Did she take the piss deliberately or am I being U?

[Oopsydaisyy]

Got my first customer to do ironing for as I'm venturing in an ironing business. I advertised per black bin bag for £15, 4/5th full, not to the brim just to undercut a few companies. She gave me a huge sack that wasn't even a black bin bag and it has 50 items in it, very creased tops and long thick dresses and shirts as it has all literally been twisted and bunged in. So I worked all day for 30pence per item! I am a bit miffed. Can anyone tell me what to do in future to make a profit at least? What are you willing to pay? If you iron or have an Iron Lady, how much do you charge/they charge? I feel so silly and have shot myself in the bloody foot

My cleaner charges per hour at the same hourly rate as she does for cleaning (£11)

I’m charged by weight, so a huge pile normally costs me £50ish

My original ironing lady advertised one black bag full. Big mistake as they come in different sizes.

My next ironing lady gave us a box and anything that fitted in was ironed for a set amount

. I’m in London and my local ironing service advertises “Shirt on hanger - £2.60”. “Shirt folded - £3.50”
For the love of God stop doing sackfuls for fifteen quid!!

Charge by weight....

My ironing lady ( midlands) would have charged about £30 for the amount you described.
I dont think the customer was taking the piss to be honest. You didnt specify anything about the bags size so she probably thought it was an opening offer or whatever. She could have been waiting for you to say something about the enormous amount she handed over ,but since you didnt...

I pay a set amount for 20 items but Shirts are more and can’t be included in the bundle

I pay £1 per shirt (ironing only, not washing) can’t remember other items as we mostly do shirts but it’s similar.
She also had a minimum order of £15 which I think is quite a good idea.
She has built up lots of regular customers so for example I am booked in on a rolling basis every 3 weeks and she texts me the week before to remind me/confirm if need the slot the next week or if we can go another week.

I pay per time so my lady does 1.5 hours and I pay £20 but I’ve known her for 10 years and I trust her and she trusts me. Some people pay about £15 per laundry basket but to avoid confusion I’d supply the laundry basket so they don’t buy a massive one. Also I’d say something like ironing shirts will incur an extra 25p per shirt or something??
Good luck.

Holey moley. Where do you live. Can you do my ironing!!!!! I would LOVE to pay that.

Give them back in 2 or 3 black bins bags and charge her the appropriate amount.

And get better at pricing up. It's a mistake we only should be making once.

One other thing, my lady takes about a week to get my ironing back so therefore I only put in stuff that can wait a week so that’s only my husband’s stuff as he has so many clothes and shirts!! I would probably put in more school uniform etc if it came back within 2-3 days but I don’t have enough stuff for her to have it an entire week so maybe try and get it back super quick too.

I iron and charge £10 per 20 items.

So it works out as 50p per item but I always charge a minimum of £10.

I could do with putting my prices up a bit to be fair

I would buy a load of IKEA bags and say to customers it’s £x per ikea bag up to a max weight of x kg. They can provide their own bag, buy one from you or transfer ironing into a bag on arrival

I think we pay around £2 per kilo

I send all my ironing on hangers ie all the shirts / T-shirt’s/ trousers have been dried on them to minimise creasing. They come back in the same hangers. Perhaps you could suggest this to your customers ( or charge extra to provide hangers)

Ikea bags! My ironing lady used to supply an ikea blue bag for the ironing and weigh it at the front door when she collected it. Price per kilo and the short handles were perfect for the suitcase scales.

My ironing lady charged £20 per IKEA bag. If it was particularly full she'd charge £25, if it was a bit emptier she'd charge £15. I thought her prices were very cheap and would have been happy to pay more.

You need variable pricing as some items are more complex than others. Pillowcases and tea towels should be cheaper than shirts.

Where I live you can get ten shirts washed and ironed for £9.99

Look at what others are charging and price accordingly.

Also take into consideration how fast you iron. My DH can do a shirt in four minutes while I take three.

You need to work out what you need to earn per hour for this to be worthwhile and charge that. Don't try to be the cheapest in your local area. Charge in the middle ground but aim to provide top service (faultless ironing, reliable, quick enough turnaround).

If you want a fixed rate then do some trial runs and work out how long it takes you to iron 10 shirts, then 10 less onerous items and work out how much people need to pay you per 10 items for you to earn your chosen hourly rate.

I did the ironing for a family of 6 for a year. Because they knew they wouldn't have to iron the clothes they made no effort whatsoever to straighten them out on the washing line when hanging them up so I know how much longer it takes to iron scrumpled clothes. You need to take this sort of thing into account when deciding your rates.

Either:
Charge by weight
Charge by item
Charge by the hour

Either way, don't let people take the piss. I hate ironing, as do most people probably. This woman is a cf.

Per black bag- you should see how small I roll jeans and jumpers- you would have had 120 items in a black bag off me! (Okay slight exaggeration..... may 80 items!)

Def do by number of items!

I pay £1 a shirt for ironing, but I only send out my husband's dress shirts. Everything else just gets folded or hung.

If people are giving you miscellaneous items I would charge by weight -- simple and straightforward. Weigh it in the basket dry before you iron it and charge accordingly.

I would weigh a man's dress shirt and charge a pound for every multiple of that weight. So if a dress shirt weighs 200grams, charge £5 per kilo.

I pay £20p/h for ironing lady to come to me. She does all DH’s work shirts, kids uniforms and a few extra bits I throw in. She comes twice a week.

I would definitely pay 15 pounds an hour for ironing !