Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

Hi everybody, I run a junk removal company in a major city. For many years, this business was very profitable, and my company enjoyed a significant market share. However, in the last couple years several other companies have emerged on the scene, offering services very similar to ours. Could anybody out there please give me some advice on how to get a competitive advantage or to retake some of my company`s market share?

Hi there, I just have a few comments that I hope can help you.
What is your new competition offering? Is it simply the same service, and they are undercutting you?
Is there anything you can offer that we would be the least challenged to meet? Your competitive advantage needs to be defensible, as well as convincing.

In my experience, the best ways to develop competitive edges is to make your service clearly better than the others. You could try offering additional services in addition to your core one of junk removal. Do you have any experience at other services that you could bundle? Marketing your service as the more organized, experienced and/or cheaper one, is hard to actually defend.

From what you said in your first post, it sounds like you were/are one of the first companies on the scene, so you hopefully you have an established group of loyal clientele. Try to encourage word-of-mouth advertising or referrals to take advantage of this.



-------------------------

Need help with your bootstrap business?
Check out The Harbour Forum for advice from dedicated staff in a secure environment and fellow entrepreneurs

There is a big focus on niche markets these days and capitalizing upon them can be very successful.  Junk removal is a niche in its own but is there a market more narrow than that?  I really do not know anything about the junk industry and have never used any services.  But what about yard waste, especially in the warm months?  How about oversized junk?  How about automotive junk?  What aspects of your business have been most profitable?  Think about focusing on those in your marketing efforts.  Of course you could still haul away anything, but your marketing could be more targeted.  Get known as the one that specializes in clearing out the crap when someone buys an old house, or moves into a new business space, or...

Here is another idea.  When people remodel homes, those giant dumpsters go out front the house for a while.  How much do those cost to rent?  Can you set up a deal with contractors to undercut that cost?  You`ll show up every day or third day or whatever to haul away the construction junk.  I have NO IDEA if this even makes financial sense but it`s a thought.

Or maybe you junk removal companies are the ones who supply those dumpsters.  I don`t know.  If not, maybe get into the dumpster business too.  That`s another thought.

Hello junker, because of the nature of your business, no one here give you any advice worth using without knowing where you live, intimate details about your company as well as details about your competition, including the type of advertising you`re doing etc.

The more details you provide, the better the information you`ll receive back.

Dale King

 

-------------------------

If you`re tired of all the money-making
hype, lies and scams...read this!
Click here for more details!

Yes Junker, it would be helpful to have more details. And others have already touched on being able to differentiate your service from the competitions.

You can now take your point of differientiation and use it to "attack" the competition via marketing. Tell your target audience why you are better than the me-tooers.
Tell your target audience why your competition`s service- aint so great.

Another avenue to explore.. I hear medical waste removal is lucrative. Can you look into this.. learn all about OSHA standards.. I know that dentists, doctors, hospitals, veternarians, healthcare clinics, HealthCare schools & Colleges all use the waste removal service to cart away to an incinerator. My college pays almost $3,500 for just two visits a year to pick up bio department lab specimens and a few practice syringes.

Best wishes!

-------------------------

Jeff Atwood
DearlyDepartedTshirts.com
New York/ Atlanta

"Always Remember"

I think it`d be useful to bring to the discussion the concept of how does anyone compete. I`m not certain these are the only options, but any business can compete using:

• price
• speed
• efficiency
• features
• convenience

I`m thinking there are some other ways, but those are pretty basic. So which areas are your competitors using, where you`re weak and they`re strong?

From what I`m hearing, the "Got Junk" franchise is competing on efficiencies of scale? Is that right? I don`t know about them...haven`t heard of them.

In the "features" arena, you could maybe consider changing your company image from "junk" removal to "environmental cleanup." Something like that, where "environment" is a hot buzzword.

We had someone starting a business where they take care of electronic equipment and do a safe disposal. You could highlight something like that, positioning yourself as "other than" your competition.

You may also be able to, in addition to differentiating yourself, establish some kind of block in your strategy. For example, I am a very small business, and in my field there are large companies that can provide similar service ... but those services come at the price of using these companies (where price = actual cost, encountered problems, etc).

So I can easily employ a block to show my clients exactly WHY they go with me instead of other places.

What`s a "block" in this context?