Show every area including the unglamorous ones, disclose known problems, and ask five questions: what's excluded, who supplies consumables, how keys are handled, what happens on a miss, and who you actually call. Twenty prepared minutes produce an accurate proposal.
The walkthrough is where your cleaning price actually gets made. Twenty prepared minutes produce a proposal that matches reality; a rushed lap around the lobby produces a number that gets corrected later — in change orders and arguments.
What to show
Walk every area you expect cleaned, including the unglamorous ones: all restrooms, the breakroom at its honest worst, storage corridors, the entrance path people actually use. Point out floor types — carpet, LVT, tile, concrete — because they set the floor-care routine. Show the janitor closet or note there isn’t one; water access and storage affect logistics.
What to disclose
Say the quiet parts: the restroom that gets complaints, the area the last company always missed, weekend usage, shift patterns, security constraints. Providers cannot scope around problems they never heard about — and the honest ones will respect you more for the candor.
What to ask them
“What is excluded?” Every scope has exclusions. A provider who claims theirs doesn’t is hiding them in fine print.
“Who supplies consumables, and who monitors them?” Soap, paper, liners — someone buys them and someone notices they are low. Both names belong in the scope.
“How do keys and alarms get handled?” The answer should involve documentation, not vibes.
“What happens when something is missed?” You are listening for a process: report to whom, corrected how, documented where.
“Who do I actually call?” An owner or accountable manager beats a support inbox. Ask who answers in month six, not month one.
Red flags during a walkthrough
Pricing before seeing the restrooms. No notes taken. Every answer is “yes, included” without qualification. Pressure to sign on the spot. A quote that arrives suspiciously fast and suspiciously round.
What happens after ours
We turn the walkthrough into a written proposal: tasks per area, frequencies, exclusions, consumables responsibility, and the recurring price. You get time to compare it honestly — that document is designed to be put next to competitors’ proposals, because scope-for-scope comparison is a fight we like our chances in.
Apply this to your facility
Free walkthrough, written scope, honest recurring proposal.