Service Master Prices

[Bill Soukoreff]

I just booked a job with a customer who told me I was cheap. I have been told a lot of things, but never that I am cheap. :shock:

He was quoted $450 to clean 3 small bedrooms (townhouse), 20 stairs and a small living room. That was for a "basic clean" and the tech would advise him on other services that might be needed.

What's going on?

 

[hogjowl]

I don't think ServiceMaster has uniform pricing for all franchises. It is my understanding that they have time and motion studies for most services they provide that indicates to them how long certain activities should take and then they price accordingly for the hourly rate they need to be profitable.

I suspect the particular franchise you are talking about does a bunch of restoration work and doesn't care about normal residential work. So, he's probably pricing the residential work high.

 

[Bill Soukoreff]

Yeah, I think you nailed it. I was surprised they even did residential. That makes sense.

 

[Willy P]

They don't - I just lost a bid on a hotel with a fair and reasonable bid.

 

[Joel D]

they are high here too. I booked a job with a woman for $330 last year she said a friend got an estimate from servicemaster to clean a house about the same size as hers for a $1000.

i wish there was more companies around like that

 

[Bob Foster]

The dropped their drawers on pricing here about 6 months ago.

Willy and I got Yellow Trucked on a 14 story hotel.

 

[Kevin. McCreary]

Yeah I have one franchise in my county that is higher priced, because the really don't care
if they do residential cleaning as they are far too busy with DR. The other franchise to the west of
me is a cheap hack that uses OP on everything.

 

[Rawb]

I live in Calgary and there are 5 separate franchisees in this area. The residential, janitorial, commercial and disaster restoration franchises are all owned separately from each other with the commercial franchise divided into North & South territories. I just know they don't pay their carpet cleaners all that well. When I worked for a company 10 years ago, I was paid 30% of the gross with no expenses or deductions. Service Master pays their contractors 35% and they incur all of the expenses essentially. That's a pretty bum deal. I would think that 50% would be a more realistic and fair percentage to pay a contractor if they're doing everything but acquire the contracts.

 

[starrett]

Just to clear up any confusion. There is no uniform pricing within the system. Franchises are for the most part indepently owned and that owner has the say on prices charged, type of work offered and products/equipment purchased and used. Many of used are very similar to the independent, just flying the yellow banner.

 

[Newman]

Wow, the only customer that ever called me cheap was a commercial site Manager where I was bidding against the yellow truck. I wanted to revise my bid...

 

[Rawb]

Just to clear up any confusion. There is no uniform pricing within the system. Franchises are for the most part indepently owned and that owner has the say on prices charged, type of work offered and products/equipment purchased and used. Many of used are very similar to the independent, just flying the yellow banner.

What would be a fair percentage to pay a contractor whom essentially incurs all of the expenses? In your opinion that is.

 

[minuteman]

Don't mean to stop the flow of the thread but, is SM like or part of SP in the USA?

 

[WANDMASTER3]

i work for servicemaster in visalia ca... we have 4 carpet techs and each do about 2 to 3 jobs a day.we have no complaints on our prices because our customers are paying for the service, not just to get there carpets cleaned.

 

[Rawb]

i work for servicemaster in visalia ca... we have 4 carpet techs and each do about 2 to 3 jobs a day.we have no complaints on our prices because our customers are paying for the service, not just to get there carpets cleaned.

Are you commercial, residential or both?

There are 5 franchisees in Calgary, AB. Commercial is divided into North & South, Resi is separate, as is Disaster and Janitorial.

I've looked into purchasing a Service Master franchise and depending on the population, one can purchase the territorial rights for all branches. Otherwise, it's one fee for commercial, one for residential, disaster etc.

 

[WANDMASTER3]

were commercial, residential,restoration, and construcion.im carpet cleaning ,upholstery cleaning and wrt certified.

 

[Rawb]

were commercial, residential,restoration, and construcion.im carpet cleaning ,upholstery cleaning and wrt certified.

How do you like the Servicemaster chemicals compared to say ProChem or Ultra Chem Lab products (if you've used them in the past)?

The prices are good and cheap for sure, but I found some of them to be a disappointment. They aren't as effective on heavily soiled commercial carpet and I have found other chemicals to do a better job. I wager the chemicals would work just fine in a residential setting.

 

[WANDMASTER3]

ihave to agree with you all we use are servicemaster products and sometimes they dont work as good as other products.specially now that were mainly using "grren" for carpets.

 

[Ed]

ServiceMaster products are comparable to other brands. We use mostly SM products but do use others as well. There are a lot of great carpet products out there. The problem I have with SM is that they are stuck in the 70's with some of their product line. Too many additives. "Green" anything sucks, unless you are cleaning very lightly soiled carpet. Green cleaning is the largest hoax ever perpertrated on the American public except for Obama's policy of change. You can have it "green" or you can have it clean, but you can't have both.

 

[WANDMASTER3]

lol...i agree with u but unfortunately thats what our boss wants us to use for every job.

 

[Rawb]

ihave to agree with you all we use are servicemaster products and sometimes they dont work as good as other products.specially now that were mainly using "grren" for carpets.

Have you tried mixing the Green for carpet with anything else? I mixed Ultra P with the Green for carpet and it made the Ultra P less sudsy and bubbly. I'm not going to use the Ultra P or TLC anymore. They make me sneeze and cough in confined spaces. Not good at all.

The Green is good for maintenance but not for cleaning really dirty carpets. There are a few other green products I am looking at that apparently work really well. Only time will tell.

 

[R W]

I think that basically there is a certain % of customers that will pay any price, as long as the company is a "Big Name".....SS, Coit, Sears. They believe that they are getting the best service available because of the name. In a lot of cases, they probably are.....in a lot, they are not.

I priced a job today which I thought was fair, even a little bit high. The custy jumped right on it without hesitation. Little did I know that her neighbor works for SS. If I knew that, I would have priced even higher.

 

[WANDMASTER3]

ihave to agree with you all we use are servicemaster products and sometimes they dont work as good as other products.specially now that were mainly using "grren" for carpets.

Have you tried mixing the Green for carpet with anything else? I mixed Ultra P with the Green for carpet and it made the Ultra P less sudsy and bubbly. I'm not going to use the Ultra P or TLC anymore. They make me sneeze and cough in confined spaces. Not good at all.

The Green is good for maintenance but not for cleaning really dirty carpets. There are a few other green products I am looking at that apparently work really well. Only time will tell.

ill mix with ultra pro sometimes or a chem we use called 4-U.