How many other orgs related to PW cleaning exsist?
PWNA
WRAPI
UaSMC
CETA
ITECKA
RUSTYS????
PHIL AKLAND
PWNA
WRAPI
UaSMC
CETA
ITECKA
RUSTYS????
PHIL AKLAND
How orgs related in this industry?
- Thread starter Ron Musgraves
- Start date
Les Howington
New member
First let me say that this is not to step on anyones toes or to discredit any one particular organization.
Now, my question is, what's up with all these new organizations coming to be recently? It seems to me that everyone wants a piece of the action. On every corner of the net there are organizations, institutes, associations, networks or whatever wanting $200 here, $150 there to be a part of them.
I understand one benefit and the only one in my opinion, is the potential to have the experience of its members at your disposal. Isn't that the main benefit of most associations? But most associations or organizations don't have bulletin boards all over the internet providing that knowledge for free as our industry does.
Sure you can offer buying power, but is it that much of a benefit to anyone other than the company who you are buying from. Say the paid sponsor, XYZ chemical offers a discount to an organization's members and XYZ is located in southern California. What benefit would that be to me if I'm on the east coast and shipping costs more than the chemcials I could buy locally? Seems to me the only one benefiting is the chemical company.
Or say the association offers a certification program. What weight would that carry with my customers? NONE. Most of my customers or probably any of yours either, have a clue who any of these organizations or certification programs are.
Of course there is the newsletter. No more than I could get reading any of the hundred bulletin boards on the internet for free.
and then you have the bulletin boards. It seems everyone and their brother has a BB now. And why not? I understand the reasoning behind it. If contractors come to my BB, they will buy my product. There is nothing wrong with that. Thats business, but call it what it is. Don't put an association's forum on a directing member's own personal business's website. Oh I get it. Pay me $200 to join my association, you can come to the forum and get the collective experience of the members and by the way, while youre here, buy my products. Great marketing!
and those benefits! I guess it is nice for the board members and directors and managers and secretaries and trainers and certifiers and whoever else is associated with the group to be able to travel from city to city all paid by the members dues and socialize, expand their own businesses and get breaks from the sponsors.
To me it's just another form of greed, self-promotion, ego and if I must say so, a great marketing strategy to form a new ASSociation and offer all these "benefits" to its members.
Wake up people! Take all of that money you are spending on membership dues and go to the local community college and take a business course or marketing course. Put your efforts into letting your customers come to respect you and your work. make a name for yourself and YOUR company. Don't rely on some fake association or organization to do it for you. If you really want to be a part of something, go volunteer for Big Brothers or Big Sisters. Help a little kid who has nothing. Help the little old lady or retired couple down the street who can barely get by on social security. Their network is way bigger and stronger than any you could pay to join. The self-esteem and self worth you get from that will carry you way further than any so called certification that has no legitimate weight behind it. If you are looking for experience, there are a few legitimate schools that will train you the right way. One of them is Delco's. A company with a proven track record of actually wanting to help the contractor. Of course, like any school, you will pay for it. But that's what it is. A school. You go, you learn, you apply it to your business. They teach you hands on by professionals.
What I see happening is the more people that get on this marketing craze of forming their own business organzations, the legitimate organizations and schools will lose some of their own credibility. Just as when one contractor goes around town giving the industry a bad name, we all pay a price for it.
It needs to be exposed for what it truly is. A way of getting their own name in the light for business and personal reasons, falsely improving their own credibility by claiming to be a President or CEO or BOD of some "fly-by-night" association, milking members of their hard earned money by promises of more business so the directors can gather at their "round table meetings" at the cost of the members and generating income for themselves either through membership fees or through promoting their own personal business ventures through the association.
These people know who they are. I give them credit where credit is due. They are geniuses at marketing and maybe that's where they need to stay. They found an industry that lacked organzation and saw $$ signs. Forget going in business as a contractor. There is way more money to be made selling the contractors "knowledge, chemicals, websites, marketing tools, magazines, newsletters, books, certificates, directory lists".
I will be the first to admit this indusrty needed some organization, but through regulation and education, not through useless benefits and certifications. Those are no good to anyone other than the ones offering them. Wolman and Olympic certify contractors as a way to get the contractors to use their products. Those certifications mean nothing to the homeowners. A great marketing strategy on the part of wolman and olympic. They rely on the idea that if you carry their certificate, you will use their products. Why do you think they send you the test with the answers included. SO YOU WILL PASS. There is no training involved. Thank God other professions don't do this. I surely wouldn't want an electrician wiring my house that got his certificate from a test through the mail or a plumber fixing my pipes who got certified from a manufacturer of plumbing products. You think that manufacturer cares about anything other than that plumber buying their products.
The same holds true for these new associations popping up everywhere except you are conned into paying for a membership. Sure, you may have to travel to another state, sit through a day of seminars, pay a fee and get a certificate but are you really leaving there "Professionally Certified"? NO. What you are leaving with is a useless piece of paper that cost you $250 that you could have probably printed yourself with any publishing software and carried just as much weight with a homeowner. Again, if its training you want, go to a legitimate school thats been around awhile. The internet is a vast array of knowledge. There is too much out there for free to be paying these people to show it too you.
These organizations care nothing more than what you can do for them. That's why most of the sponsors who offer discounts are also board members. They are promoting their own business through membership. It doesn't work that way for the contractors because the only people who see your name are your competitors. The people who form the associations disguise themselves as your peers but are actually trying to get your business.
Don't buy into these scams. These associations are only business ventures from those who are starting them. They are not to benefit the contractors. They are marketing strategies for business growth and trust me, it ain't your business they are looking to grow.
Now, my question is, what's up with all these new organizations coming to be recently? It seems to me that everyone wants a piece of the action. On every corner of the net there are organizations, institutes, associations, networks or whatever wanting $200 here, $150 there to be a part of them.
I understand one benefit and the only one in my opinion, is the potential to have the experience of its members at your disposal. Isn't that the main benefit of most associations? But most associations or organizations don't have bulletin boards all over the internet providing that knowledge for free as our industry does.
Sure you can offer buying power, but is it that much of a benefit to anyone other than the company who you are buying from. Say the paid sponsor, XYZ chemical offers a discount to an organization's members and XYZ is located in southern California. What benefit would that be to me if I'm on the east coast and shipping costs more than the chemcials I could buy locally? Seems to me the only one benefiting is the chemical company.
Or say the association offers a certification program. What weight would that carry with my customers? NONE. Most of my customers or probably any of yours either, have a clue who any of these organizations or certification programs are.
Of course there is the newsletter. No more than I could get reading any of the hundred bulletin boards on the internet for free.
and then you have the bulletin boards. It seems everyone and their brother has a BB now. And why not? I understand the reasoning behind it. If contractors come to my BB, they will buy my product. There is nothing wrong with that. Thats business, but call it what it is. Don't put an association's forum on a directing member's own personal business's website. Oh I get it. Pay me $200 to join my association, you can come to the forum and get the collective experience of the members and by the way, while youre here, buy my products. Great marketing!
and those benefits! I guess it is nice for the board members and directors and managers and secretaries and trainers and certifiers and whoever else is associated with the group to be able to travel from city to city all paid by the members dues and socialize, expand their own businesses and get breaks from the sponsors.
To me it's just another form of greed, self-promotion, ego and if I must say so, a great marketing strategy to form a new ASSociation and offer all these "benefits" to its members.
Wake up people! Take all of that money you are spending on membership dues and go to the local community college and take a business course or marketing course. Put your efforts into letting your customers come to respect you and your work. make a name for yourself and YOUR company. Don't rely on some fake association or organization to do it for you. If you really want to be a part of something, go volunteer for Big Brothers or Big Sisters. Help a little kid who has nothing. Help the little old lady or retired couple down the street who can barely get by on social security. Their network is way bigger and stronger than any you could pay to join. The self-esteem and self worth you get from that will carry you way further than any so called certification that has no legitimate weight behind it. If you are looking for experience, there are a few legitimate schools that will train you the right way. One of them is Delco's. A company with a proven track record of actually wanting to help the contractor. Of course, like any school, you will pay for it. But that's what it is. A school. You go, you learn, you apply it to your business. They teach you hands on by professionals.
What I see happening is the more people that get on this marketing craze of forming their own business organzations, the legitimate organizations and schools will lose some of their own credibility. Just as when one contractor goes around town giving the industry a bad name, we all pay a price for it.
It needs to be exposed for what it truly is. A way of getting their own name in the light for business and personal reasons, falsely improving their own credibility by claiming to be a President or CEO or BOD of some "fly-by-night" association, milking members of their hard earned money by promises of more business so the directors can gather at their "round table meetings" at the cost of the members and generating income for themselves either through membership fees or through promoting their own personal business ventures through the association.
These people know who they are. I give them credit where credit is due. They are geniuses at marketing and maybe that's where they need to stay. They found an industry that lacked organzation and saw $$ signs. Forget going in business as a contractor. There is way more money to be made selling the contractors "knowledge, chemicals, websites, marketing tools, magazines, newsletters, books, certificates, directory lists".
I will be the first to admit this indusrty needed some organization, but through regulation and education, not through useless benefits and certifications. Those are no good to anyone other than the ones offering them. Wolman and Olympic certify contractors as a way to get the contractors to use their products. Those certifications mean nothing to the homeowners. A great marketing strategy on the part of wolman and olympic. They rely on the idea that if you carry their certificate, you will use their products. Why do you think they send you the test with the answers included. SO YOU WILL PASS. There is no training involved. Thank God other professions don't do this. I surely wouldn't want an electrician wiring my house that got his certificate from a test through the mail or a plumber fixing my pipes who got certified from a manufacturer of plumbing products. You think that manufacturer cares about anything other than that plumber buying their products.
The same holds true for these new associations popping up everywhere except you are conned into paying for a membership. Sure, you may have to travel to another state, sit through a day of seminars, pay a fee and get a certificate but are you really leaving there "Professionally Certified"? NO. What you are leaving with is a useless piece of paper that cost you $250 that you could have probably printed yourself with any publishing software and carried just as much weight with a homeowner. Again, if its training you want, go to a legitimate school thats been around awhile. The internet is a vast array of knowledge. There is too much out there for free to be paying these people to show it too you.
These organizations care nothing more than what you can do for them. That's why most of the sponsors who offer discounts are also board members. They are promoting their own business through membership. It doesn't work that way for the contractors because the only people who see your name are your competitors. The people who form the associations disguise themselves as your peers but are actually trying to get your business.
Don't buy into these scams. These associations are only business ventures from those who are starting them. They are not to benefit the contractors. They are marketing strategies for business growth and trust me, it ain't your business they are looking to grow.
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Clean County PW
Active member
Some like to belong to organizations that represent themselves and the industry they belong to. Robert Hindeliter from Delco along with a few others started the PWNA and because of that they gave others a choice to belong to a group or not..You always have that choice and for me personally I'm glad that I did. The best part about belonging to an Org. is the people you meet and I'm honored to say that I've met Robert & Mike Hindeliter along with Larry Hinkley, Joe Walters and tons of other people that belong to this Industry. To me as good as these bb's are there's no comparison to meeting the people behind these post.
Les Howington
New member
John, My post was not to discredit all organizations. They are not all bad and some actually do what they promise. My post was about the ones that charge huge membership fees for worthless benefits such as certificates, rental car discounts, office supplies, newsletters and so forth, all things we can get on our own as well as being used by the founding members and board of directors to further their own businesses which are usually not contract cleaning businesses but suppliers and distributers that contractors purchase from. In other words, the directors are charging the members yearly fees to buy their products at discounted prices. Add it up at the end of the year and there is no discount. the only ones that have profited are the directors and the sponsors.
it sort of reminds me of how our government operates, with all the lobbying, pay outs and all the other greedy politics that go on.
My post is not to offend or discredit anyone especially Robert Hinderliter or those at Delco. Way I see it, the only people that I think it would offend are the crooks that are doing this sort of thing.
it sort of reminds me of how our government operates, with all the lobbying, pay outs and all the other greedy politics that go on.
My post is not to offend or discredit anyone especially Robert Hinderliter or those at Delco. Way I see it, the only people that I think it would offend are the crooks that are doing this sort of thing.