Hello folks!
I’m going to be starting out this spring and have been lurking here for a while and I guess its time to say hello!
After leaving school (25 years ago!!) I got a job with a Birmingham based industrial cleaning firm on the windows team. Another kid and I were teamed with this guy who drove the van, he was a real to$$er to be honest and thought nothing of having us up the top of a ‘treble’ in the wind and rain while he went to “price up jobs” LOL! However it had its value – I learnt to squeegee well and work fast and learnt to get used to the ladders. Enough was enough though when it was as clear as day that I was being left to do jobs worth hundreds but getting paid £75.00 per week!
I jumped ship with the other lad after agreeing with a local domestic cleaner giving us all the work we could do at 75%. Not a bad deal I thought? We bought ladders and the rest of the gear and did well for a year or so.
Things were processing in my life - I wanted girls! I wanted a car! It was time for a proper job! I got said proper job, but the job involved six months of training till I got the full wage for the job so I needed to supplement. Time for my own, one day a week round. I walked the streets, knocked the doors and built up a tidy Saturday round, 4 days work in total on a monthly basis….
I sold the round to the guy I used to sub from when I qualified for full pay in my job. That was 20 years ago, and I’d always missed it!
My situation is now good – I’ve a house, partner and I have a car each, both have a job etc etc, but things could be better – everything is going through the roof – gas, electric, water, interest, petrol etc. I have had my work patten altered recently too, I now do a four day week. I can easily spare one day a week to find something that will pay for a few luxuries in life and I recon W/C fits the bill!
I aim to build a round on a monthly clean basis, one day per week from scratch. Purely traditional cleaning as I can not finance WFP nor could justify it for 1 day a week either, better to stick with what I know I think? I know how to knock for work, what tends to work and what doesn’t but then again, every area is different and everyone is feeling the pinch as well….
I recon approx £500.00 start up cost? Going for double and single pointers, mops / scrims, Squeegee’s and scrubbers etc and of course, public liability. Going to be telling the taxman within the first 3 months too, but don’t imagine I’ll have much of a tax bill for the fist year due to the start up cost? I think a ‘company’ polo shirt/sweatshirt/cap etc look great too so shall be looking into those as well.
Present cleaners in the Blackpool area should note that I will only be targeting ‘dirty’ houses first. Should several houses in one street tell me they already have a cleaner I shall be moving on and will not be giving prices to those houses either. There is tonnes of work out there for all of us, I know this as I’ve been looking and asked folk for the last 3 months now and they are crying out for a decent cleaner…. (you have nothing to fear from me, I am but a tadpole in a large pond!)
I will ask of you collective experience though – Ettore or Pulex squeegee’s? I seem to pick up a definite leaning towards pulex soft rubbers from the past threads but what about the squeegee’s?
Oh yea, I’m a fairy man by the way…… Be careful how you read that! I mean I’m a fairy liquid cleaner – I can make it work well, why change? Plus I believe the customer likes to see the suds, as log as the residue is cleaned off the sill….
Look forward to you thoughts!
Paul