A solid cleaning budget is essential to the success of your building services contracting business. Find out how to set and reach your budget goals.
Budget. Whether you have a crew of one with a small handful of clients or contract with every office park in town, this is the one word that can mean the difference between success and failure. Your maintenance and cleaning budget is the key to a solvent business.
Budget is also a word that, unfortunately, has a bad reputation. It’s a word that’s mired in the idea of limits and scarcity. But it doesn’t need to be. In fact, a good budget means you are in control of your money. A budget turns your cash flow into a tool that can work for you. A budget means you can earmark funds to get that new floor buffer or hire the help you need.
Over time, your maintenance and cleaning budget can give you information about the value of your business, where you could spend more, and where you might cut back. In addition, it can help you with your taxes. Since a budget is also a form of record-keeping, you can easily review how much you spent on cleaning supplies, business improvements like ongoing education or professional certifications, or business meals when tax time rolls around.
In truth, there’s no negative to creating and sticking to a budget. And once you get past the idea that a budget is something to fear, the hard part is over. The next step is using that budget to reach your BSC business goals.
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5 Ways to meet your maintenance and cleaning budget goals
As a building services contractor, what goes into the goals for your cleaning budget? Of course, the easy answer is that you want to turn a profit, make sure you aren’t overspending, and find out how efficiently (or not) you’re using your funds.
A budget is much more than that, though. Your budget is a major element of customer service. A firm grasp on your cleaning budget gives you room to work with your customers to provide them with the quality they deserve while still keeping your business profitable.
But perhaps the most significant benefit of reaching your budgeting goals is that you control your money. You aren’t paying out extra in interest charges or late fees. You aren’t scrambling at the last minute to order supplies, leaving you to pay higher rates for expedited shipping.
Your specific goals could be any combination of things. Even if it’s as “simple” as paying invoices on time and turning a profit, a cleaning budget goal is important. Now then, how do you reach those goals?
1. Use janitorial management software. Naturally, we’re biased on this point, but the right software can do wonders for helping you reach your budgeting goals. You can use it for time tracking, supply tracking, organizing your billing, equipment maintenance scheduling, and running reports on your business. Put together, budgeting and janitorial software are two powerful tools that can elevate your BSC business.
2. Review and update your budget regularly. The best budget in the world isn’t going to do much for you if you don’t use it. However, if you keep on top of it, a budget will help you plan for upcoming expenses and minimize the chance that you will overspend. Plus, keeping up with your budget makes the work easier. If you only look at it every few months, you’ll get overwhelmed and give up.
3. Reevaluate your spending. One of the great benefits of a budget is that it allows you to examine where your money goes. And once you know that, you can redirect your spending to be more in line with your goals.
4. Create an emergency fund. You should have funds set aside for things like equipment maintenance or upcoming purchases. However, an emergency fund gives you some room in your budget in case of an unexpected breakdown or accident. Then there’s also the fact that, if we’ve learned anything since 2020, unexpected events are bound to happen, and it’s good to prepare for them as much as you can.
5. Learn from the past. You can’t change what’s already happened. You can, however, learn from it. Look through any previous budgets and see where you fell short or made mistakes. Don’t use this as an excuse to ignore your current cleaning budget or give up. We all make mistakes, but using those mistakes to improve is how we grow.
Your cleaning budget is there to help you. When you take advantage of the power it offers, your business, your team, and your customers all benefit.
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