Our Competition

There are plenty of green cleaning companies to choose from in Portland but we think you’ll choose us after shopping the competition. Our competitors range from cleaning franchises to large, multi-national companies. Before you sign a contract, you should know what to expect:

Cleaning Franchises such as Jani-King, Coverall, Jani-Pro, ServiceMaster Clean, Vanguard Cleaning Systems, Jan-Pro and others are in the business of signing accounts and selling the business to other cleaners. That means you don’t know who will be cleaning your office building or what their cleaning standards are.

Franchises don’t screen cleaners or cleaning contractors. They hire whoever is willing to pay the franchise fee to service your account. No cleaning experience is necessary!

They also charge hefty fees:

• For a $1,000/month account you will have to pay $6,000 or more upfront! And that's just because they signed the contract, instead of you!
• Service fees include a monthly 15% charge, which go to royalty and management fees.
• If they lose your account after the 6-12 month guarantied period, you are required to pay the initial franchise fee again, which is generally 6 times the monthly account fee, or a finder's fee, which is 3 to 4 times the monthly account fee.
• Franchisees are trained in green cleaning products and procedures by watching a 1-2 hour video; many are just trained in regular janitorial cleaning procedures and products.
• They require franchisees to buy cleaning tools and chemicals and uniforms from them, which often are very expensive, outdated, and inefficient.
• Some companies require you, the franchisee, to buy business insurance from them at a much higher rate.

National Companies and Multimillion Dollar Companies have large staffs of managers and cleaners, which can mean you can get lost in the shuffle. Those large staffs also drive up your monthly cleaning fees.

Larger companies vary in how they operate. Some offer low benefits to workers, meaning they aren’t able to attract the highest quality workforce. Generally cleaners don’t even receive reviews of their work, so they will never know if they need to improve to meet their clients’ needs.

On the other hand, at unionized companies, workers may receive better benefits, but many times management is too weak to discipline hourly employees who are responsible for cleaning a building.

Because there are so many layers in larger companies, communication between the customer and the cleaner gets lost and distorted as it passes through the chain of command. This leads to miscommunication, which is a very frequent and unpleasant issue between the owner or property manager and the cleaning company.

Like cleaning franchises, big companies often hire smaller janitorial companies as subcontractors to manage part of their business. That means you don’t know who is cleaning your building. Those janitorial subcontractors actually hire the employees and other subcontractors, which will ultimately clean the building. There’s no guarantee those employees will be licensed or bonded or even trained in proper green cleaning procedures.