2023_PWN_V5_No1_web

How Has the
Game Changed?
An expert’s list of the Top 10 Changes in the
Pressure Wash Industry over the last quarter century
BY ALLISON HESTER
I’ve written for the cleaning
industry for more than half my life.
The year was 1994. I was 24 years
old and needed a job, so I answered a
newspaper ad for a magazine editor.
During the interview, I learned
the publication went to the pressure
washing industry. (The what?)
I remember leaving the interview
thinking there was no way I wanted to
write about pressure washers.
Then I got the job. Little did I know
how that would change my life. I’ve
seen a lot of industry changes since I
took that first industry job 28 years ago.
Here, in my opinion, are some of
the bigger ones.
About the author: As the former publisher
of eClean Magazine and past editor for
Cleaner Times Magazine, Allison Hester
has been writing for the exterior cleaning
industry since 1994. She is now a member
of the marketing team at J. Racenstein, a
preeminent distributor of window cleaning
supplies, tools, equipment, and more. The
company has been around for over 110
years -- almost the very beginning of the
professional window cleaning industry!
1
Pressure washers
hit the big box
stores.
This occurred shortly after I started
my job, and for many in the industry,
the idea of pressure washers showing
up in Home Depot was terrifying.
How would equipment distributors
survive?
What about the professional
contract cleaners?
Would they still have a job?
In the long run though, it helped
create awareness and grow the industry.
2
The world-wide
web made
its debut.
I remember around 1996, I wrote
a story explaining what the internet
even was. It was new and most of us
didn’t really understand it.
Of course, we had no idea in that
day how it would take over the world
and change the way the industry did
business.
3
Distributors began
selling nationwide
(and beyond).
When I first started in the industry,
there was a pressure washing distributor
who was ostracized by many in
the industry because he sold his equipment
nationwide, which was seen as a
huge “no-no” in those days.
It was stepping on other distributors’
toes. With the introduction of the
internet, however, the “rules” changed.
4
Working from
the ground.
Not counting the original Tucker
poles, the first water-fed poles started
showing up in the late 1990s, but took
a while to catch on.
Since that time, the technology
keeps on improving to comfortably
reach new heights, keeping window
cleaners off of ladders.
5
Going from
High Pressure
to Soft Washing.
When I first started in the industry,
pressure washing was all about high
pressure.
The higher the psi, the better. Part
of this had to do with environmental
concerns around water consumption
and wastewater, but it also just came
from a misnomer that blasting away dirt
was the best way to clean.
I remember roof cleaning was often
done using surface cleaners.
These days, the industry has
gotten smarter. Today’s professionals
look at flow in order to work faster,
and they recognize that soft washing
is the safest way to go when cleaning
buildings and roofs.
6 Overlapping
services.
When I first started in the industry,
there were window cleaners and there
were pressure washers, but very rarely
were there both.
As equipment technology advanced
and as awareness of the industries
grew online, contractors began to offer
add-on services.
The water-fed pole has made it
24 | PRESSURE WASH NEWS | VOL. 5, NO. 1 | SUMMER 2023