What size territory do I get with a James Home Services cleaning franchise? 

We get this question a lot from potential cleaning franchisees…

and there’s good reason for it; it’s really important you understand the ‘area’ you are being granted rights to trade in by your Franchise Agreement. It is after all, what your business is based on, and what your buying! 

So, in this blog post, we’re diving deep into franchise areas, territories, size and more! 

Firstly, let’s get the basics straight. What is a ‘territory’? A ‘territory’ in the franchise world, is a specific area that is mapped out and assigned to your business to trade in.  

At James Home Services we provide you with an ‘exclusive’ territory that is protected by your Franchise Agreement. That means, no one else from our network can trade in your area, all leads from that area for cleaning services are sent to you only, and you’re never competing against your fellow James Home Services cleaners for work in your exclusive area. We call it, your ‘protected’ area.  

The size of the protected area we grant for an interior cleaning franchise is 2500 households.  

Why that size? Well there’s quite a few reasons… let’s get into it: 

We’ve proven this is the sweet spot 

We’ve been starting cleaning franchises for 30 years in Australia. We’ve started hundreds and hundreds of these businesses and over that time, we’ve learnt all the tricks to ensuring a business gets off to the strongest possible start. We’ve also learnt that 2500 households for a protected area is the sweet spot. Not too big, and not too small. It’s serviceable, but also allows plenty of room for someone to grow their business and employ staff if they wish. 

It’s large enough to grow your business 

Demand for cleaners is growing. Currently, we can’t service all the enquiries our network receives. If your sceptical as to whether the work is out there, then join your local buy/swap/sell page, or community page on Facebook for your area and take a look at just how many posts there are each week from people looking for cleaners. And this is just the tip of the iceberg – because that doesn’t take into consideration all the people searching on Google for cleaners, or asking their friends and family to recommend them someone. We have cleaning businesses in our network employing staff and growing in their areas. The size of the protected area we assign to you is large enough for this.  

Think about it this way… if you can turn just 2% of your protected area into reoccurring fortnightly customers, then you have 50 jobs already booked up, every single fortnight. Then add in bond cleans and once-off services and it doesn’t take long for you to reach capacity!  

And realistically, if you asked 100 people if they use the services of a cleaner or not, there would be a lot more than just 2 people (2%) who do, or who would like to… some quick maths demonstrates there’s a lot of opportunity for your business in a protected area of 2500 households. 

It allows you to group your customers together 

On the one hand you want your protected territory for your cleaning franchise to be large enough to build a strong business… but on the other hand you want it to be small enough geographically that you’re not wasting time driving 15 minutes and more between jobs. 

Why? It’s simple… for every minute you spend in the car travelling… you’re not able to charge for that time. So, if you have 6 jobs in a day, and you spend 15 minutes travelling to each job, then that’s 1.30 hours each day, that you can’t charge anyone for. In a week, that becomes 7.5 hours, and in a year that becomes 390 hours! Even on an average hourly charge out rate well below the average in our network… that’s almost $20,000 every year you’re loosing because you’re travelling a distance between jobs! Yikes! 

So, keeping your protected territory geographically controlled, is giving you more earning power in the long run! 

Saturate your market faster 

This one is all about marketing! In a smaller area, your marketing efforts are amplified. Your potential customers are more likely to see your business if you’re only trying to reach 2500 people and not tens of thousands of people. When we market your business, we target our marketing to your protected area. We also train you in effective marketing strategies that you can implement in your cleaning franchise, and those become even more effective, when you’re focused on a concentrated area; your efforts aren’t being diluted. 

For example, when you first start your business, we provide you with flyers. This may sound old fashioned, but they work! We give you enough flyers to distribute to your protected area, four times over! That means, every household in your area will see marketing for your business four times as you distribute those flyers.  

We also train you in how to build relationships with places like Real Estate Agents and Aged Care Coordinators – these businesses are always looking for professional cleaners, and your efforts in building strong relationships with just 3-5 businesses can result in a significant amount of work. In a smaller area, your efforts to build those relationships are concentrated and you can give each business more of your focus which gives you a higher likelihood of securing work from them. 

There’s lots of other reasons why 2500 households in a cleaning franchise is the sweet spot for your protected territory; but these are our top 4.  

If you’d like to find out more, then we’d love to talk! Just submit an enquiry and one of our team will be in touch.  

Think owning your own business is out of reach financially… then you need to check out our subscription model! From as little as $100 per week + GST, we can get you started in your own James Home Services cleaning franchise! Freedom and flexibility – that’s affordable to anyone!