recession update

[huggytree]

havent seen anything about the recession in a while, so i thought id get a new post started to see how things are in your States.

here in WI the recession is still getting worse. is it improving or getting worse in your area?

im finding projects are getting smaller and smaller. My jobs used to be mainly $5,000-$10,000....now they are all in the $1,000 range. I only have a couple of builders who get around the $5,000 range anymore and they are all lake homes.

Many of my old customers are out of business or do 1 job a year. I have kept finding new customers to replace them. Almost all my builders I work for on a steady basis are less than 1 year with me. They know how to find business in the recession is what makes them different. By attaching on to them its helped me survive. If i didn't constantly find new customers id be out of business by now.

Ive been waiting for the competition to go under for 3 years now. they have all survived until recently. now they are going under 1 or 2 a month. It is helping me pick up some new business.

any suggestions or trends in your area which can help us survive?
is it getting worse or better?

[greenoak]

we are in the rust belt and its bad....but we were already bad maybe..
..anyway our business is way up this month....over 30% up.... and up for the year but not that much, maybe 10%...im hearing better reports from other businesses around me quite a bit now....
ann

[billbenson]

I think FL hit the bottom a while back. We are still close to the bottom, but I don't see it going lower. I've never seen anything that said this, but we have a lot of waterfront and nice property deals right now and a lot of people want to live here. We might see a better recovery than some from out of state money. Local jobs suck and are underpaid, but its always been that way here.

[Steve B]

It seems that more people have been buying houses around here. 4 years ago it seemed that 20% of my customers had just moved into a house, then it went to practically zero for the last couple years.

In the last few months I've started to get a few that were just moving into houses again.

[huggytree]

im getting alot of customers arguing with me about who supplies fixtures...even though my bids say I SUPPLY them, they want to. After problems with builders standing by me i started to put a clause saying if the homeowner supplies them add $xxx to the job....that has solved the problem

im also getting alot of homeowners and low end builders asking for discounts if they pay in cash...yea i always got offers a few times a year...now its a few times a month.....my latest 3 new builders are laid off carpenters doing side jobs...they are busy...for some reason they want to pay full price for a plumber.

the largest electrician is going under this week...he's filing bankruptcy and coming back non-union

I am having an up year, but I can tell its going down hill still by the changes in the jobs and customers.

[everclean]

The wife and I have been cleaning houses and detailing cars for a decade now. This has been our best year, and though we're located in Clarksville, IN, our primary source of business is nearby Louisville, KY, where Steve B is near as well. The only difference that we've noticed is that we've had a lot more turnover in clients than ordinary. Just this summer alone, we have five clients all moving out of state. They happen to be five of our largest clients, but we've got so many jobs coming our way that we aren't really sweating it too hard.

I've made a point to talk with anyone and everyone I can, and I market us in every area that I'm normally in. I could probably really grow our business, but we choose to keep it small, just us. We are hustling though, working like crazy people. Cleaning jobs are rolling in, not just regular jobs but some one-timers as well, and people are still calling wanting their cars detailed.