This has been the best community I have ever been able to be a part of. Everybody on here is incredibly friendly and helpful. I have spent the last month researching everything I could about pressure washing. I’ve practiced on many families houses for free with rented equipment from my boss and am proud to say that today I made the leap to purchase my own machine. A 5 GPM @2,500PSI, Honda engine, General Pump, belt driven.
I am a full on newbie still but am aware that endless uneducated questions are a big nono here. So I come to you all with my current plan seeking you guys to point out what I may be missing or a flaw.
I have 2 weeks before this machine arrives at my doorstep. I am also aware that I am a little late for this season so I am trying to start off running. In the next 2 weeks, I plan to, purchase a surface cleaner that is well suited for my machine most likely under 20’, purchase a buffer tank of 55-100 gallons, purchase either a ford ranger, mazada rebranded ford ranger, or a Toyota Tacoma or tundra. 2 Reels with 150 ft garden and pressure hose. I plan on doing about 1,000-2,000 door hangers in my area as well as advertsing in other methods while I wait for my set up to get here.
Is there anything I am missing before I should start my first day of surface cleaning in a residential area?
Thank you to everyone who replies I appricaite it so insanley.
I think 150ft of pressure washer hose is not enough I keep 250 on the reels and often need to add another 100 . When buying reels make sure there rated to hold that much
Advertising is important now. Here’s the thing, though: You don’t need to spend weeks passing out 100,000 flyers. Rather, you need to have a MULTITUDE, an ASSORTMENT, some might even say a PLETHORA of advertising methods.
You need to be in the newspaper, in the classifieds and the business card directory.
You need to be a Chamber of Commerce member.
You need to be on facebook buy/sell groups, maybe some paid ads, and have an FB page made up.
You need to have a website with SEO. You might not be able to afford SEO at first, that’s fine. In that case, make sure you are directing people to your site’s purpose built dedicated landing page.
You need to have NICE business cards. Studies show that standard cards on normal paper aren’t worth the ink they’re printed with. Spend $20 extra per 500 cards on vista print - they are having a 50% off sale right now.
You need to have yard signs.
You need to have vehicle signage.
You need to have craigslist ads. They are $5/each/month now. I currently have 5 running in various sections. Make sure you list a bunch of keywords at the bottom of the ad. My bigger jobs come from these.
You need to do 5 around whenever you have a job.
You need to be hanging flyers up on community boards in gas stations, thrift shops, hardware stores, wherever the heck you can.
Some of these might work for you, some might not. I have had success with many of these and not with others. (For me the “never again” ones were community board postings, flyers, and yard signs.) Thus, you will need to gauge which ones are good. (By “good,” I mean provide you at least 100% ROI.) Drop the ones that don’t perform. Until you get word of mouth going, you need to be everywhere. Everywhere any potential client looks, you are there.
Remember, that nice machine isn’t worth a freaking penny if you don’t have houses to wash with it. For now, you aren’t a pressure-washer, you are a marketer. Now get out there and make some money.
Oh, and one more thing: Find yourself a 100-gallon leg-tank for the back of that Ranger or whatever. WHen I first started I had to turn down what could have been a minimum of $1000 of work because I couldn’t bring my own water. It’s not hard to get set up, so do it ASAP.
I will be doing the same thing next week out of st. Louis mo. I’m coming up against a pretty hard deadline with with some student loans and need a bit more income to keep things running smoothly. Once I can pack my weekends I hope to move full time. Being an RV mechanic is driving me up the wall. I’m ready to go! Good luck man hope all goes well.
Ouch. I understand that. We had a few come in when I was with kenworth. They’re a real pain in the butt. You can’t get to anything without disassembling half the rv and working with boots off clean uniform and latex gloves to insure nothing got a smudge
