Our company started the year off:
7 employees
3 trucks on the road
ready for a huge year…
Shut down March 13th
Since restarting May 4th…
We had 2 employees come back… only able to hire one guy since… I’m also working 6 days in the field
We have been working on a wait list that extends through most of June
Should be somewhere between -$5,000.00 and $0.00 on our YTD P&L July 1st (started at -$35,000 end of april)
We got PPP money but we are treating that money like it is not forgivable
We normally have atleast $20k in the winter fund by end of June, we have $0.00 in it right now
For those that don’t know much about my business, we target mainly residential (80% of our sales) and also do a lot of larger commercial and construction cleanings.
So with all that said here is the data I am looking at…
This time last year, we averaged 8-12 contacts a day on a normal day. During certain periods we would sometimes have over 30 in a day. The first week of May 2020 we had about 6-8 a day. Since then it keeps falling.
yes it was a holiday week which is shorter, but it matches up with what has been trending down all month. We also doubled advertising budget this year.
In conclusion, the issue is this… Between Window Cleaning and Powerwashing we are completing 7 to 9 customers a day. Our close rate this year is around 55%. That means we are only scheduling about 3 jobs a day. With our current schedule and the flow of customers coming in, we should hit a wall sometime in early July. We normally have around a 2 week slow down like most companies around first of august, but then we are normally rolling strong again my end of august. We still have a ton of ground financially to make up this year. Trying to be proactive instead of reactive. We are starting to position our schedule (4 day work weeks starting in July), Expenses (cutting costs), and reshaping future plans. The goal as always is to first be and stay profitable.
March and April were about normal (always weather), May was extremely dry and I easily had my best May in 25 years. June is already booked solid and I pretty much expect the usual lull the end of July beginning of August. Hoping that I will pick up a $10K job that was put off last year due to some building maintenance. I’m predicting I will be only down 10% in sales from last year, as I had one huge CCU job that really made 2019 my best year. I would say 2020 will be my biggest year for total number of invoices. Pretty positive outlook, but our country is going down a scary path right now.
thanks for sharing all those metrics Kyle, its definitely a plan for the best (new abnormal) and be prepared for the worst type thing
6 days a week, I feel your pain, I have a FT guy who doesn’t want to come back . . . yet. So I’ve made other arrangements, and for peak season the goal is to efficiently and in a balanced way with additional resources grab as much as can right now with the positive wave (as long as this weekends events don’t continue and don’t drive people away from ‘normal’ stuff), still, 2 months behind is what it amounts to plus short staffed, there’s no catching up, it’s just skip a cycle and move on, but everyone keeps calling at the same time wanting now lol
there’s no making up ALL the lost ground right now, that’s too stressful, it’s about just picking where we are now and going forward in a profitable way, if possible, or as profitable as possible is probably the better choice of wording. but some may face future restrictions on operations if areas flare up as virus hotspots, or protest hot spots now, who knows
I have been finding window demand sentiment pretty steady nonetheless since spring started
you’re from Iowa, same ol’ cliché right? Make hay while the sun shines, which you are obviously doing as best you can
We are scheduled out a couple of weeks and that trends up for the next month. I’m leery of July as it is a mixed month and August is monsoon season here, even though it is not really raining much folks avoid the cleaning.
I am down ~50% for March, April and May. My guys hurt the most. Two of my guys have now found different work and the one I have left helps in the afternoon after he is done working day shift for the school district. I am having my daughter and nephew come out, green horns but workers. We will be working shorter hours starting next month and only Mon-Thurs, as others have said they are planning. I will be knocking commercial doors and laying out a lot of flyers this year! I have been a terrible advertiser. This needs to be the year I change that. Several bucket bobs are showing up and their work sucks but they are getting work. One guy I spotted and spoke to was charging $75 inside and out on a 50 pane house. He was 3 hours in and half way done. It looked terrible but he was making cash he thought.
We got through because of the tight budget manager at the house. Thank God for a good, smart woman!
I do not foresee that money coming back. I just hope this doesn’t cause folks to go crazy when it swings back through.
@Frozone I currently only have 3 on the schedule right now. I have a solid interview today so maybe 4 by the end of the week.
We have 2 trucks for window cleaning and 1 powerwash truck. Window cleaning truck can hold 3 employees. They are out 45+ hours a week right now. They are killing it knocking out 4-5 houses a day. I have a great WC crew leader and solid techs.
Over the past 3 weeks, I started doing all our house washing and pressure washing by myself. I spread it out over 6 days and I have so far kept up on it and keeping tasks for the business going too.
We took a 66% dive in April. 50% if we count the check we got for a job we did in February. Don’t know May yet but June looking to be business as usual for us. Last week we worked what we count as a full week. It’s only my wife and I, so obviously not gonna pull the numbers you do but it was encouraging to have our income not be from Uncle Sam.
I have a feeling we’ll be busier than we were this time last year. Orlando is up and running. Not that I think that’s a good thing, as I do believe a second dose of this virus will strike. But for now things are picking up, when usually June/July are dead for us.
I really hope all of you can pull through this. I believe a good name is worth more than anything right now and If you have one, you should be ok in the long term.
WOW! it sounds like you are staying incredibly busy!
Do you have someone reconciling your bank account daily?
I hired someone for my office manager this year who I’ve come to learn is REALLY good with the numbers end of stuff. It’s not going to be real useful this year, but i’m hoping next year Her regularly reconciling my accounts will put me in a good spot to do financial forecasting/projections/budgeting on a fly.
Up to this point I’ve had to rely on my book keeper to reconcile my accounts (I’m not good with that stuff) and my book keeper would do it 4-6 weeks after the fact, so it has been tricky to accurately gauge things.
With the amount of employees and working load for us on our schedule… we are swamped. As far as where we were at this point last and where we were planning on being at this point this year… it’s very discouraging. All the effort right now is not building up thousands of dollars in the bank, but trying to overcome shortfalls.
I have an accountant who handles all taxes, payroll, and some minor tasks. I handle all of my day to day bookkeeping. I have systems set up daily and weekly to update all checking, savings, and investment accounts for the business. I formally reconcile my books on QB the end of ever month. I can tell you daily how much money I have in the bank, labor percentages, crew production numbers, expense budgets, etc. I kinda like spreadsheets lol.
@DaveYogi … they announced the other day Missouri is opening up 100% monday… and the estimates and bookings started flooding in… lost an key employee also… and just spend 4k on new powerwashers… when it rains is pours!
It’s always been one of the most deflating things when I’ve had an employee I key employee quite. It tends to prompt me to take a step back (after I vent and collect myself) and remember that God’s my provider, so then I get back to square one and seek the Lord for what he wants me to do, whether it’s wait, or act, and if he wants me to act on pursuing something I’ll ask him how.
I feel your pain @Kyle even though I don’t have nearly as much happening in my small business compared to yours.
