Whats your opinion here?

Who would be the most successful in this scenario?

#1 low rates do fair work and as many jobs as possible. (customers are too hard to educate and really dont care)

#2 Moderate rates and do good work with trying to sometimes educate and upsale some customer.

#3 High rates with extremely high end work and quality...educate, upsale.

Reason Im asking is because I had coffee with a local competitor and he is very curious where I will fit in to this spectrum, I didn't tell him but was shocked at his blatent confessions to me. It got me to thinking as to why he would be "this" particular type of company.

It depends on the market you find yourself.

If you are a volume cleaner in the Catskills, you will fail. If you are the high end cleaner in the Bronx, you would also fail.

The #2 cleaner can survive in just about any market. I've found that around here, the prime customers are households that earn at least 75k per year and are about 35 years old with college degrees. I target that demographic when marketing to residential.

What is your market set up like?

I'm a #3 and prefer that. ......less work, less jobs and still make good money....And I'm too old to be doing 5 jobs a day. But that was my way when I had more life in me too.
It usually works out well.......

Im in a college town....and we have tons of rentals...we also have lots of high end customers. Im going to focus on #3 as well...if I slip a little I may touch on #2 BUT i know it will conflict with #3. Ultimately I want few quality with a couple water damages a month....back in my hayday I was doing a water loss every day. Two Air duct jobs a week and countless carpet jobs.

Perfect situation then......offer two divisions: Division one is upscale clients where you bring your best game and a second division where you can get your son that valuable training and experience.

I would separate the 2 though so the high dollar clients don't associate one with the other. To a wealthy client, the idea of their cleaner also cleaning trashed apartments might turn them off.

Keep the van free of logo and they would never know the difference, but have a separate website and phone number. Maybe even different attire as well.

We have a landing page now, and probably going to add another. Its basically a 2nd website that has high conversion and a targeted area, like (cityname)carpetcleaning.com etc

anyways the point Im getting at is we are going to add economy cleanings, which are pad cap only.

This will almost be a separate business, but paying taxes under the same entity.

Jobs will be pre vacuum, then pad cap thats it. The truth is you want to mostly be doing high end cleanings if your market supports but there is a lot of money left on the table with cheaper customers.

These jobs I wont be doing myself of course, just a friend of mine. Hell have solid vac, and then good pads with a mini max/trinity machine along with some great encap juice. Hes young and can handle more than 5/day. Most would be sold as a 3 room deal.

Dont be mistaken you can bill thousands per week serving these customers and make them happy

the main reason were adding this is because were losing a lot of business in areas with terrible access and smaller units. they call all the time and we turn them down

capitol hill, ballard, queen anne, and bell town are all areas with high incomes and no access what so ever, no express van even.. has to be smaller like a ford transit connect

Devon07 wrote:Im in a college town....and we have tons of rentals...we also have lots of high end customers. Im going to focus on #3 as well...if I slip a little I may touch on #2 BUT i know it will conflict with #3. Ultimately I want few quality with a couple water damages a month....back in my hayday I was doing a water loss every day. Two Air duct jobs a week and countless carpet jobs.

I'm less than a mile from a Cal State University, so I have plunty of cheap renters calling me too.....but lucky there is also plunty of mid to upper scale around too.

I usually scare off the cheap ones by Quoting them a min. charge over the phone.

I will have lots of commercial too. I need my van logo to show.....it's a serious part of my weapon. All my work will be quality....but if they want me to trim the fat I can in little ways. A guy here tried to run two rigs because he was expensive and partnered with a cheaper company who was terrible and cheap.....once he was uncovered...nose dive! He would bid a job and if they said he was to expensive he would send in the "jack" and sweep up the money anyway.

Devon07 wrote:I will have lots of commercial too. I need my van logo to show.....it's a serious part of my weapon. All my work will be quality....but if they want me to trim the fat I can in little ways. A guy here tried to run two rigs because he was expensive and partnered with a cheaper company who was terrible and cheap.....once he was uncovered...nose dive! He would bid a job and if they said he was to expensive he would send in the "jack" and sweep up the money anyway.

I understand, my show is 90% commercial and the van's script gets a lot of viewers.

"Sending in the jack" is what a lot of industries do, not just cleaners. Goodyear sells a tire called Workhorse and BFG sells one called Cavalier....they are the same company, but built to lesser quality. Same goes for Fender guitars and their Mexican versions.

I think the dual division works and can work well, but like you said, it can be a downfall as well if not done properly.

That may have come across wrong....Im planning on being the #3 but at times I will be okay with keeping quality and dropping price a bit if I get the right customer....as long as they understand what im really giving them....thats important to me. Im leaning heavy on personal interaction so I can show my son different ways to use charisma. Its not always about the money for us....dont get me wrong though! we are in business to make it BUT im teaching him life skills too. He has one more year and he will be an Eagle Scout and for that I am blessed! He is doing way above average in school and should be bumped up a grade even though he is really able to be in a lower grade because of age....he talks about being an anesthisiologist(sp) and has for a few years......so, I see value in showing him a good grounded version of hands on work ethic and dealing with normal everyday working people...its a skill that isnt taught in school.

Back when I tried to find help and thought all I wanted was a simple person to teach.....boy was that a task to find. In collage and cant make change or see work that needs to be done without being told like TAKE out the trash.

Its a teaching thing as much as a money thing for me.

Sounds like a good kid.....and a good Dad.

Social skills are all but dead with the new generation. Everything is via an electronic device and none of them know how to interact in person. Your coaching will go a long, long, way to ensuring his success in life.