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The Wash Bros Podcast
Join The Wash Bros, Matt Jackson and Clay Smith, as they talk friendship, business, and how working together as owner/operators of competing businesses has helped them achieve even greater success.
The Wash Bros Podcast
Season 2: Episode 19: How We Doubled Revenue Without Changing Our Marketing Strategy
Ever find yourself turning down jobs because you're booked solid for weeks? That's not a badge of honor—it's a revenue leak. In this revealing conversation, Clay Smith breaks down how he scaled to two pressure washing trucks and completed a staggering 60 jobs in just the first half of the month without changing his marketing strategy one bit.
The most surprising discovery? When you're consistently booked out more than two weeks, you're not just leaving money on the table—you're creating a scheduling nightmare. As Clay explains, "People want to reschedule, they don't have the money, something has drastically changed in their life." The solution isn't to raise prices or brag about your waitlist—it's to expand capacity.
Matt and Clay cut through common industry myths, particularly the equipment obsession that keeps many pressure washers stuck in technician mode rather than business owner mode. They reveal how they complete standard houses in 45 minutes using simple systems while others spend hours with complicated setups for identical results. "It's not about the equipment," Matt emphasizes. "It's about your branding, marketing, and sales."
Particularly valuable is their breakdown of how adding a second truck often solves its own problem—work materializes to fill the schedule because your increased capacity makes you more attractive to clients who need service soon. Clay's employee lives on the opposite side of town, effectively creating a second service location without additional overhead.
For pressure washing business owners wrestling with growth decisions, this episode provides the permission and practical wisdom to overcome the fear of scaling. Stop leaving money on the table and discover why, as Clay puts it, "If you're scared to take that risk, don't be."
Have questions about scaling your business? Join our Facebook community and connect with us directly. We're committed to growing this industry by sharing real numbers and proven strategies.
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what's up, guys? It's matt jackson and clay smith and we are the wash bros. Thanks for tuning in for this father to stay episode. We're going to be uh, season 2, episode 19. So can't believe we're already 19 episodes deep into this. Uh, with our rebrand.
Speaker 1:It's june, 15th sunday, it's hot outside, father's day and we're gonna bang out this episode, probably quick, just so everybody can get back to their families and everything like that. So what we're going to talk about today is, um, we're just playing, we're kind of talking about this before the episode. We're talking about how, uh, like when you're expanding into multiple trucks, like he's got two trucks, two rigs on the road right now and he's he's like, hey, my marketing seems I feel like I haven't really grossly changed anything on my marketing, but I'm able to fill two trucks up like no problem and I'm doing more than I was before. So, kind of talking, talking about, uh, how it's been, I guess, like a progress report on clay, like adding on that secondary truck and like how successful he's been able to be so far with just doing it. So you want to kick this thing off, clay.
Speaker 2:Yeah, man, appreciate everybody YouTube, uh, linkedin, wherever you're listening from. Appreciate you Spotify, apple podcast. Obviously, we're on all the platforms. Make sure you go, hit a like and follow, get in the Watch Bros group on Facebook. Make sure you follow all of our pages on Facebook and Matt doesn't even know this. Appreciate whoever's listening from Arizona I got a phone call from you this week.
Speaker 2:Appreciate you calling. It's good chopping it up with you. It's always awesome chatting with somebody across the country. So appreciate you listening. Thanks for everybody that does give us a call, talk to us, whatnot? And, uh, we're always here to help you.
Speaker 2:So, uh, what me and matt were talking about before we even aired and we said it'd be a good topic to talk about today was basically, I have scaled to two trucks. I have a full-time guy and we have not dealt. Uh, so it's the 15th of the month, 10 working days. We have done over 60 jobs, so the revenue is crazy on that, and what I'm trying to get at here is, if you're looking to scale, you're already two weeks out, three weeks out, however many weeks you are out, it is not a I don't know how to say this. It's not something to brag about to be two or three months out, right, you're leaving a lot of money on the table. It's just the way it is. I'm going to assure you a hundred percent, and I will be willing to bet on it, that you are having scheduling issues when it comes up to that week that that customer is time to. It's time to wash your house.
Speaker 2:I know that there's something that's probably came up. They probably don't have the money, they probably don't have the time. They want to be there for you. You just run into all kinds of scheduling issues when you're two weeks out, or three weeks over over two weeks out. You want to stay at that two week margin. You don't want to go any further than that because you start running into those issues where people want to reschedule. They don't have the money. They've had a daughter's appointment. Something has drastically changed in their life. You're giving too much time and you're leaving money on the table.
Speaker 2:So what me and Matt were talking about was I've scaled the two trucks, we've knocked out 60 jobs in two weeks and I have not changed anything. That scarcity mindset is gone. I'm not worried about any kind of work flow, lead flow. I'm not worried about scheduling, and that's what a lot of people, I think, that are scared of. When I get those two trucks, am I going to be able to feed this other guy? Am I going to be able to put more jobs on the table? But we have knocked out 60 jobs in 10 working days and I have not changed a thing. So, as I always say, be consistent in everything that you do and it'll all come together the way it should yeah, and I think that's something I realized too when I decided to scale.
Speaker 1:I kind of ripped the bandit off fast and I was like, oh man, how am I going to do this? And then it just kind of took care of itself. So if you guys are on the fence or, like you said, if you're five weeks out, that's not a flex. Uh, we occasionally have people who are like I don't know, haters or something like that. They like message us or DM us and they got like, oh, here's my opinion on things. And then I say, cool, how much revenue are you guys doing this month? And then they say, oh, that's a secret. I'm not going to tell you about what I'm doing, but I'm five weeks out and they're trying to brag about the five weeks out part.
Speaker 1:If you're so much more growth to be had as you scale this thing into a business and the objective here at like the Wash Bros, is to talk about our growth journey and like there's nothing wrong with like hey, I'm the owner operator, I'm doing this, I'm comfortable here, that's completely fine. Everybody has a different way of doing things. But like you're going to get to a point in business where you're going to be so good at what you do, you have so many customers, you're doing everything right. It's the natural progression to get another truck into scale and you'll find that a lot of times it just takes care of itself.
Speaker 1:You'll get opportunities that you didn't have before because people see you have multiple trucks. They're like this guy's a real business. Now People will be like, hey, I'm booked out three weeks or four weeks. This guy needs needs to get their house washed in the next week or so. This guy's got multiple, multiple trucks, he's got a crew, let's go. And I've noticed too, on commercial opportunities, we've been able to bang out a lot more stuff and we're getting a lot more leads because our brand is showcasing multiple trucks and not just an owner operator, cause, like everybody and brother is doing this as an owner-operator, when you have multiple trucks, you've got everything in place. You're really separating yourselves from others.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I truly believe it's how you position yourself and how you want the people that are viewing you online to see you. If you want to look like a Chuck in a truck with a trailer which there's nothing wrong with that I was there at one point but if that's the way you want to look, you want to look like a handyman or look like a uh, just another guy in the neighborhood pulling a trailer with a pressure washer, then that's how you're going to be viewed. Um, but even when I did look like that, I still scored commercial work. It all boils down to how you target your marketing. It's all boils down to the relationships you're making, the relationships you're making, the relationships you're making with other people in your industry, your competition, um. Are you getting your reviews to make sure you have a reputable space online? Um, it's all about who you, who you're wanting to get in front of.
Speaker 1:you just got to figure out how, how to get in front of exactly right and um, yeah, it's like kind of like Clay says this is not really a secret we discuss in every episode over the past two seasons and a couple of years on, like everything we've done.
Speaker 1:So it's pretty cool to see Clay getting off the, going from like doing it all himself to scaling to a secondary truck and, like you said, now he's doing like six.
Speaker 1:He's already done 60 something jobs and it's like halfway through the month. Like six, he's already done 60 something jobs and it's uh like halfway through the month. So you're able to knock out what you were pretty much doing in one month by yourself already with half the month left to go, and you can just see how, like, instead of killing yourself and doing it all yourself and holding onto the control, you're able to like bring another team member on and like double your business without really stressing too much about like oh, how am I going to make it work? It's it kind of seems like it just uh, sorts itself out with, with your branding and with everything else and it's like, hey, if you build it, they will come. So if you guys are on that line where you think, oh my gosh, I don't have a perfect plan. I'm going into uncharted waters. You have faith. You open yourself up and like work will kind of flow to you.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Another thing is not only am I able to bring on another guy, I'm actually able to pay them. Well, with how that I've done things, with just being a one man show, and how I've set things and what I've worked hard towards, you want to work hard, build that capital, be able to buy that second truck, buy that skid, buy that trailer, whatever you want. However, your business is set up, you do all these things and early on you're just setting yourself up for whatever you, wherever you're wanting to go in the future, and that's what I've done from the beginning. A lot of guys will stay in a certain radius.
Speaker 2:Well, with my business model, I am everywhere in my area. I mean, I'm 50 miles and then some. And where that has paid off is when I grew to my second truck. I'm able to send a truck over to the opposite side of my area and I'm able to be on all the way on the other side of the area. And now that I have customers in the whole upstate, it just all blends together and I have that bigger customer base.
Speaker 1:Also your employee with your truck. He lives on that other side of town than you do, so you can strategically work that out where it's almost like you're having a secondary location, Because if he's got the truck and he's leaving in the morning from his house with that truck, you don't have to worry about driving an hour to get to one side of town.
Speaker 2:Right. Not only do you have that other truck, he doesn't have to worry about driving to my shop or my house, or wherever that truck is sitting, to grab that truck. So it's just, it just makes a world of difference for everybody. I'm a big fan of the skids. I know you're a big fan of the skids matt. They just make everything more convenient, especially if you go and you're working in tight spaces, tight neighborhoods.
Speaker 2:Um, we have these luxury type neighborhoods, uh, in our area and it it's very hard to get around. I mean, I was actually on a job on that one time. We almost got stuck in there because we had a trailer. So it's just, it's just so much easier having that skid. If you are a trailer guy, I would I would just at least look into skids. They're just so much easier. The best move I ever made, the best decision decision I ever made, just because there's tight spaces like apartment complexes, there's tight neighborhoods, you don't have to worry about taking mailboxes out, don't have to worry about being in the way. When you have that skid, it's in the back of the truck.
Speaker 1:When you have a trailer, you're basically taking up room for basically two, two vehicles and the cool thing is, when you have a skid, you can have a trailer behind it too. So you got a big job. You want to have multiple people help out. You can literally rock a trailer pulled behind your truck and a skid, and you can essentially run two trucks instead of just one. Just drop the trailer wherever you want to have that trailer, and then there's your one command center and then you've got your skid on the other side of the building. So you're banging stuff out and you're just driving one vehicle 100%.
Speaker 2:I've done that one before too, but it's just all about. There's no blueprint business. We try to preach and give all the. We're not really trying to preach, but we're trying to tell you guys what all has worked for us. This is real stuff. These are real numbers. Anybody wants to see them? I'd be happy to show them to you. This is not just some bull crap we're pulling out of the water just to impress anybody. We are really trying to help this industry. We're trying to grow our industry the best we can to help everybody out around the country.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and the thing you need to look at. Don't look at how fast somebody is putting up numbers, because everybody has their own speed. You don't know what's going on behind the scenes. You don't know where they're market. Look for people. If you're trying to emulate, if you're new, look for people that have tenure in the game Somebody who's been at this for 10 years or 15 years or has an established record.
Speaker 1:Don't just look at somebody who's trying to sell you oh, I made X amount of money in six months or I made this much in this. Look for people who are like highly branded online. They have a lot of Google reviews. They have a lot of things that you can't shortcut, because in this game heck, since just 2020, when I've been around I've seen people come and go, especially in the guru space.
Speaker 1:I've seen people who are like blowed up one year disappear the next. They're a joke in the industry. But like, if you're finding somebody to emulate or to listen, to make sure there's tenure and they got skin in the game and they're not just kind of talking on social media about it. So that's one thing. Um, just because it's easy to get wrapped up in the hype that people can put out there and make sure that they're actually walking the talk and they're not just oh, I'm one year into this business teaching. Teaching you guys, when it's like the blind leading the blind and like when you get some experience under your belt, you can see through these belt you can see through these, you can see through these people.
Speaker 2:You can tell by how they talk whether they know what they're talking about or not. It's definitely easy to point them out because sometimes I'll go and I'll look and I'll do some my own little due diligence and research and see, see what these guys are looking at and, like you say, if you haven't, you haven't marinated yourself in the, it's kind of hard to know what's what. It's easy to believe a lot of things, because I was there at one point I believed a lot of crap. And if you look up these guys' companies and you see that they got 20 Google reviews and they've been in business for X amount of time, you can tell they really don't care. They're just wanting attention. They're wanting to sell you a.
Speaker 2:From what I've gathered, nine times out of ten. They're wanting to sell you a. From what I've gathered, they nine times out of ten. They want to sell you a product, some kind of course, that they have robotically generated, or they're wanting to I don't know get you into their convention or something of that nature. That's just. There's a lot of common denominators there. It's like the blind leading the blind yeah, and the.
Speaker 1:I mean another thing too. We we talk about, I know this the topics were kind of shifting away from like how clay's been with his two trucks, but it's like, okay, well, he's able to be successful because like the same blueprint, the like the wash rose formula that we both use, and that is like we're focusing more on building the business itself than like what equipment we have. Like him and I have both probably run through every single piece of pressure washing equipment you can. I have had a p40, ar45. I just rebuilt my ar45 eight gallon a minute pressure washers. Five and a half gallon pressure washers. Three and a half gallon pressure washers, four gallon pressure washer, whatever you started with um different whisper wash surface cleaners. Be surface cleaners. Like we've gone through the entire thing, extras, like we've 12 volts, like we've literally gone through all the technical here.
Speaker 1:And what's making us successful isn't all of that. And as far as cleaning houses, that's like everybody can clean a house about the same. And don't fall into these traps of like you need this piece of equipment or you need this or that. Those aren't unique selling points to customers. Customers don't care, you're being sold by vendors, by people like we're saying, who are trying to be gurus online in order to, like you, give them your hard-earned money. And that's why you're seeing a lot in in the market of all these like 50, 60 000 rigs being up for sale and they're worth 20 grand at best or 15 grand at best, because a lot of these guys have been sold a lot of like oh, you need this trailer because you're going to make so much money, but they missed the entire point of what's required to grow a business. And that's kind of like the lessons we have here with sales or, excuse me, with the wash bros, is that we are like sales and marketing focused and branding focused, and like we're like people come at, come at us or come at me, and they're like, oh, your pricing is needs to be this or that, and it's like no, like, figure out what works for your business. And if you, if you're trying to charge more money than somebody else and if you have, if you're complaining to your competitors about losing jobs on price, maybe you should look in a mirror and look at yourself because, like, what works for one company doesn't necessarily work for another. And if you're also trying to be like gouging people's eyeballs out, don't complain about work that you're not getting, like you like I've never reached out to somebody and I complained to them because, oh, like I undercut them. I'm like sorry we're so busy. I don't necessarily know what we're even talking about here.
Speaker 1:It's like people fixate on small things and little things and that's the reason they're stuck and they get. They hide behind their ego and this is just kind of like a coaching lesson to people. If you're trying to grow, like me and Clay, you're going to have to take risk and you're going to have to like lean into faith and go into the unknown uh, like unknown territory. And you're not going to be able to do that by like overanalyzing things or focusing on stupid things Like how much are you charging per square foot? Like. If you ask these types of questions and that's what you fixate on, I guarantee you're not going to grow your business because you're just focusing on the completely wrong things. If you're trying to figure out about like technical or this, like nonsense, you just fundamentally don't understand what business is about. And hey, if you want to run this as a hobby and this is like your thing, that's cool. If you want to be the big bad pressure washer technician again, that's cool. But if you're trying to really grow this into a business and have employees and, like Clay says, you get an employee, he's able to grow it be excited. You pay him good money. He's not doing that by fixating on these technical, non-important issues or how much you're charging per square foot. It's just like come on, bro, you fundamentally misunderstand what a business is about and that's where plugging into the Wash Bros, getting your mindset right.
Speaker 1:Don't get so stuck on your ego and then look in the mirror and complain that you're not making any money and saying, oh man, the economy's rough. This is hard, this is tough. Clay and I are both able to grow in the economy today in a very, very saturated market where, like, I don't even recognize the market anymore in our Greenville area because it's just so many newbies, so many people I see pop up out of the blue on Google ads, so many people, new yard signs, new Facebook people. Like it's very difficult and you got to be laser focused in your branding, your marketing, in your sales in order to stay on top of that. And and then you don't just allow somebody who's like, hey, this guy's hot over this summer, this guy's hot over that summer to listen to, like figure out, people like Clay and I both been in this game for five years, four years like like there's ebbs and flows in this and as long as you're moving up into the right, that's all that matters.
Speaker 1:So that's kind of the rant I have just from like what I see, and, and in the summertime, like we're father's day, it's clay was clay and I were just talking about this. Like we don't really have crazy leads right now, like our leads don't seem to be super crazy, like I'm able to fill up my weeks on both trucks, but it isn't anything like super crazy to brag about. Um, it's just hey, it is what it is. You take it while you can and then you just keep moving forward. And that's kind of the attitude and mindset you guys have to have, uh, to get through times like this, because I I mean, I guess vacation is huge, people may be afraid of the economy, stuff, like that all you can do is kind of keep your head down and keep going forward.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean even going back to the equipment type stuff you're talking about. Think about it this way If you have a million different gadgets and machines and whatever you got, what are you doing with all that stuff? Like with me, I want to be in and out on a typical cookie cutter Ryan Holmes type home like a cookie cutter home. I want to be in and out on a typical cookie cutter Ryan Holmes type home like a cookie cutter home. I want to be in and out of there anywhere between 45 minutes to an hour. If I'm pulling 10 different hoses to do 10 different things, then it's going to take me half a day to do that house.
Speaker 2:So keep it simple, keep it efficient and rock on and make the money, because the money is why we do this. I mean, some of you guys may have a passion and just have a some kind of a freak about a pressure watch, I don't know, but I do this because I want to make a good living, provide for my family and hopefully retire earlier than I should. So Think about the business side of things. Stop worrying about the equipment, stop following these gurus that are trying to sell you the equipment and just keep it simple.
Speaker 1:I mean, just keep it simple somebody on, I'm going to charge them 30 cents a square to pressure wash their house. That takes Clay and I 45 minutes to do in our own market and you're going to triple charge or double charge what we're charging these people. You're not going to be in business very long and that isn't people killing the market, that's just you're not understanding what we do as a commodity and the bells and whistles of like oh, look at this. Like, for instance, like we were doing a commercial project, uh, for our local city with a football field and I had to use a on one truck. I have an ar 45 so I'm used to that gas pump and that's cool, but I burned through 30 gallons of bleach in like 15 minutes. So this other truck I got a 12 volt on there and I used like a remco five and a half gallon 12 volt and I was like hitting poles that had like black growth on them and it was neat. I needed to hit it with like a roof mix so I had to use it. While I was doing this, I was talking to my employee who was there and and he I was like can you believe that people literally wash houses this way? And like we downstream with aids because it's super efficient and easy and, like clay says, we keep simple and we can bang out a Ryan Holmes generic two, 3000 square foot house in like 45 minutes and I could. I, as I was hitting it with this 12, all I could see like all the proportion are dialing in soaps, dialing in this stuff, and I'm like I can see where people spend three hours doing a house that Clay and I are in and out in 45 minutes. The result is the same to the customer their house is clean. It's like we showed up professional communicated. Their house is clean. That's a very simple business. We can charge X amount of money, be done, get a referral, go to the next house and knock out two or three houses.
Speaker 1:By the time that one house is done that you try to charge them 800 bucks to do. Sure, you could say, oh well, I don't have to move, move my truck, I'm just doing this one house all day long and I'm making 800 bucks. But when you zoom out there's not many people that are going to want to do that one house for 800 bucks and you're not going to get volume of work. That's not saying, oh you, I don't want to run two trucks. I can make more money doing one truck. And that's complete lie. Just like just know, like cool.
Speaker 1:If you want to go high ticket model, that's one thing, but you have to have a ton of leads. If you're a new guy and you're complaining and you're like, oh man, I just can't find my in. I'm trying to go high ticket because I don't want to run multiple trucks, I don't want to do this. Your value isn't built yet.
Speaker 1:Clay and I could probably do high ticket and just cherry pick and just run one truck. But looking at the numbers, like we make way more money by running multiple trucks than trying to cherry pick and do the single truck. And like Clay's probably realizing now like how much money's flown in just because he's got two book, two trucks on the road and he's not really spending that much more money on advertising or changing anything. He's just getting more profit because he's able to bang through a lot more work. And it's like if you guys are you guys are trying to decide what business model to do like hey, it's a lot easier just to kind of add that extra truck and make that risk and then build that team up and scale. And that's why the number one thing you guys see on these groups is like hey, if you're you're wanting to grow your business, you got to get off the truck. So absolutely.
Speaker 1:I think we've pretty much covered everything today, especially with our father's day edition, yep it being father's day, we're cutting this thing short, so we're about like 25 something minutes here, uh, but you guys want to drop us a comment and uh have any questions, etc. We're trying to build up the wash grows, the wash bros group. Uh, we're posting a little bit more on social media, trying to engage with you guys and stuff like that. Clay got any last minute remarks.
Speaker 2:Nah, if you have any questions, reach out to me. I know a lot of you guys already have. Try to keep it on social media, though. I know I get some of you guys' phone calls sometimes and most of the time I'm still working a truck, so I'm still a little busy myself. But if you're scared to take that risk, don't be. If you have any questions, you might want me to help you with reach out to me via facebook if you can. Um, be happy to help you. Anyway, since this is new to me, it's been going great. Like I said, 60 jobs in two weeks is phenomenal. My first I mean that's, that's my first two truck. You know this is my first two truck month, so 60 jobs is, uh, just straight up phenomenal. I couldn't be any happier. I've actually exceeded my expectations. So if there's anything that you guys have questions about, reach out to me. You can reach out to matt as well.
Speaker 1:Be happy to help any way I can yeah, and clay and I, both in the same market uh, our little wash bros, we're probably going to bang out 120 130 000 combined this. So we're putting up numbers. We have a good pace of what's going on in the environment because we're able to take a huge chunk of that market out. So if you guys are saying, oh man, I do $10,000 a month, clay and I together we're banging out like 10 trucks worth of that type of revenue just with us both, because we both have I got two, he's got two, so there's four trucks right there.
Speaker 2:So that just shows you like and that's in the same market.
Speaker 1:Same exact market, competing with the same customers. We're usually probably one of each other's three quotes that our customers get, so like we're able to do this based upon what we talk about here on this episode and all that stuff. But yeah, same with. Clay says if you guys want to reach out, I think somebody may have called me. It may have been the same guy you were talking about. Was his name like Tony or something like that? My VA picked up the phone.
Speaker 2:He's out of Arizona.
Speaker 1:Yeah, maybe same guy, and then my virtual assistant. He just answered my phone for me, so he mentioned somebody called.
Speaker 1:But yeah great that you guys reach out. We look forward to helping everybody and keeping the Wash Bros momentum going and I'm working on building up the website. I got some like merch that I'm slowly testing out, so we'll try to drop some stuff on our website with the Wash Bros. But if anybody has any questions, feel free to hit us up. You want to have any closing responses before you got to run out to your parents.
Speaker 2:Just like and subscribe. Guys Like and subscribe to everything Apple Podcasts, youtube, facebook. Clay Smith on Facebook, matthew Jackson on Facebook, my company C3 Wash Pros on Facebook, matt the Dropaway Gal on Facebook from Matthew, and just make sure you're following us on everything, make sure you're staying up to date. I have been posting lives of me working in a couple of groups in our, actually the wash bros group. Um, just type in the wash bros on the uh private group on facebook and then make sure you're following the wash bros podcast group on facebook as well yep, and I'll be posting some stuff too.
Speaker 1:We've been able to do a lot of cool commercial stuff over the summer, so I've got some media and new videos for our personal marketing that's going to drop soon. That'd be cool and we can share all that stuff in the group as well. But we hope everybody has a great evening and happy Father's Day and kill it this week. So we'll see you on the next one.
Speaker 2:See you guys.
