Better to Specialize or Expand?

I spent the day with the printers designing some new business cards and flyers and then went over to look at a Sprinter that I saw for sale near my house.  By the end of the day I began to wonder...Is it better to specialize at 1-2 services instead of offering multiple services?

When you think about it, specializing allows you to be leaner and meaner.  You wouldn't need the box truck or sprinter vans since you wouldn't have all that equipment like you do for multiple services.  That would mean less fuel costs, less maint, costs, less training, less employees....less everything.

Of course, does specializing also mean less income?  Can you survive the seasons and the market if you don't take advantage of all the various surfaces inside a building?  Does offering several services help insulate you from downshifts in the economy?

I have asked myself this question for years and I am still not certain about it.  I keep growing in services and find myself needing larger and larger vehicles as well as storage space.  The over-head climbs and the marketing gets tougher as well, but I still remember when I just did carpets and how many times I left money on the table when the customer asked if I cleaned tile, stone, etc.?  Heck, if I add any more services, I will need to continue the list onto the back of my business cards  

Before I approve my proofs for the printer, I am trying to draw a more solid conclusion.....are you better off lean or fat? 

Short answer, expand.

Clean as much as possible for max $$$.

I don't have the room in my F250 to haul all my equip, so I bring what's needed when needed..............it's another advantage of looking at/quoting jobs before doing them.

Lean and mean.

Why?

When I didn't have business I craved more avenues for work. So I expanded to all kinds of crap. They made money but I never became a specialist. A jack of all trades is a master of none.

Sure add on simple tile work... takes up little to no space.

But be a specialist. I get so much work because I'm the go to carpet guy.

I keep my costs down and focus on the work I want.

Spread out if you need to make ends meet. But you'll just be a hack at a lot of different things. Millionaires won't call or refer you.

Both, specialize during summer and expand during winter, summer is busiest, you wouldn't want to spend unnecessary time in a job you're not an expert at or still learning, in the winter you have more time, that's when you do them and learn and have more experience in doing them.
Since you're designing the business card, depends on how many you're planning to make, if you're planning to make a lot, then you should list as much as possible that you're planning to offer in the future, when customer ask for that type of service that you don't want to do on summer, just tell them we actually stop doing that due to the demand is not there or my specialty employee that's doing that resigned last month, just find excuses not to give service but on the winter you can call them and offer it to them if they haven't had it done through someone else :-)
If you're planning to make a box or two, then you shouldn't list them, instead just inform your customer when you're at their home that you'll start doing that specialty service this winter and ask if they want you to call them when you start doing that service.
Hope that helps :-)

I clean many things, and don't "jack" anything.   

Everyone from Poor fuvks to "Millionaires" referrer me, because I do whatever I do very well.......36 5 star reviews on Yelp, and no one has called me a "hack" yet.  

WE are all AZZHoles, and all have one, or something like that!   

So I say take what you want! :LOL

Interesting approach Dp with the seasonal aspect. My present cards still list 2 services that I dropped due to low demand (radon and meth labs) and that is just what I tell the rare customer that asks about it...dropped the service due to low demand.

I am actually leaning towards a separate website(s) / sub-companies for services in groups. That way the calls will be for a more specific service that I could load up for in an efficient manner. They don't need to know that it is the same owner.

It would be more expensive at the start, but it would allow me to stay diversified while being more specific when going to the jobs. Sort of a sub-division under the parent company.

It sounds like there are many others walking between these two approaches, hopefully more will offer their opinions.  

I asked that question myself to many times before. If you want to do something else (carpet repair, streching, installation, clean tile, grout, floors, windows etc) just to make money here is my advice: keep it simple and start right away offering DEODORIZE and PROTECTOR every job, a lot of money there going around. The only problem is that we as a carpet cleaners don't know how to sell it. Believe me a lot of profit there for almost nothing of labor, just try it to offer both of them in any single estimation and you'll be surprise.

Pablos wrote:............................... Believe me a lot of profit there for almost nothing of labor, just try it to offer both of them in any single estimation and you'll be surprise.

Yep, when We speak of "sales", and most cleaners run the other way
I'm not taking about "high pressure sales", or really "sales" to speak of.............it's just simply mentioning a service as an option, as you say, Pablos.

I think the word "sales" scares many of us away, from the money.

its not hard to be good at all types of cleaning,   all surfaces..    

Its not like your a plumber,  painter,  roofer   etc  

its just cleaning,    not that complicated

you can easily be a master of many surfaces with practice and good knowledge

offering more services allows you to expand and eventually get more vans,    running a solid 3 van business would be pretty sweet....   or you can o/o til you cant do it anymore and hopefully youll have saved enough money or other retirement plan  

expanding is just natural course,   its gotta be done

Expand and suffer if you ask me. Stay small and prosper. You'll sleep better at night and you should plan for your retirement regardless. IMHO

ACpower1 wrote:its not hard to be good at all types of cleaning,   all surfaces..    

Its not like your a plumber,  painter,  roofer   etc  

its just cleaning,    not that complicated

you can easily be a master of many surfaces with practice and good knowledge..................

Well said, I totally agree. It's not rocket science.   

Fuzzsucker wrote:Expand and suffer if you ask me. Stay small and prosper. You'll sleep better at night and you should plan for your retirement regardless. IMHO

why do you think to expand is to suffer?     ya theres tons of businesses that get in over their head,  expand too fast and create tons of overhead...   but thats just failed business practices  

thats why you grow slow and grow smart,   build a model based on 1 van that is profitable and then multiply is slowly

Im my mind to not expand is to suffer unless you have a good amount of savings built up, if you dont then when your done.... the business is done, thats it over with

all your hard work and research, training, etc etc is just gone.

Follow the flow your business leads you. It's neither one or the other. You could find your service is in demand on carpet cleaning. You could fill additional work with a helper early on, soon to follow may be an additional van with your now trained technician running it.

You could have more demand for additional services, so follow the flow.

Provide quality service, and you'll always have this decision to consider.

There is no right answer really. If you don't like managing people, stay extremely small.

The grow slow advice is very true. I have always followed that route, it keeps ya grounded.

I've been thinking this issue over a lot and all the advice was valuable...thanks.  

Not to sound all Walden's Pond here, but I was trimming my large walnut tree behind my house today while thinking about this growth issue. Have you ever seen a tree that would grow straight up without expanding?? A tree will follow the water and the sunlight and grow according to the needs of the trunk...just like Ryan and others have noted about business.

The opposite is also true, you have to prune the dead ends to help the trunk prosper. So, I guess the answer really is both...you have to expand and be ready to prune the dead branches as needed.

Like Dp pointed out, it is better to offer more services than less as you can always discontinue some down the road if the demand wanes.

I think that was my answer really: Expand and let the market do the pruning as the need arises.