Looking to get some fast food chains for window cleaning or getting some grocery stores. Who’s the best person to get in contact with? General managers? And if so, how do I beat the current cleaner
I have a 150 store route with 95% of it based on independent businesses. Very few corporate franchises. I won’t waste my time attempting to market to them now. Not enough money, they don’t care, and billing is absurd. They will also fire you in the blink of an eye. No remorse. There is no loyalty. Just my take on it. I have been doing this for 38 years.
Henry
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I have found the ones around me contract the work out as a block of cleaning the whole store, then that company who has the cleaning will generally not be local to you will set a price they feel they would like to pay to have the windows cleaned. The ones I looked at they told me there was $90 on 1 and $100 on another in my area easy 3 hours work on each( had to be done after 9pm also), so I declined.
I did not seek the work so can’t help on that side.
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Are these national service providers that have given you the work? And do you have any that you’d suggest? I
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How long does it take you to get 150 stores finished? I’ve been looking to make my business mainly storefront and commercial rather than 100% resi. How much does 150 storefronts pull in monthly? My area, there isn’t much competition and people are willing to pay above average for window cleaning so I have an advantage
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I haven’t had much luck with the few stores I did end up doing. Lowes tried to get me cleaning off the hardened bird poop inside their atrium, which I declined of course. It was also a massive hassle getting the ‘authorized’ manager to sign the form, then calling in to the services contractor down in florida to send me a check after giving the special code.
I also did a lot of Taco Bell’s back in the day, yikes. Smeary, oily handprints, dried burrito bits on the sills, drive thru’s…yuck. All that for $60!
Any time you deal with a ‘third party’ such as corporate or services contractor, you may not get paid for up to a month. You also have to work around their schedule, such as inbetween crowds or early in the morning.
I’ll stick to residential. Show up, do a great job, get paid right there and no extra ‘boss’ to give you clearance.
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The company I work for does about 250-300 commercial jobs. I think maybe …4 of them are chains. Most of the “corporate” places are not allowed to hire a cleaner, believe it or not.
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How many employees
@ExpendableYouth
That’s a good point, when I did a few KFC’s the manager of each store paid out of pocket because corporate wouldn’t hire window cleaners. Forgot about that.
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I can’t say how much I despise corporate. If it is not an independent store I won’t waste my time bidding it.
Henry
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Jobs go from 10 to 250. Frequency is every other week, monthly, every two months, and every three months or quarterly. Rates are 1 to 2 per side per plate. I am changing my pricing for new jobs now. 2, 3, and 4 per side. Small, medium, and large plates. Then round off at five dollar intervals. Also pricing at 20 dollar minimums. The better pricing structure usually produces 90 to 100 per hour. The older structure produces between 50 to 60. I have a newer job now with 20 medium plates outs only at 2 bux each. 20 plates is 40 bux. It takes about 25 minutes. My suggestion is to watch some videos. Watch the time line at the bottom. Count the windows. Some of these guys move slow but clean fast. And on the right job bigger IS better. I have a 24, 30, and 36 inch Swivel Sorbo. Still having trouble getting a zero degree swivel handle for Sorbo channels. Bought one but it snapped out and broke real fast. So the Ettore Wide Body Super channel handles are not what they are supposed to be. Just will have to get out my tools and pull a Henry Unger. Build my own! You know when Henry died 20 odd years ago he still had a bench downstairs at his home in Connecticut where he developed prototypes. He was a really fun old guy.
Henry
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How much do fast food chain pay for windows? I tried to price Hardee’s at $50 for a window cleaning. And I got the typical, “we will get back with you.” Reply.
Same here, I even tried to see what it would take to get awarded fast food chains.
I found even if you have many locations the volume of work still couldn’t make the lowcost worthwhile for a business
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Do you have storefront routes or have you left those behind for the bigger commercial work
I have a monthly route 12 accounts, mostly small offices. Would like to expand my route work. Problem is, most places either don’t see a need to pay to have windows cleaned or they had someone clean them every month by the same person for last 25 years.
I gave up years ago on small chains, just wasn’t worth it. Still have other reoccurring routes, great fillers or new guys
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I’ve done pretty well with some privately owned. I have a Wendy’s, some BKs and DQs. The local McDonald’s has me on retainer (which is very sporadic as usually maintenance handles it- decently I might add).
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From what I’ve gathered, Wendy’s is one of the easiest to get right?
Depends on where youre at, Wendys here would rather waste time and money having employees do them and they look like garbage. McDonald’s has a maintenance crew that makes them look like trash too. Some businesses are just a waste of time trying to get, because not all regional managers are business people and dont care about customer perception. It all depends on who’s sailing the ship, because some people dont see the purpose or value in a window cleaners job. Those people are usually douches from my experience.
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I think you might be biased… 
