Many pressure washing and power washing companies don’t understand the amount of money that can be made cleaning industrial items. In fact, when I first started my company I hadn’t realized this either. But eventually I became fearless in trying to sell contracts, and whenever I saw fleets of vehicles, I would always go in and ask the manager if they needed their vehicles cleaned. Once when I was 18 years old I stopped into a locomotive yard because I saw some industrial work trucks alongside the building, to see if I could get a contract to clean them every other week.

Indeed, I was in luck, I signed up the account for five work trucks, one supervisor’s car, and some heavy equipment in the yard. Once I started, they noted I had a really powerful steam cleaner, and they asked if I could degrease their locomotives, and how much what I charge? I told them that I would charge them $60 an hour, and back then that was a lot of money. After I did that job they were quite satisfied and they had another locomotive that they needed the paint stripped off so they could re-paint it. Again, I charged $60 per hour. That job took me almost 200 hours.

Yes, I found a new niche power washing and degreasing locomotives. At the time I didn’t realize it, but there are OSHA safety standards and they are quite serious in the rail industry. If someone slips on a catwalk or railing they could cause themselves serious injury or even death. Therefore for safety reasons locomotives had to be constantly power washed and cleaned. That was fine with me (18-years old) at $60 an hour. Over the years, the price per hour has gone up, and the safety restrictions have increased. Needless to say, there is a lot of money to be made pressure washing and cleaning locomotives.