The moving calendar: how to market for peaks and fill the gaps

Step 1: Build a capacity calendar

Start with capacity, not leads. Capacity is the number of crew-and-truck slots you can sell each day. If you run four trucks with a crew for each, you have four slots a day, roughly 88 in a month of 22 weekdays plus whatever weekend slots you staff.

Now pull your last 12 months of booked moves into a simple sheet with these columns:

From that sheet, three views tell you most of what you need:

1. Utilisation by day of week. Booked truck-days divided by available truck-days, for each weekday.
2. Utilisation by day of month. Same calculation for the 1st, 2nd and so on through the 31st.
3. Lead time. Days between enquiry and move date, by move type.

Most movers who do this for the first time find the pattern isn't what they assumed. A weekday they thought was "fine" turns out to run at half capacity all year.

Step 2: Put a value on the gaps

Once you can see the gaps, price them. The formula is simple:

Idle truck-days × average revenue per truck-day = revenue left on the table

A worked example: a company with four trucks has 88 weekday slots in a month and books 60 of them. That's 28 idle truck-days. At an average of $1,400 per truck-day, the gap is $39,200 a month in unsold capacity. You'll never fill all of it, and you shouldn't try at any price. But even filling a quarter of it adds about $9,800 of monthly revenue without another truck.

That number becomes the ceiling for what marketing aimed at the gaps can sensibly cost.

Step 3: Know your peaks, and don't overspend on them

Some peaks are local and some are written into law or custom. The clearest Canadian example is Quebec. According to a June 2026 notice from the Tribunal administratif du logement, most Quebec leases end on June 30, which brings many moves on July 1 every year. A Quebec mover's calendar around that date is likely to be full weeks in advance.

For peaks like that, marketing has three jobs, none of which is "buy more clicks":

• Capture early bookings and secure deposits well ahead, according to your own policies.
• Steer flexible customers to the days on either side, where you have room. Say plainly which dates still have space.
• Protect your reputation. On the busiest days, delays happen. Set expectations in writing and communicate early; the reviews from peak week shape the rest of the year.

Outside Quebec, peaks are usually your own: certain weekends, the end of the school year, or the weeks around large local employers' transfer seasons. Your calendar sheet shows them. Don't assume a pattern from another city or another company.

Step 4: Aim each channel at the gaps

Each marketing channel can be pointed at specific dates in its own way.

Google Ads respond fastest. Raise budgets for local campaigns two to three weeks before your usual slow stretches (adjust to your own lead time), and lower them for dates already full. Ad text can mention weekday or mid-month availability, where that's true. See our Google Ads service.

Your website can carry a short, honest note on availability: "We often have weekday dates open with less notice." Avoid fake scarcity; customers can tell.

Quote follow-up is the cheapest gap-filler there is. When a customer is flexible, offer the open date first. When quotes go quiet for a peak date you can't serve anyway, follow up with alternatives. Our quote-to-booking guide covers the messages.

Commercial and long-distance work is especially useful for gaps, because offices often prefer weekday or after-hours moves and long-distance runs absorb several truck-days at once. See long-distance and commercial marketing.

Repeat sources such as property managers and real estate offices tend to produce work spread across the month, which smooths the calendar.

Step 5: Price signals, carefully

A lower weekday rate can fill gaps, but it has costs: it trains customers to wait, and it can make your peak price look inflated. Try these in order:

1. Tell people the date is open. Many simply don't know.
2. Add value instead of cutting price, for example a longer arrival window or help with a specific task, if your operation can deliver it.
3. Use a clear, published weekday rate only if the first two don't work, and keep it consistent so it doesn't look like a bait offer.

Whatever you choose, make sure your advertised prices and terms are accurate and match what customers are actually charged. If you have questions about what your pricing claims must include, ask your provincial consumer-protection office or a lawyer. We don't advise on those rules.

Step 6: Review monthly and adjust

At the end of each month, update the sheet and compare:

• utilisation by weekday, against the same month last year
• idle truck-days, against the month before
• revenue per truck-day, to make sure gap-filling isn't just discounting
• cost per booked move for each channel

A simple rule: if utilisation on a target weekday rose and revenue per truck-day held steady, keep going. If utilisation rose but revenue per truck-day dropped sharply, you're buying volume with margin; pull back the price signal and lean on clarity and follow-up.

A one-page monthly checklist

• ☐ Capacity calendar updated with last month's moves
• ☐ Next 60 days marked: full, filling, open
• ☐ Ad budgets shifted towards open dates
• ☐ Website availability note checked for accuracy
• ☐ Quiet quotes followed up with open-date alternatives
• ☐ Peak-week customer messages drafted, if a peak is coming
• ☐ Review requests sent for every completed move (see our reviews service)

Common mistakes

• Spending heavily during peaks. It mostly buys enquiries you'll turn away.
• Planning from someone else's calendar. Seasonality varies by city, move type and customer mix.
• Counting leads instead of truck-days. A long-distance move that fills three truck-days is worth tracking differently from a two-hour labour job.
• Discounting before communicating. Often the gap fills once people know the date is free.

If you'd like help building your capacity calendar, call, text or email. Bring the past year's bookings and we'll go through the gaps together. See pricing for plan options.