AWC: How did you get into window

cleaning?

wash in Detroit, Michigan that I washed

my first window. As the car traveled

though the car wash I would get inside

and wash the front window, working 12

hours a day on weekends for $1.25 an

hour.

I also worked with my father at a

Coney Island and with him I learned the

value of hard work. The stack of dirty

trays that had to be washed were as high

as me. That might not be so high for

some of you, but at 16 they seemed high

to me.

Later that summer in downtown

Detroit, I learned the important lesson,

Jimi Hendrix live concerts were out of

this world. It was the golden age of rock

and roll and I was right in the middle of

Motown and loving every minute of it.

After my hippie days, I found that I

was really looking for something that

would give me a better life. I found a

love of the Bible and a new career in

window cleaning at the same time. After

my baptism in 1970 a “brother” offered

me an opportunity to work with

him and there started my introduction

to this great business. I have been window

cleaning for 33 years and if you

count the car wash, you could add another

two years.

AWC: What kind of window cleaning

did you do back then?

to subcontract cleaning 11 Kentucky

Fried Chickens for $2 a store, three

times a week from C Clean Window

Cleaning in Detroit, MI. We did mostly

route work and some homes.

You would just finish a job in the

middle of winter, and a car would come

by and splash dirty snow and water

right back on the window. You did have

job security back then.

I wound up doing the route and bid

work on the side until I had enough to

break off and start my own business.

Back then in 1972 I was making around

$4 an hour subcontracting three days a

week and lived at home.

Then I moved to Tennessee where I

started over again. The only supplier in

the area was Detroit Sponge. We

thought we were in window cleaning

paradise because there was a whole wall

of just window cleaning supplies. Back

then, you used only a five-gallon bucket

and a camel- or horse-hair brush along

with a small wooden pole. With a

handful of TSP and your leather

chamois you could handle almost any

window. This all would fit in the back

seat of my 1969 VW bug. By the time I

started to have my own route of banks

and Lum’s restaurants we were up to

$7 an hour in 1973.

AWC: How did you end up in Tennessee?

and I went to visit Tennessee in the

middle of a Michigan winter. When we

so we both moved down south.

AWC: How did you start a new

route?

TN. We made around $250 a day that

we would split. We just finished cleaning

the same bank which is now Union

Planters, and it was over 30 years ago

that I cleaned it for the first time. We

get $975 now and are able to clean the

whole job in four hours with six people:

www.unionplanters.com.

But Oak Ridge was mine to keep,

and after my wife, Diana, and I were

married in 1975, we moved there. (Notice

the poles in the picture of my VW).

I also would carry a 32-foot ladder on

the VW. Diana, at first worked with me

but over the years she felt better if I did

the window cleaning by myself. (It might

have been the standing on a window

jack out a fourth-floor school window

doing construction cleaning. Window

jacks were like a small diving broad that

clamped on the wall).

Back then we would ladder most

jobs and using a 32-foot ladder was not

a problem when you are in your 20s.

Now at 50, I try hard to work smarter.

We now use the pure water pole for most

of the work we used to do with ladders.

Phil Alexander

Phil Alexander

with his reverse

osmosis (RO) and

deionized (DI)

waterfed pole

system

Phil does window & chemical cleaning jobs at theMercedes dealership.

Diana’s father started to work with me

in 1978, and nine months later we

doubled the business and he was able

to start his own. We were better apart

than together, but he did teach a me lot

about running a business more efficiency.

My mother-in-law did the books

and would count the money to the penny.

No free lunches!

AWC: How did the business grow?

and restaurants who were customers.

I still remember my first bank jobs

and how it felt to really get a large job

that would take two days for $300. We

would ladder everything back then, but

even then I was using a sprayer to apply

the water – which we still do after

30 years!

AWC: How did you grow your

business from a one-man operation?

plan to increase my window cleaning

business. The first year we were able to

double it and the second year increased

it 30% more. I knew I had to make

money by hiring other people and by

doing add-on services and this how I

came to have employees.

For more than 20 years I would only

work three days a week and the other

days involved in my ministry. In over

30 years I have only worked a 40-hour

week for about eight months when I

worked with my father-in-law in 1978.

In 1995 I started a second business, and

when we sold it, we were $166,000 in

debt with me being responsible for over

$75,000 of it on credit cards.

Even though I was receiving $1,400

a month, I knew it would take way too

long to pay it off. It was window cleaning

that pulled me out of that mess along

with a lot of prayer.

We now have three full-timers and

three part-time employees along with

two sub- contractors. I like to bring my

employees to the convention every year

to get the safety training, and we all

have a good time. The women really do

a great job and I feel an all-female

window cleaning crew is something that

should be considered if you do a lot of

homes. But we train them for the highrises

along with the guys, and we find

that they take safety seriously.

AWC: What improvement in equipment

have you seen?

our job so much easier.

It used to take eight hours with ladders,

now we do the same job in three

hours with no ladders using only poles

inside and a waterfed pole system outside.

One of the greatest improvements

in the window cleaning profession: the

ability to clean four-story buildings from

the ground using water- fed systems.

AWC: You like inventing and modifying

tools. Give us examples of inventions?

out about using a garden sprayer and

have been trying to perfect it ever since.

We find that it speeds up production. I

wanted to come up with a way to copy

the auto assembly line. We found out if

we used a 15-gallon sprayer we can keep

one person spraying and another person

scrubbing. The other two squeegees,

along with one getting drips (five-person

crew) and you have the ability to do

production window cleaning with an

average of $200 an hour. This works well

if the crew chief can do the spraying and

keep the crew busy, or you can limit it

to a three-person crew with one

spraying, one scrubbing, and one

washing. The advantage of this method

is the ability to do large commercial

buildings without getting the crew too

tired before the job is done.

AWC: What other ideas have you

incorporated into your business?

Ledger handle

www.northerntool.com

can

By putting this all together in a

small luggage carrier, you are able to

have everything you need right in front

of you. It was always a pain to run back

to the car to get something that you

needed. By training your new employees

with this system, they don’t know

When I was 18 years old and

just starting out it, was the freedom

from having to work a 40-

hour week. Now it is having more

time to enjoy the different hobbies

like digital photography, and

video taping, golfing, fishing, and

my ministry. I also built my own

computer system and do beta

testing on different software.

The window cleaning business

should give you more time to do

the things you like.

Newly weds Phil and Diana on their way to Tennessee (1975)

Phil outfitted in a clean suit for work in an eye surgery center facility.

any other way, and it is faster on route

work because you only scrub the middle

of the window where the dirty marks

are. The spray reaches all the other areas

of the window.

This is one system we have been

using for more than 20 years and I feel

it works the best because there are

fewer drips to get, and when you reach

an office you can leave the sprayer in

the hall and just bring in the wand.

AWC: What equipment would you

like to see?

off the top and side edge of the window

frames at the same time.

I would like to see some type of system

where a small sprayer and pole with

the squeegees hooks onto the ladder. We

do use a small quart sprayer we get for

$10 from Northern Tools and it works

great inside for doing homes.

AWC: What did you learn from your

first IWCA convention?

making so much more money than

myself by using employees. I usually

would just give the extra work away

causing my own competition.

After that convention, instead of

hiring my subcontractor as an employee,

I foolishly let him go after all that training

in Nashville. He went on to start

his own business and has done very well

at it. It is so much better to train new

help as employees with noncompete

agreements. Also, never train them how

to bid or even have them meet the one

who pays you, if possible. You don’t want

to cause your own competition if you can

help it. If I were to get 10% for all the

window cleaners I have trained over my

30 years, I would have a nice retirement

package by now. Yes, do train others to

clean windows, but have agreements in

writing before they ever learn anything

from you.

Also when I saw the pure water-fed

systems at my first convention in

Nashville, TN, they were truly amazing

to me. I wanted one, but I felt at the

time that the cost was too high. Now I

wish that I had just bought one. I went

to the Yellow Pages and called all the

water companies to see if they could

make me a portable waterfed system.

My first was a converted home reverse

osmosis (RO) 125-gallon-a-day system

in two 40-gallon tanks that were

installed in my ’93 Ford AeroStar van.

AWC: How did that work?

pressure of the water from the faucet

and even after I doubled the system, it

was not enough water in the time I

needed it (100 gallons in 24 hours time).

AWC: What did you do?

under “water,” “pure water,” and “reverse

osmosis.” We found an electric unit that

was small and could produce 500 gallons

AA%2D22521TP.htm.

It has worked well at the shop but

not at the job site because a lack of

sufficient water pressure would cause

the motor to burn out. That is why I

show. After reading about and talking

to the different manufacturers about the

different systems. I found the one that

works on the job for us was the 900

gallon a day RO unit from Pure Rinse

with the attached DI unit:

www.purerinse.com/anywhere/

This took care of the low water

pressure problem and we had enough

water for two poles. We used the 500-

Make Big $$ Pressure Washing

Free Catalog Many Sizes Available

www.dcs1.com

Delco Cleaning Systems

2513 Warfield St., Ft. Worth, TX 76106

(800) 323-1277

Fax: (712) 323-0819

Local: (712) 323-9630

Ladder V-tops

12” & 16” sizes available

Suction Cups

MID-SIZE ROLLER

gallon a day electric unit in the shop to

produce the water at night so the van is

filled before the day begins. We used an

electric timer and a water meter that

turns off both the water and RO unit

either after so much water goes though

or so many hours which we set on the

timer. Both these units require little

maintenance if your water pressure is

high enough.

You might have to use a 40 psi

limiter value on the unit if the water

pressure is too high – over 75 psi. It is

important to keep the pressure below

40 psi if you only are using a DI tank

and normal water pressure, or the DI

will not work as well. The key to these

units is having a tank to fill up so you

can keep enough water going for the

jobs. We just use rented DI tanks, but I

feel the best results are when you use

the reverse osmosis units to bring the

water down to zero total dissolved solids

(TDS).

The DI will give it the finish to

produce the best results and the DI

tanks will last much longer depending

on the local condition of your water. If

your TDS is in the high 500-800 range,

you will find it harder to use this kind

of system. Our water from the tap is 70-

100, which is not very bad at all. If you

just rent a DI unit from a water

company and use what poles you have,

at least you can be safer then climbing

ladders! Yes, we use this system on all

our homes, too.

AWC: What other kinds window

cleaning jobs have you done?

different window cleaning jobs, but here

is a list of the most interesting jobs we

have done:

plastic spikes in double rows, but you

need to use the cleaner and the glue they

provide because we tried using other

brands and they do not work as well.

Cleanup is messy and we do not promote

this service. One job was a white stucco

building, and I found this spray paint

that matched and painted the plastic

spikes to match – you hardly noticed

them.

is fun but dangerous work and in many

areas you need special licenses and

permits. We have a six-floor bank

elevator we do once a year. The right

way is to have the elevator service

person run it while you clean the

windows.

If you just have to caulk a leak without

taking off the old caulking, this is some

of the best money you can make. You

want to use a dark color if you can and

avoid using clear because it will not last

as long. Cutting out the old caulking

takes a lot more time but sometimes this

is the only way to do it right.

paint, which has its own problems

because you need to find where you can

get rid of it. You have to avoid the storm

drains, and you might have to contain

the whole area in plastic.

building dressed in a clean suit.

They give you this paper white suit and

hat, mask along with boots. You get a

lot of funny looks, but I have some great

and difficult jumps. This is

another area we try to stay away from.

first time required a removal of paint

from every inch of window but the

second time we hoped to make back your

money. It was a time-consuming job but

if we do it again it should be much easier

and there are other large homes nearby

that we will bid on soon.

on low-rises for $2,600 twice a year. We

also were able to restore windows with

Winsol 550 and recaulk all the windows

for $12,000. The previous window

cleaner used an acid wash each time.

Then he came back after we had been

doing the job for four years and rebid

the job for only $600.

What were we going to do? It took

two men to do the outside and the two

women to do the inside for a total of 64

hours, and he was going to do it all in

two days with two workers! I don’t care

that he said he has been in business

since 1959. He told the building

manager that they would bring a

moving rig and tie off to the vent pipes!

I told the manager that this was unsafe

and an OSHA violation. They agreed but

still wanted me to drop the price to

$1,800 and include the dusting of the

blinds. We agreed because we worked

too hard to bring the building around,

and what my crew said is we could do

the job with three of us hanging and four

inside and get it done in one day! What

a great crew!

If we could get rid of the low-price,

unsafe window cleaner, we would all be

better off. Perhaps we need to spend the

money to send the I-14 to all the

companies that supply liability

insurance, and they would not issue it

to any who do not comply with this new

regulation. My other customer had the

I-14 and when I mentioned an engineer

certifying the way we would tie back

Jordan and Chelsea Kreager (just married), Daniel Orr, Justin Kreager, Anna Hooven.

Winsol

pick up from

issue #97

page 35

b & w

“Crystal

Clear”

they just cancelled the job.

This was OK because $1,000 for 11

floors (50 drops) was too low anyhow. We

have to be able to walk away from

unsafe jobs or the I-14 will have a less

effect than it could. We also need to have

OSHA work with us when we find

unsafe window cleaners without any

backlash. Maybe a toll-free line would

help or the IWCA could help in some

way: any ideas from any of you might

help us. P.S.: We did the job in one day

with seven people and still made our

$1,800.

As you can see, we all have difficult

times with unprofessional window

cleaners. This aspect of window

cleaning is not fun.

This is where the IWCA and the

IWCCI will do a lot to help stop the

unsafe window cleaners from both low

pricing and unsafe employee safety

practices.

I would like to see, a new flyer that

would only cost 50¢ each. We could put

the highlights of the I-14 and state the

importance of hiring only IWCA members.

This might go along way in educating

our customers in a very reasonable

way.

When I was 18 years old and just

starting out, it was the freedom from

having to work a 40-hour week. Now it

is having more time to enjoy the different

hobbies, like digital photography,

and video taping, golfing, fishing, and

my ministry. I also built my own computer

system and do beta testing on different

software.

The window cleaning business

should give you more time to do the

things you like.

AWC: Name an add-on business

you’d especially recommend?

for profit is chemical cleaning. A little

soap and bleach solution with 10 gallons

of water to one gallon of bleach. We

were able to charge $2,000 for the

chemical cleaning and $850 for the window

cleaning. It took 10 hours with

seven people. We could have cleaned it

faster with another pressure washer to

put on the solution and rinse it off.

If you were to use a pickup truck

with a 100-gallon tank and small Honda

pressure pump, you could go three to

four floors from the ground. Remember

to close off the doorways or you might

be buying a new outfit for someone. Also

check with the EPA for your water collection,

and never have any water run

off into the storm drains. You can average

$750 a day with two workers, which

is a better return than most window

cleaning. Check this out at the IWCA

show in Dallas 2004 with the power

washer association that will be with us.

AWC: How do you look for new business?

and offer to clean the glass they

cannot reach. We have over the years

added a lot of new work once the janitor

companies have moved on. One bank

changed the janitor but gave us all their

branches four times a year. They like

workers they can trust and it is work

we do during the day.

AWC: How do you promote your

company?

About the Cover

Created by Rose Barber.

The image represents a modern day

stained glass window featuring two

muses of inspiration. The women were

drawn out by hand and painted in

Photoshop. A photograph of a squeegee

was then incorporated into the image.

Rose can be contacted at

rose_barber3@hotmail.com or

510-839-9911.

Window cleaning should give you

more time to achieve the higher

things in life like, God, family, and

friends. I once read a story that

said what you remember in life is

not the great people you read or

hear about but the people who

make a difference in your life, your

first-grade teacher or coach, or the

guy that first taught you how to

clean windows!

low Pages and the Yellow Book, and by

having a web site.

AWC: How do you manage to get

whole shopping centers?

shopping centers and commercial offices

are also a great thing to go after. A third

of our yearly work comes from this

source. This is also one of the ways to

grow a business in a short time, why bid

one job at time when you can service the

whole shopping center once a month?

Your price usually is lower, but you

make up for it by less driving and invoicing.

AWC: How important are customer

relationships?

is next to impossible to live down a bad

reputation. A good relationship with a

facilities manager will always be to your

benefit when the competition comes calling

with a lower price.

AWC: How do you use the internet?

www.wedewwindows.com. We have included

pictures of some of the jobs we

do.

On the internet at

www.servicemagic.com/servlet/

It cost $99 a year and $9 for every referral

you accept.

So far we have received four jobs,

which have paid for the advertisement.

We will start to e-mail our invoices as

soon as the vendors agree. QuickBooks

are set up to do this.

AWC: What about e-mail?

this way; our e-mail is:

in “dew” windows because we spray the

water on, so the play on words helps

people remember us more.

AWC: After 30 years in window

cleaning what are you plans?

lets us leave for a week to ten days, and

all the work gets done. Some of our vendors

we have serviced for over 25 years.

If anyone out there would like to live in

the green hills of TN, make me an offer

and I might just really retire. We will

sell our Knoxville monthly route this

summer.

We have changed our name to We

‘Dew’ Windows, Inc., and started a new

C. Corp. This way we can add a medical

saving plan which helps us to deduct

though the corporation most of our

medical bills. I was able to do most of

this online. Most states give you the

ability to download the forms to incorporate

and change you name along with

transferring you forms like Federal Tax

www.irs.gov/businesses/small/article/

Corporation.com 1-888-692-6771 also

Anna and Chelsea with Sörbo Samuelsson and Giulio Guizzi at the IWCA Atlanta convention.

500 gallons a day electric unit reverse osmosis (RO) unit with deionization (DI) tank, too.

will help you to file all the forms very

reasonably.

It would be fun to design window

cleaning equipment or do some type of

consulting work.

AWC: Random thoughts?

business and I have no regrets. If

you are just starting out, don’t try to do it

all alone but rather subcontract or hire

employees, because without having them

you only have a job, not a business.

If you’re in a large business take

time with your family and kids. The

business can live without you a day or

even a week or two. Make window

cleaning work for you not you for window

cleaning.

Also going every year to the IWCA

convention no matter where it is, is a

way to keep abreast of what is happing

in the industry nationwide.

The speakers have been great and

Paul West has bought us to a new level.

Garry Jalowka of Mr. Window & Company,

Lake Elsinore, California, is going

to carry on that tradition

AWC: Did you find fulfillment in

window cleaning?

good way to make a living that would

give me more time for the more

important things. Yes, my faith in my

God is important and my pioneer

ministry has brought me untold

blessings. My service days are the

highlight of my week, but I have to

admit it is hard for me not to talk about

window cleaning.

When you go off your first jump of

the day and your heart rate jumps

several beats, you really know you’re

alive. Over the years, perhaps my

influence on 50 different people to start

window cleaning businesses could be

considered crazy. But if it has helped

some to find more time for God and their

families, then it was all worth it.

AWC: What do you feel about the

past 30 years in window cleaning?

done a great job in education for the

small one-man window cleaning

company. I feel they have helped me to

expand my business in a much more

professional way. With the IWCCI, large

companies and small ones will have a

training program they can promote

among their employees and customers.

AWC: What are some of the tricks

of the trade?

can trade for just about anything you

want.

We barter at the country club for

two rounds of golf and at another golf

course we get four rounds with a golf

cart. Some of the better restaurants will

give you the 50% employee discount for

food while you work there. You can

barter for your accountants and lawyers

by doing their homes, but according to

the IRS, this does count as income (fair

market value) so we do count the

wholesale value of these services as

income.

AWC: After 35 years of window

cleaning, what insights can you

give?

as possible, and train them to do the

work when you are not there. This will

give you the most work when you are

How to Advertise for Free

Bosun chair cleaning at the Y-12 Credit Union.

not there. This will give you the most freedom and help you

work on your business and not in it. If I understood this

concept 30 years ago, I would be now on a houseboat fishing

somewhere like Aruba! The sooner you trust someone to do

the work, the sooner you will start having a business and not

a job. You take care of the money or at least always keep an

eye on it, but let someone do everything else.

Window cleaning should give you more time to achieve

the higher things in life, like family, and God and friends. I

once read a story that said what you remember in life is not

the great people you read or hear about but the people who

made a difference in your life, your first-grade teacher or coach,

or the guy who first taught you how to clean windows! I feel

we should try to be that person who makes a difference in

someone’s life! Window cleaning has given me that kind of

time to help others and for that I will ever be grateful to the

business that has given me so much.

AWC: Thanks, Phil.

in your local Yellow Pages and offering to subcontract

their window cleaning.

and painter contractors, maintenance, home builders and

real estate companies.

are interested in and acquire a working relationship

so they will refer you to others in their field.

(we trade for one window cleaning to pay for our yearly

membership).

and your company.

your accounts.

ads or referrals.

refer you to others.

and give them to your clients.