Commercial moving without stopping the business
A household move ends when the last box is in. A business move ends when the business is running again — phones answering, the shop open, orders going out. Everything about a commercial move is planned backwards from that moment, which is why most of the work happens in the evening, overnight or over a weekend, and why the question we ask first is not “how much furniture?” but “when do you need to be open?”.
Simplex moves businesses across Greater Montreal with its own crews and trucks, under one coordinator who stays with the project from the site visit to the walkthrough in the new space. Commercial work is priced to the project: a fixed project price when the scope can be defined in advance, an hourly rate when it makes more sense — a small office, an internal move between floors, work where the volume is hard to pin down. Either way, you have it in writing before the work starts.
Which page describes your project
Most commercial moves fall into one of four kinds of project, and each has its own page with the detail:
- Office moving — an office changing address or floor: packing on the last working afternoon, the move overnight or over the weekend, desks ready to use the next morning.
- Office furniture — workstations and systems furniture installed, reconfigured or removed, with or without a move.
- Large-scale moving projects — warehouses, institutions, healthcare facilities and multi-floor or multi-site moves run in phases.
- Corporate relocation — employers moving employees’ households, one at a time or as a group.
The rest of this page covers businesses that do not fit neatly into those four, and what every commercial move has in common.
Shops and showrooms
A store cannot close for a week. Retail moves are usually split in two: the stockroom, back office and anything off the sales floor go first, a night or two ahead; the sales floor goes last, after closing on the final day, so the new location opens the following morning. Stock is packed and labelled by department or product group, not by the shelf it happened to be on, so restocking takes hours instead of days. Display cases, glass shelving and mirrors are crated or padded individually; fixtures that were built into the old space are measured before anyone promises they will fit the new one.
Restaurants, cafés and hotels
Food service moves around two constraints: equipment that has to be disconnected by licensed trades, and a dining room that should close for as few services as possible. Commercial kitchen equipment on gas, water or dedicated circuits is disconnected and reconnected by your technicians; we schedule around them and move the equipment once it is safe to lift. Dining furniture, bar stools, linens and décor move on a closing night. For hotels, rooms are usually refurnished floor by floor so part of the building keeps selling rooms while the rest is emptied.
Clinics and professional practices
A dental office, a physiotherapy clinic or a small medical practice moves like an office with two extra rules. Patient files are confidential: they travel in closed, numbered containers, listed on an inventory that follows them from the old room to the new one. Equipment that needs recalibration — dental chairs, imaging, lab instruments — is prepared by your supplier or technician before we touch it. Most small practices move over a weekend so that no appointment is cancelled. A hospital department or a multi-site clinic is a different scale of project; see large-scale moving projects.
How a commercial move is priced
Before quoting, someone from our team visits the site — usually under an hour — to count workstations, check the loading dock and elevators, measure doors and note anything that needs special handling. You receive a written scope and a quote, usually within two business days: crew, trucks, packing materials, number of shifts and timeline. Depending on the project, the quote is a fixed price or an hourly rate with a realistic range of hours; we tell you which works better for your move and why. If the scope changes, the quote is updated in writing before the work, not after.
What moves the price is the volume and the number of workstations, access at both buildings, the time window you give us, whether your staff pack their own desks, and specialized items such as safes, server racks or machinery. Evening and weekend work carries no premium; we plan crews for those hours as a matter of course.
Buildings, insurance and paperwork
Most commercial buildings will not let a mover through the door without a certificate of insurance naming the landlord or the management company, and both buildings usually have their own rules for moving hours, freight elevators and loading docks. We book the elevators and docks at both addresses, send the certificates directly to both property managers, and confirm the hours before the date is fixed. After the move, you receive the inventory of what was moved and, on request, the old space is emptied and left broom-clean.
Leaving the region
Moves to Quebec City, Ottawa, Toronto or elsewhere in Canada follow the same planning with a fixed long-distance price; see long-distance moving for how transport and delivery windows work.
Commercial moves by size
| Project | Typical crew | Typical timing | What usually drives the price |
|---|---|---|---|
| Small office, up to 10 people | 3–4 movers, 1 truck | one evening | stairs, elevator window, IT packing |
| Office floor, 20–60 people | 5–8 movers, 2 trucks | Friday night to Sunday | workstation disassembly, archives |
| Retail store or showroom | 4–6 movers | two or three nights | fixtures, stock labelling, opening hours |
| Warehouse or workshop | 4–8 movers | a weekend or several days | pallets, racking contents, machinery |
| Clinic, or an institution | 4–6 movers | a weekend or a closure period | confidentiality, sensitive equipment |
Every project is different, so this table is a guide rather than a quote. The site visit replaces it with real numbers for your space.
The five most common mistakes in a business move
- Planning the move before the new space is ready. Painting, flooring and cabling that are still running on moving night turn a weekend move into a week of disruption. Confirm the handover date with the landlord or contractor before you fix the moving date.
- Forgetting the building rules. Both buildings usually have moving hours, freight-elevator bookings and insurance requirements. Missing one of them can stop a move at the door.
- Leaving IT to the last minute. Network, phones and servers need their own plan. Agree with your IT provider who disconnects what, when, and what has to be running first on Monday.
- Moving what should be thrown away. Old archives, broken chairs and surplus furniture cost the same to move as what you keep. Decide before the move what goes to disposal, donation or storage.
- Not telling staff what to do. A one-page instruction — how to pack a desk, how to label a chair, what to take home — saves hours on moving night.
Property managers and landlords
We work with property managers on tenant moves, unit-to-unit moves, furniture removal before renovations and building cleanouts. For managers with several buildings, we can set up a simple account so each move is booked, insured and invoiced the same way.
Questions to settle before you ask for a quote
A commercial quote is only as good as the information behind it. Before the site visit, it helps to know the handover date of the new space and the last day in the old one, how many workstations and private offices you have now and will have after the move, what furniture is being replaced or disposed of, whether your staff will pack their own desks, who your IT provider is and what they will handle, and what the building managers at both addresses require for moving hours, elevators and insurance. With those answers, the visit takes less than an hour and the quote is accurate the first time.
