[Darran Pryce]

The amount of carpet cleaners popping up, saying full house £50.... is a joke.  I contacted three of them in our area saying I have 14 rooms in total, 6 of which are double bedrooms and 2 or master bedrooms, also asking what machines do they use.... Rug Doctor and the puzzi came up trumps.... What a joke, if people think there getting value for money...  (We haven't got that size house by the way)

I priced up a job 1 living room carpet 100% wool, gave her a price of £70 for the 1 carpet, she came back and said that's far too much, already being quoted £20!!!!!

These people are jokes... probably got no insurance and if they have it wont be for items worked on or treatment cover... Wonder if her carpet cleaner has shrunk her carpet!!!!

We still have many who pay good money to get a top job done, but these cut throats are popping up everywhere!

[Mike Gwilliam]

last year I had a lady call to give a quote for a 2 bed small property end of tenancy. I knew the road and the type of property and how much to charge without looking at the house and gave her a quote of £120.

She said why? quite abruptly. I said what do you mean and she said, well the last house I was in which was a four bedroom (twice the size), I had all the carpets cleaned for £50. I quickly ended the call and forgot about her.

Two weeks later, she called me on a Saturday to say, I'm due to have the carpets cleaned tomorrow (Sunday) and the company I had booked say they are not comming as they have double booked me.....can you come tomorrow? I said of course not....I'm on holiday (which I wasn't)   

[wayne zabel]

Theres a guy advertising in the local paper at the moment.

Carpets cleaned from £14.99.

I called and asked him for a price to clean a 3 piece suite and a through lounge..£60

[Smurf]

It's shocking to know now how little some charge now so can understand your frustration... 
When I was into carpet cleaning my average price was £50-£60 mind you that was over 30 years ago.

I turned up at a job a few weeks back to clean the exterior of a rental property and the customer was also having the carpets cleaned at the same time. The chaps with the truck mount were in and out in less than two hours and charged £169.98 so I thought fare play to them. When I notice the firm wasn't local I asked why didn't the chap use a local carpet cleaning company and he replied "because they were the cheapest"



 

[M.Acorn]

Why compete on price, there are plenty of low priced people operating around here, as mentioned using little car valet machines or rug docs.
The genuine customers know the score, well the ones I tend to work for do and they are far more likely to get you back in once the need them doing again.
So far this year, it's been the best start too the year I have had and put my prices up also.

[bennymon]

We have cheap ones round here with decent equipment . Problem is there not all crap but will work for bugger all . It makes the internet really difficult to get any work now .  del

[Darran Pryce]

Just finished a job (domestic) 9 carpets £260. Rung last week I gave them a price and said fine book me in.  Not many like this.... We are getting more and more commercial work now so prices are good.  Done some work for the NHS in Leeds which is good money. 

Still too many £50 full house job.... out there....

[SteveAllan]

Theres a couple of these cheese heads my way charging that. One guy even says £55 + fuel on his ad  He also uses the imfamous Puzzi 100.

[Neil Worsnop]

Last appointment today was to quote.  Single room, no stains, quite small and there won't be any furniture in it.
So no point measuring as its a minimum rate for this one.

The look of surprise on her face when I said it will come in at my minimum rate - £65.  Thought I was going to have to either justify my price or leave it to somebody with a rug doctor.  She was surprised it was that low (curses) and quickly booked the rest of the house in for a clean as well.

Wish there were more like this.  Nice biccies as well.

[Darran Pryce]

Thing is 99% of the carpets we clean are great quality carpets.  For them to replace a living room would cost hundreds.  My mothers living room carpet cost £1000, so to pay £50 or £65 as a minimum prices for them to say that's a lot of money, or I can get my full house for £50 is such a joke and an insult.

Out of 10 calls per week, I would say 6 we get, 4 either don't come back or say they can get it much cheaper....

When pricing up commercial jobs, 8 out of 10 we get, and they don't even get 2 or 3 quotes, so no complaints with commercial work, just the domestic.   

[gwrightson]

Just had a customer call me back , she had agreed a price today t/l   stairs landing, and another flight of stairs ,
as she works for a company who,s office carpets I clean I gave her some discount total price £100


the call, sorry my husband thinks its expensive m we still need it doing but we will get some more quotes

Geoff

[david@zap-clean]

I'm no expert on marketing, but if you're attracting a lot of 'cut-price shoppers' maybe you should take a second look at how you are selling your services?

[Darran Pryce]

Dave, We are very high on google (first page) for carpet cleaners Leeds.  So will attract every type of person down to commercial work, down to those looking for £50 full house job!  Looking at my cms/stats most are coming through google.  Can't stop that unless I take my website down, which I'm not!

[david@zap-clean]

Ok Darren, I guess the more traffic you attract the higher number of price shopper you get - a simple fact of life.

[garry22]

The beauty with websites is that you can change them instantly. That means you can change your positioning at will. It's not like being stuck with a Yellow Pages advert for twelve months.

Within a day you could make all the changes necessary to your site to educate / discourage price shoppers.

We are in a business that the bulk of the population does not want or care about. It's not their fault that they don't know the difference between quality and cowboy work. They don't know any better.

At the moment, the £ 20 clowns are setting a price point in these peoples' minds.

[Steve9]

At the moment, the £ 20 clowns are setting a price point in these peoples' minds.

Exactly. It's easy to say there are people out there who will pay more for good quality work, which is true. But most of the public have no idea of what is cheap, what is a fair price and what is over priced.

[Mike Halliday]

I think people do have an idea what cheap is,  but some are actually looking for cheap. Which is a market heavily served by many companies.

Some people are searching for quality, it's a bit like me, at the moment I'm looking to book a holiday,  on the holiday websites  I tick 5star A/I  which  gets rid of all the cheap budget holidays.

I know we can't  filter our website calls like this but like Garry said we can make our websites more quality orientated . To me poor people want...... quick & easy, .....you look ok,.... you tell them what they want to hear.

Quality people want more information, they want indelph information about the whole process so they can make an informed decision.

 Just like newspapers, cheap  people read the Sun with its big pictures and big headlines but no real information, the rich read The Times or Telegraph with massive amounts of indelph information. Rich people want information.

[gwrightson]

So Has she rang you yet mike ?

vale drive kirkella 

Geoff

[Mike Halliday]

No idea what you're on about

Do you mean Valley Drive Or the Vale

[gwrightson]

the vale 

oops

Geoff