How's Business??

So, how's business guys? For me, well.. it's been bad since October. Luckily I was able to make some money in Houston after the hurricane but not nearly what was expecting.

Things have seemed to slow down big time. I actually had to run coupons to get some calls generated. Here is my problem. I've got really low prices (almost half of what I normally charge) and I absolutely positively do not up sell (not anything other than extra services not related to carpet.. excluding carpet repair and pet odor removal). But I think I might be shooting myself in the foot trying to be "honest" especially in these times.

I've talked to other people I know who I refer to as "coupon guys". You know, those $59 whole house cleaning guys (with preconditioning an additional $.25 per sq. ft.). Yea, on 2000 sq ft.... that adds up!

I've always had the most minimal amount of respect for those operations (no offense to any of you running those) but they tell me they are SLAMMED. And I believe it considering it's the holidays! I should be slammed too! Instead it's $75, $99, $75, $99 all day long. And my "honest" approach doesn't let me sell the things I could be selling like "pre-conditioning" so if there are no pet stains and no furniture or tile to clean.. then I'm screwed. Which seems to be the typical case lately.

The rest of the year, I've been good. $40/room, great full service cleaning, charging extra for replacing pad, disinfecting pet stains, UPT washing etc. etc. But suddenly... SLOOOOOOW.

So I'm really considering starting a second company.. $59 whole house type of thing. You know what's funny too, my referrals are low, extremely low. I mean maybe 1 or two a month. The bait and switch guys I know tell me half their business is repeats and referalls! And one of these guys is a dry cleaning guy! And he gets more commercial accounts than I ever thought and somehow books them at $.50/sq. ft!

I use to do that when I worked for a bait and switch company. So I know what I can and cannot sell. Plus I know what pisses customers off and what doesn't.. and yes, the bait and switch guys PISS A LOT OF CUSTOMERS OFF! But still, they prosper why the honest guys are stuck out.

Now these bait and switch guys could be full of sh*t.. because frankly, they are. But one guy in particular, the dry cleaning guy, wouldn't BS me. He's been a good friend for a long time and he still doesn't get it why I go through so much effort and expense to do the job honest and right.

So, what do you guys think? I'm starting to think people like getting ripped off. They LOVE IT! I'm really about to say screw it and just go for what I use to know.. buffer, selling each spot for $10-$100 depending on what it is, selling "deep cleaning" "heavy duty preconditioning" and everything else I can think of. The only problem is, those companies don't last.. which is why I'd never do it under my real company name.

I dunno.. maybe some of you guys can help push me either way.. towards the bait and switch or towards doing it the way I'm doing it know. All I know is that I was out for about 10 hours today and I came back with $400. That's typically my average ticket! With $6000 worth of bills a month BEFORE gas and food... $400/day, while sounding nice, just doesn't cut it!


Edited by Atlantis - 19/November/2008 at 8:44pm