Expanding The Window Cleaning Family Business

Jim Vaughn's license plates honor a window cleaner's best friend. Click to enlarge.

Gresham's All Clean Window Service is thriving as father hands reins of family business to son - When Jim Vaughn got into the window-cleaning business in the 1970s, many computers were the size of his van. Now, 35 years later, Vaughn carries a computer in his pocket, but the tools of his trade have not changed much: It still takes a squeegee to clean a window.

Even so, Vaughn's All Clean Window Service has rebooted and modernized in the past year and a half, since his son Brandon joined as a partner in the company based in the elder Vaughn's Gresham home. Like his four older siblings, 29-year-old Brandon Vaughn spent years scraping the grime off glass alongside his father before making his own way into the working world. Unlike his brothers and sisters, Brandon was drawn back, particularly as his father nears his 64th birthday and thinks about climbing fewer ladders. "Windows just run in our blood," Brandon Vaughn says with a chuckle, noting that his brother tints windows and one of his sisters sells window coverings.

Jim Vaughn left a job printing telephone books and newspaper inserts so he wouldn't have to work nights. At the time he was a young father with two daughters and a third on the way. Two sons would follow. "My family was more important," he says. "I didn't want to be away from my kids." A retiring acquaintance was selling off a small window-cleaning business, and Jim Vaughn thought it might be a better fit for family life.

Jim Vaughn, (right) who turns 64 in a few weeks, will leave more of the window washing to son Brandon and two employees as he scales back his workload at All Clean Window Service in the coming years. Vaughn's business has been cleaning glass in Gresham and surrounding areas for the three and a half decades.

Like father, like son. Brandon Vaughn also had two young kids when his job marketing machinery demanded ever-increasing travel, and three decades later he came to the same conclusion. A business is born - When Jim Vaughn washed his first windows in the late 1970s, it was tough to earn $800 a month during the slower winter months. For a while, he and family members did janitorial work to make ends meet. He grew his business just enough to fill a schedule for himself and one more worker and then kept it on an even plane for years. At one point he sold part of his client list to keep from getting too busy.

Increasingly, more aggressive companies are moving into the window-washing business, but Jim Vaughn says he never felt it because he kept his customers happy. At least a fifth of his customers today have been with him for 25 years or longer. "Unless they move or pass away, or the economy hurts them, very rarely do our customers leave," he says. One customer, Jeff Baldwin, general manager of Suburban Chevrolet in Sandy, says he's had other people make bids to clean his windows. "I won't even listen to them," he says. "(Jim Vaughn's) word is his bond. He does what he says he's going to do."

The Vaughns plan to keep that same approach now that Brandon is on board, though with a bit more volume and significantly more technology. In the past year or so, Brandon has built a website and rebranded the company, including new graphics on their shirts and vans. He outfitted them with iPhones and iPads, fully synched with their schedules and accounting software. They are armed with carbon fiber window-washing poles and automatic water filtration systems. They've added gutter cleaning, roof treatment and pressure washing to their menu of services. "I love this kind of stuff," Brandon Vaughn says . "My dad passed on his entrepreneurial spirit to me."

Jim (left) and Brandon Vaughn help customer Geri Nevis enjoy a clear view from her rural home southeast of Gresham. Click to enlarge.

Trust matters - So far, it's working. Brandon Vaughn says sales have increased 30 percent over last year and 50 percent when comparing last month to February 2012. They employ two young men who also attend the Jehovah's Witness Kingdom Hall on Salquist Road where the Vaughns are active. Their customers range from residents of modest ranch houses, who pay about $100 per service, to mansion owners and big commercial building managers who can pay many times that sum to make their windows sparkle. Commercial businesses often schedule them for monthly cleans while most homeowners opt for twice-yearly service.

The Vaughns are expanding both the residential and commercial sides of their business. Most of their customers are in an area that includes Gresham, Sandy and east Portland, but they have some customers stretching from the Willamette River to Welches. Building a larger customer base is part of the family's succession plan, creating enough income to allow Jim Vaughn to work part-time and supplement retirement while helping to support Brandon Vaughn's and their employees' families.

The younger Vaughn says they don't want to expand All Clean so much that customers no longer recognize the person on the other side of the glass. "If we have enough (business) to take care of ourselves and our families, that's all we need," he says. "I think that's why our customers appreciate us." The level of familiarity and trust that the Vaughns have built with customers is much of the reason they are booking cleaning jobs well into 2014, they say. It's why Geri Nevis has kept them coming back to her home built on a hillside between Gresham and Boring for the past 35 years. Well, that and the fact that her back windows are more than two stories above the ground. "I'm not going to climb those heights," Nevis says, "and my (late) husband had no intention of doing them."

Window Cleaning Family Business To International

Office Cleaning Services was formed in 1930 and combined with New Century under the OCS name in the 1970s.

Family firms defy downturn as generation game fuels profits: Overshadowed by big corporations with their brands and easy access to finance, some have argued that family businesses have been pushed into the shade in recent years. However, it is now becoming clear that the recession has been a leveller, providing opportunities for well-run family firms that can overcome the problems of financing, management, succession and liquidity. “A limitation of family businesses is that they don’t have as much access to cash as quoted competitors,” says Chris Cracknell, chief executive of cleaning and services business, OCS, itself a family business with plenty of advice for smaller, similarly structured firms. “Maybe that instills different disciplines in us which have been beneficial over time. There are many fabulous family businesses in the UK, from Wates to Swire Group and others with very good track records.”
 

Family businesses are an important and often overlooked sector in the UK. Their lack of a listing means they are often ignored up against FTSE 250 rivals. In 2011 a report by Oxford Economics revealed that family businesses account for 66pc of all SMEs in Britain, employing more than 9m people – 40pc of total private-sector employment. They generated revenues of £1.1trillion. But there are also dangers inherent in being a family business. “The number of family businesses that make it through to the fourth or fifth generation is not that great,” says Cracknell. “The failure rate is very high.” OCS is an exception. Based in Crawley, West Sussex, its roots date back to The New Century Window and General Cleaning company, founded by Cracknell’s great grandfather, Frederick Goodliffe, in 1900.
 

Office Cleaning Services was formed in 1930 and combined with New Century under the OCS name in the 1970s. OCS now employs 76,000 people, including 26,000 in the UK. With a turnover of £800m, it is one of Britain’s largest privately owned companies. It remains owned by 130 individual shareholders, all but five of whom are members of the original founding family. The company’s history demonstrates some of the perils of family firms.
 

Goodliffe and his wife had five daughters and three sons. The sons went into the business, diversifying it to such an extent that its assets 35 years ago included a Kent hotel, shirt and carpet makers and a UPVC window manufacturer. The board, however, remained solidly family-based until the late 1980s. The company sold its manufacturing businesses and hotel to concentrate on support services, ranging from security to laundry and cleaning.
 

It has also embraced globalisation to such an extent that it is now the second biggest British-owned employer in Thailand, after Tesco, with 26,000 staff. Cracknell, 54, joined the family firm in 1977 and has been chief executive since 1996. He says that managing those transitions had to result in loosening the family’s traditional control. The first external non-executive directors were appointed in 1999, while five years later a share option scheme for senior management was introduced. OCS also now has remuneration, nominations and audit committees with external non-executive directors, including a group chairman.
 

Cracknell believes the group has progressed from being family-owned and run to being family-owned and professionally managed. “We’re now a meritocracy and the board is not just reserved for the family,” he says. “It’s helped preserve our family culture, ethics, background and style as an organisation. I think it’s a differentiator that’s enabled us to compete and grow to the size we are today. “The key stage was a recognition that the family relied very heavily on the board management team and staff who worked in the group to make it successful and go forward.
 

“Secondly there was a recognition by the family that there was no genetic disposition that they had the capability to run it and that we needed expertise to come in. “My successor could be family or non-family. At the end of the day, all of our interests are best served by having the best people to lead us in the future.” Another issue for family businesses is providing exit routes for members who want to liquefy some of their assets. OCS has provided a share-sale scheme that allows this to be managed carefully and Cracknell says this has helped maintain continuity and keep shareholders on board. “There are many models out there for family companies,” he says. “Some have elected to buy out some of the shareholders. We’ve not chosen to go that route. We’ve kept our full number of shareholders. The largest shareholder has only 5pc.”
 

The success of OCS in overseas markets means Asia now accounts for nearly a third of group turnover. But the difficulty of financing such growth has meant that it has been a slow journey since the first investment in Thailand in 1989. “Typically we’ve formed partnerships with other family businesses, taken a minority shareholding and grown it up to 100pc,” says Cracknell. “As a family business, we’ve got the patience to use that approach and it aligns us very well with many family businesses in Asia. “Our Asian activities are by far the fastest growing part of our group. Last year, we did two acquisitions in India, a second acquisition in Malaysia, completed an investment in Singapore and began a new joint venture in Qatar. “We grew by more than 17pc in India last year and anticipate our growth there will remain in double digits.”
 

Such success has led to quoted rivals eyeing OCS, but the family is in no hurry to sell. “The market knows we’re not for sale,” says Cracknell. “We do get loose approaches, but we don’t solicit or have any desire to have formal approaches. “One of the great strengths is being able to wake up in the morning and know who owns you. That’s what the family gives us. It’s that stability and confidence.”