Yesterday I did a residential job for a friend who's mother died this past week. They're having the funeral this Saturday and then folks will be stopping by the house afterward. I'm explaining all this because that's about what it takes for me to go out and do a residential job anymore 1) a favor for a friend and 2) a death is involved. In case you can't tell, I HATE RESIDENTIAL! It chews up too much time for the money.

But I learned something valuable on this job (aside from the fact that I'm glad I don't clean residential any longer). I was able to evaluate the difference that varying degrees of agitation makes when cleaning with encapsulation.

This house only had carpet in the front room, they had tile everywhere else. It was a white olefin Berber that was installed 13 years ago. The room was very small so rather than bringing in the Cimex I decided to keep it simple and just grab the little Oreck Orbiter OP machine.

I pre-vacuumed the carpet and went to work. I started in with the little OP machine and I scrubbed, and I scrubbed, and I scrubbed, and I scrubbed some more (my arms where buzzing). This old grayed-out oil-loving olefin Berber was really fighting me. I finally stopped and went out and grabbed the Cimex. The carpet then cleaned up quickly after that.

It looked great when I was done! Part of the room had an area rug - where it was still white underneath. After scrubbing with the Cimex you couldn't even see a variation where the rug had been.

Long story short: Good agitation makes all the difference when it comes to encapsulation cleaning. When I was running the Oreck it just wasn't powerful enough to address this old olefin beast. More aggressive scrubbing was the ticket.

So I look at this little job for a friend as a good thing... I was happy to do a favor for an old friend. I got to see how drastic the difference can be with different degrees of agitation. And it strengthened my resolve to stick with commercial carpets - (unless a death is involved)




Rick Gelinas

Did you use the PADS with the CIMEX, or the brushes? I tried to clean 3 offices with Berber with the CIMEX/PADS, but I was not happy. I should keep doing it till it cleans? Well, I steam clean it and that’s it.
I'm in the process to get commercial work, but the liability Ins. requirements killing me.
$1000 a month, including everything, even $3000 for my two vans. But I know it’s expensive, so well, I got to pay anyway to get the account.

Chris

That sounds awfully high for liability insurance?

I have:

1,000,000 Libility & Medical Expenses

1,000,000 Personal and Advertising Injury

2,000,000 Products Completed Operations

2,000,000 General Aggregate Limit

500,000 Fire liability

10,000 Medical Expense

5,000 to cover my equipment in my van incase of theft or whatever.

Care Custody & Control

All that insurance, and I don't know what all of it means....cost me $450 per year.

Ofcourse I only have one van,...the State Farm ins. on my Ford Van is about $320 per year.

Chris,

I used the FiberPlus pads on this Berber carpet.



Rick Gelinas

The total for our business insurance is about $6000 per year.

Our business liability is about $1800 per year.

Our vehicle insurance for 4 vehicles is about $4200 per year.




Rick Gelinas

Our total insurance package
Liability plus 6 trucks = $9600.00

In these packages, workmanscomp is included?

No, workman's comp is separate. Chris the insurance company audits business owners each year. They determine how much to extract from you by considering a few things. They consider how much you're grossing. They check how much you're paying your employees. They also consider previous claims. And they consider the level of industry risk. They factor all of that together and then decide how badly they want to whoop you.

We've found the rates with Auto Owners for business and vehicles to be competitive and the coverage is good.




Rick Gelinas