[Mike Burd]

Here’s a question:

If you had 3 vans out (3 staff)  turning over at least £300 a day each 46 weeks of the year (which takes holidays / sickness into consideration) and were flat rate VAT registered - would it make you money without having to do any of the manual work yourself?

Of course it would.
£900 x 230 = £207k
£207k - 16.5% = £173k
- 3x £25k wages
- 3x £15k expenses
= £53k

But the investment in 3 vans and filling them up with work would be considerable. Keeping 2,000 or so customers organised would be no small task, and managing 3 members of staff as well.
My expenses wouldn’t allow a lot for ongoing marketing, you might need to replace 2-400 customers a year.
Trouble with staff or a blown up van could see you  left with only £30-40k, and most people would be able to make that kind of money on their own in fairly short hours without any major hassle.

If you were growing your business by a van a year and paying an outside agency to canvass/deliver leaflets, marketing costs would all buy wipe that profit out.

I’m assuming it’s flat rate vat? You’d need a unit in addition (in my opinion), you’d have water charges too. If the vans were on hp your costs might be tight. On £300 a day with VAT and paying £25k a year we’d be wasting our time. There would be virtually no profit. They’d need to be doing around £380 - £400 a day unless there were no HP costs or unit costs. My mate would be on about £75k profit. Van paid for and working from home. With my minimum salary and all profit in dividends I’d be on much less than that.

[NWH]

You could have 1 person working full time in a van doing the bulk  if you have decent work if you yourself worked 2-3 days a week imo you’d be better off than your 3 vans financially and far less stressed as it’s easier to organise,it’s all about how quickly and easily you can get to you’re number per day without knocking your pipe out every day-week. Makes no difference how many vans or staff you have within reason in this job I mean,every area of the country is different what might be a good days work in one place might just  be a couple of jobs in another.
If coming off the tools is so important  to you get the right person it can be done with 1 employee,ok you edge your bets if they were to leave but you are in a similar position if you have 3 vans and you lose 2 employees makes no difference.

[Smudger]

There are lots of other things to consider and currently your all assuming a multi van biz just does windows at £300 a day

A good percentage of works could/would/should be gutters, s/f/g wash, conny's etc.. this would raise the daily totals by at least 50% without the need for extra staff

One man band if pretty full will earn more than someone with just 3 employees - however each depends on circumstances as to the end profits - one thing is for certain - as a one man band if you don't go out cleaning your not earning  - holidays, time off sick etc... no money - get a long term illness and your £60k profit is gone maybe forever

Darran

[jo5hm4n]

I can’t see anyone learning a route of work in 6-8 weeks that last not acceptable imo,it would take ages to learn certain routes if work especially rural work in areas where Satnav wouldn’t have much of a clue.
6-8 weeks what’s that 1-2 cleans nowhere near enough time to learn a round of shops spread over 2-3 towns let alone Rural jobs in the middle of nowhere.

We have the exact co-ordinates of each job programmed into the app, I also have a system in which each job is fully documented, what to do and not to do, and how to do it. I recently sent my 2nd guy out on a group of 450 houses that he has never seen before and he hasn't called me once. To be honest it sounds like you don't know what you're talking about.

I would be really interested to hear more about your system for this.  Would you be willing to share at all?  It sounds really good.  I could do with this for my lads, i was thinking about upgrading my system of doing things for a while just not got round to it.

[jim bean]

The above maths shows how little spare there is unless you’ve got 5+ Vans
Doesn’t seem any point to me unless you CANT work for some reason the bit from 2-5 vans you’d have to carry on working to make it work financially
Also your relying on 10 other people with 5 vans if one or two for any reason can’t work and you have to replace them and retrain new staff you aren’t gonna be able to hit the same numbers for a while and you’d be losing money

[Smudger]

I would agree with that particularly if you only did windows - but its not always about what you get in the short term - long term and expansion will more than pay for itself.

there are things to consider -  are you suited to manage staff - its not easy and certainly difficault giving up control - you have to accept staff will not always do that extra step - ( from some posts here sole traders are not willing to go that extra step either )

yes as a sole you earn way more than an owner of 2 or 3 vans but you have to do the work yourself  and are limited in income by being on your own.

The idea of multi van set-up is you keep moving forward - there is no longer a need to be on the tools - the role changes - window work is like clockwork ( I could take 6 weeks off and return without the place missing a beat )
Doing other services is where its at - S/F/G cleans - conservatories - gutter clearing - these can be done daily (2 or 3 a day) every day bringing in over twice the window clean rate  - and there's no interruption to regular windows while doing this work.

Darran

[NWH]

I agree with all that Darren says but you don’t need umpteen employees to get paid for doing little,let’s say for example you had 1 person you could rely on or maybe 2 if you have the right work they’d be doing enough for a good rate for them and a wage for you.
If you invested initially in a decent vehicle and they are half sensible human beings without a lead right foot you wouldn’t have vehicles repair bills every other week,if they are able to hit good numbers without breaking their backs day in day out and it’s pleasant work to do you may keep them.

[Stoots]

Its 2 different mindsets, business owner vs self employed job.

I think a big reason why a lot try employing then go back to being solo or small is because they never went into it with the mindset of business owner but with creating a job for themselves. Its hard to let someone else loose on what is "your baby".

Totally different mindset from an entrepeneur whos sole aim was to build a money making system from the start, they dont have the emotional attachment to being the technician, its simply numbers on a spreadheet.

[NWH]

That’s nonsense if it was able to be done from an office with no emotional attachment it would be a National business done by many and by big companies,think every aspect of this business through and think why it’s not being done you might be able to make sense of it.

[james peters]

Its 2 different mindsets, business owner vs self employed job.

I think a big reason why a lot try employing then go back to being solo or small is because they never went into it with the mindset of business owner but with creating a job for themselves. Its hard to let someone else loose on what is "your baby".

Totally different mindset from an entrepeneur whos sole aim was to build a money making system from the start, they dont have the emotional attachment to being the technician, its simply numbers on a spreadheet.

very true.  also some people like me just cant handle the stress.  it takes a certain type of person to be a multi van business.

[NWH]

An entrepreneur wouldn’t choose this business or if they did they’d soon realise that they need 1000s upon 1000s of customers and if they  don’t know how it works ie how long jobs take what can be done and just in general.
Multiple van setups you see about 99% of the time are run by people that have done the job for some years maybe traditionally also and gradually built the business.

[NWH]

It’s a lifestyle job from which you can earn a very good living it ain’t been that many years and only very recently really that members of the public have realised this,seems like yesterday when you’d  said what you did for a living and they would say yeah but when are you gonna get a proper job or are you just doing it as a stop gap.
When you’ve been at this job for years it’s so easy to forget how easy a life we all have just driving round picking up money colouring in glass,life’s too short to contemplate employing 5-6 idiots to upset my life 🤣🤣🤣

[Matt.]

So for me it is a case of I would rather work on my own and for myself, but the customers I have always want more and more done so I took on a lad to help out and more work came in so got another lad. Both have done 10 years or more for me.
Am not chasing the dream just keeping customers happy and getting through the work but more work comes along so am now in a position we’re the 3 vans all go out daily. I encourage the 2 lads to do longer hours but less days so they do there 40 hours ( all work is commercial ) in between 3.5 - 4 days a week and do a few bits for them selves which am happy about.
I take lads out regular just to look at there standards of work and just to see how they are after an hour or so, if I don’t get a good feeling am not interested in keeping them.
Am in the market for a new guy now who I will do the same as other lads were they can get there hours in ( as long as work done properly ) in less than 5 days and have longer time off. It’s just a case of finding them or training them up from scratch.
I could easy afford to stop working on the glass and just mange them but what do I do then….

U can only grow a business and get off the glass if u have good staff, good staff will keep u informed of what’s going on and deal with most problems themselves.

[Richard iSparkle]

Its 2 different mindsets, business owner vs self employed job.

I think a big reason why a lot try employing then go back to being solo or small is because they never went into it with the mindset of business owner but with creating a job for themselves. Its hard to let someone else loose on what is "your baby".

Totally different mindset from an entrepeneur whos sole aim was to build a money making system from the start, they dont have the emotional attachment to being the technician, its simply numbers on a spreadheet.

Exactly this

Build the business which is right for you

There’s no right way or wrong way

[NWH]

The main reason why people go back to being on their own or keeping  it smaller is because of the hassle they’ve had when they employed in most cases you mean,nothing to do with mindset if you’ve pushed to do it you have the mindset in a lot of cases you are let down by employees time and time again,this business would be a walk in the park if you could get people that were reliable and didn’t have endless personal issues.
This job seems to attract people with alcohol issues disruptive home life’s that then become your problems,it’s not setting it up to work it’s easy enough you are mirroring what you do X whatever it’s the people and some will say you get these people in all businesses but I tell you something there’s a lot of them that look for work in ours.