It was bound to happen

Residential
1

…my first lowball.

I went to a town home community to give a quote to a resident, each unit is the same. They wanted to “team up” with some neighbors, to bring the price down (fine by me). Three units total, 40 panes total in/out each unit. I had the lady sold on local, professional service…satisfaction guarantee - full service…yadayada. A little time goes by, and no call back. I give her a call today, and her old window cleaner quoted her half of my price. Here is the math:
1 unit has 40 panes of glass = My price $160, minus $25 coupon, minus another $15 for quantity discount. Final price per unit $ 120
3 units x $120 = $360

Their Price = $60 per unit

I know each unit would take a guy an hour to complete if removing & cleaning screens, doing interior/exterior, clean sills and tracks. Plus I looked up this company and they are located over an hour drive time away.

So that’s three hours of labor, plus an hour of drive time there, and possibly another 1/2 hour - 1 hour drive back or to the next job. That’s 4-1/2 - 5 hours for $180???

Shoot me now…

I hope they jack up their price after realizing their mistake(s). Either that or I am going to seriously have to reconsider my pricing for this area.

2

I really hope this isn’t taken the wrong way…

I don’t like the term ‘low baller’. There’s really no way to tell how the person operates their business, so you have no way of telling what their operating cost are. Although their pricing was lower, their profit margin may be higher.

Bottom line: If the person is not charging enough, he won’t be in business for very long at all. The quality of his work will suffer, which will ultimately make you look better.

Then there’s another angle… Some business operate on the premise of making everything perfect. They have to charge a higher price to make everything 100% perfect. Suppose the customer only wants something 75% perfect. The bidder who discovers what the customer WANTS will usually win the bid. The person who bid on what HE wanted done loses.

Now a really good salesman will find out what the customer WANTS, then show him whats possible, and make him WANT the 100% best. Now the customer is willing to pay a higher rate for 100%.

If somebody is able to make a customer happy, and put money in the bank, is he a low baller just because his bad was half that of other competitors?

Sorry for the “rant”, it’s not directed towards anyone. I’ve been accused of being a low baller and a hack before - not because I didn’t charge enough - or because I did low quality work - but because I can operate at a lower rate (and still remain profitable) then another company.

Hopefully my words made sense…

3

Same as “We Wash”, please don’t be offended…But…If the fella already has his equipment and you are accurate on your time table, the fella made about $45 dollars an hour. He may never crack a window and wipe a ledge. He may not do the screens. He may have rented porn on their cable TV. You will have to approach the customer that you missed, (you don’t make anything out of those…), and ask them if they would use them again.
That being said.
I shoot for $60., (just cuz i like to say “buck a minute”) So by your standards, I too am a low baller . But ,I need to point out that this is always by my competition and never by a customer. Most of my customers tell me horror stories of the guy before me that did half the job at twice the price. After cleaning windows for almost thirty years,I am able to do my job quickly, thoroughly and efficiently. If I’m not yapping with the customers and petting dogs and such, three small houses ,about an hour apiece, Not great but it will pay the bills. I don’t know about the rest of you, but I have felt the economic crunch. I see it on the grocery shelves and in my mailbox. I have lost customers that have lost their businesses. One fella that owned a car dealership is getting in the window cleaning business. I’ll help him where I can cuz he’s a good guy. even though I know it may not be in my best interest to do so. (Cuz I believe heavily in Karma).

I am afraid that as “Obamanomics” kicks in that you are in for a rude awakening.

[B]THEGLASSMACHINE[/B]
[I]“because glass looks it’s best when you can’t see it”[/I]

4

Thanks for the input.
The reason I was claiming this other guy to be a lowballer, is that all of the other residential jobs I have picked up, have not had any qualms about price…until this one. While I am relevantly new to the scene, I always said I would adjust my pricing to the market. I thought I was spot on, until my bid was cut in half. In my mind, $45/hour doesn’t pay the bills once the costs of doing business are taken into account. At that point, you are working for $15 an hour. I should note that I work in an area with really high taxes, plus the economy, and obamanomics…it sucks.

Micah - I see your point on selling the cutomer what they want. But when the customer wants an interior/exterior job, I give them my int/ext price…maybe she didn’t care about the screens being washed, but I am not about to pick apart my pricing item by item. I do ins, outs, or both…choose. But you are definately correct in your statement.

I was a bit bummed out at first, but in reality, these are not the type of customers I want anyways. When it comes to residential, and PRICE is the deciding factor, I would rather pass. These people will undercut the next guy, on and on… Storefront or commercial is another story altogether.

That being said, I am going to review my pricing structure, and adjust according to my demographic. At first I was all about “flat rate” pricing, but the more I think about it… five dollars spends differently in everybody’s eyes. Oh well…on to the next one.

5

Plus I should also note that I quote on a per pane price, not necessarily amount of time. Reason being is you can’t estimate for ecerything - moving furniture, rabbid dogs, landscaping, etc… I have found per pane works best. But in this instance, this other guy is cleaning for $1.50/ pane. How many of you charge $1.50/pane??? Because when I was doing my research, & asking questions about pricing, I don’t think anyone said they charge that low. But then again…maybe I was wrong.

6

If you are just now feeling the affects of low balling, be happy. it’s been going on here for 10 years. But we are in the high rise commercial end of the business, although we do houses also. The commercial real estate market has collapsed in this town (St. Louis), and our industry with it. We aren’t getting the money we did 20 years ago for the same buildings. Everyone is underbidding the last guy who underbid. We don’t have 1/2 the work we did last year. Fortunately, it’s starting to show signs of recovery.
So don’t feel too sorry for yourselves, it could always be worse. Besides, the economy will rebound, and we will be back in the saddle again.

7

1.50 a pane is on the low side of what is typical. However, what if because his price $60.00 a unit, he landed 10 more units?

Have you been losing a lot of bids, or is this more of an isolated problem? The reason I say that is if your closing rate is 100%, you may be able to charge more. You’re % rate will go down, so will your work, but your profits should go up. Don’t change your pricing drastically because somebody came in lower - instead, I would work on selling on quality rather then price. You have to accept that this won’t work every time though. Don’t let rejection get to you. They’re future customers… they just don’t know it yet.

8

Like I said, I am fairly new to the scene. And of the jobs I have quoted and called back, this is the first one where the customer told me “the other guy’s price was half”. I consider this an isolated incidident, as I have not had issues with pricing on other jobs. But I also want to make sure that I am competitive in price. As far as altering my pricing, I firmly believe that market sets the price, so whatever market I am targeting, the price will reflect that. (not by much though)

Micah- I’ve never liked the idea of high volume, low margin pricing. Sure I could go around and bid everyone in my area $50 bucks to clean their windows, but what happens when all the windows are cleaned? You have to keep a balance between your market share, and your pricing. Otherwise you are leaving money on the table. Very few industries can work in this manner.
Think of Home Depot vs your local hardware store. I cringe when I go to Home Depot, because of the service, but I enjoy their low pricing.
I also cringe when I go to the hardware store, because I know I am paying more, but at least I can pick the old guys brain for some good advice.

I have found it to be true that if price goes down…so does something else - like service, quality, reliability, etc…
And I have also found the exact opposite to be true - most times, you get what you pay for.

I should also note that it seems some people are in this for a paycheck, while others are trying to build a business. None the less, I just wanted to share my story, and see how many of you are charging $1.50/pane for resi work. Thanks

9

Oh boy, what a thread!!! Especially after the goings on of today. Long day here for I DO WINDOWS. Had a storms over 6x6 French pane job with a house wash–first thing–power washer died, I mean died! Then the windows wouldn’t open to pull the storm panels out from the inside (painted shut) ((and what sucks most is I even test three windows when I bid the work. I guess I picked the random three that weren’t stuck.)) And to top it off, the storms were so old and weak that we had to put about 30% more time into each one. BUH!!!

But here is actually my response to the above:

I am not really found of low-ballers. Call them what you want, but I call them low-ballers. And the customers that hire them too–they suck even worse.

I had a quote go out via email today. Nice house. wants in/out windows and gutters. I quote it, and have my secretary send it via email. She calls back, picks a day next week, and gets on the schedule. Yeah, another job.

Until----one of my competitors calls me this afternoon. “Hey Bert, I got a house I am fixing to look at. You interested in helping me one this one? She also has gutters and wants them cleaned out as well. It’s an interior/exterior job. You In?”

I asked where it was because I had a sneaky suspicion about this. He says, I’ll call right back. So he does. He tells me he quote her at $385 for all.

I ask again, “where is this house, Charles?” He tells me what street its on. Same street as the one I bid. I said, “was her name Mrs. Doe?”. He said, “Yep thats her. I got the job. When can you come help me do it?”

This guy doesn’t even do gutters. He subs me out for it. Usually in the past, we just trade out work instead of paying each other for it. I am re-thinking, probably stopping, this process.

I call the office and tell the lady’s that Charles got the job. They tell me that this lady had just called and canceled her service date.

Ok, so I lost a job. No big deal. BUt what the customer doesn’t know is that my competitor is hiring me to do it for him.

So I get back to the office tonight and call the lady. I told her that I had just gotten back to the office and had a message that she canceled. I asked her why she canceled and told her that i wanted to make sure that I didn’t miss something. She told me, “We just decided that we weren’t gonna do it right now.” I said, “OK. call me if you do it in the future.”—I was totally playing like I believed her.

So I give it a few minutes or so and I decide to call her back. This is verbatim what I said, “I am so sorry to bother you again. But, I was going through all of my messages after I spoke with you, and I had a message from a competitor, that we help out occasionally, regarding cleaning your gutters for him. Are you aware that he does not do gutter cleaning and that he hires us to do all of his larger jobs when he can’t handle them alone? He has contracted us to clean out your gutters, and I was wondering if the Friday next week that you had originally scheduled was a good day, or would you like to pick something else? I’d also like to know why you canceled us and hired him when I know that his price was nearly identical to ours.”

She was speechless, and I was totally pi$$ed off. She told me that he was also gonna do her ceiling fans and chandelier for her at the same price. I informed her that we don’t do price matching, but that we would have done that and maybe more, if she only asked.

We agreed to phone each other tomorrow for a better schedule date and hung up. I can’t believe the nerve of some people. Don’t they realize that this world is a small one and that kind of crap will come back to bite them in the shorts. Karma, hell yeah thats Karma.

I have another job scheduled to trade off with this guy on Saturday. It’s an awning cleaning job. He doesn’t do those either. I think after both of these jobs are over, I will not be doing any more work with him. It sucks too because we have had a decent working relationship in the past especially for competitors.

One more note: I am going to chew off the ass of my secretary that didn’t get the deposit that is required on ALL jobs when they schedule! She probably wouldn’t have canceled us if we had up front money like we normally do!

AAAAARRRRGGGGHHHHHH!!!

10

"My karma ran over my dogma"
I hate those kinda days.

11

i understand BERT , that woman made you eat poop, but you were still going to get the job,AND the money in a roundabout way . " Another day,another dollar" is the expression,i believe.

12

Since I’m pretty new, I’ll need clarification here…

If I count all my panes, cut ups, 2 panes for double hungs, etc., what kind of price should I be looking at, on average to wipe frames, wet-wipe sills, squeegee and wipe edges and dry brush the screens?

I’m aiming to make $60 per hour, mostly because I don’t think my competition is going over that amount. I see comments from customers at “Angie’s List” telling how the guy was there for 6 hours and charged $250.

I don’t see how someone in the midwest is able to make $120 per hour, Dormatex ?? (or whatever it was that your original post stated). Admittedly, I’m a bit ignorant though.

13

Brian -
Like I said, I go by a per pane price. And although I am quite new to this myself, it would take me about two hours to do each unit - so I would be making $60/hour also.

I was just stating that a guy who was in high gear and highly skilled, could probably do it in an hour’s time. But that is not me…yet.

14

Also Brian -
If you were going about my speed, six hours at a job is quite a bit of windows - about 120 panes. So in the example you gave about six hours = $250 you would be looking at a little over $2/pane (doing my math).

Pricing is going to vary by area and market, but I thought there was more money in Residential than this…

15

Very interesting, indeed.

I’m sorry you hit the brick wall of reality that some customers just want the cheaper solution.

In a way, its our fault if all we offered is a higher price, and they don’t turn out to be price-shoppers at all…(not to say that this was true of you)

Remember this, too:

[B]Different window cleaners have different ideas as to what they are “worth”.[/B]

Let me repeat that:

[B]Different window cleaners have different ideas as to what they are “worth”.[/B]

Window Cleaner Doug may believe he is worth $45/hr and does a great job.

Window Cleaner Bob believes his time is worth $65/hr and does a great job.

Window Cleaner Jim might believe that his time is worth $150+/hr and does a great job.

All of them can get what they want, if they do it right. None of them are necessarily “low-ballers” per se, their often just hard-working people who have a lower estimation of what their own time is/should be worth.

Of course, Window Cleaner Jim usually lands fewer jobs, and has to flex more marketing muscle to charge what he does, but then again, he only has to work 1 day for every 4 that Window Cleaner Doug works.

And also remember that even if you have a local competitor that is willing to work for much less than you, he can only do a certain amount of work. And if he ever tries to expand, his system will fall apart, so he’s only a small threat, at best.

16

Not sure re :Q of panes and pricing, probably jacked thread.

Will comment of “low baller” coming in behind you, cutt’n your bid.
Call’em what you want, their our competition.
It’s a fact of life, it’s gonna happen no matter the profession.

It’s a dog eat dog world out there people, like it or not … deal w/ it!

17

Of course lowballers are a way of life, and consistent lowballing really gets you nowhere. Maybe times are that tough, maybe I charge too much.

WAIT…Now I know what to do! I am going to advertise everywhere $50 full service window cleaning. And of course I might be only making $8 per hour, but I’ll drop my insurance and my bond, but I’ll just lie to the customer instead. Next I’ll get rid of my work van, and build a small trailer for my mountain bike so I can haul my tools around. Then I’ll franchise the idea… I like where this is going. Oooh! I could tell customers I only accept CASH - then screw the government and taxes. The we’ll move into your territory and bid storefronts for 10 cents per pane - any size! I can just scoop some windshield washer fluid out of the bins at the gas station - screw soap!

I think I have just figured out my window cleaning empire. MMWWAHAHAHAHA

Then I’ll change my fake business name to Lowballers Window Cleaning - Where we beat any bum’s price! Guaranteed!

Okay enough of my rant…so anyone want to answer if they are charging $1.50 per pane residential or should we just kill this thread right here?

18

I bid a job at $450 today and heard the lady gasp.

66 cut-ups (on the inside of house only)
24 DH’s (on 1st & 2nd Level)
2 Dormors (outside only)
3 transoms
1 single pane at a 3rd Story level
1 single pane at a 2nd story level
1 large basement slider
1 patio set (2 thermal doors)

Comes to 125 panes. Cost / pane = 3.60 That included a hand wash of screens. If I dry-brushed the screens, I would have taken off $50, so the Cost / pane would’ve been 3.20

Last job I had was 42 panes at 190… 4.52 per pane. All panes were DH’s, 1st & 2nd Story, except for 3 basement sliders and a storm door. That job took me 5 hours. I’m new at it, did a thorough job, and the customer talked a lot (and I had cat hair to deal with).

19

Very true. I also believe that Price is never the real issue

20

I have a basis for charging per window. I also add other factors in to that so it is a melting pot formula for bidding but it usually works for us. But to answer your question, I charge $12.00 per window, inside and out, includes washing the screens, regardless of the size–to a point. So I guess, if you count that as 4 panes, it comes out to $3.00/each. If its a casement, then 2 panes is $6.00/each.

Does that help?