Most advice about growing a commercial cleaning company starts with "pick a niche". Almost none of it tells you how many buildings are actually in that niche in your city. This page does. It comes from the database we use to generate commercial cleaning leads: roughly 31 million business locations with a category and a map position, cut to a 30-mile circle around each metro's downtown and grouped into six facility types.
These are counts of commercial locations on file, not a census of every business, and neighbouring metros overlap (Los Angeles and Riverside share buildings, so do Washington and Baltimore), so the numbers cannot be summed. Read them as relative size and mix. Territory availability for each metro is on the markets page.
The largest commercial cleaning markets
New York, Los Angeles and Chicago are in a class of their own, but the gap closes fast after that: the median metro on this list holds about 121,024 facilities, and the difference between Seattle, WA and Cleveland, OH is smaller than most owners assume. A mid-sized metro with fewer competing cleaning companies can be a better place to build a book of recurring accounts than a coastal giant.
What a metro is made of
The mix matters more than the total. A cleaning company built around medical offices wants a different city than one built around warehouses.
Where medical and dental concentrate
Medical and dental practices are the largest single facility type in most metros. They buy on trust, want disinfecting protocols and a walkthrough before they sign, and churn less than offices once they are happy. These metros have the highest medical share of their commercial base.
| Metro | Medical and dental facilities | Share of metro |
|---|---|---|
| Milwaukee, WI | 18,522 | 27.4% |
| Minneapolis, MN | 39,928 | 26.1% |
| Pittsburgh, PA | 25,140 | 26.0% |
| St. Louis, MO | 18,298 | 24.8% |
| Cleveland, OH | 27,787 | 24.5% |
| Baltimore, MD | 37,890 | 24.2% |
| Columbus, OH | 20,602 | 24.2% |
| Detroit, MI | 43,969 | 23.9% |
Where industrial and warehouse concentrate
Industrial space is under-served by most cleaning companies because it needs different equipment and staffing, which is exactly why it pays. These metros have the highest industrial share.
| Metro | Industrial and warehouse facilities | Share of metro |
|---|---|---|
| Riverside, CA | 19,919 | 13.9% |
| Providence, RI | 8,987 | 13.7% |
| Vancouver, BC | 8,214 | 13.4% |
| Toronto, ON | 16,283 | 13.3% |
| Houston, TX | 36,129 | 12.9% |
| Dayton, OH | 8,258 | 12.9% |
| Los Angeles, CA | 65,226 | 12.7% |
| Hartford, CT | 15,055 | 12.7% |
Where offices concentrate
Offices are the bread-and-butter recurring contract. Office-heavy metros are also the most competitive for cleaning companies, so pricing discipline matters most here.
| Metro | Office facilities | Share of metro |
|---|---|---|
| Washington, DC | 63,268 | 21.9% |
| San Diego, CA | 25,694 | 20.8% |
| Austin, TX | 17,586 | 20.4% |
| San Francisco, CA | 43,856 | 20.3% |
| Atlanta, GA | 43,276 | 20.2% |
| Minneapolis, MN | 30,904 | 20.2% |
| Miami, FL | 37,520 | 20.0% |
| Nashville, TN | 13,523 | 19.7% |
Where schools, daycares and churches concentrate
Schools and daycares buy on background checks and disinfecting; churches are approachable first accounts with weekend schedules. Together they are the smallest group in every metro, which is why the ones that focus on them face little competition.
| Metro | School, daycare and church facilities | Share of metro |
|---|---|---|
| Vancouver, BC | 2,754 | 4.5% |
| Toronto, ON | 4,768 | 3.9% |
| San Jose, CA | 4,975 | 3.4% |
| San Francisco, CA | 6,848 | 3.2% |
| Seattle, WA | 5,624 | 3.0% |
| Boston, MA | 6,374 | 3.0% |
| Washington, DC | 8,582 | 3.0% |
| Baltimore, MD | 4,544 | 2.9% |
Every metro, by facility type
The full table. Each metro links to its own page with territory availability and the surrounding cities.
| Metro | Total | Offices | Medical and dental | Schools, daycares and churches | Industrial and warehouse | Retail, gyms and hospitality | Other commercial |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| New York, NY | 620,395 | 112,820 | 146,811 | 17,852 | 57,782 | 137,321 | 147,809 |
| Los Angeles, CA | 513,963 | 97,506 | 104,134 | 12,431 | 65,226 | 114,350 | 120,316 |
| Chicago, IL | 319,980 | 61,916 | 74,950 | 7,493 | 36,410 | 62,111 | 77,100 |
| Washington, DC | 289,234 | 63,268 | 61,940 | 8,582 | 25,716 | 57,052 | 72,676 |
| Houston, TX | 280,223 | 53,044 | 50,970 | 5,850 | 36,129 | 66,828 | 67,402 |
| Dallas, TX | 237,555 | 44,224 | 45,220 | 5,048 | 29,182 | 56,640 | 57,241 |
| Philadelphia, PA | 230,905 | 42,708 | 54,665 | 6,141 | 24,356 | 48,905 | 54,130 |
| San Francisco, CA | 215,887 | 43,856 | 48,764 | 6,848 | 21,265 | 42,019 | 53,135 |
| Boston, MA | 214,626 | 41,957 | 48,978 | 6,374 | 23,078 | 41,596 | 52,643 |
| Atlanta, GA | 213,884 | 43,276 | 42,865 | 5,249 | 22,972 | 49,656 | 49,866 |
| Seattle, WA | 188,247 | 36,582 | 43,309 | 5,624 | 21,383 | 33,066 | 48,283 |
| Miami, FL | 187,138 | 37,520 | 37,915 | 4,259 | 19,512 | 42,067 | 45,865 |
| Detroit, MI | 183,898 | 33,550 | 43,969 | 3,686 | 20,948 | 39,566 | 42,179 |
| Denver, CO | 168,048 | 32,796 | 36,303 | 3,415 | 19,779 | 33,687 | 42,068 |
| Tampa, FL | 161,715 | 29,297 | 33,161 | 3,244 | 18,131 | 35,448 | 42,434 |
| Phoenix, AZ | 157,958 | 29,568 | 36,435 | 3,090 | 18,283 | 31,931 | 38,651 |
| Baltimore, MD | 156,321 | 29,894 | 37,890 | 4,544 | 14,816 | 32,262 | 36,915 |
| Minneapolis, MN | 153,022 | 30,904 | 39,928 | 3,697 | 16,103 | 26,978 | 35,412 |
| San Jose, CA | 147,460 | 28,186 | 32,608 | 4,975 | 16,676 | 28,718 | 36,297 |
| Riverside, CA | 143,057 | 25,987 | 28,172 | 3,720 | 19,919 | 31,210 | 34,049 |
| San Diego, CA | 123,516 | 25,694 | 27,810 | 3,075 | 12,999 | 24,171 | 29,767 |
| Toronto, ON | 122,110 | 23,283 | 19,650 | 4,768 | 16,283 | 24,138 | 33,988 |
| Portland, OR | 121,024 | 21,994 | 27,438 | 2,900 | 15,048 | 22,412 | 31,232 |
| Hartford, CT | 118,788 | 21,195 | 26,085 | 2,695 | 15,055 | 23,455 | 30,303 |
| Orlando, FL | 117,083 | 21,895 | 24,258 | 2,535 | 12,552 | 26,544 | 29,299 |
| Cleveland, OH | 113,570 | 20,122 | 27,787 | 2,581 | 13,278 | 22,732 | 27,070 |
| Charlotte, NC | 104,668 | 18,802 | 20,190 | 2,255 | 12,896 | 24,336 | 26,189 |
| Cincinnati, OH | 99,471 | 18,178 | 23,546 | 2,237 | 11,973 | 19,290 | 24,247 |
| Pittsburgh, PA | 96,706 | 15,978 | 25,140 | 1,988 | 9,939 | 19,089 | 24,572 |
| Kansas City, MO | 93,484 | 17,563 | 20,180 | 2,036 | 10,872 | 19,914 | 22,919 |
| Sacramento, CA | 91,689 | 16,776 | 18,933 | 2,425 | 10,942 | 19,521 | 23,092 |
| Indianapolis, IN | 88,313 | 16,805 | 19,541 | 1,992 | 10,633 | 18,214 | 21,128 |
| Austin, TX | 86,376 | 17,586 | 17,480 | 2,208 | 9,330 | 17,762 | 22,010 |
| Columbus, OH | 85,016 | 16,443 | 20,602 | 2,231 | 9,102 | 16,361 | 20,277 |
| Raleigh, NC | 80,671 | 15,076 | 18,777 | 2,035 | 8,532 | 16,622 | 19,629 |
| St. Louis, MO | 73,865 | 13,919 | 18,298 | 1,767 | 7,303 | 14,583 | 17,995 |
| Las Vegas, NV | 71,761 | 13,423 | 14,358 | 1,256 | 7,744 | 17,139 | 17,841 |
| San Antonio, TX | 70,337 | 12,920 | 14,238 | 1,600 | 7,537 | 16,427 | 17,615 |
| Nashville, TN | 68,546 | 13,523 | 14,719 | 1,345 | 7,413 | 15,051 | 16,495 |
| Milwaukee, WI | 67,508 | 11,187 | 18,522 | 1,670 | 6,926 | 13,550 | 15,653 |
| Jacksonville, FL | 66,942 | 11,820 | 14,049 | 1,453 | 7,499 | 14,995 | 17,126 |
| Providence, RI | 65,712 | 11,590 | 13,310 | 1,808 | 8,987 | 13,419 | 16,598 |
| Dayton, OH | 64,210 | 10,911 | 14,444 | 1,329 | 8,258 | 13,268 | 16,000 |
| Vancouver, BC | 61,517 | 11,229 | 9,312 | 2,754 | 8,214 | 12,851 | 17,157 |
| Oklahoma City, OK | 57,075 | 9,960 | 12,802 | 1,289 | 6,321 | 12,942 | 13,761 |
| Richmond, VA | 51,938 | 9,839 | 10,794 | 1,358 | 5,435 | 11,793 | 12,719 |
Why prospects in these markets say no
Size tells you where the buildings are. It does not tell you which ones will buy. Across the leads our clients dispute, five reasons come up again and again. They are worth screening for before a walkthrough, whoever generates your leads.
- No intent to buy right now. The decision-maker is open to a quote someday but has no reason to change vendors this quarter. Ask when the current contract ends and what would make them switch before you spend a walkthrough on it.
- Residential or out of scope. A house, a one-time post-construction clean, or a service you do not offer. Screen for building type and recurring frequency before you drive out.
- Frequency too low. A small office that wants cleaning once every two weeks rarely covers your travel and setup. Set a minimum frequency and say it early.
- Outside your service area. A good prospect twenty minutes past your last route is not a good prospect. Define the territory by zip codes, not by feel.
- Unreachable. Nobody answers after the agreed call. Speed is the fix: contact within the hour of a lead landing, then a fixed follow-up schedule.
How to run the walkthrough, the proposal and the follow-up once you have a live prospect is in how to get commercial cleaning contracts; the cost-per-signed-contract math for deciding whether to buy leads at all is in exclusive vs shared commercial cleaning leads.
Method
- Source. Zotex Media's own database of business locations, built from Google Maps scrapes since 2024, about 31 million rows, de-duplicated on place id.
- Radius. 30 straight-line miles from each metro's principal city centre. Neighbouring metros overlap; do not sum.
- Types. Keyword rules over each place's primary Google Maps category, applied in the order medical, schools, industrial, offices, retail, other. About one in five places falls through to "other" (long-tail or blank categories).
- Exclusions. Residential addresses. Metros where our database is still being built out (Calgary, Edmonton, Ottawa, Winnipeg, Virginia Beach, Montreal) are left out rather than published low.
- Date. Counts as of September 2026. We refresh them as the database grows.
Zotex Media, "The Commercial Cleaning Market, Metro by Metro", September 2026. https://zotexmedia.com/commercial-cleaning-market-by-metro-2026. Licensed CC BY 4.0. Download the dataset (JSON).
Frequently asked questions
Which metro has the most commercial cleaning prospects?
New York, NY, with 620,395 commercial facilities on file within 30 miles of downtown, followed by Los Angeles, CA and Chicago, IL. A larger market also means more cleaning companies competing for it, so size alone does not tell you where to sell.
What counts as a commercial facility here?
A distinct business location from a database of about 31 million places, matched to a Google Maps category and assigned to one of six groups: offices, medical and dental, schools and daycares and churches, industrial and warehouse, retail and gyms and hospitality, and other commercial. Residential addresses are excluded.
Why is the radius 30 miles?
It is the distance most commercial cleaning crews will drive for a recurring account, and it is the radius we use to define a client's territory. Neighbouring metros overlap, so the numbers must not be added together.
Which facility types are worth targeting?
Medical and dental practices are the largest single type in most metros (about 22% of facilities on average) and buy on trust and disinfecting protocols. Offices are the most common recurring contract. Industrial and warehouse space, about 11% of facilities, is under-served by most cleaning companies and pays for specialised work. See the metro rankings above for where each type concentrates.
Can I use this data?
Yes. The dataset is published under a Creative Commons Attribution licence. Cite Zotex Media and link to this page. Download it at https://zotexmedia.com/data/commercial-cleaning-market-by-metro-2026.json.
Want the buildings, not just the count?
Book a free strategy call. We will show you which facility types are open in your territory and what we have on file near you.
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