Binderlane

For owners with a crew

Cleaning business profit margin: what it is and how to check yours

Busier and not richer is the most common thing owners say once they have two or three cleaners. It is almost always a margin problem, and it is almost always visible in about a minute of math.

Margin on the price, not markup on the cost

Profit margin is the share of the price you keep after the job has paid for itself. If a job breaks even at $99.13 and you send it for $141.62, the profit is $42.49 and the margin is 30%. Same job, same numbers, but as a markup on cost it would be called 43%. Two names for the same dollars, and they lead to different prices when you use them the other way round. Pick margin on the price, and keep the dollar figure next to it so the percentage never hides what it is worth.

Why the margin shrinks when the crew grows

A solo owner prices from their own wage, often without burden, often without overhead, because the business is small enough to feel it directly. Then they hire. The new cleaner costs the wage plus payroll tax plus workers comp. Insurance goes up. A second van, a phone line, software. The price stays where it was because clients are used to it. Nothing on the surface changed and the margin quietly went from healthy to thin.

The fix is not a bigger price by feel. It is the loaded rate: wage × (1 + burden) + overhead ÷ billable hours. With a crew, the honest version of that number is the one that decides whether the business is paying you or you are paying the business.

Check yours

Put your real wage, burden, overhead and billable hours in. Then a real job. The margin slider shows the price at each margin and the profit in dollars. If the price you have been sending is under the break-even line, that is the whole answer. If it is over, the slider tells you what margin you have actually been working at.

Your costs

example
$/hr
example

Hours you bill clients. Not driving, not quoting.

hrs/wk
example

Insurance, phone, ads, software, the van.

$/mo
example

Payroll tax, workers comp, on top of the wage.

%

This job

example
ppl
example
hrs
example
$
example
mi

An hour really costs

$27.58/hr

Break-even, this job

$99.13

Send price

$141.62

30% · $42.49 profit

Loaded rate = wage × (1 + burden) + overhead ÷ monthly billable hours. Break-even = labor + supplies + miles × 70¢. Price = break-even ÷ (1 − margin). Example values are placeholders, not market data.

Nothing here is saved to a server. Change the examples to your numbers.

What to do with the number

  1. Rerun it whenever a cost changes. A raise, a new policy, a new van. The margin is the thing that moves when you do not.
  2. Reprice the next new client first. New clients have no old price to compare to. Existing clients can follow at renewal with a plain note.
  3. Send the price as a quote the client can accept. A confident number on a clean, branded quote gets less pushback than the same number in a text. See the template.

Questions owners ask

Is margin the same as markup?
No. Margin is the share of the price that is profit. Markup is the amount added on top of cost. A 30% margin on the price is a higher price than a 30% markup on cost. Binderlane uses margin on the price and shows the profit in dollars beside it.
Is the owner’s pay part of profit?
Not if you want a true number. Put what you would pay yourself for cleaning in as the wage, and what you would pay yourself for running things in overhead. What is left after that is profit. If you skip this, the business looks healthier than it is until you hire someone to do what you did.
Why did my margin drop when I hired?
Usually because the price was built from your own wage, and the person you hired costs more than that once payroll burden is on top. Rerun the loaded rate with the real wage and burden, and the price that keeps your margin is the one the calculator shows.
What margin is normal for a cleaning business?
This page will not give you a number, because your number depends on your costs, your area and what you want the business to pay you. What it will do is show you yours, so you can decide if it is enough.

See what your jobs are actually paying you.

A few quick questions. See your break-even and your price. Then text the client a quote with your logo on it. First 3 quotes free to send. No card.

Check my margin