Sparkle Squad Equips Franchisees to Secure Revenue Year-Round With Multiple Services

Sparkle Squad, the emerging window cleaning franchise backed by Happinest Brands, brings a business model proven by Elite Window Cleaning in Canada to the U.S. market. The franchise has honed its window cleaning processes over the years to provide a top-notch customer experience in this service area, but it has also made strategic additions to its service lineup to boost franchisees’ potential for revenue while maintaining the integrity of the brand.

“We have created an opportunity to establish a repeatable cycle within a single customer base,” said Chris Stoness, CEO of Sparkle Squad. “If we’re serving a multi-unit residential condominium for window cleaning, that same condominium very likely needs gutter cleaning or pressure washing. We have verticals that allow us to upsell throughout the year to create that multi-touch situation with the customer, which is critical in growing your business.”

Stoness recognizes the value of long-time customers in growing a successful business, and by incorporating other services that Sparkle Squad has the expertise to deliver well, Sparkle Squad owners are able to create a stable customer base with repeatable opportunities far beyond just window cleaning.

“We’re very deliberate in the synergetic nature of what we do to provide that customer experience and customer journey that we pride ourselves on,” said Sharon Cupach, Vice President of Franchise Development at Happinest Brands. “Rather than trying to be an expert in every single thing, we focus on the services we know we’re the best at.”

Great Service Year Round

Stoness explained that, over the course of the year, Sparkle Squad franchisees will have opportunities to leverage a suite of services to build and maintain relationships with their customers. In the typical market, the following seasons tend to bring peak demand for specific services as follows:

• Spring: Screen cleaning, siding and exterior home cleaning, and gutter cleaning are prime services in the spring.
• Summer: The summer brings an even bigger emphasis on residential siding and exterior home cleaning.
• Fall: Window cleaning is the main focus, supplemented by screen and siding cleaning, as well as holiday light installation, which can run through October and as late as December. While the large majority of holiday light installation jobs are in residential settings, franchisees do have the ability to secure six-figure deals with light installations for public areas through city or county parties.
• Year-round: Pressure washing is an annual service with very few seasonal restrictions outside of the harshest parts of the winter in Northern markets.

Alongside this fairly typical residential schedule are parallel demands from commercial and institutional customers.

“Commercial customers are generally serviced weekly or monthly all around the calendar,” explained Stoness. “Hotels tend to get cleaned during the summer and fall, and customers like retirement homes are typically cleaned during the spring and fall. Institutional customers like hospitals or larger multi-unit residential facilities are also typically serviced in the spring and fall.”

While there are ebbs and flows in exterior cleaning businesses, being able to cater to a wider range of customers provides franchisees a bit more stability.

“When you layer all of those things on top of each other in a very peak and valley kind of seasonal business, you end up with a normalized season across the calendar,” added Stoness. “It certainly peaks in the spring and fall, but those valleys are much more shallow because we focus on verticals that go around the calendar.”

A Variety of Services Isn’t All Sparkle Squad Has to Offer

Sparkle Squad’s range of services certainly supports the success of franchisees, but the entire experience is driven by company values. It is the combination of the carefully chosen service offerings and reliable Sparkle Squad experience that keeps customers coming back.

“Our core values are, ‘Perfect windows, happy technicians and delighted customers,’” explained Stoness. “Each of those three things rely on the other to be able to become repeatable year over year. If your customers and team members are happy, the byproduct will be amazing windows. If your people are happy and they do an amazing job on the windows, you’re going to have a happy customer… and so forth.”

Having a strong ecosystem also helps franchisees to drive reliable service and teamwork year round. While seasonal changes can bring their own challenges for outdoor work, if a franchisee has built a committed team, they are able to rely on each member’s commitment to the concept and their customers.

“We coach to culture and lifestyle, and your technicians should like what they do regardless of the weather,” explained Stoness. “When you have an all-hands-on-deck mentality and team members feel that symbiotic reciprocity that should be felt in an employment situation — when your people feel valued and feel that they’re fairly compensated for their work, the world doesn’t stop when it gets cold.”

Through all layers of the business, Sparkle Squad has worked to ensure that franchisees feel supported and have the tools and resources necessary to create a business that will offer them year-round stability. 

“It's important for us to create a 12-month seasonality to assist our franchise owners with growth and cash flow management, which is really, really important for a new business,” explained Stoness. “We’ve designed these service offerings and planned a go-to-market strategy so the owners aren’t left with a huge influx of cash in the spring and a gap in cash flow during the summer. We normalize that across the whole season.”

To find out more information on costs to buy this franchise, please visit https://1851franchise.com/sparkle-squad/info