How to start a great (scalable) cleaning company

If I had to start over, this is how I would start my cleaning company

As my father (Chris) likes to say: “There are a million ways to skin a cat!”. I had never heard anyone else use this odd proverb, until I met Sam.

Beyond sharing the similar proverb, Sam reminded me of Chris in his early entrepreneurial years. While I obviously wasn’t there to witness Chris’ prime business building years firsthand, I have spent my entire life learning from him in the various stages of his career. I’ve heard all his stories, experiences, and lessons that shaped his 47-year career in the commercial cleaning industry, which has given me some understanding and perspective as to what he was like in those prime years.

When I met Sam, a few years ago, we instantly hit it off. We share a lot of common interests and philosophies. Yet what stood out to me most was how much he reminded me of a younger Chris. Both Chris and Sam are men of high moral character, hard working entrepeneurs, and they have similar business stories.

Additionally, both men started their cleaning careers with zero prior experience in the industry. In order to get up to speed on all things janitorial, and better understand what it takes to deliver high quality cleaning services, they spent a large portion of their time on the road visiting job sites, being very hands-on with their cleaners.

What’s admirable is they’ve maintained this approach throughout their entire careers. While many CEOs can’t wait for the day to remove themselves from the front lines and be able to focus on “vision and strategy”, Chris and Sam have remained steadfast that showing up, being visible on-site, checking in on staff regularly, and dropping in on clients/prospects is the best way to build a sustainable and profitable cleaning business.

To be clear, Chris and Sam are not against growth, efficiency, or strategy. They simply understand that revenue is vanity and profit is sanity. Most importantly, the best way to not have the wool pulled over your eyes by your own people, is to have a deep understanding of the business and industry you’re in. Some call them old-school; I call them domain experts and exceptional owner-operators. A dying breed.

While there are certainly “a million ways to skin a cat”, and there are super successful people who did not take the same approach, I respect the way Chris and Sam built their businesses. I believe it is an effective way to build a great cleaning company. Particularly through the first 5-10 years in operation. To be on the road day and night may not be the most efficient by today’s standards, but it is effective and builds a strong and sound foundation.

While the topic of this essay is how to build a great “scalable” cleaning, you don’t have to be hyper efficient from Day 1. Odds are you won’t be. You’ll always be tinkering and identifying ways to get a little smarter and a little faster. Efficiency is important, but don’t stress about it too often in the early innings.

One of the most well-known venture capitalists in Silicon Valley wrote an essay titled "Do Things that Don’t Scale”. By nature, venture capitalists look to invest in companies they believe will be hyper-efficient scalers. VC Paul Graham is advising founders to do the opposite in the early innings. Get in the weeds and get your hands dirty.

The benefit of doing things that don’t scale, in the early days, is that you become extremely familiar with your business, your people, your clients, and the industry. You become an operational expert. While you can’t do this forever, due to potential exhaustion and the risk of being a bottleneck, you would carry this mindset and skillset forever. This is a competitive advantage. Being a domain expert on operations takes time and patience. Another dying breed.

While you may not find Chris and Sam’s method appealing, because it’s hard work, I highly recommend you leverage their approach in the early days. You will better understand your business, build lasting rapport and strong relationships with your clients, and most importantly, it makes it harder for anyone to slip something by you. And there will always be people trying to slip something by you.

But again, “there are a million ways to skin a cat.”

My father was my first teacher and mentor, so naturally my approach to building a great cleaning company was taken from his playbook when I started out. Long days on the road, dropping in on clients, and getting my hands dirty with the cleaners.

Since then, I’ve had many experiences of my own that have shaped how I think about building a great cleaning company. While I still believe the approach Chris and Sam took is a great way to be successful in this business, there are more/better tools available today than they had. As a result, there are ways to optimize and automate many functions that can free up your time and multiply it. Which can set a foundation that optimizes for efficient scaling. Something I am hyper focused on today.

Before I dive into my philosophy on how to start a great cleaning company that’s built for scale, let me define what I believe a great cleaning company is:

• A great cleaning company is one that operates legally and ethically.

• A great cleaning company is one that delivers a high-quality service.

• A great cleaning company is one that solves customer problems quickly.

• A great cleaning company is respected by its peers, customers, and competitors.

• A great cleaning company is highly transparent (internally and externally).

• A great cleaning company can grow revenue, at minimum, 15% CAGR (excluding M&A).

• A great cleaning company can retain >97% revenue YoY.

• A great cleaning company has double digit EBITDA.

• A great cleaning company has no bottlenecks or data silos.

• A great cleaning company is able to scale swiftly and efficiently, expanding their top line while maintaining strong profit margins.

My fellow owners reading this may not agree entirely with my factors or have other factors they think should be included. My ears are always open to hear other opinions, so be sure to drop a comment below and let me know if your definition differs.

At Impact, we currently hit all but two of these benchmarks. Many have been maintained every day in our 70-year history, because we believe they are non-negotiable. The first few points in bold, are our non-negotiables and you’ll never find us violating those principles. Anything that is not bolded, is not always achieved. These are high benchmarks, and they take time attain and maintain.

Without further ado, let’s discuss how to start a great (scalable) cleaning company.

Part 1: The Foundation

This part is critical to get right. You can’t build a tower on toothpicks. Take the time to build the base the right way. This is key to building a SCALABLE business.

From Investopedia: Scalability refers to a business or other entity's capacity to grow to meet increased demand. A business that can scale up successfully should benefit from economies of scale where production costs are spread across more units, resulting in higher profit margins.

A) Get a name and domain

Please pick something unique. I see too many companies with similar names. If you’re not creative or struggling to find something that hasn’t been used before, use Gemini or ChatGPT to provide ideas. Once you have a long list of names, go to Namecheap and enter the names to see available domains. In a perfect world, you want to find a .com domain (.ca is also ok for my fellow Canadians). Worst case, .co is an acceptable alternative and commonly used today. Ideally, you want a strong name with a short domain. As an example, my company is Impact Cleaning Services, and our domain is impact.ca. The only way we could improve our domain is if we were willing to pay $500,000+ to secure impact.com. Which we are not.

Cost: $9.30 USD/year | $25 CAD/year

B) Get a Logo

You don’t need a fancy logo on Day 1. In fact, you’ll probably change your logo down the road. Impact has had a number of different logos in its history. Brands evolve. Keep it simple and clean.

Search “logo design” on Canva and they’ll have free templates. You can mess around with different fonts, graphics, colours, etc. I just did this recently for one of our new companies and it works great.

If you aren’t creative and you would rather have someone else do it for you, hire a freelance graphic designer. Search “logo design” on Fiverr, look through some portfolios, find one you like, message them your idea, and they’ll give you a cost.

It’s worth noting, no one cares about your logo as much as you do. Don’t stress over it.

Cost: Free or $25 USD | $35 CAD

C) Get Incorporated

This part is easier than ever. You don’t even need a lawyer anymore. There are a bunch of online companies that do 90% of the work for you, at a reasonable cost.

If you’re in the US, Doola can get you incorporated for as little as $297.

If you’re in Canada, Ownr can get you incorporated for as low as $499. Bonus: if you open an RBC Business bank account (offered during signup) you get a $300 rebate on the registration. I’ve personally opened two companies with Ownr and am pleased with the process and customer service.

Cost: $297 USD/year | $499 CAD/year 1 (-$300 rebate = $199/year)

*This is not legal advice. If you are worried about the legalities of owning and operating a business, speak to a lawyer*

D) Get Google Workspace

We all know how to use Google/Gmail. Get Google Workspace.

Make your email your first name (ex. bob@cleaning.com). Don’t make it firstname.lastname@superlongcommercialcleaningcompany.com. This is annoying, risks typos, wastes time reciting to people, and it looks ugly.

“But George that’s not scalable… what if I hire someone later with the same name?”. This is a small inconvenience, and you can address it when it happens.

For reference, we have three people in our company with virtually the same name: Sandi, Sandra, Sandro. This can certainly cause some confusion with first name-only emails, but it’s worked so far. If we can make it work, you can make it work.

Cost: $7 USD/month | $9.20 CAD/month

E) Get A CRM

Now that you can legally operate, it’s just you and the open plains. Time to start prospecting! You need a place to keep your contacts, call and email logs, notes, quotes, proposals, tasks, etc. In my opinion, this is one of the most important software’s to have from Day 1. If your goal is to build a foundation that allows you to scale efficiently, eliminate the likelihood of data silos and bottlenecks, and ensure good notes and records are kept, then get a CRM.

While I haven’t used every CRM, I’ve used a fair few. My favourite is HubSpot. It has a free version that gives you all the necessities you need to get to your first $1,000,000 in ARR. I use the free version today at one of the companies I work with, and it does the job just fine.

We also use HubSpot at Impact. We started on the free version and as we learned how to utilize and optimize the platform, we’ve added on additional features. To date, we spend a few thousand a month on the platform and I believe it’s worth every penny.

Cost: Free (upgrade incrementally as you grow)

F) Get An ERP

In the span of my career, I’ve met with or spoken to several hundred BSCs (Building Service Contractors). Most use QuickBooks Online (QBO). While we don’t use this at Impact, I’ve used it for one of my startups. It’s easy to use and easy to get started. YouTube has tutorials if you’re ever stuck on something and need an answer.

My understanding is that most companies “outgrow” QuickBooks and move up to a more advanced ERP as they grow into a mid-market or enterprise size business. However, I was recently talking to an industry friend, and they mentioned that they know a few companies doing over $100M in revenue and still use QuickBooks. I was surprised to hear this, but it would suggest QBO is even more scalable than I thought.

Cost: $35 USD/month | $24 CAD/month

*This is not accounting advice. If you are worried about the financial implications of owning and operating a business, you should speak to an accountant*

G) Build A Website

Building a website is easier than ever since the options are endless. I’ve built websites on WordPress, Squarespace, HubSpot, and Shopify. My recommendation:

• Use Squarespace

• Find a template you like (something sharp, keep it clean, and keep the copy concise)

• Get a Homepage, About page, Contact page, Services page, Location page, and Blog

• List out all services, but don’t go crazy. Start with one main service (i.e Janitorial/Commercial Cleaning). If you feel the need to add a few more, keep it in the same vertical (i.e. Carpet Cleaning, High Dusting, Construction Cleaning). Reminder: Focus on being great at one thing first.

• Tell your story in the About page. Who are you? Why did you start the business? What makes you unique and well suited to service people’s properties. People love founder stories but not many share theirs on their site. You are your brand. Be honest and authentic.

• If you’re not good at writing copy use AI to help. Use prompts to explain what you need, the tone you want to write in, and anything else it should know that will help it convey your message clearly and concisely.

• Turn on your website and share with everyone you know. Promote on your socials.

I would also encourage you to spend time scouring the internet and look at as many cleaning companies and facility services websites as possible. There are some great ones out there, like impact.ca. Find the ones you like and use them as reference. Don’t plagiarize but it’s ok to pull inspiration from them when starting out. Over time, continue to iterate and make it more your own.

Cost: $16 USD/month | $21 CAD/month

H) Find Prospects

Everything I’ve listed up to this point is straightforward. As of 2024 there are approximately 884,632 commercial cleaning companies in the US alone. Add in Canada; add in residential cleaning and facility services companies; and add in all the companies that have sold, merged or gone bankrupt to date; you’re probably well over 2 million in the history of the North American cleaning industry. Meaning, there are a couple million people who didn’t have to read this post to figure out how to start a cleaning company. Whether you take my advice or not, you’ll probably figure it out just like the rest of us did.

That being said, what I believe the majority of these companies haven’t figured out is the fastest and most efficient ways to find their ideal prospects. I would venture a guess that most of those millions of companies do their “business development” much like Chris and Sam did. Pick up the phone and make some calls, send a few emails, ask for referrals, network at industry events, and drop their business card when visiting properties. Don’t get me wrong, this stuff works, but it’s a grind.

While I personally don’t mind “the grind”, and I do utilize some of the methods listed above, it’s not the most efficient way to grow your business. So, in addition to those old school methods one of the key tools I also use a Apollo.io.

Apollo.io is a sales intelligence platform that:

• Helps you find your ideal prospects.

• Allows you to connect with, and contact, your ideal prospects.

• Automates your lead generation process.

• Allows you to scale your sales process without having to hire salespeople.

  • (P.S. don’t waste your money on salespeople, more on that later…)

If there is one thing you take away from this post, this should be the one thing. Get Apollo.

Cost: Free (I use the basic plan for $49 USD/month - worth every penny!)

Total Cost To Start A Great Scalable Cleaning Company:

$85.60 USD/month or $75.78 CAD/month

Let’s break that down further:

• 21 working days per month

• $3.95 for an Iced Coffee at Starbucks

• 21 x $3.95 = $82.95

For the price of your daily Starbucks coffee, you could start a commercial cleaning company that you alone could scale to, at minimum, $1,000,000 in revenue!

Some more, overly simplified, back of the napkin math:

• Revenue = $1,000,000

• Labour + Supplies = $800,000 (at most!)

• Gross Profit = $200,000

• Other expenses (transportation, phone, laptop, subscriptions) = maybe $50,000

• Profit = $150,000

There are worse things to have to sacrifice than an overpriced cup of coffee to get yourself on your way to becoming a millionaire.

If I was starting my cleaning company over today, the steps outlined above are exactly how I would start it to ensure it was built to scale efficiently. The tools above are more than enough to build a 7-figure cleaning company.

Once you’re past the million-dollar mark, you will likely need more tools to support your operations. I will be publishing additional playbooks in the coming weeks, focused on how to grow and how to operate. Be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss it, or even worse, so your competitors don’t get the information before you.

Thanks for reading and have an amazing day!