My good luck has finally run out. I cold called on 23 hotels and motels yesterday. No one wanted their carpets cleaned.
The owner of the last hotel refferred me to another hotel in town, she knows the owner. When I got there, he said that he has someone doing his carpets for $8.00 per room. That was half of what I charged the first hotel. He said that I could clean all 59 rooms right now if I wanted. I told to stick it were the sun don't shine. Just kidding I was nice about it. I'll put him on my mailing list and keep mailing him until he asks me to stop or uses my service.

Successfully starting up a new business is not much about luck, but about persistence. Some people have enough of it to make a go of it; sadly, others do not.
Is there a Chamber of Commerce in your community? If so, join it, participate in its activities, and in this manner network with decision-makers in businesses and other organizations in your area. Be subtle: don't head off to your first meeting seeking to jam a business card or other marketing piece in everybody's hand. Get to know the managers of real estate offices. Offer them free carpet cleaning in their offices on an annual basis, just so they can experience for themselves the effectiveness of your method. Offer to speak to the brokers in a group some morning when they have their weekly staff meeting, and want to learn about something new & useful locally. Go to the pastor of a local church and make a comparable offer to perform a good work on some carpeted portion of the parish's flooring. Maybe he/she might agree to print your name or ad in the weekly bulletin in exchange for your work of charity.

Right after my last post, I received a call from a hotel that I visted yesterday. She wanted me to clean 13 rooms. I was just kiddig Mark, I didnt expect to get a job yesterday on the cold calling. I was just meeting people and letting them know what service I had to offer. I just got spoiled because the last two times I cold called, I got jobs. Bye the way I cleaned my daughters childcare center last week. The director is going to put me on their newsletter and is giving me a receipt for a tax deduction, and I got a chance to meet the property owner

I cleaned two hotel rooms today and my challenger just quit on me. I called Challenger and they called me back right away. I had a wire disconnected at the prong and a female wire disconnected at the lever at the top of the handle. I have no idea how I even did two rooms today. Its al fixed now. Going back tomorrow to finish the job. I told the client I had a family emergency. I was to embarrased to tell her that my machine stopped working. What a day.

8-16 dollars a room, wow, I was blessed with my hotel accounts.

Im getting 15.00 a room the guy says he has some one doing it for 8.00 a room. What are you getting Jon?

I have an account with two hotels, I was charging them $60.00 a room for the cleaning and then I would clean the halways and stairs for free. I also charged 20.00 a room for protectant. At one of the hotels I charged a hundred dollars a room and this covered the carpets, protectant, and furniture cleaning, but did not include the halways. I would probably not get this price at motel 8 or somthing similar but this is a very busy hotel in a casino and they like the results that I give them along with the fact that I can go into a room at check out time and the carpets are dry by check in time, when they used steam cleaning they some times had to keep the rooms closed for a whole day and sometimes even two days. I have never made so much money before I used to work fultime and do residentail carpet cleaning, and still did not make as much as I ammaking now working parttime. I am going to be giving up the casinos hotel because I am taking a job thier as a black Jack dealer, because of benifits for my family and they make realy good money, and I can keep my other hotel account. It sucks because this was my money maker I make about 25,000 to clean it before cost and takes, so it is good money but as a black jack dealer I can make any where from 70,000 to 200,000 a year plus benifits and keep my business going, so I think it is worth it.

Trust me though when I first started I would of gladly accepted 15 dollars a room I would of kept these accounts to pay the bills and then look for better accounts, plus where I was before was a economically challanged area, now I live in the golden state, Cali.
Good luck, and keep doing good work and hunting for good accounts and you will be succesful.

Mo, also do not get discouraged by someone else charging 8 a room keep your price if they are steam cleaning it would be probably a wise business decision if the hotel used you because you can clean the room in and after about an hour the hotel can turn around and rent the room out, that was the big selling point for me.

Hang in there, anyone charging 8.00 a rm will not be in business long. Trust me I know first hand. You will get a lot of guys/gals going around low balling just to work. He's not making any money doing it but he is working(or so he thinks). When I had my cleaning service years ago, I did the same thing. Sure you want your 6,000 sq ft office cleaned three times a week no problem I can do it for 25.00 a night. I was always screwing myself. And guess what I went out of business because of it. I was running around here and there working my ass off and not making any money. Stick with your price. Your time is worth more then 8.00 a room

John, Sounds like your making a good decision for you and your family. Two bad you can't keep the biz and hire someone to do the work for you. Good luck.

Thanks for the encouragement Joe. Are you back in the carpet cleaning business now?

I only do a little here and there for now, I have taken a step back to look at the things I need to change and do to make it a full time biz. Things like getting out of debt with the charge cards, buying some equipment like an Icapsol and a few other things. I hope to go full time in about 3 years.

$7 to $10 per room is what hotels are paying around Cincinnati and Dayton Ohio. Hospitality is not an industry you want to be in if you want to make money. Restaurants and hotels are difficult especially with companies like Marriot. They do a "white glove" test on the carpet after the cleaning and it is very difficult to please them. Of course, they want the best quality at the lowest prices. We should leave these types of deals to the HWE folks.

Not even HWE will pass a white glove test.

ESPECIALLY will not.