Three Things People Get Wrong About Window Cleaning…

There are a few things people believe about my trade — and about me — that just aren't true. So let me clear them up.

"You can't clean windows in the rain"

I hear this one constantly, and I understand why. It feels obvious. Why would you clean a window while water is falling on it?

But the reach-and-wash method doesn't work the way people imagine. I'm not wiping glass with a damp cloth and hoping it dries clear. I'm rinsing your windows with purified water that dries spotless on its own — no streaks, no residue, rain or shine. A bit of rain on top of that changes nothing. The windows come up just as clean.

That said — this is your home, and if it's tipping down and you'd rather I came back another day, just say so. I won't argue. But I'll be honest with you: this is Scotland. If I waited for dry weather to clean windows, half of you would be looking through grime until July. So I generally crack on, and the results speak for themselves.

"Traffic wardens are out to get you"

This one isn't really about windows, but it comes up — because parking is part of the job, and people assume I must have war stories.

I don't, really. I've had my share of tickets over the years. Not for dangerous parking, not for blocking anyone in — just for the ordinary business of stopping where I shouldn't have for a few minutes longer than I should have. And here's the thing: I earned every one of them. The warden wasn't being unreasonable. I was parked where I wasn't meant to be, and that's on me.

In six years of doing this, working all over Edinburgh, I can think of exactly one interaction with a warden that wasn't perfectly civil — and even that one wasn't all that bad. They've got a job to do, same as me, and most of them do it fairly. So no, I don't think they're the villains people make them out to be. Mostly they're just people standing in the rain enforcing rules the rest of us would rather ignore.

"Your window cleaner will let you down"

This one stings, because it's the one with the most truth in it.

You've probably had it happen. A cleaner who said they'd come Tuesday and didn't. Who turned up every few weeks for a while, then quietly stopped appearing. Who you had to chase, text, wonder about — until you gave up and assumed they'd moved on without telling you. It's so common that a lot of people have stopped expecting anything else. You almost build it into your plans: the window cleaner might come.

That's the bar in this trade, and it's a low one. Which, frankly, suits us — because clearing it is easy.

We show up. We come when we say we will, on a schedule you can actually rely on. If something changes, you'll hear it from us first, not work it out from our silence. You shouldn't have to chase the person you're paying. You shouldn't have to wonder whether we're coming back. With us, you won't.

That's not a clever promise. It's just doing the thing we said we'd do — which, somehow, is enough to stand out.