You can build a thriving pest control business in the UK.

Or how to overcome the skills and time deficit.

In my ten years of running a property services business I’ve come to realise that not very many people want to start a pest control business. Understandably, it’s not an easy trade. You get to work with chemicals and pests, but you also get to be in a trade where competition is scarce.

That means you also have room for growth. Given the right support, you can turn a one-man pest control operation into a business where you have four, five, or how many you want pest controllers working for you. 

But you need skills and trainings and qualifications to operate as a pest controller. Those qualifications will often help you get better jobs for your business too. 

For most people running a pest control business though, there's one major obstacle in their way. It's not a lack of customers or training. It's not bad marketing or sales strategies. Although all these contribute.

The real obstacle stopping your growth is... time.

The trouble with time

Most property service business owners struggle to find the time to do everything they need to do in a working day.

You need to spend time on marketing to find clients. You need to continuously improve your operations if you are going to keep those clients once you've found them. You need to sell.

If you don't have the skills or expertise needed to do any of these things, you need to find the time to get them or develop them yourself. Somewhere in there, you also need to find time to actually deliver your services.

Most small business owners don't have the time to do all this. Or they are missing that vital expertise. And without that expertise – in marketing, operations, services and sales – it's very difficult to grow.

Without more time, you can't go out and get that expertise either. This means that most small service business owners need an alternative if they're going to boost their revenue.

Finding the skills you need

Fantastic Services might have over 2000 professionals on three continents and 500 franchisees as part of our network today. But we started like most service industry businesses do.

As a team of five people delivering a select range of services. It wasn't easy to grow from that point. It took, as you might guess, a whole lot of time.

It helped that my business partner and I had complementary skill sets. Luckily, between us, we knew about marketing and sales and knew what we wanted to achieve with our operations and services.

It still took a lot of time and iteration. It still took incredibly long days of work. It still involved many nights of little sleep. If we hadn't had that combination of skills in hand already, I can't imagine how much tougher it would have been.

Well, you might say, good for you. But not all of us have a complementary business partner on call.

Don't worry though – there is an alternative.

The franchise as a time saver and skill provider.

Joining a franchise network is an easy way to access the skills you need. It's like having the best possible business partner.

Not only do they have the skills in, say, marketing and sales (in our case, those are skills we put to work on our franchisees' behalf right away and every day, actively filling their daily schedule with customers). A franchisor will also have already invested the time needed to iterate on and perfect their processes for things like service delivery and customer support.

Even with the ideal business partner, that's normally a journey that takes a lot of time. As part of a franchise, you save all that time and hard work improving and iterating. You jump to the forefront of your industry, with the processes your franchisor has mastered all laid out for you.

A question of control?

The usual argument against this is that by investing in a franchise, you are giving away some control over your business. Of course, this isn't really true.

Sure, you might need to abide by your franchisor's standards. But if those standards are those that have seen them come to dominate part of the industry you're in, is that really a negative?

You are still your own boss. Knowing what high standards and the best processes involve and needing to achieve them constantly isn't a hurdle. It's a benefit.

Master a growing industry

Running a pest control business might not be your first thought when aiming to build a big business. But like many property services businesses, this is a strong and growing sector in the UK and across Europe.

Growing your business is hard work. If your day-to-day schedule is already packed delivering services and scrambling for more clients, it's hard to find the time you need to master the skills required to streamline and improve the processes you use to do both those things.

That's where a franchise comes in. Offering you a way to bypass the time needed to iterate and improve and gain access to the skills you need to grow your business towards your first million.