Q&A with an Esporta Certified Operator

 * The questions below were asked by a prospective Esporta purchaser to another member in their network who has already implemented the Esporta technology.  

Who sells this new textile service?  Sales, PM’s or both?

This is a dual effort, but for the most part it's operational. More of an awareness thing on the sales teams efforts. We were extremely surprised with the amount of revenue we were "stepping over" when we were in water jobs and fire jobs. If you respond quickly to the fire claims, it's fairly simple to sell this value by cleaning the emergency items when you walk onsite and then pack out the clothing when you have the rapport with the customer. Items to consider would be: kid’s favorite teddy bear, leather items, wedding dress, any items you need for the upcoming week, etc. 

In regards to water claims, we teach our guys to pay attention to the circumstances. When they walk in and there is damage in closets and bathrooms, then know to ask if they had any items that are affected from the closets and most of the time, they can see these items in the bathtub (because they are wet). It's an add on to the claim.          

Who manages the textile jobs? 

We had a fire manager that manages our fire claims, but switched to PM's. This is simple to add on and doesn't require additional staff initially to complete in compared to your workload.

Do you use this service as an add on for the fire and pack-out PM’s or do you use it as a standalone division and have a dedicated PM’s to push textiles?

This is an add on to your current team. If the business is run in divisions, you can easily add this division inside the fire department. That's what we did initially. It was easy and our fire ladies just ran loads in between cleaning hard contents. As both sections grow from doing it in-house, you will have to add people, but that's always a good problem. Once we got to a certain size, we did break it off by PM but they scheduled that work in house instead of working with a sub-contractor, kind of like on construction, except you produce in house. It has been successful both ways.

How many employees are dedicated to the service?

Initially we started out with one lady with our first machine. We now have 4 ladies that produce $2 million in hard contents, packout and soft contents.

How do you combat TPA’s and direct work between carriers and franchise dry cleaners?

We don't do any TPA work, so we aren't on any programs. The work we get is direct referrals, social media or SM program work. We still land work that is "program" work, but our team does a great job of selling the customer to create the relationship.

Do you make money?
 

We bought our first machine in August. In January, we bought a second one. We have had high years and one year where we didn't do much revenue, but with the most unskilled laborer, you will never have a labor percentage more than 20% and materials are a job case basis. You will on average have a higher margin of profit net and gross with soft contents than any other service line you will offer. I can argue this point in a court of law. 
 

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