Nice one Mick.
I too am "up" compared with a couple of years ago (if we are talking revenue), but as I started out in 2009 that would only to be expected. It's not revenue (turnover) that i'm looking at, nor margin (which is improving year on year - average clean value up £1 since last year).
I was more concerned with looking at the number of customers I have and looking at trends. I should point out that I am 99% domestic. I produce graphs to monitor custie numbers, projected revenue and custies won/lost in the month. This way I can see trends, which helps with planning. For me for the first time I've seen a trend to losing custies rather than gaining.
Actually that's wrong - we all lose custies from deaths, moves, we bin them, the recession - any number of reasons - but this is the first time I've seen more losses than gains - usually there are more new custies than lost custies.
The number I've lost in the last year is broadly the same as the year before, it's just that this year there have been far fewer replacements from new business and it was this point that I was interested in and which prompted me to set out the OP wondering if the recession and government cuts are really starting to bite and persuade people to cut back on luxuries?