Just new to encapping. Experimenting with my rotary right now. Surprised at the results quite honestly, and sure like the reduced fatigue (except for loading and lugging that buffer!)

I've noticed that often you guys are talking huge square footage, 25,000-30,000 sf.

I'm used to much smaller jobs with HWE, but certainly open to larger ones with the ease of encapping.

What kind of discount would be offered on such large jobs. I'm sure you wouldn't charge in the .20 range as one might for much smaller jobs.

Any input on a discount scale for such large jobs?

Thanks,
John L.

John -

Prices for larger commercial jobs are not standardized. One reason is that there is competition in many cases from contract cleaning companies, which can do the work for prices as low as 3-4 cents per foot, usually bonnet cleaning or portable extractors. No, they don't make a killing at that level. But they look at the overall relationship with the client and since they may be getting $3,000, $5,000, $7,000 per month or more from the client, they are willing to handle the carpets for metsa metsa money to keep the relationship all under one roof.

Another reason is that the costs for doing the job drop drastically when the job size goes up, usually. For set up time of 30 minutes, you can clean 8 hours in a large building or 30 minutes in a house. One way, unproductive set up time is 50% of total, but it must be paid for nonetheless. With larger jobs, it may be 6% or so....much more efficient.

I've heard believable numbers of 6-9 cents per foot, I've also heard 10 cents used as a baseline for jobs in the 2,000 to 15,000 sf range.

Personally, I would not mind doing a lot of larger commercial jobs only. I feel comfortable with them.

Clay hit it on the head from my limited experiences.

others claim to charge near as much as they do for resi work...for those ppl commercial is not a necessity so they charge high and if they get it, they rake it in, if they don't get it, even better.

if your like alot of us here, you actively seek out commercial CC'ing work, so Clays figures are more realistic. personally i typically charge between 8 cents - 14 cents depending on many circumstances. on those larger accounts (20k - 40k on up) i would go as low as 6 cents...depending.

thanx --- Derek.