi Paul, can i ask why you passed your business on ? New venture perhaps ?  I've seen Ovenu in central Borders once. Not that i was looking out for it but it caught my eye.  That would be approx 9 months ago.  By reading the details of franchise companies, they project a very good living from the service. Maybe in large Towns and Cities but in rural areas im not overly convinced.  Paul, as you were based in Newcastle, when you mention a decent weekly wage, are you thinking in the region of £300 - £500 per week ? (avarage)


Hi Graham. The area here has been very hard hit with business closures over the last 2.5 yrs. There is a lot of unemployment. The ones still in a job may just be holding onto their money as they wont know what the future holds for their post.   However, im not trying to paint a gloomy picture im just tying to give you an idea what it's like here as you may see an opening i've missed.  ABC's ? Not sure what you mean, sorry.

Being a rural area we have a lot of farms, B&B, etc...

Newspaper advertising is expensive although a one off may be a kick start. Vehicle livery is probably the key however, i still need to get some jobs in for a vehicle to be parked up for passers by to see it.
I do see your point, its getting that initial marketing out there to get the word out. Luckily i can create basic websites which is a big saving, i'd certainly be doing that.

6 years is a fair amount of time, well done.  Im sure you will be well established. Do you have problems in your area with others starting up constantly ?


Cheers,
Keith

[paul macca]

Hi again Keith,
Yes turnover gradually built up to around £300- £500  low overheads so very good profit.The repeat business and referals is the good thing about this service.
I passed it on to my brother in law because i have now semi retired.

In reply to your question about what does ABC refer to well this classified the customer type ABC,s being the upmarket homeowners DFG,s etc  are lower down the scale in terms of property and spending power.
If you key oven cleaning into this sites search engine,loads of information there to assist you.
Most importantly get training, few guys on this forum offer this at a very reasonable price.
Paul

[bravo20]

Hi Keith

Did you get my e mail I sent regarding training, if not let me have your e mail address and I'll re send it.

John

[Graham Rogers]

Hi Keith,

You turnover will depend on  your ability to grow your oven cleaning business in your area. You would be looking to build up your client base and then get repeat business from this client base. In a rural area you may need to drive a bit of distance to do this, which means you'll have a large area to cover.

ABCs are a good indicator of the wealth in your area. A franchise business will normally say that you will get a postcode area which has, say, 100,000 householders. What you need to know for any particular area, postcode area, is the number of ABC and C1 s in that area. This will give you an indication of potential growth.  You can normally tell if you have a good area as someone will be doing one of those small A5 colour magazines in which lots of local businesses are advertising.

Van graphics don't play a significant part in our marketing. We have five vans and the number of calls directly from them is just a few. What it does however is make people aware that such a service does exist.

For us some competition is healthy.



Graham

[DanielWelford]

Hi Graham

I am interested to see that you operate 5 vans. How many ovens do you clean per week, and were does most of your work come from?

Thanks

Dan

[Graham Rogers]

Hi Dan,

We clean on average 15 to 20 ovens a week  per van, for 4 of the vans. We currently run one van on Saturdays which does another, on average, three jobs. I do part time work in the fifth van, normally concentrating on AGAs and this week I will have cleaned four four oven AGAs, and one two oven AGA with a module and a single oven.

We advertise extensively so we get our work from lots of domestic homes and we also have regular letting agents, landlords, repeat business, and referrals. Really it has been a case of building our client base up.

Graham