Window cleaning looks simple from the sidewalk. It is a pole or a ladder, a story limit, and a price that matches the glass. Exterior routes, interior panes, screens, and storefronts are different hours and different risks. The business that survives is the one that says which of those it does, and which stories it will not climb.
This is not legal, tax, or insurance advice. Read the state board and the city before you advertise. The window cleaning start guide collects the IRS EIN page, the SBA notes on structure and insurance, and the filing or licensing office we could verify for each state. The EIN is free from the IRS. Skip any site that wants a fee to get you one.
Split the work
A ground-floor exterior and a second-story interior are not the same visit. Screens add time. Hard-water stain is not a missed spot. If you remove mineral film, say so and price it as its own line. If you do not, say that before you are standing in the driveway. Storefronts are a different calendar from houses: early hours, a manager, and glass that the public judges from the sidewalk.
Pick one offer for the first month. Residential exteriors on houses you can reach from the ground are a common start, because the equipment is a pole, a brush, pure water or a bucket, and a way to carry them. Add interiors when you are insured to step inside and you have a system for sills and floors. Add storefronts when you can show up before the shop opens. The website guide for window cleaning is the checklist for putting those lines on a page without blending them into "streak-free shine."
The film on the glass is local
Pollen, salt, construction dust, winter grime, and irrigation overspray are not the same job. A photo of rainy glass from another climate will not match what the customer sees. Coastal cities add salt. Dry cities add dust and mineral spots. A long wet season means the outside never stays clean on its own. Read a city page before you write yours. Seattle, Phoenix, and Miami describe different films and different buildings. Use them as patterns. Do not claim the neighborhoods if you do not drive them.
Apartments and condos have access rules a suburban route never mentions. Ask who has to approve the visit. Hills, parking, and a street with nowhere to stage a ladder belong in the price. A statewide "we clean windows" claim reads like a call center.
License, insurance, and the company
House and storefront window cleaning is often a city business license and a tax registration, not a state contractor classification. Confirm that by reading the contractor board. Work from a ladder does not, by itself, invent a contractor license. If you add pressure washing, screen repair that changes the frame, or anything you would call construction, read the board again. High-rise or swing-stage work is a different question from a ground-level house route. The state guide says what we could verify and what we could not. It does not guess a fee.
General liability belongs in place before the pole touches someone else's glass. Tell the insurer you use ladders and, if it is true, that you step inside for interior panes. A broken pane and a soaked sill are the claims. Commercial auto matters if the car or van is how you move between stops. Workers' compensation is a state question the moment someone else is on a ladder or carrying water. Ask. Do not copy a headcount from a forum.
You can start as a sole proprietor under your own name. An LLC is a state filing. It does not replace insurance. Form it when you hire, when a storefront wants the company on a certificate, or when you want the bank account in the business name. Search the name at the filing office before you print shirts. Deposit route money into that account the same week. Window stops pay small amounts, and those amounts vanish in a personal account.
Price the stop
Write two numbers before you need them. One for a ground-floor exterior. One for a second-story interior, or for the story you will not do. Include screens if you offer them. Hard-water removal is its own line if you offer it. The job pricing calculator builds an hourly rate from the overhead you pay every month, the pay you want, and the hours you can bill. Then it prices the job from the hours it will take plus any materials. Drive time belongs in those hours if you want the drive paid. The calculator does not know your city. You do.
Pollen season, salt, and stairs change the time. A price copied from an empty suburban photo will lose money in a walk-up. Adjust after you have timed ten real stops, and tell recurring customers when the price changes. Do not improvise the number because the customer is watching.
Get the first route without buying a shared lead
The first ten stops are usually people who already know your work is careful: a neighbor, a store you shop at, the crew you used to work with, one property manager. Offer a specific visit, not a speech about entrepreneurship. A link to a page that states the story limit is enough. Shared leads are an expensive way to discover your price. You can decide later, after the route has a shape.
Claim a Google Business Profile in the business name. Hours you answer. A service area of towns you drive. Ask for a review after a clean visit, and ask them to name the neighborhood and whether it was exterior, interior, or a storefront. Those reviews are how the next stranger trusts the story limit.
While you are on a ladder you will miss calls. The missed-call calculator is the arithmetic, using your close rate, not a downloaded average. A form on the site catches the person who will not call back. Publish the free page when the phone number is one you answer. The page does not book the calendar for you. It keeps the request in a list with a name, a number, and what they asked.
Equipment that fits the route
Buy the pole, the brush, and the hose you will use this month. A water-fed pole is enough for a lot of ground-floor exteriors. A ladder is a different risk and a different insurance conversation. Do not finance a trailer, a lift, and a full storefront kit because a video showed them. Add the next tool when a repeating job is awkward without it. Pure-water systems and traditional mop-and-squeegee methods both work. Pick the one you can keep streak-free on the glass in your climate, and describe that method in one sentence on the page so a customer is not surprised.
Recurring routes are the business once the first houses are happy. A quarterly exterior and a monthly storefront are different rhythms. Write them down. A route that hops across the metro to chase one-off jobs will look busy and pay poorly. Density is the point of a window company, the same way it is the point of a mowing route. When you publish the towns, you are also deciding the route.
What to say no to
Say no to the fourth story, the rotten frame, and the interior you are not insured to walk into. Say no to a city you cannot reach before noon. A shorter service area converts better than a map of the whole state. When the first offer has a day that repeats, add the next service. Until then, the route is the business. The trade and city guides are there when you are ready for the page to name the towns out loud.