Background story. I left my original company to join this new company. They offered me more $$, ft employment as a supervisor with a vehicle (I trained the owner of this new company from the point of never having held a squeegee). Ended up not getting the vehicle and was also unemployed for more than a month because “others” needed the $$ “more” than me.
Dude, there is plenty of glass to clean without having to look at past accounts. Get out there and hustle to build your route. If you are good, reliable and professional then word will spread along with your efforts to hustle a route.
Any other reasons you provide are not not, no one will say to take away business from another washer.
So after your done with those few jobs that you have to low ball to get what next ?
It’s residential window cleaning. The phone has to keep ringing to keep you in businesss. Are you going to go steal another list somewhere ?
Seriously man !! Do you want to make it ? Figure out how to get your phone ringing there is no short cut.
This guy is going to do zero damage to his former employees business. Yes , there are guys that will want to steal from you , but when it comes to residential it’s very hard to do it on a large scale. As far as storefront that’s a different story. If you had a guy working your route for a long time ,an he starts to build a rapport with the customers he could put a hurting on your route if he wanted to. Especially by undercutting. But like others have mentioned be weary pal , because pay back is a bitch.
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I do not think this is a great idea. HOWEVER, I am not you. I have lots of residential jobs that I have serviced for 15 years (Hundreds through the company I work for)-- while these people may tell me if something happens to my boss they want ME to do the job— I am not comfortable— as I work with his son and that would be stealing in my eyes. I do not need to poach customers, my reputation will get me my own jobs. BUT if he was dead/dying, and the son wasn’t interested— Yes, I would be their window cleaner. They are comfortable with ME, they’ve only known me for 15+ years. You get what I mean? But unless a deal is worked out to benefit my interests going forward, why would I bother? There is no shortage of work or glass in Florida.
Google is your friend. I’ve seen it with 3 different companies now over the last 2 years-- it is a solid and almost guaranteed sales generator.
“Shortage of work, is shortage of marketing”
Listen to Denver13, he is 100 percent right on the matter.
Why would you do that? Let’s set ethics aside for two minutes and just think financials.
Why don’t you work for those companies anymore? It’s not because you hate window cleaning, otherwise you wouldn’t be window cleaning on your own. Is it because you had the genious idea that you could cut out the middleman (your employer) and make more money by pocketing the profit the companies were making off of your labor? Now, let’s say you go to those clients and offer to charge less and now you are responsable for the overhead that your former employers used to take care of. Plus, you don’t have as much work, because not all of the clients are going to hire you. At the end of the day, was it really worth it? Less of the same clients, less of the same schedule, less of the same money? Hmmmm.
This sounds like Dwight pulling out the Staples customers list he stole and used to beat the computer 
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If you knew it was ok and felt totally comfortable doing it with a clear conscience, you probably would not have asked the question, " If you should or not ". This is your conscience speaking brother. Better follow it. When I don’t in any area of life, it never turns out well. Plus I have to live with it.
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Go for it, you will be out of business soon enough. Enjoy the race to the bottom!
Having said that, this is probably a troll post.
I always believed that if you have to question it, your safest not doing it.
Exactly! If you have to ask is this a good idea, probably not a good idea
I’d like to know how extensive this list is , an what your approach would be.
“ Ya hi Mrs Jones this is joe blow I use to work with the window cleaning company you’ve been using for the last 5 years . if your interested i just left them ,an went on my own I could cut your price by 30%.”
Would it be something like that ?
Out of 20 calls how many do you think you’ll get ?
You can make up a ton of flyers or door knockers , an get more of a ROI , then calling an sounding like a desperate person.
Just my opinion. You’d feel better about yourself . You’ll get customers at a price that makes you a better profit , an the next time you clean them you’ll have a nice smile on your face.
JMO !
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