[Adam P]

quoted a small office job a couple weeks just found out didn't get it only because we weren't cheap enough. it was a simple job just 7 desks, 2 toilets and they only wanted 1 hour 3 times a week (mon, wed, fri) past 6pm.

would be interested to know what people would have quoted for such a small amount? competition went with £51 per week afaik

[Wc Solutions]

1 hr is prob not enough time to do a proper job so i would of said you need more hours ...

cleaning rate is £12 per hour

[Adam P]

for what they wanted 1 hour was enough. only vacuum once a week, wipe desks that are empty, typically 2/3 a visit, and then toilets each week plus the dusting.

[Pristine Clean]

So what did you go in at? Come on please what was your total price?

To be honest even at £51.00 per week I could have easily beaten that price and still made a reasonable profit.

That is based on 3 hours per week.

Don't forget we all have different approaches to how we run a business. By that I mean your price whatever it was may have still been "Value".

Other companies may still be giving value in a different way and work on volume so price can be cheaper.

Dave

[Small but perfectley formed]

Who do you get to clean for 1hr 3 x a week .
We dont even quote for jobs like this waste of time almost impossible to get staff for 1 hours pay.

[Adam P]

i went in at £63 per week as said our minimum is typically £21 per visit. i offered carpet cleaning which they desperately needed at a much lower price and suggested ways to make it less, one being that it doesn't need 3 visits a week

[Pristine Clean]

Who do you get to clean for 1hr 3 x a week .
We dont even quote for jobs like this waste of time almost impossible to get staff for 1 hours pay.

That's why you don't get a separate member of staff just for that job. You have to work out logistics of each job and price accordingly.

We would have had a mobile cleaner do that type of job. Where they are paid a day rate and have a company vehicle. They drive around to all the jobs allocated to them that day or that week. It depends on how far you plan ahead. Obviously a small company may not benefit from that type of job(s)

Dave

[garyj]

You probably killed your chances before even putting in such a high price.

They asked for an office clean 3 times a week and told you exactly what they wanted. You then tried to change it to suit yourself and went straight in with the carpet cleaning upsell.

I bet they laughed their heads off at your price, £21 per hour to clean an office!!!

[Pristine Clean]

You probably killed your chances before even putting in such a high price.

They asked for an office clean 3 times a week and told you exactly what they wanted. You then tried to change it to suit yourself and went straight in with the carpet cleaning upsell.

I bet they laughed their heads off at your price, £21 per hour to clean an office!!!

Ill agree with some of that. They gave him what they wanted and he tried to sell carpet cleaning. Potential clients are not bothered about extra stuff or services. Not on a quotation anyway. Sell your extra services after you have done a few cleans. See if you get to keep the job in question first.

Dave

[Adam P]

huh? when did i up sell anything? i offered them an additional service which they needed at a reduced price. where the is the upsell?

also we have offices at £39 per visit, some of our best customers actually get great reviews from them each time we see them. it's not £21 per hour but £21 per visit. we have sites at this price that take just 10 minutes plus travel.

making it to suit us would have been more days so more charges, however we offered advice to save them money which funnily enough results in less for us. customers like to hear different points of views. what they had didn't work so they come to us to quote for them and we told them what we felt. plenty will also say to us we want a company that wants to do everything and wants to offer as many services as they can for us.

when we walk round we ask them question like who supplies your hand towels as we also do this etc. none have had a problem with this question or been put off because we did a simple thing like ask a question. when they answer x company but if you do it as well we'd like to know your prices then we quote for them too. imo that's providing what the customer wants.

[Gilbert Sprous]

I would have been able to provide 1.5 hours per visit at 50 pounds per week no problem and still had 35% profit margin.  I would use a mobile cleaner and given them 1.25 hours to clean (which would have raised the standards currently set) and another of the .25 for travel to the next site.  I do quite a few of these and find them to be quite profitable once you have 20 or so on the books at 35%. 

As far as the upsell, that is the way I perceived it also.  Even though you offered it at a reduced price I would think you are still making a profit.  I offer several additional services that I make money on and give the client prices at the time of quoting for the cleaning but I ensure they understand that the acceptance of additional services has nothing to do with the current quote and we are happy to clean without the additional services.  Some of the potential clients have accepted right away and others have waited to see what the cleaning was like and still others are quite happy to just do the cleaning.

I have fell into the mistake of selling what I want to give opposed to selling what is asked for, and it is a recipe for failure.  The basics of selling are to determine needs and interests, offer them what they ask for, then provide what they want.  I think everyone has tried to sell what would suit them at a time or another, and you may come back and say that is not what you have done.  But, if you look at your post, you have sold them what you would like to give.  Which is cleaning at your minimum price (not the 3 hours asked for) and to make up the difference carpet cleaning at a reduced rate.  Just remember that not all companies will operate with a minimum so their price will be cheaper.  Don't know if this helps any or if you agree but I hope it does help.

Gilbert

[Adam P]

well the purpose of this thread was to get some good honest advice so i appreciate that. will have to rethink our prices. tbh we set the minimum from advice from this forum and now will have a think about changing it from others advice. i'm sure in 6 months someone else will say something different  

just to be clear, the customer asked for 3 cleans per week, and asked for carpet cleaning (which it really needed as was filthy). we said this is our prices for the office, this is our reduced prices for carpet cleaning, and this is the price for the different schedule we feel would be better as discussed on the site visit.

i know you can say we should have just offered the service they wanted but in this example i think it needed our advice. this was an office with just a few staff members, they don't know much about cleaning (they didn't even have a schedule on paper so didn't know how often dusting happened) but why should they? we are the pro's and know what would work. i think it's fair to say we will all agree that vacuum and toilet cleaning could be done the same day, dusting and tables another. at the current 3 days a week say you did vacuum and toilets monday, dust wednesday, then only thing left for friday is 3/4 desks to wipe. if this office was bigger i wouldn't tell them what we should do unless they asked for it, but this small one wasting money seems dishonest not to say just to earn more money from them.

If i was hiring a company to make a website for me, i go to them say my current guy isn't working, i don't get many customers calling, rank poorly on google, so i have come to you and i want you to do the same. i'd hope the company would offer their professional advice as to what i should be doing instead to get the results i want even if it means less money for them.

as we did the site visit we asked questions about what they wanted, e.g. external window cleaning, janitorial supplies etc the only one they wanted was carpets so we priced for this too. we didn't sell janitorial supplies but we had to find out if they needed us to quote for this. i'd rather the customer think we are enthusiastic rather then can't be bothered

[Gilbert Sprous]

I would not give up you minimum if you are happy with it.  I have a minimum also but if I am bidding on a small job I realise that it is very possible to be under bid because if you have a minimum of 2 hours per visit (not using you as an example just flipping some out there) and the job only take 30 minutes (I actually have two on the books like this right now which gives me a very healthy margin although small in price, but as I said a few can add up if you get them) then you have to be ready for someone to bid it at 30 minutes which will beat your quote all the time.  I will not go under my minimum ever, but I have clients that are happy to have me in for that price.  But if I get undercut because someone is ready to price the job at 30 minutes a visit then hey ho, more power to them.  I have had people come back and say that this is a bit too pricy and I say I understand but I dont change my minimum.  Others have come back and said fine lets do it, good margin and worth the time to invoice it.  Long story short, in my humble opinion, You should have a minimum that you are comfortable with and if you get undercut by someone willing to make 20% margin on a 50 pound a month job then more power to them. 

I am sorry if misunderstood that they asked for the carpet cleaning it was just in the original post I got the feeling you were offering it to justify your minimum.

Gilbert

[clarkson]

 Hi
 why on earth are people talking about increasing the time. 7 desks,two toilets plus vaccing and bins is easy under an hour including locking up.

 and it is defo worth doing as said you just have mobile operatives doing a few, get five or six and you have a nice 16hr part time job for someone.

 my core rate for office cleaning is 11.80 an hour plus vat, but for jobs like this i try for 15.00 per hour but iam prepared to drop as low  13 if it clinches the deal.

 that would put you somewhere between 39.00-45.00. pay say 21.00, kit 5.00.  your gp would be 13.00 to 19.00 pounds.

 ten like that thats your mortgage paid, a 100 like that and you can go and live on a beach somewhere and leave a manager in charge.

cheers

john

 

[Pristine Clean]

 Hi
 why on earth are people talking about increasing the time. 7 desks,two toilets plus vaccing and bins is easy under an hour including locking up.

 and it is defo worth doing as said you just have mobile operatives doing a few, get five or six and you have a nice 16hr part time job for someone.

 my core rate for office cleaning is 11.80 an hour plus vat, but for jobs like this i try for 15.00 per hour but iam prepared to drop as low  13 if it clinches the deal.

 that would put you somewhere between 39.00-45.00. pay say 21.00, kit 5.00.  your gp would be 13.00 to 19.00 pounds.

 ten like that thats your mortgage paid, a 100 like that and you can go and live on a beach somewhere and leave a manager in charge.

cheers

john

 

Nice to see some one has the right idea.

[D woods]

Hi Guys

Yesterday I receveid an email from a company offering cleaning services (they didnt realise we are a clening company) they had a table with all different cleaning

options. For two hours a day they will charge £8.21 per hour.

This includes equipment, window cleaning , first week free of charge and four months free washroom products.

Whow can this make a profit?

[Pristine Clean]

Hi Guys

Yesterday I receveid an email from a company offering cleaning services (they didnt realise we are a clening company) they had a table with all different cleaning

options. For two hours a day they will charge £8.21 per hour.

This includes equipment, window cleaning , first week free of charge and four months free washroom products.

Whow can this make a profit?

Yes they can. Because they work on Volume. We are up against prices like that all the time.


There tactic generally is a few cheap jobs at low low rates and a few jobs at higher prices this way they generate cash flow. As I am sure you are aware cleaning contract can come and go in a flash

I will say though the £8.21 mark for just 2 hours is a little low. We normally compete on mark when there are a few more hours than that.

regards

Dave

[Small but perfectley formed]

6 jobs in the day @ £12 per hour pay the cleaner 8 hours including travel to sites .

£72 -£48  wages, vehicle costs and other expences
Dont see much margin !

[Pristine Clean]

How much margin do you want? £72 - £48 is nearly 34%.

Not all jobs will be as low as that either. Some of our one visit per week sites are charged a lot higher. We have one small job on a monthly visit of £70 + vat a visit and no more than 2 hours on site.

You guys are saying each job is at a flat rate. Its not. It varies on lots of criteria.

Location
Type
freq
Tools req for example we have one job again only monthly and its to clean a floor.

We charge a fair amount as a scrubber drier is required and obviously we need ROI for the machinery.

There's plenty of money in small jobs.

Do you think then on a job of £50,000 a year contract will earn you a lot.

You will be lucky to get £8-£10,000 return on that.

Also large companies say turnover of 2 million do you think the profit is £500,000 you will be lucky if its £270,000.

[Gilbert Sprous]

I think Pristine has hit the nail on the head with the margins.  The numbers you give are per day, 22 working days in a month and you 48 x 22 = 1056 per month per person you have on the Van.  You have to get your mobiles teams to 2 or 3 people that way the Van is earning more for the same investment.  I have a Van running with two people that service my small sites 5 days per week, most of the one day per week jobs are not bothered which day it is so you can make more full days.  Although they service my smaller sites, combined (even after fuel, insurance and maintenance) it is easily my highest margin and good earners for me.  I do not make the 1056 per month per employee but with two of them on the road my net is well over 1000 for the both of them.

Gilbert