[frames to panes]

There has been some talk on here from a few people who insist that the future lies in hot water systems, flash vans, glossy four colour leaflets etc. I just wonder what the general feeling is on this for domestic customers. Would it put them off - flash kit etc = expensive so won't bother to phone for a quote? Or WOW! i'll have that?

[Andy@w.c.s]

Nice thread but what are your thoughts
What would you go for as an individual
 take it one stage futher when you need a proffesional around your home what would you go for business card and a mobile number, or a land line and a point of contact that has some thought behind it
evrytime image is every thing

[macmac]

Personaly, the whole flash van, uniform, hot water system, letter full of over-complicated dribble thing is a big put off for most domestic customers.
You give them your price, they look at what you've got & think, sod that, i'm not paying for his new van, flashy equipment etc! They certainley don't want you to be earning as much as them.
All they want is clean windows, you to be reliable, respectable, polite etc. none of which requires vew vans, hot wfp's etc.(or wfp at all )
On larger commercial jobs it's probably an advantage & on some (cream of the crop) domestic but in (real world) general domestic terms i'd say it's a disadvantage, it's all got to be payed for.
I know the kind of posts you're reffering to dave, sometimes i wonder who they are trying to convince, themselves maybe?
Common sense & a bit of drive is what counts more IMO. We are window cleaners at the end of the day, we've not done years at college studying our craft, it's not what most people consider a skilled job. If you turned up at my house with 20k worth of van & equipment to clean my windows & gave me a quote which reflected this, i, personaly would laugh & tell you where to go. You can drive your business forward & reap the rewards without such expense but you can't run before you can walk either.
Just my 2 pennys worth as per.

Tony

[magic1]

If your work is mostly domestic how professional you want to be i.e uniform, van, id etc depends the type of customers you are trying to attract.

The customers i have on council estates are more of the '' so you got a new van eh, bet that cost a bomb. i'm i paying for that '' not all only a few. The middle class customers seem to like it more. dont mind paying a bit more knowing you have insurance, look smart etc.

The proof of the pudding for me is i now seem to pick up more work in affulent areas than i ever did before. They see the van and uniform and approach us. When we went out before in our car, ladders & jeans etc that would have never happened.

Hotwater, glossy leaflets and all thats your personal choice. I tend to look at the area i am targetting and use whatever i think will work.

[The Seven Bays Window Cleaning Company]

I have to admit I was looking at leasing a a new van, only because I had fell out with my old Land Rover - it has been giving a lot of trouble recently !!

But she's running nice again now

Anyway - that did go through my mind. That I would be turning up in a flash new van, and as most of my customers are domestic I could see it could have negative effects for a percentage of my round.

I'm glad my old Landy is behaving herself, as I think no one judges my level of success in my old Landy - bless her

I believe for the most domestic rounds being reliable, presentable, friendly and polite are in some ways more important than being able to leave a smear free window 

For example:

I know for a fact I left some streaks when learning to do WFP, a month later I would apologize  to the customer. All that I mentioned this too said , they never noticed any. Its as though me turning up on time, having  a cup of tea and chat with them, IS the service

[Village Gleam]

A very good approach to this topic DJW but i have found that you never really get very far into this before some name calling starts.

Therefore the people who may have something to add hold back. I have put my views forward several times on this and been shouted down.

I  like a good argument, a row even, but i prefer to stick to the issues. I think Mac Mac made some good points as did magic1.

Let's say to follow magic ones targeting point, that to fly transatlantic, jet engines are than propellors; for short haul internal routes the opposite might be true.But if you spoke about the future  of avaition you would be talking about jet engines.

The other thing to add is that invariably people are talking about themselves. They give you and the pro approach a good slating and then you find out that they only work part time, have another job, bought their round and like to stay compact, or they make they a very good living and just don't see that there could be another approach.

[Londoner]

There is a fine line between being smart / presentable and being flashy. My belief is that you want to appear to be the honest and reliable tradesman that you are. You want to give the impression of being capable and confident.

At the bottom end you have the benefit dodger image, unshaven, trackies, chav cap, fAg etc. At the top end now we have logo-ed vans, uniforms and glossy leaflets.

Both extremes, in my opinion, put people off. In any business, but never more so than with window cleaning, ultimately its you that is important. Be nice, friendly and reliable and your customers will respond to it.

[frames to panes]

Thanks guys, nice civil answers on a subject that isn't intended to cause trouble. I wondered because i'm sure a lot of people think they must be paying way too much when they look at my kit even though it's reletively modest by some standards. The fact that the money to purchase it all never came from my cleaning trade dosen't occur to them. One or two even insist on bringing the money to my door which seems a little odd too. Its' a difficult one because being just a windowcleaner your not supposed to earn good money. In the past it has always been seen as one of the lowest trades around and the butt of many jokes. I think wfp is brilliant for bringing the trade in line with other occupations as it looks so much more proffessional.
 On another note - i had a lady phone up for a quote yesterday, fronts only, two bay windows and a side pane so about nine panes in all. I quoted six pounds. She nearly passed out and exclaimed that she was only a pensioner!

[Londoner]

Six pounds? thats cheap. But you are always going to get that from a few people.

Years ago I decided to branch out into gardening and delivered a load of leaflets. One of them resulted in a call from a man who had inhereted a nearly derelect house and wanted the garden cleared prior to selling it.
The garden was a jungle and it was big. I gave him a price of £1000. He nearly fell over and said he was thinking in the region of £50.

My friend John had a window cleaner who had cleaned his windows for £4 and never put the price up in 15 years.

[frames to panes]

What would i go for? Well with most things i look at the dearest, then look at the cheapest, then normally go in the middle to upper range if i can afford it, but never the top of the range as this is the area where i feel i'm getting ripped off normally. But that's just me.

[Davo]

Yep its all hogwash.

If you just want to clean windows and earn yourself a decent wage then you can work out the back of a 15 year old escort estate car. You dont even need a pole, window cleaners have managed for years with out any problems (well the odd death but that goes with the territory)

If you want to target the market for cleaning gutters, PVCu building plastics, conservatories etc and you want a chance to earn a very good rate for your time  then turning up in the same 15 year old escort with a shammy and a ladder wont get you very far.

It depends on  what you want.

However, for those who want the former and think the latter is a load of baloney  dont start shouting liar liar when  a poster obtains more money for a particular job than you, there is a very good chance they present their business differently to you.

Bottom line is this, if you are earning the money you want to earn in the way you want to earn it, then great.

One thing is for certain in business, nothing stays the same for ever.

Mark

[D.Salkeld_Ltd]

Thanks for this thread

My "Image" is something I have been thinking about just lately.  And, to be honest, I'm not clear as to what I want

My Skoda Felicia and Trailer is feeling untidy to me .  The public and customers think it's the biz

Practically........It works well .............so why am I niggley about it?

At the end of the day I have to be honest and ask my self to accept the truth.
Find out where I really am now and find out where I want to be.
Then see is it REALLY worth moving on?
If so, how am I realistically going to get there?


Any way, it's Sunday.................
Nice morning.................
I think a stroll on the beach with Tracy is the best move

David

[peter holley]

i bought a new van 14 months ago.....because i wanted a reliable van that looked proffesional, i target large domestic ....my round is established and i know i can afford the payments......

i have had a lot of work off the van signs, and when i reverse into a drive the custie knows who i am , rather than wondering what im doing on their drive......

i still only have 9000 miles on the clock, so im hoping i will get many reliable years out of this van, i want it to last at least another 6-7 years...

i don't do the glossy bruchure thing, but if someone wants to go down that route thats their desision... i am all for trying different forms of marketing....... last year i tried yellow pages.....nowhere near as good as canvassing but it was ok...

taffy

[mark.laycock1@ntlw]

hi all i was like that got a new van only cus every one i had broke down . the last van blow up and took me off the motorway and rolled in a field nearlly killed me . so i said to myself why not get a new one. my customers like it got new sweetshirts put my name on them i do get look at posh boy i say why not you only come this way once.

[windowwashers]

my thoughts on this:

It really depends on where you want to take the business.
Some will be happy to stay trad some diy set up wfp others install van then theres the hot wash systems at the end of the day it is what you want.

None of them are wrong.

as for what customers think, does it put people off if having a flashy van good system nice uniform ect I think yes it will put some off but will also gain ones that could not be got before.
having a car and doing trad works just the same.

[Stuart Webster]

Thanks for this thread

My "Image" is something I have been thinking about just lately.  And, to be honest, I'm not clear as to what I want

My Skoda Felicia and Trailer is feeling untidy to me .  The public and customers think it's the biz

Practically........It works well .............so why am I niggley about it?

At the end of the day I have to be honest and ask my self to accept the truth.
Find out where I really am now and find out where I want to be.
Then see is it REALLY worth moving on?
If so, how am I realistically going to get there?


Any way, it's Sunday.................
Nice morning.................
I think a stroll on the beach with Tracy is the best move

David

Take your wife for a walk.

Image is just that it's an image.

One of the problems with forums like this is the peer pressure it puts on us to "keep up".

Dont change what works well!!

Bear

[windowwashers]

Thanks for this thread

My "Image" is something I have been thinking about just lately.  And, to be honest, I'm not clear as to what I want

My Skoda Felicia and Trailer is feeling untidy to me .  The public and customers think it's the biz

Practically........It works well .............so why am I niggley about it?

At the end of the day I have to be honest and ask my self to accept the truth.
Find out where I really am now and find out where I want to be.
Then see is it REALLY worth moving on?
If so, how am I realistically going to get there?


Any way, it's Sunday.................
Nice morning.................
I think a stroll on the beach with Tracy is the best move

David

Take your wife for a walk.

Image is just that it's an image.

One of the problems with forums like this is the peer pressure it puts on us to "keep up".

Dont change what works well!!

Bear

yes and no to that one, sometimes it is peer pressure to keep up, other times it is people just wanting you to stay like them because they cant see it working.

Agree with dont change what works well just build on it

[frames to panes]

I think a lot of this image thing comes more from our own viewpoint rather than the customers. We all want to look good - smart proffessional, we would all like a new van with our own company logo and we would all like the top of the range kit inside however, my origional question was wether it makes a domestic customer go for it or against it? I have a feeling that a lot of them would go against it for the reasons mentioned before. There are some excellent replies on here from both angles.

[xxmattyxx]

Personaly, the whole flash van, uniform, hot water system, letter full of over-complicated dribble thing is a big put off for most domestic customers.
You give them your price, they look at what you've got & think, sod that, i'm not paying for his new van, flashy equipment etc! They certainley don't want you to be earning as much as them.
All they want is clean windows, you to be reliable, respectable, polite etc. none of which requires vew vans, hot wfp's etc.(or wfp at all )
On larger commercial jobs it's probably an advantage & on some (cream of the crop) domestic but in (real world) general domestic terms i'd say it's a disadvantage, it's all got to be payed for.
I know the kind of posts you're reffering to dave, sometimes i wonder who they are trying to convince, themselves maybe?
Common sense & a bit of drive is what counts more IMO. We are window cleaners at the end of the day, we've not done years at college studying our craft, it's not what most people consider a skilled job. If you turned up at my house with 20k worth of van & equipment to clean my windows & gave me a quote which reflected this, i, personaly would laugh & tell you where to go. You can drive your business forward & reap the rewards without such expense but you can't run before you can walk either.
Just my 2 pennys worth as per.

Tony

What he said











pretty much anyway 

[philboy]

I think you will attract a certain class of customer depending on how high your profile is.  Some people will always want to find the cheapest quote, and personally I don't want that type of customer, there are plenty of window cleaners with a ladder strapped to the roof of their Mondeo who are making a decent living, I choose to look the part and consiquently get bigger and better jobs. I don't think you have to spend a fortune to earn money, it's a personal choice.