[Perfect Windows]

I've taken on a new lad to help me catch up.  Any tips or tricks on two man/one van working?

What we've done on the one clean we did in anger was choose a front corner of the building.  One of us goes the long way round to the corner, one the short way and we both clean till we meet.

Any others?

Thanks,

Vin

[Smudger]

we dont do a lot of 2 man 1 van working unless it's catch up or large job - house velrt etc..

normal practice for us is one takes the front the other the rear or when its compact work a house each


Darran

[Tom White]

Where ever possible, work on separate properties, and plan your work so that you both finish at the same time, or, if you've got to knock on doors for payment, so that one finishes five minutes early to do the knocking and collecting; so that ultimately you both finish together.

What you don't want is one of you hanging around while the other one is working; it takes a little thinking and planning; and practise. 

[Frankybadboy]

Where ever possible, work on separate properties, and plan your work so that you both finish at the same time, or, if you've got to knock on doors for payment, so that one finishes five minutes early to do the knocking and collecting; so that ultimately you both finish together.

What you don't want is one of you hanging around while the other one is working; it takes a little thinking and planning; and practise. 

i bet wor lass could only wish

[Tom White]

Where ever possible, work on separate properties, and plan your work so that you both finish at the same time, or, if you've got to knock on doors for payment, so that one finishes five minutes early to do the knocking and collecting; so that ultimately you both finish together.

What you don't want is one of you hanging around while the other one is working; it takes a little thinking and planning; and practise. 

i bet wor lass could only wish

Hey, she only worked 3 days this week!  But when I've got her, I employ her wisely.  She gets to do all the inside jobs! 

[Perfect Windows]

So, a couple of weeks into two man working: It's terrific in several ways.

We're catching up on first cleans - the awful overhanging rock of undoable work is vanishing visibly and verifiably.

I have someone to gas with in the van. Finally someone to disagree with over which passing women are attractive.

It's so nice doing the back of a house then coming round and realising that the front is done. A couple of days without Joey and I found doing full houses a bit of a bore, though I soon got back into it. With two of you you're setting up and moving so much more frequently which probably has helped in making me much less tired despite getting through so much work.

All lovely.

[CLEANCARE WC]

So, a couple of weeks into two man working: It's terrific in several ways.

We're catching up on first cleans - the awful overhanging rock of undoable work is vanishing visibly and verifiably.

I have someone to gas with in the van. Finally someone to disagree with over which passing women are attractive.

It's so nice doing the back of a house then coming round and realising that the front is done. A couple of days without Joey and I found doing full houses a bit of a bore, though I soon got back into it. With two of you you're setting up and moving so much more frequently which probably has helped in making me much less tired despite getting through so much work.

All lovely.

Deacon? I always wondered what he did after blue peter

[bobby p]

i do the ups, my lad does the downs.   try not to spatter him with water toooo much

[geefree]

Thinking of having a lad work with me,

but i hope he works hard enough to earn his daily wage and make me a profit, !

Because , what i dont want ... is  only making his wage... and mine... ( what i normally earn for e.g.)

just because it makes my working day easier..

It has to be more profitable than working alone. otherwise  no point,

Although i understand it will be easier to build with 2 people once the team is formed.

[TomCrowther]

Isn't young love a beautiful thing.

[Sean Dyer]

Gazza if you are both poling you will easily make more money

I only work with someone else on trad at the moment as my van is only set up for one, but even on trad i earn 50 % more than i normally do alone on a good day , i do that easily with someone doing the bottoms, and half of the extra makes his wage, the other extra is mine, its about £50 extra after wages

With wfp i would expect after a while for another lad to be doing pretty much the same as me, and so doing upto 100% more a day , so depending on your avg day rate yo will easily pay his wages and have some extra

The hard bit is making sure you get the extra work in , otherwise you will just be finishing by wednesday every week and losing money to wages!! So the days it frees up need to be for canvassing and new cleans till you are ful capacity for 2 guys

[g.brookes]

when i started my boss did upstairs whilst i do downstairs.  was bloody brillaint cos you can chat all day. one of the appeals to me of employing is someone to chat with stuff other than the weather.  mind we were traditional, being underneath a wfp in winter would be horrible!

[Perfect Windows]

but i hope he works hard enough to earn his daily wage and make me a profit, !

I can only speak for WFP, but easily, easily, easily. Obviously that's provided you get extra work rather than just working fewer hours.

I did it because I've hit the point where I simply can't manage the workload on my own.  He's upped my daily clean numbers by 60%.

Vin

[geefree]

Some good advice on here. 

And thanks to you guys who responded to my post ... really encouraging... Thanks. 

[alanwilson]

we work 2 up in each van.

every job we go all the way round the back till we meet then work back to the van.

[Perfect Windows]

Well, it's now been about 100 days since Joey first picked up a brush.

What's happened?

Using lots of water
Daily turnover up by so almost exactly 50% that you'd assume I'd made up the numbers
Profit up
Customers happy, as we're keeping up
He's getting faster all the time - our hourly rate has improved steadily since he started (we're doing roughly £9 per hour more on days 75-100 than we did in days 25-50).
Two quality of clean complaints on windows he'd done.
More time with the kids
I'm a great deal less exhausted when I get home
I'm enjoying the work more
Couple of hiccoughs with motivation - largely due to a lack of sleep on his behalf.

Main benefit:
We've managed to keep up with a staggering number of first cleans. Utterly staggering, as the phone's been red hot all summer.  An average of three and a half first cleans every day he's worked so far (with a lovely day of 14 first cleans booked tomorrow...)


Required improvement: We still get in each others' way all the time around the van. I'm having a rack built for reels and drills to turn them, along with hose rollers in the sides of the van so we're not constantly getting in one another's way with reels outside the van and so that hose reeling doesn't take all day.

Vin

[Andy Prittchard]

Have you considered two vans and one man working?

[AS Window Cleaning]

I work with my missus in our wfp caddy van, 2 pumps and 2 hose reels.  Our houses are more £8-15 jobs, semi detached jobbies normally.  Because our work is compact we do a house each normally, or up to 8 or 9 in one area without moving the van, so it works pretty well.  I know some who husband does tops, wife does bottom traditionally, or with the pole, but i imagine it would be easy to get twisted up in each others hoses.  Guess it depends on sizes of houses, we have the odd small job which i try and do by self, its not worth getting 2 hose reels out otherwise.

I use about 200-250 litres by self, and about 300 together.  Shows who does most work!!   Or so i tell her.....

[Ian Rochester]

All our vans are 2 man set ups, twin wfp and trad set ups, one does tops one does bottoms or they split and do separate houses.

[james51174]

i get customers complaining about being too quick with 2 man wfp

so only do two man on very big houses now days