Oven Cleaning Franchise - Training - Business - AGA

Spring Cleaning Your Oven.

With a lovely day today, bright sunshine and a bit of warmth I have been wondering if it's time to expect an increase in bookings as people start thinking about Spring Cleaning. If you are thinking about having a good thorough kitchen clean for Spring please consider getting your oven cleaned too. We clean it until it gleams and really get it so it looks like new - just what you want to ensure that everything is perfectly clean in your kitchen.

Our Office and Oven Cleaning Booking System

When we started we had a paper diary that we filled in with appointments and I used to take this diary out with me when I was cleaning ovens. I would also forward my main phone to my mobile and then I would take calls off my phone and then phone back callers. I then progressed to having an outside answering service company taking calls for me and I would then phone these  callers back when I got home. Now we have somebody in our own dedicated office all day long and we make oven cleaning appointments immediately. We use a very good software package that suits our needs very well. We send our operatives an appointment sheet with all their jobs on a daily basis by email using this system. In all this oven cleaning booking software system has made us very efficient, allowing us to offer the benefit of immediate booking of oven cleaning, and it has also saved a huge amount of time and money.

Fuel Price Rises are Affecting Our Oven Cleaning Business

We have two diesel vans and two petrol vans. The price of fuel seems to have increased dramatically in the last few weeks and the diesel price is very high from what it was only a few months ago. I'm guessing that most other small fleet operators like ourselves are feeling the pinch by this and are thinking hard to come up with fuel saving solutions. We have already been on government courses to learn to drive our vans ecomonically but we  really could do with some other measures to help us.

Big Thank You For Catching the Oven Cleaning Money!

I was rushing to the bank last Thursday to pay in a weeks takings into the Clevedon branch. I had to go to the Clevedon branch, as the local branch had closed earlier, and therefore I had to drive through the traffic and go via the lanes to get there. I got to the bank just in time with 5 minutes to go before it closed and I parked directly outside, but unfortunately as I got out the car all of the weeks oven cleaning takings fell out onto the road. They were caught by the strong wind and blown down and across the street; I picked up what I could and it seemed like everybody rushed around and helped me pick up the rest, including all of the cash. I went straight into the bank and all the cash was there - about four hundred pounds worth and only one cheque was missing. So I would like to thank everyone who helped me to pick up the cash and the money - I think next time I make sure that I've got everything alot more secure!! :-)

Running A Multi Van Oven Cleaning Company

I've noticed that there are a couple of oven cleaning franchisors offering a management option and therefore this means you would be a manager running a multi van operation. From what I understand you would have to pay a load more money to get this sort of franchise licence from the respective franchisors. Also you would be 'locked' into a area where you could only service a certain number of postcode areas - lets say 100,000 households, and then have to pay a large ongoing franchise fee. From our own experience of running a multi van operation in our area - we've had more than one van for over two years now  and we haven't got restrictions of where we work and haven't had to pay ongoing franchisee fees, as we are an independent company, so we can go large distances -  I can tell you it's tough and is alot of hard work. Its tough all the way from getting the right people to apply, selecting the right people and then managing them once they are working for you, and managing the vans. Lucky we have an excellent software package that helps with this. Work tends to flucuate and we spend a huge amount of money on advertising. We have a great percentage of current clients rebooking  and we have a referral system in place,  but the problem is the level of knowledge that people have about domestic oven cleaning. We meet people everyday who look at us with a puzzled expression when we tell them what we do, and then say 'Thats a good idea I never knew such a thing existed!'. As people don't know about it you need to market like anything to make them aware and it this takes up a large amount of cash and substantially reduces your margins. People need to be Educated of the different standards of oven cleaning; to get it clean so that it gleams - i.e like new - needs a professional oven cleaning like ourselves to carry out the work.

"Ok", you are saying "what about the commercial oven cleaning market? "Well yes and no, there is a market but we seem to be contacted by the new owners of pubs who have just moved in a find a 'disgusting' kitchen and this means a day of really hard work for us and from experience I now tend to keep away from them. Also pubs, and restaurants want you to clean out of hours as you get in the way of the Chefs. For us we don't want to do this - we are really happy to work from 9 to 5 each day. We have routinely carried out cleans in student accommodation but the budget that the cleaning companies have been given to clean the whole kitchen are sometimes very close to our quote for cleaning the oven - but of course we do a more professional job than contract cleaners and we get it an as new condition, using ecological products, and this standard is now become the standard that new students expect their ovens to be in.

How many ovens do we clean a day?

We are often asked how many ovens we clean a day. To make our business work each of our guys has to clean  4 or more ovens a day. We do these between 0900 and 1700 in the day and don't over stretch the guys. They can comfortably clean this many each day and every day. When we were running one van and I was doing all the cleaning myself I would on somedays clean 5 or 6 ovens, starting at 0830 and starting the last job by about 1630. We are able to clean this many ovens because of the set up of our van, or the van system that we use for oven cleaning. We don't use the gas burners that most oven cleaning franchises use and therefore don't have the associated problems with managing such a system. I understand only one of  franchise models uses a similar set up as we do - that is tank in the back of their vans where the solution is heated up with electricity. The largest number of ovens I have personally cleaned in a day is 9  (with one of them being a full range clean) and that was for a landlord in Exeter; I started early and didn't finish until 7.00 in the evening. He was extremely happy with the job and we have now cleaned his ovens three years in a row.  Last October we cleaned 162 double ovens in one week for one of the local student accommodation blocks in Bristol. With four of us working we cleaned 8 ovens each day for each of the five days. The only problem with cleaning so many ovens in a day was that we ached like anything; but it was great when we finished and we had a couple of days off at the begining of the following week.

Blustery Weather But We are still Gleaming

What Weather! Down here in the South West it's been a very blustery day. Luckily for us we have been able to get out to clean ovens as we have been cleaning ovens in small localised areas today. This has made it easy for us to get around and not have to do too much travelling. Let's hope it's the same tomorrow!

Oven Cleaning Position - Bristol

We are looking for a new team member, someone to join our team and become an oven cleaning professional. No experience necessary - but you need to park the van outside your home and have a driving licence. Ideally that person should live in or close to Bristol. Please contact us if you are interested.

Thinking about Gleaming Easter Oven? - Book Soon

We noticed a drop of in calls in the first couple of weeks of February. Oven Cleaning bookings were down but over the last week our bookings have been up to full strength, and now we are booked about two and half weeks in advance. So with Easter on being a few weeks away if you are looking to book in your oven clean please do it soon if you are looking to have a gleaming oven for the holiday weekend. So just think no need to think about having to clean your oven yourself, just give us a call and we can book you in.