[Splash & dash]

have you got a good response even in winter lee? or was the leaflets delivered months ago?

Months ago. We only deliver April-Aug sometimes into Sep.

We are down to a slow trickle now. Maybe 10 new a week which really only replaces losses.

It’s painful this time of year. The problem of picking up so many so quickly is the winter drop offs. We’re down to 5/6 a week gains I guess but it’s just treading water as we lose about the same.

Out of intrest how many customers do you have to be loosing that many each week seams a lot we generaly would loose that amount in 6 months or more ?

[Lee Pryor]

Its all relative.

We have over 5200

Constant in constant out when your that size.

[Splash & dash]

Its all relative.

We have over 5200

Constant in constant out when your that size.

Yes I understand the more customers you have the more will move, die, decide they don’t want them doing etc  especially you with 12 vans that’s a lot of work , we only have a couple of vans and have around 1500 domestic customers + commercial so very small compared to you but we don’t loose 6 customers in six months let alone a week , why are these people cancelling would be my question I would want to retain existing work as much as possible, is it due to poor quality of work ? Customer not happy with staff.? Or what ,I always try and find out why someone has cancled so I can try and resolve any issues before they get to become a problem , rather than trying to find more customers , I know some customers are a pain and I will make the decision dump them as they are a pita . If a staff member is the problem it needs nipping in the bud to stop them from loosing customers , but I guess that we are all different how we run our buisness, you are oviously very successful at what you do , but I think that sometimes when companies get large they loose that personal touch , I feel that you get far better service from the local greengrocers than the likes of tesco , better quality produce from the small shop , our buisness are the same employee s will never do the job as good as the owner , this is why I still am hands on doing the job ,all work is alternated and I will still do every job we have and keep a good rapour with the customers , I know that’s impossible for you to do with your size of company , Ime not intrested in building an empire , I regularly turn down work now as we are so busy and I don’t want to expand further . I do however enjoy seeing how ones run there buisness  and we can all learn from each other keep up the reports as it’s very good for ones who want to continue to expand the companies like you have done .

[Pete Thompson]

TOTALLY NAFF





I like it!

[John Mart]

Its all relative.

We have over 5200

Constant in constant out when your that size.

Yes I understand the more customers you have the more will move, die, decide they don’t want them doing etc  especially you with 12 vans that’s a lot of work , we only have a couple of vans and have around 1500 domestic customers + commercial so very small compared to you but we don’t loose 6 customers in six months let alone a week , why are these people cancelling would be my question I would want to retain existing work as much as possible, is it due to poor quality of work ? Customer not happy with staff.? Or what ,I always try and find out why someone has cancled so I can try and resolve any issues before they get to become a problem , rather than trying to find more customers , I know some customers are a pain and I will make the decision dump them as they are a pita . If a staff member is the problem it needs nipping in the bud to stop them from loosing customers , but I guess that we are all different how we run our buisness, you are oviously very successful at what you do , but I think that sometimes when companies get large they loose that personal touch , I feel that you get far better service from the local greengrocers than the likes of tesco , better quality produce from the small shop , our buisness are the same employee s will never do the job as good as the owner , this is why I still am hands on doing the job ,all work is alternated and I will still do every job we have and keep a good rapour with the customers , I know that’s impossible for you to do with your size of company , Ime not intrested in building an empire , I regularly turn down work now as we are so busy and I don’t want to expand further . I do however enjoy seeing how ones run there buisness  and we can all learn from each other keep up the reports as it’s very good for ones who want to continue to expand the companies like you have done .

I’ve got 1,600 and three vans. If you pick up lots, you’re going to go through a lot of “messers”. We’ve picked up around 550 this year. I reckon I’ve lost at least 30 this year from moving! I dropped 5 in one day last week for cancels on the day, slow paying etc. You can’t compare a full business that’s turning work away to one that’s growing rapidly. In one day last week I had 4 cancels, 3 were following debt chase texts and one moving.

[John Mart]

A question though, how do two vans service 1,500 customers? You must work very fast.

[cleaniac]

Its interesting actually. I have also had to drop a few messers as the winter has started to take hold.

Sort of 6 steps forward 3 steps back isnt it when your growing.

I guess if your signing up hundreds in a short space of time, its 100 steps forward 40 back..

[Stoots]

This year gone from about 400 to 500 customers, so 100 new ones.

To get this extra 100 I've gone through probably 200 new ones over the course of the year.

When I look on suspended jobs on cleaner planner I have nearly 600! That's more than double active.

When you try and grow its inevitable you will pick up dross. They die, they move, they cancel, they don't like the rain, can't pay online, never leave gate open, access is poor, no where to park, dog poo, slow payer, non payers, one off. The list goes on.

[cleaniac]

A question though, how do two vans service 1,500 customers? You must work very fast.

there could be a large portion of that as quarterly

[Stoots]

I do about 40 customers a day as a 2 man or 25 on my own.

That's 9-3 though. . so maybe 50 2 man for a full day if it was compact enough.

And my work is nearly all one stop as well, I could imagine if you had an estate with 80 houses on with only a few van moves you could have a good go.

So numbers can be decieving.

[Simon Trapani]

Really?! I could do maybe 20 tops! Usually more like 15.

[Stoots]

Really?! I could do maybe 20 tops! Usually more like 15.

15 is about what I would have said a year or so ago

Knowing the round off by heart, not knocking doors, and generally been less ocd had seen me speed up a lot.

But of course we may not be comparing like for like.

Most of my work are semis and small detached houses.

[cleaniac]

I only have 13 today.

[Lee Pryor]

Again until you have over 5000 customers most here cant really comment as you simply have no idea of the diferences of being that size..

I will say however we drop a large portion ourselves, non payments, messing around, being rude to my staff either cleaners or over the phone ect. As some have said above when gaining vast amounts rapidly this is totally normal. we are up by bang on 1000 this year but actually got 1700 in.

Cant remeber who keeps saying 12 vans but its actually 10 on the road and we are about to replace our spare that was written off, so 11 total.

Although I had said in a previous thread we would add a few more next year I have decided to remain the same size for the next few years as i repay my investment to myself, so next year we only need 400 customers to top up and remain the same size.

[Splash & dash]

A question though, how do two vans service 1,500 customers? You must work very fast.

We are mainly 4 weekly and do a lot of  estate work with 40 + houses in one road so the van might only move a few hundred yards in a day two guys in each van on 3 bed semis it’s easy to do 5 per hour my best guy can do 7 per hour , most of my domestic is a maximum of a mile from home , we work 8 hours a day don’t sit in the van drinking tea we all work hard , and still do a lot of gfs , guttervaccing,softwashing, pressurewashing, commercial work we travel up to 200+ miles from home for some contracts , so we are flat out all the time , this is why I said Ime turning away work all the time , in the last 6 months at a guess I have turned away enough work to keep another van and two guy going for 3-4 days a week , I cannot be bothered to expand all the hassle trying to get decent staff that will get on with the job and not try and rip you off , doing private jobs pocketing the cash for themselves etc I cannot be bothered with it all , apart from ones moving or dying we very rarely loose a customer I prefer to have a hands on approach with all my customers offering them a full cleaning service for all there needs , I have never advertised apart from my web site , most new work is recommendations from existing customers , we are a very small  company offering a service to our customers that not many others offer , especially with some of our more wealthy clients , I try to focus on quality not quantity . I understand what you are saying about customer s you have dumped due to issues , I very rarely experience this  now as I spell out to potential customers what we will do for them ,and what I expect from them , we work all year in most weather , we won’t accept “ oh it looks like it’s going to rain leave it this month “ that’s an Instant dump , if they have a genuine reason then that’s fine . This way of working will not give you rapid buisness growth but I dont need growth , I am trying to continue to refine the work we do bigger better properties, as this happens I will stop some of the estate type jobs and focus more on larger houses and bigger commercial hotels, and large blocks of flats this type of work is coming in slowly but shorley

[Splash & dash]

Really?! I could do maybe 20 tops! Usually more like 15.

On compact work I can do 7 three bed semis per hour x8 = 56
My least productive guy does 5 per hour x8= 40
That’s a total of 96 per day
This is not hard to achieve if you are prepared to work and not sit in the van drinking tea , I had someone off the forum come out with us on Tuesday this week as he struggled to do more than 18 per day , he was totaly amazed what we did  both number of properties and money wise , but when he explained that he’s working using barrels I can see why his productiverty is so low , van set up and compact work the above numbers arnt hard to achieve , I know where I am there is very little competition trying to build a compact round in many areas is now very hard
I accept the van may only move maximum of three times a few hundred yards but I don’t break into a sweat doing that amount 5 days a week and Ime 56 !!!
There is no point in driving miles between jobs unless they are £60 upwards as far as Ime concerned

[John Mart]

Really?! I could do maybe 20 tops! Usually more like 15.

On compact work I can do 7 three bed semis per hour x8 = 56
My least productive guy does 5 per hour x8= 40
That’s a total of 96 per day
This is not hard to achieve if you are prepared to work and not sit in the van drinking tea , I had someone off the forum come out with us on Tuesday this week as he struggled to do more than 18 per day , he was totaly amazed what we did  both number of properties and money wise , but when he explained that he’s working using barrels I can see why his productiverty is so low , van set up and compact work the above numbers arnt hard to achieve , I know where I am there is very little competition trying to build a compact round in many areas is now very hard
I accept the van may only move maximum of three times a few hundred yards but I don’t break into a sweat doing that amount 5 days a week and Ime 56 !!!
There is no point in driving miles between jobs unless they are £60 upwards as far as Ime concerned

If I was charging £8 a semi I wouldn’t lose any either.

[Shrek]

Really?! I could do maybe 20 tops! Usually more like 15.

On compact work I can do 7 three bed semis per hour x8 = 56
My least productive guy does 5 per hour x8= 40
That’s a total of 96 per day
This is not hard to achieve if you are prepared to work and not sit in the van drinking tea , I had someone off the forum come out with us on Tuesday this week as he struggled to do more than 18 per day , he was totaly amazed what we did  both number of properties and money wise , but when he explained that he’s working using barrels I can see why his productiverty is so low , van set up and compact work the above numbers arnt hard to achieve , I know where I am there is very little competition trying to build a compact round in many areas is now very hard
I accept the van may only move maximum of three times a few hundred yards but I don’t break into a sweat doing that amount 5 days a week and Ime 56 !!!
There is no point in driving miles between jobs unless they are £60 upwards as far as Ime concerned

If I was charging £8 a semi I wouldn’t lose any either.

I was thinking the same . Some guys near me charge 5-7 per semi and never really lose any.

[p1w1]

Really?! I could do maybe 20 tops! Usually more like 15.

On compact work I can do 7 three bed semis per hour x8 = 56
My least productive guy does 5 per hour x8= 40
That’s a total of 96 per day
This is not hard to achieve if you are prepared to work and not sit in the van drinking tea , I had someone off the forum come out with us on Tuesday this week as he struggled to do more than 18 per day , he was totaly amazed what we did  both number of properties and money wise , but when he explained that he’s working using barrels I can see why his productiverty is so low , van set up and compact work the above numbers arnt hard to achieve , I know where I am there is very little competition trying to build a compact round in many areas is now very hard
I accept the van may only move maximum of three times a few hundred yards but I don’t break into a sweat doing that amount 5 days a week and Ime 56 !!!
There is no point in driving miles between jobs unless they are £60 upwards as far as Ime concerned

If I was charging £8 a semi I wouldn’t lose any either.

I'm sure he means x 8 hours

[Splash & dash]

Really?! I could do maybe 20 tops! Usually more like 15.

On compact work I can do 7 three bed semis per hour x8 = 56
My least productive guy does 5 per hour x8= 40
That’s a total of 96 per day
This is not hard to achieve if you are prepared to work and not sit in the van drinking tea , I had someone off the forum come out with us on Tuesday this week as he struggled to do more than 18 per day , he was totaly amazed what we did  both number of properties and money wise , but when he explained that he’s working using barrels I can see why his productiverty is so low , van set up and compact work the above numbers arnt hard to achieve , I know where I am there is very little competition trying to build a compact round in many areas is now very hard
I accept the van may only move maximum of three times a few hundred yards but I don’t break into a sweat doing that amount 5 days a week and Ime 56 !!!
There is no point in driving miles between jobs unless they are £60 upwards as far as Ime concerned

If I was charging £8 a semi I wouldn’t lose any either.

Lol Ime not charging £8  per semi that’s 8 hours work read the post properly 😂😂😂