Residential cleaning is a rip off! Why pay someone to do something that we can do ourselves? It’s super expensive and never great service. Cleaning companies make huge profits and are just racking up the money…but not sharing it with their staff.

Yep. A lot of these statements are true of the industry. However, a lot of them are not true of most cleaning companies who are working hard to build reputable businesses. I believe it’s important to change these overall beliefs, demonstrating that cleaning is about more than, well, cleaning. It’s about a quality of life. To do this, I want to start by being completely transparent about the real costs of where your hard-earned money goes.

 TRUTH 1: HOME CLEANING IS AFFORDABLE FOR MOST HOUSEHOLDS

There is a misconception that to invest in residential cleaning services, one must be earning hand over fist in cash, with lots to spare. The key to affording it is working with your budget and developing a schedule that suits your lifestyle. For instance, there are a number of ways you can split a $440 monthly cleaning budget. Let’s break it down here:

Monthly Cleaning Budget: 440 CAD

Results in: 8 cleaning hours / month at 55 CAD / hour

Cleaning Options:

• Option 1: 1x/month for 8 hours, 1 lump sum payment, monthly cleaning list

• Option 2: 2x/month, 4 hours/visit, 2 lump sum payments, cleaning priority list

• Option 3: 2 hrs/week, 4 lump sum payments, weekly cleaning priority list

While the budget remains the same, the spacing of payments and type of cleaning can be manipulated to fit your family’s budget and life schedule.

TRUTH 2: PROFITS ARE INVESTED BACK INTO THE CLEANING COMPANY’S PEOPLE

To be incredibly frank, Clean Club Calgary currently has a slim margin at only 10% in profit. This goes directly back into the company and the development of our people through team building workshops, individual training, and educational opportunities. In addition, 90% of what you pay for is for a lot more than clean floors. It supports an entire ecosystem that supports Calgary’s economy, both in terms of service offerings and in adding jobs. The reality is you are supporting a local business, along with the costs of running a reputable, ever-improving company. This breaks down into specific business, operations, and human costs.

BUSINESS COSTS

• Insurance: making sure that both our customers and our team/business are covered with the proper type and amount of insurance is crucial to building a reputable business. By having the right insurance, we are able to stand behind both our team and our customers should an issue arise.

• WCB: if anything happens to our team while on the job, we must take care of them. This means investing in WCB coverage to, again, protect both our team and our customers.

• Background Checks: you are trusting us in your home with all your personal belongings and your family members! We cannot, and will not, hire anyone who has a history with red flags. This means covering timely and accurate security checks to make sure we continue to earn your trust with the right people on our team.

• Team Payroll and Business Taxes: as with most businesses, one of our largest overhead costs is the employee payroll. At Clean Club Calgary, this accounts for more than half of your hourly rate. In addition, there are also those fun CRA taxes, such as GST, Payroll, and Corporate taxes that all incorporated businesses must pay. We are a business who takes pride in paying our team a healthy living wage while still remaining in good standing with the CRA.

• Administrative Fees: all of the above have monthly administrative fees to obtain proper coverage and certifications, along with ensuring we remain up to date with industry organizations.

OPERATIONAL COSTS

• Overhead costs: items such as cleaning supplies, office rent, and our user-friendly booking system through Jobber is crucial to ensuring that you receive quality cleaning when you want it.

• Travel Costs: not all cleaning companies do this, but at Clean Club Calgary, we pay our team for travel time and mileage in between cleaning jobs, particularly since a team may clean three sites a day. We do not charge the client for this time, but we ensure that this is covered as travel is a requirement of the job, much like it is for a sales rep.

• Advertising: cleaning is a very competitive industry. Even though word of mouth is our preferred – and most common – way of advertising, we still invest in professional advertising services, such a Google AdWords, to ensure we remain competitive in the market.

• Image: running a professional company goes beyond the quality of service (but never overshadows it). It’s in how we show up, including with what we wear, how we carry and present ourselves, how we communicate and respond to clients – all of this takes time to train, reinforce, and ensure that you receive a consistently positive cleaning experience.

• Ongoing Training: Currently, there is nothing available for residential cleaning training in Calgary. Any training we do receive must be done outside of the province. For instance, I completed my IICRC House Cleaning Technician certificate to properly support my clients, along with onboarding my team through best practices, industry standards, and new cleaning techniques. Since training includes completion in person, one must travel to where the training is taking place. While I would love to bring this type of training to Calgary (future goals!), there is nothing here at the moment for us to send our team to. We account for this when completing our yearly training budget.

HUMAN LABOUR COSTS

• Back-Breaking Work: cleaning is not easy on the body, especially for people who have mobility limits or body injuries. Yes, you are paying us to take this physical labour off of you and, while we are absolutely honoured to do this, we then place the stress on ourselves. You are literally paying us to put additional strain our bodies.

• Team Benefits: to ensure that our team remains in tip-top shape due to this additional strain, our company must take care of them. Specifically, Clean Club Calgary has an excellent health benefits plan that keeps our people happier and healthier. Read more about how we invest in our team here.

TRUTH 3: THE QUALITY OF YOUR HOME LIFE & RELATIONSHIPS IMPROVES

As I sat down with a recent prospect and his wife, he said,

“you are really taking care of things that we would otherwise fight about!”

At the end of the day, he’s right. You are investing in getting your time back in multiple ways – from not having to do the actual cleaning, to avoiding the time-wasting “who does what” convos and “who can hold out the longest” mind games we have all done (myself included, much to my husband’s own frustration). Residential cleaning is as much about providing you with a quality clean as it is about investing in the quality of your personal relationships.

I fully acknowledge that cleaning services are a luxury investment as they are something that most households can do on their own. At the end of the day, though, the primary question isn’t about how much your residential cleaning services cost. Rather, it should be about what impact this investment has on your life. From there, it becomes easier to understand exactly what the cost is – time, money, and harmony – for cleaning your home.

If you are curious to learn more about where your cleaning investment goes, I am more than happy to have a conversation. Contact me when you’re ready.

Alternatively, know someone who wants to understand a bit more about cleaning costs? Share this blog with them!