For those of you who run multiple crews, which is more efficient? Two-man or three-man crews?
It would seem that a two-man crew would be able to complete at least two or three average houses in a day. But I would think it would be hard for a three-man crew to do more than three houses due to drive time.
My experience has been that a 2 man crew works best, 3 can work but I have always felt everyone relaxes more with that extra guy instead of going at their usual pace. JMO
I’d have to agree that a two man crew is more efficient than three. However there are two advantages I can think of for running a three man crew. When someone calls in sick on a 3 man crew two guys can hustle that day and still get the work done. On a two man crew someone calling in will cause a big problem. I think a two man crew will burn out quicker than guys working on a three man crew because the pace is easier. JMO
Also depends on where the jobs are and type of jobs. If the jobs are pretty close together three is works better. If a crew is zipping all over town then 2. Also the bigger the job, the more to a crew.
Even if you have a crew of 2 you don’t want them zipping back and forth all over town. Scheduling with efficiency is key no matter how many guys are in the truck.
Very true. I try to make tuesdays one part of town and fridays another and so on. But as we know our customers have busy schedules. Also no one wants half days in week when your schedule 3 or 4 weeks out. Just part of the problem of have one crew.
My mountains of data over the years showed for me that 2 man does 1.5 what a solo guy will do and 3 will do 2x what a solo guy will. Didn’t have reams of data for 4 in a truck, but what I did have showed like only 2.5 what a solo guy will do!
These are year averages and were consistent even as staff changed over the years, there’s always individual days that can be radically different than the year average, but its the year average that counts for me.
Always going to depend on your avg invoice and type of work. A day of tiny storefronts or a several day single high rise job? Little retirement homes or 10k sft customs? Naturally, whatever you have most of will set the bar.
Does anyone do solo crews when you have the manpower to do 2 or 3 man crews?
What I’ve seen in the responses here confirms my suspicions. Personally, I’d prefer to work on a 3 man crew over a 2 man crew, but as an owner it doesn’t seem as efficient. Having a third person makes it more fun, but it also tends to make you feel less personally responsible for the outcome of the job. It would also seem that the communication over who does what would be more difficult with 3, thereby allowing some things to fall through the cracks.
“Hey, did you do the attic windows?”
“No, I saw Jim go up there so I thought he did them.”
"No, I didn’t do them. I just went up there to see if the attic was finished."
Bla bla bla.
I’ve learned that on a long day of all commercial jobs, I’ve gone from 4 to 3 to 2 and still get it all done. Granted, some days are REAL long for 2, but once you’ve meshed it’s no problem. This week I’m bringing a third because we got behind last week and my one helper on Wednesday is new.
On residential I’ve found 2 is most efficient for a crew but like others, very large jobs are usually fine with more.
For residential I’ve always felt a three person crew worked best. Crew leader meets the customer, introduces himself/company and confirms the estimate as the other two guys get everything set up.
One guy starts cleaning the inside, one the outside, and the low man on the to-tome pole gets screens and tracks.
We run 2- 4 depending on how busy we are…
Exactly!
Depends on the people, My experience has been with more independent types who prefer to work solo with occassionally someone else on a big job.
I’ve worked on and/or sent out 2,3,4’s on a regular basis, sometimes some real fun days, to me, do I want fun or profit and forward momentum?
3 is terrible, ok for a rookie and training, but 3 up to speed ended up very unbalanced, it didn’t “flow well”, you just couldn’t seem to get into a zone and just roll
4 is more symmetrical for large homes - 2 inside and 2 outside, worked very very well for the largest of homes,
4 outside, not so well, but I don’t have giant high rise or anything.
Sounds like many who responded are doing In and out of larger homes mostly? Lots of storms etc too?
Here’s another way I can share my experiences, based on profitability, efficiency and production volume:
1 person best for 5+ jobs a day
2 people great for 2-4 jobs a day
3 people (no rookies or training) good for 1-3 jobs a day
4 best for 1 large job, although 2 large jobs (a simple am, pm job line up) could work well too
but 4 people that’s 12-16 man hours in the am and 12-16 man hours in the pm
I don’t have any 24-32 man hour homes in my area (Hollywood Hills, Ca perhaps)
and certainly not a week’s worth day in and day out
it seems, where I live and the homes we service, a tech can do about 1,000sft of home an hour in and out (no storms etc)
as far as a home, that would mean a 24,000 - 32,000 sft home is best suited to 4 man team.
But then again, many of you are doing much more than just window cleaning, so that probably makes the biggest difference in job size and man power preferred.
We do 1-3 man crews. It all depends on the schedule. Sometimes I might have two, two man crews meet at one large house in the morning and knock it out, then split up and each crew do another one in the afternoon, so three jobs that day. Other days I might have 3 guys in 3 different trucks doing commercial routes. It all depends.
Bruce, that is some awesome info, thank for sharing! This is the hardest part of the business to me!
Thanks Steve, glad it helped somebody, that’s all I wanna do with all this mountain of data I’ve collected. I sure wish I had a heads up back in the day on a few things that took absolutely forever to figure out the patterns and get dialed in. At the same time I enjoy hearing other’s findings as well across the nation. Very interesting when the same findings come up from others all across the nation, or globe.
igree with Andrew. We do mostly hight end residential and typically run 3-4 sometimes even 5 on a crew when we are on a really large job. We never have more than 2 employees inside the house though. The crew leader and one other so we can watch everyone at all times.
