[neil 47]

I have found that when I get ,what i term a large job ie; 3 peice suite foot stool and three carpets. That this is taking me up to 5 hours for which I charge about £200 .
The job is done to what I term a good standard .
After this I would be to tired to do this again or any other job.
 So I am limited to how much I earn.
Now should I drop my standards and do more, or up my price,s and do less, but risk out pricing myself.

 


Neil

[henlow cleaning]

seems your working to hard neil  Large suite should take about 3 hrs but the price is ok. Try no t to be so picky  Also how do you clean suites
If you get to go back and see one you have cleaned you would be pleased with the  result

 Regds
Skipper
 

[Martin S]

Neil,

How does that £200 break down for three carpets and 3 pce?

If they are largish rooms maybe you r too cheap.

My price for a 5 seater suite is £145.00.

Regards.

Ps. you've duplicated your post 'quality v ££££'  (you can delete your own posts)

[Chris Bailey]

Hi Neal

quality of work vs profit???  a good topic!  do you want repeat business? of course, we all do.  So the quality of work is important and should not be part of the equation. 

IMO it should be time vs profit.

To do the same suite as you it will take me 6 hrs and I would want around £130 as it takes me about 1 hr per seat + an extra hr for setup/breakdown/sorting cushions etc and I look for £25 per seat. 

The carpets would depend on size, but £70 for 3 carpets sounds too cheap to me.

Suites are hard work, I personally only want one suite a day and would do carpets first or call back some other day for the suite.

If you qualify increasing your prices (it will take me about 6hrs to clean your suite madam) then do half the work for the same money!! Pick and choose.

Hope this helps

Chris

Hi Martin, how's thing going at your end? nice & busy I hope!

[Tony_Browning]

It all depends on how much £'s you need to turn over a year and how much you want to earn....some may say that £200 a day is a reasonable turnover....£50k p year for a 5 day week with drawings of say £25-£30k....want to earn more.....increase prices or work harder/longer. ....bear in mind that another £20 a day increase in prices   = another £5k a year.....never skip on quality, just look for methods and equipment that will increase productivity.
rgds Tony.

[Martin S]

Chris B,

Hi mate.  It's not going too bad thanks.  Things coming together slowly, but only coz I'm dictating the pace (slowish).  As you know, I have a full time job in another life that I'm not prepared to leave, so it's a bit of a juggling act at times.

I'm content to gain experience, move at my own pace, and come the day, I'll go into CC full time.

How's things for you, good I hope.

Best regards. 

[colin thomas]

have i miss-read your reply chris? 6 hours to clean a 3-piece suite, blind me, i would be out on my knees after a marathon like that!

[mark_roberts]

Very very few of us are making good money cleaning suites as we all find it hard to get the price.  Dont know the reason for this.

However carpets are different and £40plus per hour is easy achieved.  Ive topped £100 per hour doing carpets.  The thing is to move towards the jobs which give your more ie. larger houses, commercial, empty houses, larger ticket jobs etc.  The right marketing will achieve this.

Youll not make money doing 5 different lounges a day.

Your working practice needs to be looked at or else your pricing.  5 hours for a suite and three carpets for £200 is not great.  6 hours for a suite is ridiculas (sp).  Is your equipment letting you down in terms of speed.  Could autofill be adapted to your portable, better chemicals etc etc. 

I've come to the conclusion that some jobs are just better than others and some jobs need to be priced by the hour.  Example today I cleaned a 10x8 dining room really dirty but took an hour so i charged £50.  Per sq yrd would have been around £30.

Mark

Mark

[Ian Rochester]

I would say your price is about right, I would be happy to get that price for the job, if you can earn that every day you are doing alright. 

We don't get the same prices up here that people tend to get further south, I would never get any work if I charged £130 for a suite, even the franchaises are doing them for £75!!.

As for your time, you should be looking a doing it a bit quicker than 5 hours so you could fit in another job if you wanted afterwards, personally I would probably book that job in for 4 hours work. 

Whatever you charge, as a sole trader you are limited in your earnings by your own time constraints.  I would tend not to overprice yourself to increase your income, people will only pay a certain price for a job,regardless of quality or time it takes, if necessary take on someone to help you to speed things up.   

Chris, 6 hours to do a suite is a SERIOUSLY long time!  I would say you are either being far too fastidious, or you need to look at your technique/chemicals, even using MS (which takes extra time) I would expect to get a suite completed in 2 - 2.5 hrs max and I quite often do 2 suites in a day

[Saul]

If you are going to do any job you should ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS do that job to the very best of your abilities and charge accordingly. YOU are the only person who can control what prices you charge, however, if you charge a higher price for your services, your customers will expect, (and rightly so), a higher quality of service.

It is essential that you invest in very good equipment. A high end truckmount, in my opinion is an absolute must. If you are using cheap gear & cheap chemicals you are only fooling yourself that you're saving money.
If jobs are taking too long & you are getting serious fatigue then the chances are that 1. You are using inferior equipment & or chemicals, 2. You haven't enough education through certified courses in your chosen field, 3. You are doing the wrong jobs in the first place.

As far as pricing is concerned, I typically charge £100 plus per hour but priced per square foot and or per seat unit.


Saul

[Chris Bailey]

Hi All

Yes 6hrs for a 3 seater & 2 chairs, two cushions per seat.  vacuuming will take about an hour, cushions will take the longest to clean, the chairs and sofa bases will take about 1 1/2 hrs, setup and breakdown (including cleaning my equipment) will take almoust an hour.

I take my time and don't rush cus suites are hard work.

None of my equipment is more than 15mths old, only have 5lts of hot tap water at a time in the tank so yes there are two or three trips to the kitchen but time wise this in nothing.  don't have to empy the tank until finished.

Sometimes i finish sooner but that depends on the number of cushions.

Chris

Hi Martin, all is going well at the moment, still putting 5k leaflets out a week which is keeping me going nicely.

[garyj]

Why only 5 litres in the tank

[Chris Bailey]

Hi Gary

I like to clean a suite with warm water, but without sing my in-line heater so I use water from the hot tap.  I have found that more than 5lts and it will be cold by the time I get towards the end of the job.

I use a portable, prochems steampro, as I say, its less than 15mths old, I have attended training at both Prochem and the NCCA and I main use MS.

I think it takes me so long because I am such a stickler for details and a bit of a perfectionist.

Chris

[neil 47]

chris
I also use m/s on suites and agite with a terry towel .
The suite I did on monday came up like new,
I did rinse with u/m in the tank though as I found that just the clear water rinse didn,t get rid of some of the slight soiling left by M/S.

Saul

I am iicrc certified.

lion heart
it tok me from 10.00 to 15.00 to do the suite two 12x12 carpets and a hallway.
I some time s worry even if you do a very good and it only takes you a short time that the customer will think god I just paid him a hundred pounds for a hours work 
 

[Shaun_Ashmore]

Is that Saul Cornwall?

If it is I spoke to you years ago and you were charging then double to what I charge now!

Shaun

[Steve Weatherley]

Hi Chris

I have sent you an email

Steve

[conallon]

Chris
i too cleaned suites with my portable, look warm water 100 psi with open spray upholstery tool, i also used " spray on vac off technique", wich was not very efficient on heavily soiled areas ie arms, this was the way i was taught on my training course, i took around 4 hours to clean a standard 3 piece suite, sometimes longer, with excellent results

then i found higher heat, more powerfull vac, 250 -300 psi, closed spray upholstery tool, i now take around 2-2.5 hours to clean a standard 3 piece suite with excellent results  , i do now how ever  own a t/m, but when i look back if i had used a closed spray upholstery tool with my portable i could have took advantage of the exstra heat  and skimmed some time off the 4 hours plus 

Conrad 

[Chris Bailey]

Thanks for that conrad, i'll bear that in mind when I upgrade.  I will try and use a bit more heat to see if that helps.

Chris

[therapist]

just came across this posting and it made me wonder about ...........reality / fiction.

how anyone can take SIX hours to clean a suite  really beggars belief !

you even say it takes a full hour to vacuum the suite !

the longest i've ever taken to clean a suite was 3 hours and the reason was thick, sticky nicotene such as i'd never encountered before, or since.

i've stated before and repeat, that i average one and a half to 2 hours cleaning suites and 90% of my business is repeat and referred, from very happy clients who have never seen such good results.

to suggest you need a t/m to clean suites properly, is utter crap.

usually i use a ninja, but have achieved similar results with lower powered machines, the only difference being, the drying times....which, incidentally, are between two an four hours, depending on fabric type.

i have been in this business for almost 20 years, don't wear stetsons, don't bait and switch and have an excellent reputation.

of course, some people will always be quicker / slower, but there's an awful lot of nonesense creaping into this and other industries and new starts are having their heads stuffed with theories rather than reality.

this is a hands on practical skill and is really only suited to practical people.

etc, etc

waffle over,  robert m

[Ian Gourlay]

Therapist. Robert,

I believe you have  been in trade a long time.

Also did you not start out with cut price outfit.


Therefore learnt how to save time.


Although six hours  does seem a long time.