Octabiz Research · Full report
Where cleaning and antiques businesses can grow in 2026
What 3,099 Google reviews show about where cleaning and antiques businesses can win more customers, and what to fix first.
Key findings
What the data shows
Customers are broadly happy with the core service. Across 138 cleaning and restoration businesses and 2,995 reviews, the average rating is 4.9 and 97% of reviews are positive. The 4 antiques and consignment businesses average 4.6 with 86% positive.
In cleaning and restoration, slow replies to messages are now the top complaint, at 7% of negative and mixed reviews and up 6 points. Booking and scheduling problems follow at 5%, up 4 points. A shared inbox with auto replies and online booking with reminders address both.
The cleaning and restoration negative share held at 2% from 2025-Q4 through 2026-Q2, then rose to 3% in 2026-Q3. The share is small, but it is moving in the wrong direction, and the rise points to communication and scheduling rather than the quality of the work.
Price clarity shows these problems can be fixed. It now makes up 4% of cleaning and restoration complaints, down 8 points, which suggests written quotes and clear price lists are working where firms use them.
In antiques and consignment, the one named complaint is a clerk who refused to contact the vendor, at 14% of negative and mixed reviews and unchanged over the period. The negative share peaked at 14% in 2026-Q2 before easing to 9% in 2026-Q3. With only 4 businesses in the sample, owners should treat this as a signal to test, with instant staff to vendor messaging as the fix.
Exhibit 1
Businesses studied, by industry
Number of businesses with Google reviews analyzed
Source: Octabiz analysis of public Google reviews, Oct 2024 to Sep 2026
One of the exhibits in the full report.
Inside the report
6 chapters, each with its own exhibit, across 10 pages.
Chapter 1
Who we studied: a cleaning-heavy sample with a small antiques window
Chapter 2
Cleaning & restoration: slow replies to messages are the biggest complaint, and they are growing
Chapter 3
Antiques & consignment: when the clerk cannot reach the vendor, the sale stalls
Chapter 4
Are things getting worse? A small uptick in a strong market
Chapter 5
Problems every industry shares: the common thread is communication, not any single complaint
Chapter 6
What owners should do in the next 90 days
Get the full report
Every chapter and exhibit, with the methodology, as a letter-size PDF. Fill in the form and the download starts right here.
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How this research was done
Public Google reviews published Oct 2024 to Sep 2026 for 142 businesses found on Google Maps in Kentucky, California, New York, in 2 industries (cleaning & restoration, antiques & consignment). Reviews were sorted by AI into sentiment and problem categories. Shares are of negative and mixed reviews. Chains and duplicates were removed when the businesses were found. Quotes are from public Google reviews.