[big murphy]

Is the popularity of Laminated flooring affecting Carpet cleaning business? and does carpet cleaning have a future?

[John Kelly]

Laminate flooring is in decline. Anyway there are still millions of carpets and suites out there. You need to market yourself so people choose you to clean them.

[big murphy]

Thank you John, Sounds like a bit of good advice. Now all I have to do is work on a marketing plan.

[Samuel Bowmann]

I clean carpets at £3 a sq m but rugs start at £6 a sq m.
I happlily go to house and clean smaller areas for more money and find that the rugs often have little or no furniture on them.

Found that upholstery cleaning has dropped since leather made a comeback so may have to take on LTT course 

[cleaning co]

yes although carpets hav drop off in last 2-3 years i think people are slowly returning to them,but i hav noticed a huge drop in sofa cleans over last 3 years,i recon every third job i used to do was a sofa now its one in twenty !!!!  this is good mind as i DISLIKED DOING THEM SO MUCH !!!!

[John Kelly]

Don't forget, there is good money to be made restoring wood floors. I'm not talking about cheap Formica laminates but any floor with a genuine wood top layer.
The protective finish on these wears over time and needs replacing before the underlying timber is exposed.

It is not hard to do as you only need to apply a chemical sander to the floor allow to work, mop off, allow to dry and apply finish coat. Rates £20-25 square metre.

[cleaning co]

john, hows the prowler selling ? and whats the feedback bin like?
gary

[John Kelly]

Sold a few but haven't really got round to marketing/demonstrating it properly yet. We only officially open on the 30th January so from then on it's all systems go. Lots of other things going on at the moment. The guy who bought the first one has now upgraded to the new 15 horsepower model which is on its way from the states. Got to say for a truckmount it doesn't take any more looking after than a portable due to the ability to take it out of the van for servicing.

[big murphy]

John thanks for that idea, Restoring wooden floors, Where would I get some more info on this? It sounds like leather is also having an impact on lounge cleaning

[John Kelly]

Get yourself on a leather cleaning course. Cleaning leather suites is a doddle once you know what to watch out for. Chemspec do a course on wood floor re-finishing.

[Mike Roper]

For a really good course on wood floors covering a broad spectrum I can recommend Bona Kemi ,Milton Keynes. www.bona.com. Excellent products also.
Mike