[MJH]

It doesn't particularly bother me as i am busy with work, but i have been noticing alot more window cleaning van in my area, i saw 7 today (yes counting them now i must be going mad )
Anyone else noticed this in there area??

[pjulk]

Its the time of year wait until the winters here and most will be gone

[john tomkins]

I've probably seen 7 over the last few weeks, it'll be all the building workers being made redundant

[m.b.s.]

It doesn't particularly bother me as i am busy with work, but i have been noticing alot more window cleaning van in my area, i saw 7 today (yes counting them now i must be going mad )
Anyone else noticed this in there area??

i said that a while back and they are all in flash new vans all with the wfp gear in
how was you r hols

[windowwashers]

wait till it gets cold, every year seems to be the same march till oct new cleaners.
nov dec jan and feb I pick up loads more work 

The added benifit is these guys start spend out loads then we can buy there systems at near half price after a few month result I recon.

[Guy Gibson]

I saw a newbie in our road earlier - gave me the creeps.

[TennetClean]

theres an old guy who lives near me who used to start window cleaning at 7:30am (no joke!) many a time I have been woken up by his ladders clanking against a neighbors house.

He ties his ladders on to his roofrack with a scrim, LOL

newbies keep trying to invade his patch, but he's been doing it for years at about £1.50 a house, so I dont think anyones made any headway yet.

[mci services]

It doesn't particularly bother me as i am busy with work, but i have been noticing alot more window cleaning van in my area, i saw 7 today (yes counting them now i must be going mad )
Anyone else noticed this in there area??

yes your paranoid

[windowwashers]

theres an old guy who lives near me who used to start window cleaning at 7:30am (no joke!) many a time I have been woken up by his ladders clanking against a neighbors house.

He ties his ladders on to his roofrack with a scrim, LOL

newbies keep trying to invade his patch, but he's been doing it for years at about £1.50 a house, so I dont think anyones made any headway yet.

I used to always tie ladders on with scrims job to job

[dave0123]

Iv noticed a few more people out and about  :


you think 7.30 is early?  the idiot who came up our road a few years back started at 6 AM couldnt belive it. I remember seing him cleaning windows at a bout 6.30 or something stupid when i worked in another job.

[mr D]

comersial jobs 6am no prob but domestic no need 4 that!

last month i saw 8 in a day round my mannor thats unheard of! nearly all trad some gave me a wave/nod back as i always give a friendly hello but a couple one inparticula gave nasty evil eyes! i just laughed at them. theres so noneed for it! we could have 50 wc in the towns around me and still wouldnt cover half the houses its just silly.

the one guy who gave me an awfull look was cleaning a house across the road from the one i was. he was about 40 looked like he had been w/c longer than i've been out of nappies and i did 4, yes 4 houses to his 1. one of mine had a conservatry too. how he got so fat i'll never know he cant have much to spend on food working at that rate!

[Ian Rochester]

We have noticed more and more professional looking vans with WFP systems on around us, nothing to worry about, if you're good at your job and supply a competitive price then it's unlikely you will lose any customers to new competition.

The hardest thing for a new window cleaner, especially one who has invested in a wfp system and van, is getting sufficient customer base quickly enough to pay for the van and system and make a living.

There are a lot of window cleaners out there now and there is only a finite number of people who are willing to pay to have their windows cleaned and they are all getting price sensitive now. 

There are a lot of new starters who are going to the wall because they have overstretched themselves on finance for their vehicles and equipment.  As you may be aware we recently bought a Renault Trafic and Ionics Thermopure System for a song which had been owed by a guy who had been going less than a year.

As for start times, we start commercials at 7am and domestic never before 8am

[AuRavelling79]

theres an old guy who lives near me who used to start window cleaning at 7:30am (no joke!) many a time I have been woken up by his ladders clanking against a neighbors house.

He ties his ladders on to his roofrack with a scrim, LOL

newbies keep trying to invade his patch, but he's been doing it for years at about £1.50 a house, so I dont think anyones made any headway yet.

So what happened when you reported him as a ladder user Tennet? Hmmmm? 

[Pj]

No, you're not paranoid, that would suggest an abnormal tendency to mistrust others...

You have every normal reason to mistrust others!  The whole world and his wife are getting tooled up for wfp!  They're hearing from everyone thet you can learn in a day and earn up to £5k a week!
It'll crash one of these days.

I've been in a type of business that did this same thing 25-30 years ago.  Nobody wanted it to end of course....but it did.

We're dooomed

[AuRavelling79]

Now a reply to "Am I paranoid?"

Round here there has been an  increase in w/c's until about last year. I put this down to a few reasons.

1. Large number of JW's w/c around here anyway - know for sure three who live within a mile of me. And another two not far away.

2. Local "entrepreneur" setting up franchises

3. Another guy with a reach and wash logo within a mile of me. Also a husband and wife team with a very large van (Ducato?)

IMO this has been good because they are all wfp and it has helped get wfp accepted.

But I know recently of another guy (carpenter) who tried it and went back to his old work and another who moved away to the Midlands. So seems to have "topped out" at the mo'.

[Sir Squeaky]

IMO this has been good because they are all wfp and it has helped get wfp accepted.

I agree totally with that one.
The more wfp the merrier.

I'm still finding 8 out of 10 people haven't seen or heard of it before, and they're not too keen.

[SherwoodCleaningSe]

I think the reason for seeing more vans is wfp.  I was a trad cleaner a year and a half ago and used a Mondeo, I had a few decent contracts and insurance ect.  However I was told a 650L tank and 2 hose reels would not fit in the back no matter how hard I tried, so I had to get a commercial vehicle as well.

There are probably a few more window cleaners due to recession, down turn, what ever you want to call it.  People loosing their jobs and needing to make a living.  I know a few that have gone into window cleaning wfp from scratch because they have heard the rumors of good money, only to sell their equipment a short time afterward.  But a lot of the established wc's are now making the plunge to wfp and for most of them that will mean buying a van.

Simon.

[davids3511]

People see the job being done and think it is money for old rope. The problem is that only a few have the mentality to deal with the winters for starters, the non earning days that we sometimes get, dealing with the public both to get the customers and then to keep them happy and the slog of getting the first couple of cleans over and done with before you can pick up speed and really start earning.

I only started in August last year and the hardest things for me was getting all the first cleans done, for a few months every other clean was a first clean and it is very frustrating. The results can be a bit iffy and you can't go fast enough to make a good living. Motivation is a big factor int hose first few months. Window cleaning isn't for everybody.

[macmac]

Can you blame them? If they only read a few posts on here you could forgive them for thinking wfp is a liscense to print money!!! :

& yes 90% of you are guilty as charged!

Tony

[ftp]

One of the franchise companies ran a big advert type thing in our local paper a few weeks ago and stirred up quite a bit of interest. If i had gone down that route when i started i would have been close to bankrupt in my first year. Unless your very good/lucky in canvassing for work - particularly commercial work then it's always going to be a struggle to survive and build a decent paying round. But if you've forked out the kind of money they wanted then your 90% sure to be shafted.