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90 Business View Australia - January-February 2016
ter cleaning company in the areas in
which it operates. He describes how
he got into the business and the steps
that he has taken to achieve success,
“I started in 1999 and went cleaning
myself. We started the business with
nothing and 17 years later we have
got a hundred thousand customers
on the database.
“We have 115 franchises. Every dol-
lar that we made we put back into mar-
keting and training. In the first five to
seven years we were growing at 40%
a year and then for the next five years
we grew at 30% a year. Now we are
growing at a rate of about 20%.
“We went after the high-end market.
When I looked at the overall market
at that time there were 350 cleaning
companies in Sydney. Most of them
were in residential cleaning. People
care about their house in a way that
they don’t care about their office and
they are prepared to pay.
“I say to my staff that we can’t bid
against $25 an hour. We charge $40
and $50 for once-off cleaning. Essen-
tially what it comes down to is provid-
ing the best service in the market and
then people will pay.”
Types of Cleaning on offer
One of the main reasons for the suc-
cess of Houseproud Cleaning is that
the company offers a wide range of
cleaning services. Although they are
FRANC