Damien Owens, Director of OMS Facilities Maintenance, joined us for a brief chat at the Sydney Franchising & Business Opportunities Expo, August 2022.

We covered some of the key aspects of the OMS Facilities Maintenance franchise business including the type of people that are best suited, any common misconceptions about the brand or industry, as well as what he loves about what he does and more..

OMS Facilities Maintenance franchise Q & A with Damien Owens, Director.

What is your business?

“OMS is a facility maintenance company. We provide all the trades services across Australia, so from cleaning through to electrical plumbing, roller doors. 

So all the different trades we provide a management service of all those trades to our commercial customers.” 

Where are you located?

“We are located over in Brisbane at Albion, that's our head office. However, all our services are provided across Australia.”

What do you love about the business and what you do?

“I love the business because we talk to people every day. We're here to help these companies provide a maintenance service to their customers, to the company. We have a lot of different contractors that we work with and be able to have a one stop shop. It's been a real great appreciation of our customers that they can save time by using our company.”

What do you look for in the right-fit person to be a franchise owner, can you describe them?

“The right fit person for our business would be someone that's personable to the customer, understands what they need and find a solution. So that really is the essence of of providing good service to identify that and then time management to be able to organise all the different trades to meet the needs that they have.”

What’s a common misconception you believe people have about your brand or niche?

“A lot of misconceptions are that as a management service, we're, we're paying them, but they're paying a margin on top of already a trade margin. And we explain to them that all our contractors appreciate the work that we provide to them. 

So they actually give us a sub retail price by that discount. We our management fee goes to that which is therefore competitive, competing against the other competitors in the same market.”

What would your advice or guidance be to people looking to get into their own business?

“My advice to people who get into this business, any sort of franchise is to look at their track record as far as how long they've been in operation for, also to see if it's a service or a product that they feel passionate about. 

It's got to be something that they feel comfortable to do, and for us to be able to help people in a trade services is high and demand at the moment. It's something that they need to be passionate about. And if they can do that with with good ethics, then they're on the way.”

What is your key focus for the next 12-18 months?

“Our focus is always on about improving customer service and the performance efficiencies of what we do through through technology. 

We're able to improve on our back end systems, having good relationships with our contractors and technology use there as well. But also then in just our approach to our customers, finding the most efficient way to do it, but also cost effective.”