Latest / Cleaning Business Life / CBL EP 198 The La Perla Lesson

Transcript

CBL EP 198 The La Perla Lesson · Cleaning Business Life

• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: Hey everyone! Got my little ponytails on, got some gardening going on in the backyard.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_00: This is Shani with Cleaning Business Life, and I wanted to come out here and talk about lingerie.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_00: And you're like, what are we talking about cleaning lingerie?
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_00: What kind of lingerie are we talking about?
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_00: There are different segments.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_00: For those of you who don't know, I used to work at Nordie's in the lingerie department.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_00: So that's how I know so much about underwear.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_00: And a lot of other things that we won't discuss here, but I wanted to come out and share an experience I had with a vendor.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: You guys may have heard or not have heard of the La Perla bra and panties.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: They sell other pieces of lingerie as well.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_00: It's a very high-end lingerie.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_00: They typically sell in places like Rodeo Drive, South Coast Plaza, any of the high-end malls, if there is still a mall in your location.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: And I wanted to talk a little bit about what a$750 bra has taught me.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_00: And there's a lot that goes into the story.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_00: And there was a lesson that I was taught by the vendor.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_00: And it took me a while to understand the concept of like a$750 bra.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_00: Not only are they exquisite little pieces of beauty, they have to be handled delicately.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_00: You can't just throw, well, I guess you could, you couldn't just throw a La Perla bra in the washer on regular and in the dryer, you would ruin it.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_00: Just same thing with the bottom half, right?
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: And sometimes the biggest lessons about pricing have absolutely nothing to do with the cleaning business.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_00: And I wanted to share this story.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: So back in the day in my 30s, before I became a general manager and the assistant manager, well, obsessive manager and general manager of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in that location, I worked at Nordstrom's and I worked strictly off commission.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: There was a lot of really interesting experiences I had at Nordies.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_00: Some of them were good, some of them were bad.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_00: I never worked in a full commission aspect ever in my life.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_00: And I was in my 30s.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: And the vendors would come in.
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_00: And for those of you who don't know, typically high-end retailers have vendors.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_00: If you like one product and you happen to push it, you get gratis.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_00: So we would get like free bras and panties if we sold a certain product, like Waco or La Perla or Casabella or Calvin Klein or whatever, whatever brand you happen to fancy or whatever you had gold yourself to do, they would give you a kickback, so to speak.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_00: So you get gratis every month and you could spend it in store, or the sometimes we would get first dibs on any of the promo stuff that came out.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_00: So it was it was kind of a cool thing to be able to be rewarded for your efforts.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_00: And I remember when I first picked up, because they they, you know, I don't know what they do now.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_00: This was way back when they encouraged you to walk around on the sales floor to familiarize yourself with Nordstroms.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_00: And let me preface this with Nordstroms.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_00: Back in the day when I worked for Nordstroms, their employee handbook legitimately was a larger postcard.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_00: On the front of the postcard, it says, Welcome to Nordstroms.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_00: And when you flipped it over, there was no employee handbook.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_00: There might be one now, I don't know.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: And it says use your best judgment.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_00: That was the extent of the Nordstroms way.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm I'm familiarizing myself with products.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_00: There's minimizers, there's shapewear, there's all kinds of t-shirts, pajamas, dressing gowns, all of it.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_00: It was a whole gamut of lots of things I had never heard of before.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I started to walk around and I picked up these bras and I was like, wow, these are beautiful, these are exquisite.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: And then I remember looking at the price tag, and I was like, you have to remember in my 30s, I was a single mom of two kids, right?
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: Like 750 bucks.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_00: I can't believe that someone would pay 750 bucks.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: And the matching panties were$200.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, oh my God,$1,000 for a bra and panty set.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_00: And I was so scandalized over the fact that no one was going to.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_00: So I would always, when they come on the sales floor, I would never, I'd never walk them over to the La Perla display because I was like, no one's gonna buy this.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_00: But people would, people would buy them.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_00: With other girls, people bought them.
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_00: And it wasn't until the vendor came up and she's like, hey Shannon.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, oh my gosh, it's so good to see you.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_00: How have you been?
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_00: How are the kids?
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_00: What's life like?
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_00: Blah, blah, blah.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_00: And we started to talk about the product.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_00: And I was like, I really love these bras, but they're$750.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_00: And she's like, well, have you ever sold one yet?
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_00: And she goes, Well, have you tried one on?
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_00: I said, Oh my God, they fit amazing.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_00: She goes, but have you sold one yet?
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_00: And I said, No, because no one's gonna buy a$750 bra.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I started laughing.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_00: She started laughing with me.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_00: So I was, in a way, I was projecting my own financial reality into the potential sale that I could have.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: And remind you, I was competition, I didn't get an hourly weight.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_00: There was a draw.
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_00: I had to do so much in sales to earn my keep.
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_00: I don't remember what minimum wage was back then.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_00: And so there was this whole dynamic that I was, I was holding myself back from getting a larger commission.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_00: Because if you think about it, if I sold one LaPurla a week, that would cover my status, right?
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_00: I would, I wouldn't have to work really hard to sell other things.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_00: I just needed to sell one bra and panty set.
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_00: And I was, I was set for the week, right?
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_00: Or two or four, whatever I decided.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: So I really was projecting my own financial reality into that.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_00: And we had this in-depth conversation about why I felt that people would not pay.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_00: And she was like, why not let them decide?
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_00: Grab up their size.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_00: Now, and she goes, La Perla is not meant for every body type because there's certain body types that things look great on.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_00: And there's certain body types that's just not going to look great on.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_00: And she goes, when you bring it to them, you can hear them talk about the bra.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_00: You'll hear them in the fitting room.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: They'll they'll decide.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_00: You'll they'll get the buy-in, right?
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_00: So most people judge premium pricing emotionally before they understand it strategically.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_00: So I was prohibiting myself from making sales and earning commission and getting gratis from LaPurla because I simply believed that no one would spend$750 for a bra.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_00: I was actually in Nordstrom's a week and a half ago.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_00: They still sell La Perla bras, but they're$1,200.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_00: I was just like, but again, it's that natural reaction.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_00: Trust me, I've worked on a lot of prosperity manifestation and stuff, but you still revert back to your old habits.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_00: And people, and I talked to the girl next time, you sell many, many of these bras, and she's like, as a matter of fact, we do.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_00: We sell a lot of these bras.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_00: So even 20 years later, people are still buying$1,200 bras and panty sets, panties go with it, right?
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_00: So it's an interesting dynamic when I started to think about how I kept my own limitation because I did not believe that someone would spend that kind of money.
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_00: But in reality, there have been thousands, tens of thousands of you I've spoken to about cleaning and how when you I'm there on the front lines when you guys are making your first large sale and you're like, I just closed a$5,000 deal.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, that is freaking awesome.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_00: So you have to let them decide.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_00: So when you're giving your price, whether you're in person or you're doing it over the phone, you're letting them know what the price is, and then you're letting them to decide.
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_00: Now, some people are going to flat out tell you right away, no, my God, I can't believe that you charged that.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: And how many times have we been shamed?
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_00: You should be ashamed of yourself or charging that.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_00: It's only cleaning, it's only a broom sweep, it's only this, it's only that.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_00: But in reality, you're giving this person back their time.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_00: You're giving them back some value to their life.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_00: So they don't have to spend their time making sure that they have to manage their life.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_00: You're giving them opportunity to live their life.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_00: A lot of times my mom and I were just talking this morning about Downtown Abbey and large estates and how they just didn't make it because it took like Downtown Abbey, from what we saw, had a crew of like 20 or 30 people helping to run the house.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_00: That wasn't outside of the estate or the farms.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: That's just what it took for what, six people to live there?
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_00: So they they employed a lot of the people in the area, but it took a lot of people to run a really large household.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_00: The same deal applies when we live in smaller houses.
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_00: You have to choose, and and we won't even get into the societal factors of how we're groomed and conditioned to be superwomen and do all these crazy things.
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_00: That's a podcast for another day.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_00: But I just wanted to talk touch into the topic of how you have to let the customer decide.
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_00: And when you let the customer decide, they'll either jump on it or they won't.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_00: And if they won't, don't take it personal.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_00: Just say, okay, well, if it changes, please let me know and I'm happy to get you on the schedule.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_00: Because when that vendor said we'll let them decide, I was just taken aback.
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, there's no way someone is gonna spend 750 bucks on a bra.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_00: I could say 55, maybe a buck fifty, but not$750.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_00: And she's like, well, let's do a test.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_00: So she actually promised me double gratis, and I can't remember whatever you cut forever competitive, right?
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_00: I can't, I got extra, I got double the gratis, and there was something else.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_00: If I sold, I believe eight in a 30-day period of time.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_00: So naturally I was out on the sales floor just going, look at this bra, look at this bra, look at this bra.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_00: And you know what?
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_00: People started to say yes.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_00: And the more I worked with the line, the more I became familiar with all of the etched detailing, all of the pretty lace, the extra support on the straps, how the eye hooks were made differently than the other high hooks and different bras, how it like shaped your body.
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I did I learned all of these things just because I happened to have this vendor go let them decide so that I could sew my bra.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_00: So I got double gratis and I think I got some sort of prize, and then she brought me in a small statue.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_00: Do you know that sat in my locker and people knew it was my statue for as long as I worked at Norsham's, I believe it was like two inches.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if I still have that statue.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_00: It was the biggest deal to me at the time.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_00: So make sure that premium, when you are getting a premium client, and that has changed.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_00: The dynamics of change of what a premium client are.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_00: And what I consider a premium client, and I say it all the time, I like the solo method.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_00: I believe, you know, 55, 25, and 20.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: I there's no discrepancy on the margins.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_00: But the clients that I choose to market to are different than they were at COVID.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_00: When I, before I had COVID, I just catered to the retirees.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_00: They came up here from Scottsdale or Sun City, they bought a second house.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_00: I moved here from California.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_00: This was their second or third home.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, there was this whole dynamic of I got all this cash to burn.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_00: And then when COVID happened, all that dried up.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_00: Everyone was absolutely terrified of the cooties.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_00: Nobody wanted you in their house.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_00: It was a wild dynamic in that time.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_00: So I had to pivot.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_00: And I believe I said that in an interview that I was in the hardest thing to learn is to know when to pivot because you're when you start to lose too much money, you need to pivot or you'll drown and you'll go out a you'll bankrupt yourself, right?
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_00: So I pivoted.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_00: And what I look for is this is what I consider a premium, a premium client is having a weekly client.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_00: I love weekly clients.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_00: If you hit the right price point, it's gravy.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely, you get the right person in there weekly.
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_00: That means you're getting cash flow in every single week.
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_00: And everyone, when we first start in this industry, is like, oh my God, I want to get in with the ultra wealthy.
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_00: The ultra wealthy aren't going to pay you.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_00: Once in a while, you will find someone who will, but that's the exception.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_00: That's not the rule.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_00: People who have really large homes, I'm talking 4,000 feet and above, are usually house poured.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't say that to be mean.
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_00: I say it because it's reality.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_00: There's a magazine, I can't remember the name of it.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_00: Sorry, my chair is sitting a little crooked.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_00: There's a magazine that goes around as a logo magazine just for the area.
• 13:25
  SPEAKER_00: And they always say, well, we we get in these exclusive neighborhoods, we do all these things.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_00: But I'm like, what's the ROI?
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_00: How many people actually convert out of there?
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_00: They have no idea because they're just selling ad space, right?
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_00: When you're only looking for those golden unicorns, you're they're few and far between.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_00: So what I look for is I look for middle class working families who either have a business or they're in the middle of their career, they're empty nesters, and they have enough money to burn where they're no one wants to spend the time being the domestic goddess that we've all been groomed and conditioned to be.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_00: They just want someone to come in and do it.
• 13:59
  SPEAKER_00: That's who I look for.
• 14:00
  SPEAKER_00: And it makes it nice because you're providing peace of mind, you're providing reliability, consistency, trust, professionalism, communication, emotional relief, and most importantly, time and certainty.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_00: So people are not always buying labor, they're always buying the removal of the stress.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_00: So you're taking that big element of, oh my God, I'm responsible for maintaining my home.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_00: It needs to be perfect all the time, to we'll come in and do that for you.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_00: And here is our charge.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_00: And let's be honest, chaos can be expensive.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, how many times have we seen hoarding houses and it's total chaos?
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_00: And then at the end, it always ends up being the cleaning industry who has to volunteer and do it for free because they don't have the money, or the city steps in and then the taxpayers pay for it.
• 14:46
  SPEAKER_00: So it can be, and we won't get into all the details and the messiness of what happens with the a hoarding clean or a PTSD cleaning or any of those types of cleanings.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_00: That's a whole segment in its own.
• 14:59
  SPEAKER_00: But chaos is expensive.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_00: And then, you know, there's different features and benefits.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_00: You can be the one, like when I sell a move out cleaning, I always say, Well, we typically mop the floors until they're clean, where other cleaning companies mop it and it's a once and done.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_00: Then they go, Oh, you clean the floors until they're clean.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_00: Now, will we pass a paper towel test?
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_00: Not expecting to, but that there will be a marked difference in cleanliness versus when we started and versus when we left.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_00: So a cleaner talks about we mop floors, we clean bathrooms.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_00: Looking at my notes here.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_01: You oops.
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_01: Sorry, we lost my spot here.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_01: We'll have to skip this part.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_00: You're providing identity, exclusivity, experience, emotion, and confidence.
• 15:51
  SPEAKER_00: So they were never really selling the perfect fabrics, even though they were absolutely stunning to see on.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_00: Everyone felt like a supermodel, obviously.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_00: I would feel like a supermodel if I had a$750 bra.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_00: So some people will do things differently, and really it's all about what it's not how it's not what you say, it's how you say it.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_00: So some people will spend$80,000 on a truck or$100,000.
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_00: It's I think cars or trucks are a hundred grand now.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_00: Thousands on vacations, cosmetic procedures, boats, golf club, handbags, lifted side by sides, and then suddenly become financial experts when in actuality that's probably not the case.
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_00: We won't get into debt here.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_00: So the difference people value with different things, and premium buyers often find value, most importantly, in time, convenience, certainty, more than saving money.
• 16:46
  SPEAKER_00: Those are the clients that you're looking for so that you can have regularity.
• 16:52
  SPEAKER_00: Those are the people who have been groomed oftentimes with having housekeeping will always continue to have housekeeping.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_00: When there was the big thing over COVID, like when we had COVID, everyone's like, would you rather have a personal chef or a house cleaner?
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_00: And they're like, I'd rather have a personal chef.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_00: So if you grow up having a cleaner in your house, you are more than likely to have a cleaner as an adult.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_00: And let's be honest, there's a lot of blue-collar scarcity conditioning that happens in our society.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_00: We are groomed in condition not to think about having nice things, and we're groomed in condition not to have extra services.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_00: We are a do-it-yourself type of thing.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_00: And that that's really not the case.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_00: Why not get your time back, right?
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_00: And then there's you know the financial stress.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_00: Are we gonna have enough money?
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_00: And let's be honest, house cleaning is a lying item on the household budget, and there really is a lot of discomfort with charging higher prices.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_00: Remember the first time when I was trying to figure out price increases, how uncomfortable all of that felt.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_00: I was just, it was an icky feeling.
• 18:01
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't know if they were gonna drop me, I didn't know if they were gonna yell at me, I didn't know if they were gonna confront me.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_00: When in reality, it's it's not the case at all.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_00: Minor used to it.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_00: At the end of the year, we do a small bump.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, this is gonna be your new price going forward.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_00: If you're new and you don't know what you're doing or you've never given a price increase before, do a couple or one or two at a time.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_00: And that way, if they drop you, you're not without income, right?
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_00: There's also the fear of rejection and judgment.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_00: And then when you're not throwing the true price out there, you're kind of capping your own limitation and your own income because your limitation is your own income.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_00: Reoccurring revenue is also your income.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_00: So your discomfort with money does not determine your market value.
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_00: But a lot of us have heard, how many of us have heard money doesn't grow on trees, money doesn't grow on trees, money doesn't grow on trees.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_00: That's what my mom used to tell me all the time.
• 18:53
  SPEAKER_00: Money doesn't grow on cheese, Shannon.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_00: And then there's, you know, there's things like hesitant quoting, apologizing for prices.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_00: How many times have you given a price increase?
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_00: They're like, well, I'm really sorry to give you a price increase, but I gotta do this.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_00: The sandwich method is something good, something bad, something good.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_00: Look it up.
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_00: I've talked about it in a couple episodes.
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_00: So don't apologize for your pricing.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_00: There's nervous industry, not or industry, there's nervous industry in giving someone the price and then discounting.
• 19:20
  SPEAKER_00: You see this a lot with a remote model.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_00: They have no skin in the game.
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_00: If they make some margin on it, they don't care because they're all about closing the deal, right?
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_00: Or you're overselling and under-delivering, we see that a lot, especially with move out cleanings.
• 19:36
  SPEAKER_00: I cannot tell you how many times it takes for someone to become proficient in doing a move out cleaning to my standards.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it takes a lot, it takes probably 10 to 12 move-out cleanings.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_00: So if you're new and you're like, I have a move out cleaning, I'm gonna send these two girls who barely have any training to do move-out cleaning is gonna be a nightmare and you're gonna fail, miserably.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_00: I've done 20,000 moveout cleanings.
• 19:58
  SPEAKER_00: And then rambling during estimates, I'm guilty of this.
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_00: I like to talk.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, I don't mean to sometimes I'm like, oh yeah, we talk about things in town, we talk about the rodeo, whatever's going on.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_00: So make sure that you're not rambling during your estimates.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_00: And then there's calm certainty when you name your price.
• 20:18
  SPEAKER_00: When I'm on the phone, I'm like, this is the price.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_00: Hear that?
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_00: That's silence.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_00: I'm waiting for them to respond.
• 20:25
  SPEAKER_00: And then I always think back to Nordstrom's and how that vendor is like, so have you sold any La Perla bras?
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, no, no one's gonna spend 750 bucks on a bra.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_00: Luxury environments feel calm and certain.
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_00: If you've ever gone into Nordstrom's or Saxfifth Avenue, Neiman Marcus, Barney's, any of those, it's wide open space and it's calm, with the exception of the cosmetic counter, when they're having, you know, whatever special is going on.
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_00: It typically is a calm and relaxing environment.
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_00: You can go upstairs and have lunch should you want to.
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_00: It's not a rush, rush, rush, rush, rush.
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's definitely not the Walmart experience.
• 21:06
  SPEAKER_00: So when it comes to pricing and doing your jobs, let them decide.
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_00: Let them decide the price, let them decide if they want to work with you, let them decide what is gonna happen next.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_00: And it's okay if they say no, it's not gonna work out because more than likely six months later, they're gonna come back anyway.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_00: So stop rejecting yourself first.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_00: Gotta check my notes.
• 21:25
  SPEAKER_00: Stop assuming that no one will pay.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_00: Please learn from my lesson.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_00: Stop projecting your financial comfort zone onto clients.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_00: And this is a tough one because we all are groomed.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_00: Money doesn't grow on trees, right?
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_00: And then stop apologizing for profitability.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_00: Having profit is not greed.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_00: Profit is not greed at all.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I got my first shirt in, it's too big, so I gotta order the next size down, and I'll be able to show you guys.
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_00: But I'm super excited to have that t-shirt line.
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_00: And there are premium clients that exist in every market.
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_00: There was an interesting conversation in my group, the Maids Network, and then we were talking about how it was oversaturated.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: My market here, there used to just be me and four other large cleaning companies.
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_00: Now we have about nine larger, I call them larger, cleaning companies, and we have about 72 microcleaning companies.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_00: And you know what?
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_00: It's still not enough cleaning companies per area.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_00: Our area has grown exponentially since 2020.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_00: So please don't come and tell me that there's no money, that you can't do it, and there's got all this stuff.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_00: It's just tweaking it and tweaking it and tweaking it and tweaking it until you find the right rhythm.
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_00: And guess what?
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_00: A month later, you might have to tweak it some more.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_00: And then six months later from that, you might have to tweak that.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_00: It's a constant rhythm of trying to balance out what works versus what doesn't.
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_00: So your job is not to decide what someone else values, first of all.
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_00: That's the La Perla lesson.
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_00: The right clients are not looking for cheap, they're looking for certainty and time.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_00: Underpricing is often a belief problem before it becomes a math problem.
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_00: I cannot tell you how many people I have spoken to.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_00: This is real with them.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_00: They will not raise rates.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_00: I've spoken to someone individually, you know who you are, who swore that she would never raise rates.
• 23:07
  SPEAKER_00: I still don't know if she's ever raised a rate in five years or not.
• 23:10
  SPEAKER_00: We'll find out.
• 23:11
  SPEAKER_00: And sometimes the thing holding the business back isn't the market, it's the relationship with value.
• 23:16
  SPEAKER_00: So certainty, value, and time are the three biggies when it comes to selling house cleaning.
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_00: And remember, this is cleaning business life and chaos is expensive.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_00: Talk to you guys soon.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_00: Whoops, knocked my hat off.