Business Owners and New Entrepreneurs Beware: Commercial Cleaning Franchises
When you hire a commercial cleaning company or janitorial service for your business, you probably think that they will oversee or do the actual cleaning of your site and have an inspection process to ensure quality. For reputable commercial cleaning companies, that’s exactly what happens and you have nothing to worry about.
Sale of cleaning contracts
Unfortunately, this is not always the case. Have you ever heard of a commercial cleaning or janitorial company selling their clients’ contracts? Probably not, unless you have experienced this problem yourself and received poor cleaning along with no one who appears to be responsible. There is a growing number of “commercial cleaning companies” that market to new and established commercial customers without ever doing more than cleaning a county. They get the client to sign a contract and then sell the cleaning contract for a significant profit, usually by a factor of 3:1.
Contract buyers are often smaller, less sophisticated cleaning companies without the infrastructure to market their own cleaning services or start-ups hoping to launch a business of their own. Barely able to cover their overhead, many of these small businesses may not recoup their investment in their contract for at least a year and probably longer before they start making a (very small) profit. The company you thought you hired to clean your workspace usually completes this type of “outsourcing” without fully informing you.
These “franchise” companies often have no cleaning crew of their own, no quality control system, and no real interest in your business, but they do have an interest: money. Let’s say, as a business owner, you inadvertently sign one of these contracts. Then, after a couple of months and several phone calls, a whole new team comes in to do the cleaning. What happened? The first selling company has put in place their release clause which terminates the team that was there and then resells their contract to another team and the cycle continues.
Misrepresentation and other issues
So what is the problem with this scenario? Well, various things. Why would a commercial cleaning company want to sell a contract? The first answer is money. They don’t care about your business at all, no matter how convincing they sound. Your business is simply a means to an end. Their monthly contract is for $1,000 and they sell it for $3,000, a profit of $24,000 in 12 months. And you are not their only victim: they sell hundreds and even thousands of these contracts without using a vacuum cleaner.
Second, the company that sold you the office cleaning services is misrepresenting what they offer. You are literally handing over the keys to your livelihood to someone who is cheating on you from the start. Some who have been scammed would go so far as to call these people scammers, as they go so far as to promote “franchises” that promise huge returns on investment in contracts. See examples of what happens to people who buy cleaning contracts and franchises.
If you want to avoid this type of experience and hire a reputable commercial cleaning company, be sure to talk to the company’s current and former clients, check their status with the Better Business Bureau, and be careful about signing long-term contracts. .
