Gas Prices Put the Crunch on My Cleaning Business~Worried~

Afternoon everyone...I hope that this day finds you enjoying some Sunshine in your life!

The Picture above is my Good Friend Rich's house on Kelley's Island I have been cleaning this house now for 9 years even before Rich bought it. In fact this is the second house cleaning job I had on the Island. Monday night Jason called and ask if I was available to clean it Sunday and I said yea sure... I need the money..
Today I am sitting at my desk looking at my cleaning schedule and finding that I may be forced to make some major changes in both my schedule and my charges per house. My primitive Creations is my hobby turned business and it does very well for istself providing me a nice income for 6 months out of the year with clear signs of doing well year round. It has grown years for about 5 years but it isn't enough to substain my debits year round yet. Which is much of the reason why I still clean houses on the Island the other six month out of the year. Of course the perks of cleaning are my Boating and all my dear Boater and Island Friends.

Why you ask am I sharing all of this... I guess I am sorta thinking out loud and venting my worries.

Funny how one simple thing like the price of gas can change peoples lives in such a dramatic way. We all drive and fill up our gas tanks it is just the American way it is as much a part of our lives as eating dinner every night.
That is until we find that it now cost double to fill up the gas tank.
That one simple change makes the difference in everything in our lives. We may or may not notice it right away and even think we can adjust to the added expense by cutting back someplace else wo it all averages out.
Sadly it doesn't work like that... because the sky rocketing gas prices affect every aspect of our lives.
Let me paint a picture for you that affects just me one day out of my life. I will start by saying that at this particular time money is more then tight this is tax time and slow time for Ebay so money is not really avaiable for me especially the added expense of filling up a 20 gallon gas tank.
Remember I told Jason I would Clean Cozy Corner Sunday.. was tickeled I would make about $50 after gas and food and $50 bucks extra sounded pretty good to me.
then I went to the gas station and gas prices had gone from $3.69 a gallon to $4.30 a gallon.
So to fill up a 20 gallon gas tank it cost me close to $83 dollars.
I make $100 to clean that house and well you do the math... I would have made $17.00 that is of course if i don't eat anything while I am there.
I had to call Jason last night and tell him I simply could not justify driving 200 miles round trip, take the ferry across to make make $17 dollars.. could he find anyone else to clean Sunday. Imust have appologized 2 times for not being able to clean. This is my business and if I can't make my jobs then I will lose them.
Thank God it is Early Season and it was no problem finding someone who would clean for me...That will not be the case during full season...and worst of all I really don't like others cleaning my regulars they just do the job I would do and when I do return its like I have to do double time cleaning the areas they just forget to clean..

when I hung up I sat here wondering how much the gas prices are going to have on our summer rentals and will people be able to come to the Islands. How many will be forced to cancel there vacations because that one simple thing... rising cost of gas will affect there lives and where they must cut corners to make up the added expense.
With soring gas prices, we have soring Food prices to cover the cost of gas to grow them, process them and finally deliver them, then to keep them fresh in the stores.. Every one of those things are affected by the soring gas prices and it will afect every aspect of each and everyones lives...
Boaters will not be able to afford gas for there boats. Fishermen who rent our rentals will not be able to afford gas to go fishing for 7 days they are on the Island & they can't afford the added cost of eating out on the Island because gas prices forced the resurants to raise prices.... so they canel.
Then to top all of that off we have so many people who have lost jobs so those people might canel.
To go even a step further past working on the Island my EBay business suffers because the money customers spent on my Decor now goes in the gas tank and to pay for the added expenes of gas prices soring and forcing prices up on everything in our lives...

Not such a good picture I paint... and it has me really worried what my future holds for my two businesses..

Do I raise my cleaning cost? Is it practical? Will it force my customers to hire someone else? Possibly possibly not but do I take that chance by raising my charges to meet my needs? I don't know but I do know it is somthing I must think hard about and make a decesion soon.

Of course as I sit and ponder the cost of running the cleaning business I to must consider the cost of running the My Primitive Creations Ebay Business.. All of the same things affect that business as well. Raising prices on my gatherings suddenly puts many buyers out of my price range... Yet everything that makes up My creations from buying supplies to create them and ship them has risen x 2, Ebay fees have risen droping my profits to near nothing in just the pat 6 months all affected by added expenses of gas and job losses..

Wow...all that written down is even more scary then when it is just in my head and I really don't know just how to balance it all out without making things worse...Each day I pray that God will give me the right solutions to my situations. He has seen me threw many things I know he will see me threw this as well but in the mean time the bills keep coming. the sxpenes keep adding up and I'm not sure where I will stand form one day to the next.

I know that all of the same things affect each of you somehow too... what do you do when the crunch hits you.. would love to hear..

For now I am going to go outside and enjoy the sunshine and finish my flowerbeds...since the sun is shinning.
I'm going to try not to think about all of this while I soak up the sun and watch my flowerbeds come to life ..
Maybe after clearing my head a while I will see things in a different light.... so until we meet again have a wonderful day...
Hopefully your day is filled with warm Sunshine and happy moments!!

Blessings
Tonya