Nobody publishes commercial cleaning prices, and it is maddening. Here is what actually drives your quote, how the four pricing models differ, and how to compare bids fairly.
Search for commercial cleaning prices and you will find a great deal of writing that never answers the question. Every company says the same thing: it depends, call us for a quote.
It genuinely does depend. But that is not a reason to leave you with nothing. If you understand what drives the number, you can budget sensibly, judge whether a quote is reasonable, and compare two very different bids without guessing.
Here is how commercial cleaning is actually priced.
Why will nobody publish a simple price?
Because a single figure would be misleading. Two 5,000 square foot buildings on the same street in Alpharetta can differ in cost by a factor of three: one is open-plan office space cleaned twice a week, the other is a medical suite cleaned nightly with four restrooms and a procedure room.
The honest answer is not a price. It is the list of things that move the price, which is what follows.
What actually determines the cost?
Square footage
The starting point, but the least interesting factor on its own. Cost per square foot falls as buildings get larger, because setup, travel and equipment are spread across more area.
Facility type
This matters more than size. A warehouse with sealed concrete and two restrooms is quick work. An open-plan office is moderate. A medical or dental suite carries a materially higher rate because the protocol is more demanding: more disinfection, stricter procedure, and staff who need specific training. Restaurants and gyms sit in between for their own reasons, mainly grease and moisture.
Frequency
The single biggest lever, and the one most people get backwards.
Cleaning more often costs more per month but less per visit, because a building cleaned nightly never accumulates the buildup that makes a weekly visit slow. A site cleaned once a week takes disproportionately longer each time than the same site cleaned five times a week.
Restrooms and kitchens
Restrooms are the most labour-intensive rooms in any commercial building, and the ones occupants judge you on. Restroom count often affects a quote more than total floor area does.
Floor types
Carpet, vinyl, polished concrete and tile all behave differently. Hard floors need periodic scrubbing or refinishing, and carpet needs extraction a few times a year. These are usually quoted separately from the nightly scope, which is a common source of confusion when comparing bids.
What is nightly versus periodic
Every good contract separates the two. Nightly work is trash, restrooms, vacuuming, high-touch surfaces. Periodic work is carpet extraction, floor refinishing, high dusting, interior windows. If a quote does not distinguish them, you cannot tell what you are actually buying.
How is commercial cleaning usually priced?
There are four common models, and knowing which one you are being quoted makes comparison far easier.
- Per visit. A fixed price each time the crew attends. Simple, predictable, and the most common for small and mid-size offices.
- Per square foot. Usually applied to one-off or periodic work such as a deep clean or a post-construction clean. It is a poor fit for high-frequency contracts, because multiplying a per-square-foot rate across twenty-odd visits a month produces a figure well above what the labour actually justifies.
- Hourly. Common for day porters and variable scopes. Transparent, but it puts the risk on you if the crew works slowly.
- Fixed monthly contract. One number covering an agreed scope at an agreed frequency. Easiest to budget and the most common arrangement for ongoing janitorial programmes.
A quote of "$0.12 per square foot" and a quote of "$900 per month" are not comparable until you know the frequency and the scope behind both.
Why does frequency lower your per-visit cost?
It is worth understanding because it changes how you buy.
A building cleaned five nights a week is never dirty. Each visit is maintenance. A building cleaned every second week has fourteen days of accumulation, so each visit is closer to a recovery clean, taking longer per attendance and producing a worse average condition.
Volume discounts exist for that reason rather than as a sales tactic. Our published frequency and volume rates reflect the real difference in labour.
What is usually not included?
The most common gaps between what people assume and what is quoted:
- Carpet extraction and hard-floor refinishing, normally quoted separately
- Interior and exterior window cleaning above ground level
- Consumables such as paper, soap and liners, unless specified
- Regulated waste, which requires a licensed contractor
- Post-event or post-construction cleaning
- Anything above safe reach without appropriate equipment
None of these are hidden charges when they are stated upfront. They become disputes when they are not.
How do you compare two very different quotes?
Put them side by side on these points before you look at the totals:
- Frequency: how many visits per week, and on which days?
- Scope: what exactly happens on a normal night?
- Periodic work: what is included, and how often?
- Consumables: who supplies and stocks them?
- Crew: how many people, for how long?
- Insurance and background checks: confirmed in writing?
- Supervision: who inspects the work, and how often?
- Term: is there a minimum commitment, and what is the notice period?
Nine times out of ten, a quote that looks dramatically cheaper is buying fewer hours on site. That is not automatically wrong — but you should know it is the trade you are making.
What questions should you ask before signing?
- Will the same crew service our building each visit?
- What happens if someone is sick or leaves?
- How do we report a problem, and what is your response time?
- Is there a written scope we both hold?
- How often does a supervisor physically inspect?
- What notice is required to change frequency or end the agreement?
Why do we quote after a walkthrough rather than over the phone?
Because buildings surprise you. Floor types, restroom fixtures, the state of the kitchen, how furniture is arranged, where the bins live, whether there is a lift — all of it changes how long the work takes. A phone quote is a guess, and guesses get corrected upward later.
A walkthrough takes about twenty minutes and produces a number that holds. If you want a rough figure first, the estimator on our homepage gives a budgetary range so you can sanity-check a budget before anyone visits.
What does this look like in practice?
A few patterns we see regularly across Suwanee, Cumming, Johns Creek, Milton, Alpharetta, Duluth, Buford and Norcross:
- Small professional offices along the GA 400 corridor typically land on two or three visits a week, with quarterly carpet work.
- Medical and dental practices almost always need nightly service, and the rate reflects the protocol rather than the floor area.
- Warehouses and light industrial off I-85 often need less frequency than expected but more floor machine work.
- Multi-tenant buildings usually need a day porter for common areas alongside nightly suite cleaning.
If you are trying to work out how often your own space needs attention, our guide to how often an office should be deep cleaned covers the frequency question in detail.
Final thoughts
Do not choose on price alone, and do not assume the highest bid is the most thorough. Ask each company how many people will be in your building, for how long, and what they will do while they are there. The answer to that tells you far more than the number at the bottom.
A cleaning contract is one of the few services where you rarely see the work happen. What you are really buying is whether it gets done properly when nobody is watching.
Want a real number for your building? Starbiz Cleaning provides commercial cleaning and janitorial services throughout North Atlanta. Request a free walkthrough or call (404) 301-8850 and we will scope your building and put a fixed price in writing.
