I have an opportunity to wash school buses for a local school. There will be 41 buses that will need to be washed only twice a year. Any advice on how to price this out would be much appreciated. They are in a gravel lot so no reclaim, they will also provide water. Currently i have only cold water machines, would this present a problem?
I’d probably want to get $40/piece but that might be a little high. Lowest I’d go would be $30/piece. Depending on your climate cold water might lose effectiveness in the winter. However this is my first winter fleet washing and I’ve only ever used a hot water machine so I’m not super qualified. I’ve also heard that sometimes a layer of ice can form on a stationary truck and you need the hot water to melt it off before you wash it. I’m in Mississippi though so I haven’t run into that yet lol.
By the way, how did you come by this job? I’ve thought about approaching someone about washing the local school buses but I don’t know who I would need to talk to.
I called a local truck wash station and they said they would charge $45. I would think i should be a little higher then that but?? I don’t want to sell myself short. I got the opportunity by cold calling the transportation office at the school.
In that case I would probably go $40-$50. I base my prices on a local blue beacon. Basically the way I understand it is that a stationary truck wash is probably going to be better, but if you can deliver 90% of the results at the same price while also saving them the money they would spend sending all the trucks there and back, then you’ll have a winning quote.
So i just met with them today and they shared the current quote they have. They also want the inside of the bus wiped down and the floors moped with a disinfectant (Bleach water) in august. They are paying $12 per bus and $65 for the inside once a year. they would like to have the buses washed a second time in the winter with out the interior cleaning. It appears that they may be only washing the buses with hot water not chems basically just a wash down.Should the second wash be higher since it only includes the exterior or should i run for the hills lol.
Yeah honestly that’s more along the lines of what I expected a school district to shell out. I personally would run because I don’t do janitorial work. And I would only take them at $12/piece if I did a demo and knew for sure I could hit a minimum of 10/hr. That’s just me though.
I agree on the 10/hr that’s more along the lines of my normal hr/rate. I suppose i could demo them for the first cleaning as a test. As far as the interior cleaning i normally run a two man truck so one guy could clean the interior while the other washes.If the whole thing can be knocked out in one day then its pretty good money at $75 per bus that’s roughly 3k for a days work, not bad. Thanks for the advise.
$12 per bus is only good if they are washing weekly. There is a lot of grime build up in 6 months. I was getting $15 a bus for weekly washing in the late 90’s. The black mat flooring in a bus takes a lot of clean water mopping to avoid white swirls left over when it dries.
