Now that's "American"

Tom Rennie, the well-known Scottish carpet consultant, was interviewed by Floor Focus magazine. He predicted the economy for the carpet industry would start a turn around in the second quarter of 2009. That sounds great and I hope he's right, but that remains to be seen!

He also said lower oil prices have made Nylon competitive with Polyester again which is certainly good news for carpet cleaners. There is a great deal of animosity by folks in the business about Polyester. Don Terry covers the cleaning of it thoroughly at our school.

But the most interesting thing he said is that carpet, unlike other floor covering, is a truly "American" product. Carpets, fibers, backings and adhesives are all made in America, by Americans, and are sold by Americans.

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Understanding the Stimulus Bill

A college student asked his economics professor to explain the stimulus bill. The professor said, "Come over to the swimming pool and I'll explain it." The professor gave the student a bucket and said, "Go to the deep end and fill the bucket then go to the shallow end and pour it in."

After a number of trips from one end of the pool to the other, the confused student asked, "But why are we doing this?" The professor explained, "We're trying to make the shallow end of the pool much deeper. Just keep dipping at the deep end and pouring at the shallow end."

The student said, "But all we're doing is wasting time and effort. When this process is over, everything will be at the same level. All we've done is waste our time." The professor replied with a smile, "Congratulations. Now you understand the stimulus bill."

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Gasoline under $2...WOW!

The mentality of consumers continues to amaze me. Maybe P. T. Barnum was right! Forget all those conservation promises. Stop thinking about independence from foreign oil. Quit talking about off-shore drilling. Get that old SUV out of mothballs. "Happy days are here again." *

Race from one traffic light to the next. In this down economy when no one has any spare cash, mash that gas pedal and burn that rubber off those tires. If your family owns two cars, be sure to drive 'em both. Don't plan an itinerary so two or more can ride together. That would save fuel.

Think about this. The drop in oil prices resulted from just talking about reducing our reliance on foreign oil during the presidential campaign. Imagine how low the price of oil would go if we actually put a drill in the ground and had the guts to do the things we talk about, like conserving energy, building new refineries and nuclear power plants. Oh! And driving sensibly.

* The theme song of the "Great Depression."

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Difference of opinion

A survey showed a huge difference of opinion between carpet cleaners and customers who changed services. Eighty percent of the dissatisfied customers gave one or more of these reasons for quitting; misleading advertising, failure to come back on complaints, rude treatment, tardiness, unkempt appearance or poor telephone manners.

When business owners were asked why they thought they lost the job, only 10% blamed their business practices, behavior of their employees or the quality of their service. The other 90% said that demanding or fickle customers, unethical price competition and changing demographics were the reasons they lost the business.

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Pure BS (Bait & Switch)

Bait and switch hurts the carpet industry more than poor quality workmanship by professional cleaners. Here's a link to the most recent example of the affliction that strikes our business every week in some part of the nation. Help stomp this out and you'll immediately see an improvement in the consumers' perception of carpet.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com:80/lanow/2009/03/santa monica wa.html

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Respect your caller

Whether taking an order for service or answering a complaint, show respect on the phone. Good or bad news should be treated equally and politely. Listening is the key to good customer relations. Lead the caller by asking fact finding questions and be sure to listen to their answers.

Respect the caller's intelligence, too. Using technical jargon is a cardinal sin. The average consumer does not wish to become an expert in the cleaning field. But, don't assume they know nothing about the business. They could have had experiences with other cleaning firms and know enough to ask relevant questions.

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Jimmie sez: "Happy St. Patrick's day!"

People often ask about the origin of our little leprechaun. In 1969, my wife and I were on vacation in Florida and sent a St. Patrick's Day card featuring a leprechaun to her folks in Philadelphia. When we arrived back in Indianapolis, the exact card was in our mailbox.

At first we thought her folks had sent the card back to us that we had sent to them. It was the identical card but it was addressed, signed and postmarked in Philadelphia the very same day that we had mailed their card from Florida.

We'd been looking for a cartoon type character for our new residential carpet cleaning business and this seemed to be a good omen. A commercial artist sketched a leprechaun, we liked it and named him "Jimmie" after Elizabeth's father. Jimmie's been mighty good to us all these years.

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The customer is (still) always right

That old adage is truer today than ever! Difficult economic times make it even more demanding on those who provide services to the public. People are spending less money and becoming more particular with whom they spend it.

A scruffy appearance, jeans with holes in the knees, rude T shirts and crude behavior may be hip in television commercials but consumers looking for high quality furniture and carpet cleaning services want clean, courteous people to do the work for them.

Don't be misled by cleaners on internet chat rooms who brag about "FIRING" customers. You better not fire your boss. Don't fall for degenerate ideas from self-proclaimed marketing gurus who prescribe brash, in your face advertising and sales tactics that don't work in our business.

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Competition

Truck mounted carpet cleaning units that use gasoline can do a good job, but they're expensive to operate. Noise, maintenance costs, dead batteries, danger of fire or explosion, excessive down time for repairs and not being able to hook up to water in extremely cold weather are problems.

Some portable machines can do a good job, too. But they cost valuable time in setting up, taking down and stopping to fill and empty the clean water and recovery tanks. Blowing fuses, choking a vacuum system with foam build up and diminishing recovery are all common problems.

Professional cleaners make a profit when the cleaning head is moving across the carpet or the hard floor. Bane-Clene equipment has been developed over many years with these goals; high quality cleaning results, ease of operation, dependability and profit for the operator!

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Focus on sales

Professional athletes are able to project a laser-like focus on their game. Sales people sometimes have a hard time focusing on closing a sale. Cleaning technicians are often so busy cleaning they can’t focus on anything but going home.

The cleaning industry relies on sales. The person who books the job must be a salesperson. Technicians are salespeople that the company relies on for "plus sales." These often represent the degree of profit a company will realize.

Management must stress the importance of everyone selling the benefits of doing business with the firm. Showing pride in our appearance, our work environment and our equipment helps project a positive image that will help everyone in the company focus on success.

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What's wrong with this picture?

As a veteran of WWII, I remember talking with buddies about buying our own homes after the war. Basic freedoms, especially property rights, were in serious jeopardy because Hitler, Mussolini and Tojo wanted to dominate the world. WWII was a good cause.

It was a different enemy when I served in the Korean War. The domineering Communist state owned everything under those totalitarian regimes and deprived people of basic freedoms such as property rights. That war had a good cause although some had their doubts.

So much for two wars and ideology. I don't know how it is where you live, but I have homes in Indiana and Florida and those two states own everything. We're only caretakers. We pay exorbitant property taxes and the better we care for the property, the more we pay the state.

Instead of a dream to retire in a home without making payments, we're saddled with ever increasing property taxes. If you think the state doesn't own the home you live in, don't make your tax payment. You will be evicted from the state's property! King George wasn't that bad.

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Do you want people to like you?

You can help influence the way they feel about you by:

• Becoming genuinely interested in them.
• Smiling at them.
• Calling customers by their names.
• Becoming a good listener.
• Encouraging others to talk about themselves.
• Talking about their interests.
• Making them feel important, and doing it sincerely.

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Interesting article

The Wall Street Journal had an article on cleaning furniture during hard economic times. It explains why cleaning services are busy while many other industries are slowing down.

Between 2004 and 2008*, the number of inquiries to the Better Business Bureau about carpet and rug cleaners (many of which do upholstery) roughly doubled to 313,039, putting it in the top 1% of industries ranked. Yellow Pages ranks Carpet and Rug Cleaners 22nd out of more than 4,000 headings. That category had more than 88 million references last year.

This is the link to the journal article:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123499809059416999.html?mod=todays_us_personal_journal

* I think the country has been in a period of economic hard times that can be traced back to the 9/11 catastrophe. The '04 to '08 increase in BBB inquiries seems to support that theory. In my opinion the wild growth of the past few years has been artificially induced and was bound to come to a harsh ending.

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Pardon me for tootin' our horn

Bane-Clene’s service company in Indianapolis has again been given Angie’s List "Super Service Award." It is presented to those who consistently maintain a superior service rating. Fewer than 5% of the businesses rated on Angie’s List are eligible for this award, and even fewer than that actually receive it.

Angie’s List is the fastest growing consumer organization in the world. More than 500,000 members in 124 major cities submit more than 20,000 reports each month. They describe their project and grade the company’s response time, prices and quality of workmanship.

The management and employees of Bane Clene are extremely proud and grateful for this prestigious award and extend our sincere appreciation along with our pledge to continue to earn the trust of Angie’s List and its many loyal patrons.

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