The White Glove Treatment

When Southview Design, a Twin Cities-based design/build landscape firm, surveyed its customers in 2006 about what they valued most from the company, cost and work quality weren’t what they touted. Instead, they listed job site cleanliness highest on the priority list.

“That was eye opening for us,” says Chris Clifton, president of the company, which does around $7 million per year in revenue. “Cleanliness ranked as their No. 1 concern. So we took that information and started training our crews with a new emphasis on keeping the job site clean.”

This focus on maintaining a tidy job site eventually led the company to develop a new initiative. In 2007, they implemented the White Glove Promise, a written promise stating that Southview Design landscape crews would respect each client’s home by throwing away trash, picking up tools and sweeping walkways and sidewalks after each job. When the company starts working with a new client, on the first day at the site they hang a clear plastic bag on the front door with a copy of this promise enclosed. Attached to the promise card is an actual white glove, which drives home the point that the company intends to treat that client with care.

“Our crews pick up any trash they’ve created and sweep the sites daily,” explains Clifton. “And they stack any materials that they’re leaving behind in a manner that’s neat and tidy. We’ve even been known to sweep out clients’ garages while we’re at it – without being asked. Homeowners are always very pleasantly surprised to find out we took that extra effort.”

Though many companies might do regular cleanup, by going above and beyond and making it a written promise, Southview Design is setting itself apart from the competition, while keeping clients happy. “Making that promise shows we’re really committed to a clean job site and that we know it’s an important part of what we do,” Clifton says.

Since implementing the program, the company has reaped some benefits of its own, including an improvement in performance. “We’ve found that a less cluttered job site is also a more productive job site,” Clifton says. “And we also lose fewer tools. So there’s no doubt the time invested into keeping the job site clean pays for itself through both increased productivity and better control of tools and materials.”

There’s no question it’s also had a beneficial impact on the company’s revenue, Clifton adds. “This extra effort has not only gotten a positive response from our clients, but from their neighbors, too,” he explains, “and that’s gotten us leads.”

Clients who appreciate the White Glove Promise the most tend to be pet owners, whose dogs would otherwise be tracking dirt and materials inside. But every homeowner is happy to see a tidy yard, especially in the midst of a major project. Clifton says the White Glove Promise has given the company a new perspective: “We’re a business that deals with dirt,” he says, “but that doesn’t mean it has to be dirty.”

The author is a freelance writer based in Royersford, Pa.