Newbie Landscaper Pro Landscaper Book

Newbie Landscaper Pro Landscaper, my newest book. At over 450 pages, this is the greatest collection of question and answers I have researched from my Gopher Lawn Care Business Forum. At times the responses to questions can be a little long winded but I have left them that way intentionally. I wanted the reading of this book to feel as if you had a father or uncle in the landscape business who would take the time to really get in depth and answer questions you had from the perspective of a person who has been in the lawn care and landscape industry for decades.

This book will help your lawn care business grow overtime as you can keep coming back to it and review issues you hadn’t faced previously but now are facing.

Here is just a taste of the topics covered. If you aren’t thinking about these questions now, you will be in the future.

* Getting started. (Business name, New business structure and insurance, Registering an LLC, Ideal customers and pricing jobs, Starting an eco-friendly lawn service, Should you work for someone first?, Fertilizer application license)

* Equipment (Benefits of a dump trailer, Using a quad for plowing, Buying lawn mowers, Will my truck work for snow plowing?, Cab over box trucks, Tires, Do you need a D.O.T. # on your truck?, Hydro versus belt driven lawn mowers?, What to do with an old landscape trailer, Is my enclosed landscape trailer getting too hot?, Diesel powered lawn mowers, Using edgers, Having a hard time getting off mower blades, Mower advice, Knowing the guts of a ZTR, Equipment prep check list, Lending friends equipment, Best mower for smaller properties?)

* Money Management (How will you make more money?, My plan to make $100,000 in my third year, Broke during the slow season, Bill collection, Are prepayments bad?, Avoiding debt and bi-weekly customers, Should you offer your customers financing?, Late fees?, Fuel charge increases, Sales tax issues, Building business credit, How long after billing do you wait for your money?, How much profit could I make?)

* Injuries And Preventing Them (Chainsaw safety and cutting down trees, Hernias, Should you wear your mower seat belt?, Dealing with allergies, Eye injuries, Should you wear shorts or pants?)

* Marketing (Having an online presence, Advertising online, Should I hint at my age in my flyer?, Using fertilizer flags for advertising, Focusing on your competitors customers, Should you use lead generating companies?, Postcard mailings, Taping business cards to doors, Getting vinyl lettering on your truck and trailer, Truck lettering, Paying a referral the first month’s mowing fee?, Stopping lowballers, Dirty tactics)

* Running The Business (Help with expanding, Offering full service, Should I use an answering service?, Licensing and all that stuff, What other services could I offer?, Name change and incorporating, What’s your status by the end of summer?, How do you operate your lawn care business?, Buying a lawn care business online?, Selling a lawn care business, The difference between big mowing companies and little ones)

* Estimating And Bidding (Where I get work, Big opportunity or is it?, Factory lawn mowing bid, I need help bidding 26 acre cemetery, Commercial insurance requirement, Charging for snow removal, Bidding snow removal at a shopping mall, First H.O.A. bid…….) and so much more…

Enjoy your reading, pace yourself, and side step the business pitfalls most newbies run head first into.

You can order this lawn care business book on amazon today https://www.amazon.com/Newbie-Landscaper-Pro-Business-Questions/dp/B08Z2J49D6/

One lawn care business owner asked “I am wondering if anyone knows anything about building business credit. I am trying to see if it is possible to build a line of credit for my mowing business.

The purpose of asking is because I would love to buy some commercial grade mowing equipment soon and like many others, I do not have that kind of cash to just throw down. Yes eventually I want the business to have enough money to replace that type of equipment or even pay cash for new things like a truck and trailer. Right now though, a commercial mower is the reason for asking about the credit line.”

A second lawn care business owner responded “from my experiences, one of the major factors is how much money you make and what profits you turn after expenses including paying yourself. For the most part, the line of credit will be initiated around your personal income and credit.

Unfortunately to a bank, owning a business is no better than being unemployed and the only exception to the rule is how much money you make. Once you get over a certain threshold and have developed assets and cash flow they will be more receptive but unfortunately starting or owning a business does not open any new doors credit wise or give you a new lease on life.

If your business pays the bills and keeps you above water but does not leave you much else or even allow you to pay yourself generously 12 months out of the year going, to a bank your application for credit is most likely going to be material for a good laugh at the water cooler.

I am not trying to mock you or belittle you and I certainly don’t want to discourage you or anyone else but I am speaking from experience and after 23 years in business and turning a half million a year I am finally able to have some pull with the banks under my business name.

I don’t think you will need to make a half million but what they will look for is consistency over a period of 5 to 10 years of not only how much your business made but what is left over and if you are not drawing a salary as good or better than a good paying job in the industry for yourself personally, they will not be too confident that your business will be able to pay them back.

What you can do to build up some credit is the next time you buy a commercial mower or other expensive piece of equipment you can finance it through a small business equipment loan company.

They will still use your personal credit but will also look into bank statements and tax records for the business as well as it will be listed on the loan as your name DBA, which will get the name of the business on the loan.

You should not need large lines of credit in business other then what you would need to buy a new truck or something expensive but those are loans not lines of credit. As landscapers, we already have a cash generating business and outside of equipment we really should not need money to survive and if you do, it is a red flag to a bank.

If we were a factory and we just got a contract to build a million units of a particular product, we would need to borrow money to buy the supplies and pay the help until we start fulfilling the order and even when a business like that bills it is payed out in 90 day intervals. Businesses like that have a revolving line of cash flow credit that they borrow and pay back quickly vs a guy like you or me buying a new dump truck and paying for it over 5 years.

If you want to build up your businesses credit then build up your own that is the only way because being the owner or president of your corporation it will only go as far as your own name and credit can take you.”

A third landscaper responded “I just run my business expenses through my credit card and pay them off before grace the period ends. I avoid paying any interest that way. Get a lot of rewards points that way as well.

You should be able to get a small line of credit ($1K - $5k) to meet your business needs provided your income, credit score, etc is decent. The interest rate would probably be high on an unsecured basis. Obviously a bank isn’t going to throw a large chunk of money to a start-up company that isn’t well established unless they had some valuable unencumbered collateral and an external source of income. It does take years for your business to gain a reputation and for banks to get comfortable extending credit to the business.”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with this lawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One lawn care business owner asked “I am starting a lawn care business next summer and looking at a new ZTR. My load will be around 6 (may do more) hours a day, four days a week with Friday for spillovers. I need to go with a 48″ because my trailer is only 54″ wide, and this one mower I have my eyes on takes up 52.5″ in total (w/o chute) I believe. I am looking for owners to throw their two cents in. Also, how many properties can I do in a day with those hours, how well does the mower stripe on its own, and should I mulch or side discharge everything?”

A second lawn care business owner responded “there are a lot of good choices for mowers out there but the bottom line is you need the best bang for the buck, especially when starting out. Parts availability are a big thing too so it is usually good practice to stick with manufacturers that have dealers nearby.

I am convinced that for the most part, outside of frame designs and deck designs they all use the same parts from motors, pumps, and such that as long as you stick with a true commercial line you can’t go wrong.

I am not saying they are all the same as some hydro systems are totally different animals but with the exception of a few brands every brand has a line of mowers that are similar and compete with the other brands line of mowers.

I have always used various sized mowers due to variations in the properties I mow such as when it comes to hills, gates, and wet area’s. I never needed a push mower but I have had to own a couple 36 inch walk behinds for back yards.

I think it would be wise to get a couple used mowers instead of a new rider because even with a new one if it breaks and that is all you got, then you are out of business until it is fixed so it is nice to have a back up.

I like the hydro walk behinds and with a sulke, it is as good as a rider, but nimble enough to use anywhere and they are also lighter than the riders.

If you are starting out, you can find some great deals on used mowers that still have plenty of life left in them and you will get a better value being the first owner took the hit on depreciation.

In the lawn business, whether you are big or small, you need as much equipment as you can muster and you would be better off if you had 3 walk behinds than one high end rider. With the prices these mowers are going for today, you could just about buy three walk behinds for the cost of a rider.

I don’t like the thought of going out to mow with just one piece of equipment, you always got to have back up. If you got one string trimmer and it takes a dump on you midway through a job what do you do?

Stuff always breaks on the job and never breaks on the trailer. It is nice to be able to have the resources of when you go down on a piece of equipment, you can still get the job and even the day done and it takes that pressure off.

Starting out, I would rather have that option even if it meant I had to buy used equipment to achieve that result. It is all baby steps and used equipment usually does not have a payment book to go with it. During the months we don’t make money that is always a beautiful thing.”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with this lawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One lawn care business owner asked “I need help estimating this commercial hedge trimming job. This back hedge is 10 feet tall and 200 feet long X 2 feet wide mostly cedar, also various other shrubs around property. I have a Shindaiwa Multi - Purpose tool and will be using the hedge trimmer attachment. I will also use either my 10′ or 16′ foot orchard ladder. It’s not a hard job really as the hedge is only 2 feet wide. It’s just long and time consuming. I am very good at using this tool though.

I got the feeling the owner is a typical gas station owner that always wants things for nothing. He said the last guy was getting $150 a month to maintain the grounds and extra for the trimming etc..

Any help would be appreciated.”

gas station hedge trimming job 1

A second lawn care business owner responded “your bid price will depend on how low your cutting those hedges. If you are cutting them in half then it would be about an 8-12 hour job. If your trimming maybe a 1 ft or 2. Then it would take somewhere around 5-9 hours. You can do either one in a day with 2 guys. You’ll just have a large load of debris if your cutting them down to 3-4 ft.

The difference between commercial and residential hedge trimming jobs is with commercial it is all about the money. Sure they have deep pockets and are making money off the property but these are the types that will fire their landscaper who has been there 20 years to save money on a new hire. Almost everything goes out to bid so you’ll always have competition. This doesn’t mean if you don’t lower your price you’ll get less work, you just have to prove that your work is of higher quality and worth the extra.

gas station hedge trimming job 2

To come up with a bid price multiply the amount of hours by your hourly rate and you will come up with your bid price.”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with this lawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One lawn care business owner wrote “today I got a phone call from a woman about 5 miles outside of my service area asking for a lawn care estimate. I politely told her I’d take the job, but it’s out of my service area. She wanted me to cut it ASAP. So I told her I can refer her to someone closer that I would recommend. She said that she can just push mow it if I can’t do it. So by this time I’m wondering what is up.

When I get there for the estimate, I find it’s a nice plot of land about 2.34 acres to be exact. It’s only going to be a 2 or 3 week job, once a week of course. Anyway, as I’m walking around I find nothing in the way besides a house for this. Awesome! Still don’t really want to take the job. When I get to the outer edge of my service area, my price goes up to around $50. I figure the job is only another 5 minutes, so I’ll give her an estimate and see what she says. So I tell her $80.

Then there is this long pause. It reminded me of a sales lessons I learned a long time ago. Present your price and then the next person to talk loses. There was a VERY long pause, and finally she says I’ll ask my husband. Bam. I was thinking he doesn’t want to have to do it, he doesn’t care. So she says to go for it. I was happy and kinda mad at the same time. I really dídn’t want the job, but if she’s going to throw her money away, why not toss it at me. Lesson learned here, if you don’t want the job, over bid it.”

A second lawn care business owner wrote “right now I cut a yard that is a little over a half acre for $80. It’s got quite a bit of trimming though. With what you explained, it sounds like it would go for around $175+ here.

I have price a job higher a few times. I actually just did it 2 days ago. This lady called and wanted her bushes trimmed up, and weed/mulch her garden. The garden was very small - it would only require about 10 cubic ft of mulch. The whole job would only take me maybe 30 or 45 minutes. I quoted $195. That’s a no brainer that it is not worth the price. She emailed me back and wanted me to start today. I told her the earliest I can start is next week and I need 50% paid. She said payment wasn’t a problem, but wanted it done asap and she would call me in a few days to let me know if she couldn’t find anyone else. When she calls, my schedule will be filled next week. I quoted such a high price because this lady was being a HUGE pain in the butt and I could tell she was going to inspect every minor detail of work. This job was not worth it to me.”

A third shared “I have to share this one with you. I got a call for a mowing estimate and I tell the potential customer I will be there shortly as I am in the neighborhood on another job. When I pull into this horseshoe driveway it’s like OMG ! Grass and chainlink fences as far as I can see.

So I start looking around and it’s about 4 to 5 acres of lawn, sloped slightly downhill and the entire property is enclosed by chain link fence. The property owner tells me the fence must be trimmed inside and outside. For the very first time since I have been running this business I honestly didn’t know what to say. All I could think about is my guys seeing that fence for the first time and me telling them trim both sides.

After a minute I finally said I can’t touch this for less than $245.00, well that didn’t go well , she told me the last guy did it for $100.00. I said I can see why he isn’t doing it anymore. I didn’t get the job.”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with this lawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One lawn care business owner asked “I am looking into buying a lawn edger for sidewalks and driveways etc. I’ve been having a bunch of clients ask for edging and I currently do not offer it. I am wondering how much you guys charge for that service and how much work is involved.

So far cutting lawns and other small project have been keeping me busy, so I never thought about adding edging until 3 different people asked me in one week.”

A second lawn care business owner responded “edging pricing depends on the job really. When doing edging jobs, don’t forget to cover the cost of any mulch, etc. Pricing basically breaks down to how many hours the job takes. Is it just you or do you have help? There are some different variables to consider. I just did an edge, mulch, and weeding job for some border gardens. I charged $450 for that. About 3 weeks ago I did another one that was $655. My price depends on how much area I have to edge, etc.”

A third shared “for most of the customers I have, they only have small sidewalks so I don’t charge extra for the edging because it takes only a min. or two for the lawns that I have plus it makes a world of difference to the customer and other people that see the lawn. If the job were to be a longer job then I would charge based on the total time it takes add the cost of what a new blade would be and the gas ( to me ) $30 an hrs is a fair price.”

A fourth said “unless that only is the job - I include it in the time it takes to service a yard. Remember you are selling a look to the yard, not a mowing. If you want your look to be professional, and one that other people will want, do it. If you a fly by nighter, then don’t. I charge more than anyone else locally for my yard service, I mow, trim with a string trimmer, and edge, concrete surfaces, paved drives even the road edge.”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with this lawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One lawn care business owner wrote “a landscaping business is a service business. Customers will always come and go. The 3 main reasons I have found why a customer leave are the following.

1. Price
2. Quality
3. Service

I am sure many of you have some of the same mowing customers since your first year in business. We all know who we have as customers, but does anyone know who they lost as customers? That idea got me thinking and I decided to make up a spreadsheet for my lost business and figure out why they left. I include the name, address, reason for quitting, price, and any problems I had with them. I figured it would be best to keep this record to improve my business in the future. This way if/when they call again, I know why they left before AND what I need to do to not let it happen again. Does anyone else keep a list like this?

I guess when I think about a lost customer, it’s not so much losing them, because if I lose one, then I pick another one up. The main issue I am focusing on is keeping track of lost revenue/weekly sales. This way I know what I need to do to make sure I’m still on point for the year end numbers. Anyone can say ‘I lost 3 customers, I need 3 more to stay even.’ But that is not true. Although you may not lose many, which most of us don’t, it’s always a simple reminder (what to tell them if they call again, and weekly revenue). I feel like for myself, its always good to look back at reports and study what has been going on. I try to keep an advantage over my competitors and I feel this helps me. My purpose is to grow, not maintain the same customer base size.”

A second lawn care business owner responded “If I get fired, I feel like it’s never my fault.

I drop a lot of clients every year with good reason, those who drop me are suddenly capable of doing the work themselves, moving out of town, death, or can’t afford my new prices.

The ones who create the biggest problems still won’t fire me, it’s kind of silly. It’s as if some of my customers hate me, but need me - so all they get to do is complain in their corner and wait for the day I decide to drop them.

Most of my problem customers won’t drop me because my prices and quality are great, it’s more that I do not communicate well with clients who stress me out.

Once a client gets on my bad side, I do not focus my attention on them, it’s already in my mind that I will be dropping them after the season has ended.”

A third shared “I only lost one customer this year due to a low baller. I was mowing for this guy and I saw this idiot riding around the neighborhood with a push mower in the back of this piece of crap truck. I watched him stop at several places around me. Next I get a call a few days later from this customer saying he found someone cheaper. I was like ‘Ok dude whatever.’

Two weeks later this same customer calls me back and asks if I would take him back on. Yeah right! I told him maybe next year since I already filled his spot.”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with this lawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One lawn care business owner wrote “I received a call today to come out to give a quote on trimming a row of hedges and mulching underneath.

The client said the row of hedges are about 30′ long and about 4′ wide. I’m thinking I will need about 2 yards of mulch to go under the bushes.

So for the mulch price, I am going to multiply the cost of the mulch by 1.5 and then I am going to charge $100 for 2 hours labor for spreading it out. I’m not quite sure how long the hedge trimming is going to take. I am estimating it’s going to take 2-3 hours.

The grand total to trim hedges and mulch around them would be about $370. Does that seem like too high of a bid?

I am going to have the mulch delivered to her driveway. The delivery price is already included. The way she explained it to me she just wants the mulch laid down. I’m thinking 2-3 hours for trimming the hedges and 2 hours for laying out the mulch, so 5 hours total labor. I am only going to charge $50 an hour for labor since I am just starting out my business.”

A second lawn care business owner responded “bidding a hedge and mulch job all depends on how long it actually takes you.

I get my mulch for $26.75/yard. If I can just lay the mulch down and I don’t have to clean the beds out then I charge $80/yard. If I have to go through and clean the beds out first, such as the leaves and such, then I charge $100-120/yard.

Hedge trimming bid tools

Me personally if I have 2-3 hours labor in everything I would be looking about $200-275

Most all my clients are within 10 mins of where I dump and get my mulch from so I just include it in with the price of the mulch. If I were to be driving 20-30 miles out then I would charge extra.

I have calculated that it costs me .30 cents for every mile. So when I calculate for fuel costs I charge $1/mile. Helps compensate for fuel/time. ”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with this lawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One lawn care business owner wrote “I was asked to give an landscaping estimate to put in a retaining wall along a driveway. The only problem is I have never done one before. So my questions start with the most basic, how should one be installed? I am not sure I really want to do this job but I am curious as to what does it entail? There is a retaining wall that already exists. The customer wants to replace this wall and looking for an estimate to do it. The old wall was put together with slate rock.The client does not like the way it looks and wants to change it out for landscape bricking into a wall.

My measures of the wall are about 2 ft high, with a gradual decline and curves around the front. The lawn butts up against the stones there now. I am looking at it being about 50 feet in length.

I was thinking of giving her 2 separate estimates. One for the wall, and one for mulch install with bush trimming. She does not plan to do the wall until probably next spring or summer. So she is looking for a price for only hedge work and mulch for right now.

After getting a closer look at the wall of slate that is there now, and seeing the mound of grass pushing against it, I really doubt I would feel comfortable trying to do this work. I told her that we never did a wall before and honestly I don’t want to use her yard to learn. She seems OK with that, I then said, I could probably sub-contract the work out to someone that does walls, so I will see if she wants me to do that. That way at least maybe I can have my guys there to observe and learn how to do it the right way.”

A second lawn care business owner responded “I am going to give you a rough appraisal just by my experience. Let’s say the wall is 50 ft x 3 ft high that’s around 200 pieces of block if u use a L12×8x10 stone. I would buy 350 just in case, at $3.00 for each stone, that would come out to around $1150.00 in stone plus delivery + 5 yards of soil + 5 yards of limestone or whatever you want to call it, dust rock, base material. This a very simple retaining wall. It won’t be holding a lot of pressure. Most would call this a decorative garden wall. So the material I would guess are going to be around $2,255.00

Now comes the fun part. You have to remove around 2 to 3 feet of soil for back filling, then dig down to bury an entire level of block. So let’s say if your block is 8 inches high, you have to dig around 11 to 12 in X 2 ft so you can put base material down to make your bed and level the blocks. Look for the lowest point to bury your first row then that’s the way to go. Retaining walls are easy and they can be big money makers.

For the labor, I can do a 150 ft x 4 ft high by myself in 4 days. I’ve done 100 ft in 2 days before. I charge $2,500.00 to $3,500.00 for 3 days of work and guaranty the wall for 5 years. If you know what you are doing.

So your total would be $5,755.00 just for the retaining wall. There is more you can do. That place is too dark and needs some color which would enhance the beauty and the value of it. Try to upsell some plants with your mulch.

You can easy get to $10,000 or more from that place if you do your presentation right.”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with this lawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One lawn care business owner wrote “Today starts off normal like any other day and then one of my employees calls me and says we have a problem. Ok, so what is the problem? The landscape trailer is smoking and it’s coming from both sides. I ask him if something is on fire and he says no that it’s coming from the wheels.

My next thought is wondering what the heck he did. He tells me nothing out of the ordinary, just driving to the next mowing job. I tell him to stay there and I will bring another landscape trailer.

So when I get there I notice the dust caps on the hubs are missing. The axle is poking out of both sides. I couldn’t tell if the bearings were there or not. I don’t know what the hell happened. I loaded everything on the other trailer and now have to figure out what to do.

I can’t tell what is missing and I can’t find parts. I think I’m going to get a new complete axle or buy a set of duals. I would rather convert it to a tandem axle but I’m taking a chance getting them used. I don’t know how that will effect the registration of the trailer.

All I can think of is how? The trailer has a gvwr of 3,500lbs and it’s always carried half that weight, never more.

This trailer gets used twice one week and once the next. It’s set up for the small properties. So it’s probably only used around 6 times a month.

The lug nuts were on tight. The center piece just slid out making the tire slanted. I see a cotter pin in there. I assume that’s part of what holds it in place. Once I got the weight off the trailer. I could rock the wheel back and forth. I couldn’t really see what was suppose to be holding the tire on. I think if I pulled hard enough the wheel would come off.

I can’t find what hub I need. I think they cost around $50-60 each. I figured a complete axle with hubs is a better deal at $150. That’s at a local trailer supply house so parts are available.

The axles at this supply house mount to leaf springs. This trailer has none. So I would have to buy them and find a way to mount it safely. I think the lack of springs is what caused this. It could’ve just been a bump that knocked the bearings out of place? I don’t know.

The spindle or axle whatever the shaft is, has a nice size nick in it from rubbing. Not sure if this can be fixed with new bearings.”

A second lawn care business owner responded “how long ago has somebody worked on the trailer? Is there any chance somebody was trying to steal your tires? The big nut that the cotter pin goes through pretty much keeps everything together. If I wanted to steal your tires, I would pull the dust cap, remove the cotter pin and nut, then pull it all off the axle. Removing one nut is much quicker than removing 5 lug nuts.

From the look of the picture it seems like your wheel bearings have completely blown apart, If the big nut is still on the end of the axle and the wheel is slanted over.

I have seen the axle bearings blow out from driving over railroad tracks too fast before, it takes a while after that to show up though. Maybe you can fix the damage if it was not driven too long.

Trailer axle bearings need to be cleaned and greased at least once a year. There is a torque spec for them also so don’t just tighten them by hand. Rule of thumb is 12k miles. Those grease fitting dust covers will help some but you still need to do it once a year at a minimum by hand. I would suggest do them 2x per year. Before the season and after the season or on a down day. You will still use your trailer over the winter more than likely but at a minimum do it in the spring.”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with this lawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One lawn care business owner shared “today I finally decided I was going to make a shovel and rake rack for my landscape trailer. I got tired of having them just bouncing around freely in my truck.

To make it, I used 1/8″ thick metal that I cut 2 main supports for with 1×1 square stock at 2 feet. I added a base plate that is 2 inches wide by 4 inches long. Welded them together but not to the trailer because I never know what I may want to place there in the future.

Next I had some angle laying around so I thought I would throw it in just if I wanted to hang strap’s or something off it. I cut this at a 3 feet long section and welded to the top of the main supports. 

Then I had 4 inch wide flat stock piece that I cut down to 36 inches and drilled 5 holes in it 1/2 inch from one side and 4 inches apart. The holes are 1 3/4 inches around. Then welded the the main support on top of the angle. I have 3 inches on the side hang over to do other thing with.

This whole thing cost me around $12 to build. There was no way I was going to pay $40 to $100 to order one. Now I just need some paint to finish the job. 

Currently the tools are just resting on the trailer deck at the bottom for now because I’m still thinking what more I may add to this. I do know I’m going to add a trimmer rack in the front of this and tie it together somehow.

Lastly I’m also going to cut plywood 24 inches high and place on the inside of the trailer so I can get mulch without it falling out of the trailer.

I’d also like to fabricate a back pack blower rack and gas can holders on the outside of the trailer so I can keep the trailer floor clean.

It took about 30 to 45min to get the holes drilled nicely which was probably the most time needed. It was well worth the time spent. If you have some metal lying around and a welder, consider using my design to build your own shovel and rake rack.”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with this lawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One lawn care business owner asked “has anyone used any of these lead generating sites? The type that get home owners to choose which services they need and then the site contacts local contractors to bid on the job? I talked to a salesman from one of these sites and he said there are tons of calls for lawn care in my area, but I am thinking he just said that to hook me. I did research on the company, and there are a lot of mixed reviews. Some say its a total scam and rip off, and then others say the people saying it’s a scam don’t know what they are talking about and are using the service wrong.”

A second lawn care business owner shared “I know two people that used such sites.

One is a lawn care professional and he hated it, said it was a scam. They would give him bids outside of his service area and then charge him for the chance to bid on it. Other prospects he called immediately and someone else already had the job. So you have to be fast. You pay for every lead whether the customer changed their mind or the job is taken.

Another friend does home improvement. This guy likes it. For him it’s worth paying the finders fee to them for thousand dollar jobs. He gets the majority of his work from them. The downside is, to get the bids, he doesn’t even look at the jobs. He just bids them blind. He is about 50 miles away from me and called the other day asking if I knew someone who could do demolition in my city. I said sure I’ll bring some guys by. How many hours? He said he didn’t know, maybe 4. It took the 2 of them and my guy 12 hours. I’m assuming he bid it for 4-5 hours.

So from that, the usefulness of such sites depends on what services you offer. If you’re offering hardscaping, excavation, construction, it’s probably worth it. If you are doing $100 jobs and you pay 3-4 times to land one job then it’s not.”

A third added “I agree with you. I tried such a site for my mowing company and it almost put me in the poor house. I had to cancel the service because I got two jobs from it. Most people were just trying to find cheaper estimates to lower their current mowing bill.

The two jobs I landed were one time yard repairs for around $600. However getting those jobs cost me about $1,400 for leads on jobs I didn’t tell them I wanted or were way too far away. Once I canceled the service, they continued for 3 weeks sending jobs (that I never contacted) and this is still continuing. They sent me to collections for it and I had to hire an attorney to deal with them. Such sites are useless for lawn mowing, maybe good for larger jobs like hardscaping.”

A fourth said “I have had a great experience with lead generating sites. I up my advertising budget with when I need work. When I am busy, I dial back the budget. From my experience, probably 1/3 of the callers are looking for the cheapest company out there. I have done around $12,000 in landscape work this year.

In the off season, I offer property clean ups, lawn reworks, or landscape maintenance provided by them to supplement my mowing. Many customers expand their services with me and sign contracts. I pay $7-22 per lead.

To really benefit from such sites you need to focus on higher profit services & target higher income zip codes. You also have to be quick responding to leads.”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with this lawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One lawn care business owner asked “have any of you run a deal on sites like groupon that let you run deals for services? If you have, what has been your experience from it.

I just ran a deal for just mow, line trim, and blow for $37.00. Out of that, they will take 47%. So out of that I will get $19.61. I figured I’d give it a try and see if I can gain some customers after they use their voucher.

As for the deal I ran, that price is after the mark down of a 51% savings. It might be rough to make this work but you don’t know unless you give something a shot. I have it my stipulations that it’s only mowing, line trimming, and blowing debris off. Nothing else. Additional services are extra.”

A second lawn care business owner responded “I tried groupon last year. From my experience they sell your service to their list at half of your value for the service, they get half of that and you get the other half, 25%. So if you advertise a mowing service worth $150, you end up with roughly $37.50 for the service.

You lose based on that deal, but they will tell you by doing this, you will meet potential new future business this way if they are happy with your service. For me, even after marketing to these new people, I didn’t receive a single call back for additional services. If this idea is something you want to try, market to your current customer list by offering the same deal, cut out the middle guy (groupon) and make yourself 50% instead of 25%. You should be getting everyone’s email just for that purpose anyway. So you can run promotions from time to time.”

A third shared “there is a saying that goes, it takes money to make money. To say you have to lose money to gain money is absurd.

Businesses should be profit centers and not a roll of the dice. If you are not profiting from the services you offer then you are on a path to nowhere.

We live in a society where everyone wants to look like a big player but no one wants to spend the money. Sites that attract cheap customers like groupon are all a waste of time and are completely unneeded. Don’t let anyone tell you that you need to participate in that crap to build your business because nothing could be further from the truth.

One landscaper may charge $40.00 to cut a lawn while another will cut the same exact lawn for $25.00. Why is that?

The guy that cuts for $40.00 is charging the right price and his route is full. He puts his day in and makes a good living as well as has built a business with a desirable customer base.

The other guy that charges $25.00 has to run around like a chicken with his head cut off and do almost double the work to make the same money but as a result has to work longer hours and increase his payroll and also do double the billing and rely on double the amount of people to pay him in a timely manner.

The way it works out in the end is the dude who works less and prices his jobs correctly makes more money and has a better more efficient business than the cut throat dude who is twice as busy.

The morale of the story is cutting your prices and being more busy does not translate into profits and profits are why we go into business in the first place.

Sales and gimmicks are good for retail businesses and food businesses but it does not work and is useless in the landscape industry.

I can cut my prices and make my phone ring three times more than it does now but why bother if at the end of the day it is gonna mean less profits and more hours and wear and tear on my business?”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with this lawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One lawn care business owner wrote “I’ve been doing lawn care for the past four years now working for the same company. My boss has been great with teaching me the ins and the outs of mowing. So I have decided it’s time to try and go out on my own next year and start up a small lawn care business.

The mowing company I work for right now only works in the late afternoon because my boss works a full time job in the morning, so my plan is to still work with him and start mine up on the side and doing both for right now and then just playing it by ear.

My boss has taught me pretty much everything he knows and he’s been mowing lawns for around 13 years or so. He doesn’t do any mulching or planting just strictly mowing. As far as pricing goes, he doesn’t get too complex about it, he just charges one dollar per minute for how ever long he thinks it will take us to mow the yard. My friends that mow for a living do the same thing when it comes to how much to charge per yard. That’s the way my boss has taught me to price yards and it works well for him.

I’m not planning on stepping on his toes or anything, my plan is he can only handle so many lawns cause he just does this on the side so I was going to market to surrounding towns he doesn’t mow in. The reason he doesn’t go to these other towns to pick up work is because he says he already has all the work he wants. So I don’t think he would have a problem with it.

Any advice or input on what I have to look forwards to would be greatly appreciated!”

A second lawn care business owner responded “my biggest issues early on came from not knowing my numbers. If you are still working for someone else you need to learn your numbers from them.

What I mean by that is you should set up an excel spread sheet with every property on that list.

• put the lot size, and turf sq ft, trimming time, blow off time.
• how long does it take to spread mulch, plant flats of flowers, weeding etc..
• track the time for each one every week.
• find out what your boss charges.

From that setup you will have an average amount of time required for certain tasks. It will help you a lot with estimating, assuming you are using similar machines. You can use most any realtor sites online to find lot sizes of the property you are working on.”

A third shared “my advice is to network with your friends and everyone you know. Keep getting the word out that you are starting your own mowing business. Harness your social life to market yourself and just run your business like you want.

Your success depends on you and you alone. If your ready for it then get out there and start busting butt and making cash!

Once you get your business started, you may not have a job for long. I had a guy that did side jobs work for me before. It wasn’t just lawn stuff but handyman jobs. I didn’t mind it until he borrowed my snow blower to clear driveways and found out he was telling customers he would work for them for what I pay him to work for me. I am not saying this is your situation, it’s just employers are always looking out for theft.

You are walking a thin line trying to start a business while working for someone in the same field. You should probably talk it over with your boss before he finds out from someone else.”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with this lawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One lawn care business owner wrote “to be successful in the landscaping industry you need to market often and use an attention grabbing offer with no BS to get the phone ringing.

What I have learned is people want a great offer today, not in a month or two. I suggest using a discount on the first mowing and then quickly weed out customers who you don’t want.

For example: instead of offering a percentage off, make an offer of $X off your first mow!

• Make it clear that it is a one off per customer.
• Make an offer that at least covers your expenses minus labor, but seems too good to refuse and I will guarantee that you will build a client base very fast.
• Once you have your foot in the door and have done a good job the first time,  the customer will accept your full price quote, almost whatever you ask.

The main thing customers decide on when choosing somebody to mow their lawn is how much they like you as a person, followed by your work product, and lastly price.

I keep my referral programs separate in my marketing. I offer friends and relatives the same one off offer, but I make it seem extra special, and give each referral three or four ’special referral coupons’ to give out to others. I give the original client a free mow for referrals.

Keep in mind that multiple referring clients are worth many thousands of dollars over time, and each referral will result in a possible long term relationships and many more dollars.

You don’t need to waste ad space on a post card or flyer with anything dealing with referrals or much about who you are. The main headline should explain what you do, and take up most of your page space, with a little room for your number. If you want to include other services, allocate a very small line for them down the bottom.

Forget the impulse to use the marketing angle the ‘first 5 customers will get…’ etc, it will only puts negative thoughts into your potential customers heads. When ever I hear this in ads I suspect that I will never be the qualified customer, so I don’t call.
Your offer should be limited by time only. Make sure you list the customer’s opportunity window by giving a finishing date. That way, all the customer has to do to qualify is to pick up the phone now.

When I look at my own marketing, I stand back a bit and look at the overall picture, and judge whether or not my main message is most of what you see. I want the content of my message to be great, with possibly a picture of a lovely lawn, and I at least triple the font of my headline over the text in my body. Next think about highlighting it in a standout way like a red, or contrasting banner or something.

Think about offering a money back guarantee too. These additions can really put a client’s mind at ease, that you are not just a guy mowing lawns simply for beer money.

I always highlight my headline and offer a guarantee. You only get 2-3 seconds of read time when a client is deciding to throw your advertisement in the trash or keep your it for later. Keep the message simple and large enough so that it doesn’t get lost in the overall picture.

Try these steps and see if your marketing improves.’

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with this lawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One lawn care business owner wrote “I finally got my truck and have been getting some mowing accounts pretty quickly. I currently have a self propelled mower walk behind mower but it is so slow.

I want to purchase a ztr but don’t want to spend $5,000+ if I don’t have to. I like new because of the warranty. I looked at a 21hp 42″ model consumer grade tractor style mower but I’m only going to be cutting around 20-25 lawns a week each approx quarter acre in size, since this is currently only a part time job for me. I do have concerns if such a mower will hold up since I am not going to be running it 5 days a week 8 hours a day.

Next I looked at a ZTR with a 44″ mowing deck and impulsively I jumped on the offer. Using that push mower has been brutal. It was a new one with 0% financing. Luckily at the moment I don’t need to rely on this for all my income and can reinvest all the profits.

I wanted the Kawasaki engine upgrade but I couldn’t justify spending an extra thousand dollars. Since I’m not running it 8 hours a day 5 days a week I think the Briggs engine will do fine. Same goes for the hydro pumps.

With only a little bit of time to test my new ZTR today, all I can say is that it rides awesome! I can’t wait to get to work on it this weekend!”

A second lawn care business owner replied “if you get a commercial mower, you will get a better, longer warranty, and they will probably have a 36 or 48 month interest free financing deal. If you are serious about this and think you will have a growing customer base, and their is room in your budget, I would go with a commercial mower.

From what I have seen, a residential mowers warranty is 150 hours. You can do that in less then a season. The warranty isn’t worth a dime from most companies. You’ll get the ‘we’ll take care of it just bring it to our nearest service center ,’ ie across the country. This is another reason commercial is the way to go. You can bring it to any dealer.

Another option is buying a used commercial mower. I put 1,600 hours on one used mower and 200 on another without problems. My friend went through two consumer grade lawn tractors in the same time.

I really don’t see what peoples problem with buying used is. You can buy a $10,000 mower for $2500. If the engine fails, you can buy a new one for $1500. If the hydros fail, it’s about $800 per side. In my experience, you’ll still spend less and have a longer lasting machine.”

A third shared “a consumer grade mower typically has no warranty or 90 days for commercial use. I would read the details before I buy. My personal advice is look for a decent used commercial unit before buying a consumer grade. They are that much better in quality. Another thing is I wouldn’t recommend buying any consumer 2 cycle trimmers or blowers, when for just a little more you can buy something that will last and have more power.

With all that said, keep in mind, debt is the killer of a business.”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with this lawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One lawn care business owner wrote “two months ago I renovated a new customer’s lawn. When I first started, there were a lot of bare spots and dead stuff. I fixed everything, planted new seed, spread new soil, followed up every week to see how it was going. Then the customer calls and says ‘can you come out and see what’s going on because I have a huge spot on the lawn that is dead and no grass is growing. I don’t know why.’

When I get there to inspect the property there are a million flies all over the area. I took my shovel and moved the soil around to find what looked like dog poop, a lot of it, under the layer of dirt. I asked the customer if he let his dog go outside in the front yard where this spot is and he said ‘no that it was his cat.’

Really? This cat was using the 6×6 area as his litter box. WOW! This customer has been a pain in the butt all year with his lawn and his animals. So much so that I am  thinking of dropping him at the end of this year.

I have told this customer 2 times now if he does not pick up after his dog, I will not cut his grass. Today I get there and it looked like he didn’t pick up for a week. I charged him for a double cut!

Am I the only one having this problem?

The amazing part of it all is, he doesn’t care. He doesn’t say anything. He just pays. The last time he left all kinds of crap all over the yard. Chairs, garbage, etc that took me 20 minutes to move it all out of the way just to cut the lawn! So I took pictures and sent him a separate bill with the pictures for $20 just for moving everything. Then bam when I got there last night garbage and dog poop! I just sent him a letter letting him know there will be a $30 dollar fee the next time we come out and there is dog poop in the yard and another $30 dollar fee for the garbage and chairs, toys, fire pits, swing chairs, pulled weeds, cut branch piles etc plus the cost for the cut. I hope he will get the picture! If not I am going to cancel his service.”

A second lawn care business owner added “I know exactly what you are saying, Most of my customers are pretty good about picking up the land mines. I had a woman call me and ask me for an estimate to mow her lawn because her boyfriend moved out and she could not drive the mower. I got there and the grass was 2 feet high! I gave her a price and she agreed to let me mow it. It didn’t take long before I started hitting the land mines and flinging it everywhere. It got too the point I had to stop…

I ask her about it and she tells me yeah I have five dogs! OMG! Do you ever pick up the poop? I charged her for powerwashing my equipment as well as the mowing and did not respond to her next call.”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with this lawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One lawn care business owner wrote “I landed my first upscale mowing account two month ago and then my second a week after . They are next door neighbors one next to another. Here is the back story on how this happened.

Last year I did a back yard renovation for a client that involved patio work, flagstone, walkways planters, a bbq area, pavers etc. This client, gave me the phone number of their realtor and said they would have some work for me. I called the number and she never answered, never gave me any work, long story short, she gave my number to her client who called me.

A half hour later I show up to their property. While I am driving into their community, I think to myself, this is nice, they have huge yards, I can do it, I’ll mow the lawns with my (2) 21in mowers and it will take me 1 1/2 hour with help.

The lawn is (1/2) acre in size, larger than I am used to. I give the customer my estimate which includes a little discount, I always give discounts to the very first customer in a new area to secure the contract. Once I get an anchor mowing contract, the next ones in the area go for a rate much higher per service.

Next week, I get another mowing contract with their next door neighbor. The neighbor canceled their current mowing company that was servicing their lawn and fertilizing for the past 5 years. They have dead spots every where. After 3 months of my service, the dead spots have been reduced and new grass is growing. I’m getting such a nice feed back from the clients that they have refer me to their 5 friends in the same community.

I have been in the business 1 year and 8 months now. Last year I had only 5 mowing customers, now I’m up to 33 clients and I keep getting 2 to 3 clients every 45 days. My last 4 accounts have all been really referrals.

I will say from my experience, the best way to get high end mowing customers is to put your head down and keep doing what you are doing and make sure you do it right. I did an outstanding job for a rich lady. The lady had an upscale realtor friend. The realtor friend never hired me, but she refer-me, to one of her clients.

You will get high end clients if your service is up to their standard of living. They don’t want an inept idiot on a ztr coming and going. They want somebody they can trust and get a good answer back if they have, any type of concern, even if that means paying a little extra for that.

I have since doubled my mowing price for new clients in this area and new clients tell me after they sign the contract. they are more than happy to change from their old mowing service, even if its mean paying more, as long as they get the service they want.”

A second lawn care business owner added “I got a high end client from a big company during last year’s fall leaf clean up. The previous landscaping company came out, blew a few leaves around, and left. The owner was complaining about their mowing service to a neighbor who gave them my card and they called.

I went out and talked to them about what they were not pleased with, gave a price, and got the work (fall clean up). When I finished, the customer told me the yard had not looked that good since her husband passed away and would I do weekly service next year.

It feels good when a little company can take a job from a national player even when it costs the customer more per month.”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with this lawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One lawn care business owner wrote “I got a phone call from some guy the other day who wanted me to come out and give him a mowing estimate. I typed his address into google and it was in a very bad trailer park. I was still talking to him and he was telling me what he wanted done.

Then he starts asking how many people I worked with. I told him for mowing it’s just me but for other projects, I hire as needed. Then he said good I want to make sure only you come and nobody else. He also asked what type of equipment I have etc.

When he was done talking I told him I would stop by and give him a mowing quote and he told me whatever I charge is fine just let him know. Then he gave me three different numbers to call, different from the one he called me from and told me if he didn’t answer one to call the next.

After I hung up I looked on google earth and his yard was 90% sand. This guy was just too shady for me, plus he was like 40 minutes away about, 15 from my furthest customer. I ultimately called him back and told him I just looked at google again and thought it was going to be too far. He tried to convince me to come and then started getting pissed and told me if I serviced an area near there why not come another 15 min. I told him he was outta luck and hung up.

Would everyone else have done that? I am not sure what he was trying to do but it didn’t seem right.

I figure he wanted to rob me in a secluded area but I just wanted to see what everyone else had to say. The community he is from is a high drug area and having three cell phone numbers indicated he was probably a drug dealer as they often use disposable cell phones.”

A second lawn care business owner added “I too have gotten really weird calls. A few months back, I remember telling myself, ‘I should probably start carrying my gun while I’m working…’ Then I paused to think and realized that if I have a feeling like I’m going to need my gun with me, it’s probably best to just avoid the job altogether.
Better to be safe than sorry.”

A third shared “I got an email from a guy who asked way too many questions that a normal interested person wouldn’t bother to ask.

Other than the normal questions, I received questions like, ‘What equipment do you run, how many guys do you work with, how many clients do you have, etc.’

The guy didn’t even bother giving me an address, he just kept asking really strange questions through email.

It felt like he was setting me up to steal my equipment / truck or who knows, maybe he really just wanted his lawn cut, but he was a really strange person. So when I feel something isn’t right, I pass on the job.”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with this lawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One lawn care business owner asked “I got a call from a potential customer that needs a lawn renovation basically. She doesn’t know whether she wants seed or sod, so she wants quotes for both. The yard is about 7,400 sq. ft. that is real patchy and weedy. So I’m thinking about actually giving her 3 quotes. One for sod, one for power seeding, and one for tilling and power seeding. My only problem is I don’t know how long it will take.

If I put down sod, I am thinking it will take me about (3-4) 8 hour days, after tilling and laying the sod, and putting out the water timers, and so on.

Just over seeding/power seeding, I know it will probably be about a day.

For tilling/power seeding, after I clean up all the debris from tilling, I am thinking it will take me about 2.5 days.

I have thought about just marking up the seed product by 25 percent, then doubling my materials, but I would like to see where I would come out as far as time goes, and compare the two.

The thing is that she is holding me responsible for doing everything, and if the lawn dies, then I am responsible for replacing it. Including the watering too, she doesn’t live there. This is where this potential job threw up a red flag for me. Is this a realistic expectation? I don’t have this kind of capital to a have such a policy, to replace that kind of material.

I was planning on doing this alone but I might be able to find some help, I was thinking about putting an ad on craigslist. I really don’t have a big network of people I can call upon. I read somewhere, that it take 3 guys 1 hour to lay a pallet of sod. Is this close? I really want this job, but if the customer is too far out with their expectations, then I don’t know if I really want the headache. My gut feeling says there is something not right here.

So I called back and told her that I would not do sod however, I would still renovate her lawn by seeding, because she had said that was another option. That was on Tuesday, and I haven’t heard back.”

A second lawn care business owner responded “you will be there at least 15 days by yourself doing this job. You are talking about tilling a yard, then raking to remove all debris, dumping at least one time, and leveling the ground. They sell the grass by the pallet here, $160.00 for top notch grass. You would need about 12 to 15 pallets, plus delivery which generally would be about $130.00. You will need two of those. Then laying the sod, piece it together, that a lot of grass for person and after roll the grass to remove any air.

You are going to be sore for 2 days after you finish with this job.

Most of the guys I see doing this kind of work just throw the sod on the top of the soil. They barely will compact or roll the lawn. I also see a lot of rough sod jobs where they don’t put the edges of the sod together, like a carpenter would do with the carpeting, so air doesn’t get under need the dirt and sod, and cause it to die.

If you want to this right, don’t be like other guys. I really hate when I see guys just throwing sod around and being careless in the way they lay it. Most of the time a big percentage of the grass will die like that, especially around the sides of the house they do this a lot in new subdivisions. Stay away from this bad habit, let them do it, so you can repair their crap work, but when you plant grass you want to do it nice and professional.

If I were you I would charge somewhere between $7,000 to $12,000 to have a healthy profit margin and leave room to come back and water the yard by hand for at least 3x per week for 3 weeks. You need to price the job high enough where you can replace sections of the lawn if you have dead spots. If you do the job right though, you should not have any.”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with this lawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One lawn care business owner asked “I have noticed the 40+ yr old generation prefers phone calls when interacting with me, while the younger groups are all about emails! When I email a customer, I have to be very careful with what I say. Because they will study EVERYTHING I type!! One good thing I have had luck with, is in emails, type the service you are doing followed by the price. This way the price doesn’t stick in their mind as they read. I know its a debate to do a meet/greet with the customers, or talk over phone. But lately I’ve done more email quotes than phone quotes. Out of all my quotes, I only lost 1 this year- it was a highball bid because I didn’t want to mess with her. Is anyone else running into similar issues? How are you doing your quotes?”

A second lawn care business owner shared “I do agree that the times have changed but I certainly would not say it is for the better. The younger generation relies so heavily on social media that they have absolutely no social skills what so ever. They prefer to do business through emails because it takes the human element out of the equation so if you sent them a price they did not like, they don’t have to muster up the energy to tell you face to face or on the telephone.

I am from the older generation but not that old where I am out of touch. I do have conversations with customers through emails but any initial business deal I prefer a face to face meeting with. This because it is not only more professional, it shows you are willing to take the time for them. I believe you can get a better feel as to if they are serious and if they are a customer you even want to work for.

I know we all want every job that comes our way but it is very important to screen your customers just like they screen their prospective contractors.

We are landscapers and we need to work in concentrated areas so marketing to the masses is useless in this business unless you want to spend a half your day driving from job to job.

In this business, physical presence is what it is all about. Sure I have conversations with clients via email because once I established a working relationship with the people I work for, which is all corporate and commercial ,these clients are busy dealing with the day to day operations of running their own businesses. They don’t have the time to be talking about the daily happenings with their landscape while they have board meetings and a hundred employees and staff to deal with daily.

I can tell you that whenever I have a upsell to a existing client or I am selling a new contract to a new client, you need to be face to face with them for many reasons. Such as getting an answer right then and there and not risk it taking them 3 days or 3 weeks to check their email. From a contractual standpoint, you can easily put things in writing and be concise but unless you want to write a mini novel, your email can not justify the need for the service and answer every question they have.

For the most part you get one chance in business to make the sale and I have had experience in the past where a customer was waiting on a quote and expected me to get back to them and I emailed it and told them I would do so and they got busy and never checked it and thought I was blowing them off. Only to call them later and hear ‘I did not hear back from you so I called someone else.’

Face to face business dealings put finality to the situation and get the ball rolling faster.

I also found that when it comes to upsells, even your best customers will resist the added cost but when you are there to walk them through it and answer every question they have to justify the service, more often than not a face to face will lead to making the deal happen.”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with this lawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One new lawn care business owner asked “I’m in the first couple months of my lawn care business and I currently work a full time job. I do eventually want mow lawns full time once business picks up. What I’m wondering is about how much money could I possibly bring home a month?

I will just be a one person outfit, probably handling 40-45 lawns at max, I will do fall and spring cleanups and mulching and I also want to include snow removal in the winter.

I just want to get an idea of what I’m going to be dealing with if I decide to do this full time. I know mowing lawns is completely different then having a full time job with a steady income. I currently only make roughly $2,200 monthly and my wife makes about $1,500, so if I could make $2,200 or more profit a month, then that would be awesome with me. I have bills to pay!”

A second lawn care business owner responded “If I were you, I would stick with your full time job and build your business slowly. I’m doing this now and loving it. I’m off on my own working for myself in the afternoons, and have a steady income with my full time job. When you get too many mowing clients, hire a helper. Then when you still have a too much to do, think about going full time and evaluate to see if you can. I think quitting a paying job is a HUGE risk to take now a days with the bad economy and people still worried about money.”

A third shared “to make $2,200 a month you would need to make around $3,500 with your mowing business. Now making that in one month isn’t that hard but to average it over the year. Good luck with that.

Going head first into any kind of business is a major risk and I would agree that if you have a steady income coming in, to not jeopordize it for the short term gain.

Business is a funny and deceiving thing where some folks get a taste of making a few bucks on their own and they think it can only get better and then winter time comes and you get a cold hard slap of reality.

We all like to get into snow removal in the winter as our saving grace and when it does not snow enough or at all, it makes a bad situation worse.”

One last business owner shared “well if I made $300 a day, that’s about (8) $40 jobs, $40 jobs only take me 30-40 minutes. $300 a day for the mowing seasons is a gross for $50k, just for mowing. That’s more than I make in a year now. Then I either have the rest of the season to take off, or I can do fall cleanups, then snow removal in the winter, spring clean ups, mulching and then the start of the mowing season again, it seems like a pretty good money maker to me, but what do I know.”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with thislawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One new lawn care business owner asked “I want to get my mowing business off on the right foot and be a legit company. I have some questions I hope you guys can answer to help me out.

First off I was planning on going straight for an LLC, but I read you should just start with a sole proprietorship. From what I understand you would have to go to all the cities you plan on working in and register your name, which could be a couple hundred dollars a year when all said and done.

With an LLC, from what I understand, you pay the state a fee to become an LLC and that’s it (about $300 for me). Are there any advantages to a sole proprietorship that would be worth paying the couple $100 a year? I know with sole proprietorship you can be sued for everything you have. What would be a better choice?

Second, I have a question about licensing. I did a little looking and I think all I need is a business license. I’m not getting into any landscaping other than mulching and installing edging, small stuff like that, so I don’t think I need a contractors license.

Third, what about quarterly taxes. With my LLC I will also apply for my tax identification number and everything else needed. My question is, I’m small right now and I don’t have much income for my business, since I don’t make very much, will my quarterly taxes be a small amount I could easily pay until I can grow my business?

Registering as an LLC, I have 2 other options for my name if my primary one is taken. I already have all my marketing made. I want my llc to be ****’s Lawn Care LLC, so should I just do a doing business as and make it ****’s Lawn Care so I will have that name no matter what?

I really want to start my business the right way, and my goal is to be completely legit by next year.”

A second lawn care business owner responded “if you are just starting out, you should just go the sole proprietor path. That way you will only have to do your taxes yearly and it will give you more flexibillity if you do not make much money.

There is nothing wrong with an llc, s-corp, or straight up inc. but it all really depends on how much money you make and what services you are performing. If you are doing construction work your liability goes up drasticaly but if you are just doing lawn maintenance the risks are minimal.

There are obvious protections from being incorporated but you are cutting grass for a living and outside of yourself or an employee getting injured, what would you expect to happen where you lose everything without that protection.

If you have commercial liability and commercial auto insurance, the only way someone is going to get everything you own is if it were proven that your actions were the sole cause of said problem fully knowing the consequences and choosing to do so with no regard to said consequences or you had real crappy insurance and the lawsuit exceeded your coverage.

When you get further along in business after a few years you may find that there really is no money in this business and if you have a change in heart it will be harder and more costly to dissolve your business if you are incorporated.

I have been in business for over two decades and I am well established as well as I am a llc but if I were starting out today, I probably would choose a different career path because the landscape business is not what it used to be.

Hourly rates are not much better now than when I started and everything today cost 10 times what it did when I started. Lawn mowers, insurance, gas and vehicles all cost a lot more and we now make less today than when I started.

All you need to do to be a legitimate business is have a registered business name, pay taxes, have the proper insurance, look professional and if you hire employees, pay them on the books. Being incorporated will not make you anymore legitimate and if anything it will make you a slave to the government and it’s ever growing complicated tax codes.

A lawyer will probably suggest to you to incorporate so he can charge you and a n accountant will recommend you to incorporate so he too can charge you. Most accountants charge more money to do your taxes as a corporation than an individual or sole proprietor so without even talking to a lawyer or accountant you already know what their answer is gonna be.

I myself worked for a big company for several years and learned the business from the bottom up and I went from the bottom of the pay scale to the top level pay scale and I realized I wanted to make more and the only way to do so was taking it to the next level.

To this day i never really cared much about being my own boss because in reality I went from having a boss to having hundreds of bosses by way of customers.

If you are starting out I suggest you go for the easiest and cheapest route that will make you a legitimate business until you actually start making real money and by real money I mean 4 to 5 times what you would make as a high level employee for a big company because you can always incorporate and change things if and when you become more successful.”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with thislawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One lawn care business owner wrote “I mowed this one customers yard about 10 days ago. He wanted about 6 small bushes chopped down, the grass in the cracks of his driveway done, and edging. While I am on site, he asked me about how people pay me, 3-4 times. I told him they pay at time of service with cash, leave a check or invoice. I said we bill at the beginning of the month because people wait to the last minute. His response was ‘I always pay my bills as soon as I get them.’

Earlier in the day one of my employees popped a tire on the ZTR mower. I didn’t have time to replace it so I was cutting as is. The tire initially didn’t go flat until after it was sitting on the trailer. I had to fill the tire up twice all day. So the tire was taking 3-4 hours to go flat.

Another employee of mine knocked down all the bushes with a brush cutter except one because it was too thick. Next he started edging and trimming. At this point it started to thunder and lightning. I quickly finished cutting as the customer pulled up. First thing he said was the grass was too high and I should cut it lower. I did then told him I didn’t have hedge trimmer or snips with me that were big enough to cut the last bush. He said ok. I mentioned that with the rain I couldn’t spray weedkiller. I had the other bushes in the wheelbarrow, he asked if I was taking them with me, he then told me to dump them in the woods. After, we walked the yard and talked about ten minutes under cover from the rain.

Today I get several text. He’s complaining about the cracks in the driveway, the debris being dumped, the other bush not being cut down, the blades digging in the yard. Goes on about how I didn’t do what I was told. He found someone else. Then he says the lawn pictures on my website aren’t mine and I should go find a new line of work.

I feel like I was set up from the get go. Almost every issue was at his discretion. I could’ve told him I can’t mow the grass lower as it will scalp but I did what he asked. No one uses weedkiller in the rain. Then the pictures? Are you serious. I have 100’s that I haven’t even put up yet.

As far as finding a new line of work. I serve 100’s of lawn customers a year with 1 complaint that we dumped the leaves in the neighbors yard. So we came back the next day and cleaned the whole yard. This lady still wasn’t happy it was obvious that she was looking for a excuse not to pay. This guy is doing the same thing, every issue would’ve been fixed in a few days when we came back.

How do you deal with something like this?”

A second lawn care business owner responded “I am not going to teach how to run your business. I have seen your website and it’s nice. I even took the time to read some of the reviews customer have left for you. You should mention that you don’t cut the grass so short especially with this heat, it’s just not healthy for the lawn and you shouldn’t mow knowing your tire was out. You might need a break.

Just take a 3 day break and relax buddy. Your mind and body will appreciate that.”

A third shared “It’s all water under the bridge. He’s not worth the aggravation. When someone asks me to mow lower, it usually is a bi-weekly yard. I tell them I can’t because it will only make their yard look bad as well as reflect poorly on my service.

Many folks think the lower a yard is mowed, the longer before it will need before mowing again. Run from those individuals if they insist it!

Move on…How much we talking about here? Not enough, I’m sure. We all have been stiffed and it probably won’t be the last.”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with thislawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One lawn care business owner wrote “I have a weekly $30 client that I mow on Thursdays or Fridays. Last Thursday I ran out of time and on Friday it rained all day. I couldn’t get to her on Saturday due to other commitments and since I knew her lawn wouldn’t be a mess, as it is relatively slow growing and could easily be cut biweekly, I decided to wait until the following week. My loss, but things happen.

Yesterday (Fri) I mow her lawn as usual, but my pay was not waiting as it always is, she apparently had forgotten to leave it for me. No big deal, I thought. So I left a note stating that I could swing by on Sat. while in the area mowing, or she could just double up next week. She called to apologize for not having my money out and said I could stop on Saturday for it.

I swung by today on my way through and picked up my envelope. Inside was $60 and the following note:

Hi,
This payment is for last week and this week.
Everyone deserves a paid vacation
(especially someone who does such a good job),
So I guess last week you got a rainy vacation.
Thanks for all your help.
~ Lawn Customer’s Name

Isn’t that Amazing? Some people think they hit the jackpot when they don’t have to pay you due to drought or a missed mowing and this one paid for work that was not performed.

Today I also had someone give me $30 instead of the quoted $20 to do some light trimming while there to mow the lawn. I’ve also noticed that tipping comes from people you’d least likely expect it from, such as the mowing customers who don’t really outwardly project having a lot of disposable income.”

A second lawn care business owner responded “I missed a mowing on a customer’s yard, so I discounted their monthly bill. I was hoping that they would not be pissed. Later when I got the check in the mail with a post it note, it read ‘I paid the regular amount, really didn’t notice a missed mowing service. I am really happy with the way the yard looks, use the ‘extra cash’ to help pay for the new mower…’

Now THAT’S a nice customer, in my book.”

A third shared “you guys are right. From my experience it’s always the people that you least expect it from. This little old lady that I do work for always tips me no matter what I do. She’s got the tiniest lawn I mow and is always talking about ‘just being able to make it by.’ She never complains about pricing and always tips. Super appreciative of what I do for her and I’m appreciative for her business.

When I get a tip from a mowing customer I’ll always do something extra like trim the weeds out of the sidewalk cracks. It seems to increase the frequency of the tips.”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with thislawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One lawn care business owner wrote “I have grown from 5 mowing accounts to 36 accounts so far in this current season. My last 6 lawn accounts forced me to upgrade my mowing from 1/2 to 2 acre lots, so I decided to go for a riding mower.

I always buy my lawn care equipment cash. so after buying an extra new edger, and mower and riding mower I just didn’t want to, rush out to buy a landscape trailer. Ideally I wanted an enclosed trailer that would better suit me and I would have all that advertising space for huge letters.

I had been looking around here for a trailer I could afford when I came up with the idea of buying a cargo hitch, but that scared me. In my area people seem to have courtesy when it comes to driving but not a lot skills, if u know what I mean, so I decided to design this bed extender instead. I thought it would just overall be safer.

Now I can take my 21 inch mower with me along with my riding mower. I don’t have to unload the rider at every house, just where I have more than 3 or 4 houses with 1/4 acre yards in a row. I think this bed extender I made will get me through a financial pinch until I can afford a trailer and I hope it inspires others too.

To load and unload everything, I have a pair of nice ramps I got at harbor freight that I just slide underneath the rider when not in use. I used this set up today for the first time and I was freaking out a little while I was on the road, but everything worked fine and I am more relaxed now.

I am going to keep making new tweaks to the design of it to see if I can come with multiple uses for a bed extender. I love experimenting with designs and I like knowing that I am saving gas too. I’m driving a v8 5.4liter truck with not the best gas millage, 17 highway 15 in city, but that lowers to 12 to 14 when I’m hauling or towing. So towing at this time its not an option.”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with thislawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One new lawn care business owner asked “I just starting out and a question I have is do you guys charge extra when the grass is too long because the customer wants to stretch out to every other week mow? What I thought I would do from here on out is offer them a weekly mow and biweekly mow price adding in say a 1/2 hr for raking. I would get a mulching kit or bagger but I am concerned if the grass is wet at all, the bagger will plug up. What should I do?”

A second lawn care business owner responded “for me the answer is simple, I charge my bi-weekly mowing customers X 1.5. That way, if they are trying to be cheap and want to make me spend more time on their lawn every other week, I will still make an appropriate amount of profit.”

A third shared “I don’t take bi-weely mowing jobs. Period. I can not have my name associated with a crappy yard and that is what you get when you only cut bi-weekly. I sell a service, and a look. ie - YOUR YARD COULD LOOK LIKE A MILLION BUCKS - but that takes weekly service, proper fertilizing, proper weed control, etc. None of that can be done bi weekly.

I’d suggest you pass on the bi weekly idiots, sell them the look, not the number of services. By the way I don’t ever give a price per cut, only a monthly rate for service. If they say ‘well how often do you cut?’, I tell that is weekly service. If they ask for every other week, I tell them the same exact price. I get 90 percent of the jobs I bid, those I don’t get, are not worth unloading the mower in the first place.

Remember You can be a guy with a mower, or A LAWN CARE PROFESSIONAL!!!!!”

A fourth added “My viewpoint on this differs from others here. I don’t charge any extra for bi-weekly mowings. It doesn’t matter if the lawn is 3 feet tall or 3″ tall, my mower picks it up and I take it with me, it’s no extra work to cut so I don’t see a reason to charge more.

There is a large property that I do every month or so and sometimes it’s 5-6 feet tall, I can’t even see over the hood of my tractor when cutting it. It can be annoying but I tough it out and get it done as it’s only every now and then it gets that bad. With that property however I don’t take the clippings with me, they are all weeds and they just want it cut down. I may change my stance if I had to take the clippings with me. For the average lawn though I don’t see a reason to do it, it’s not like it’s that much harder to cut it biweekly or weekly.”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with thislawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One lawn care business owner wrote “I had the best luck with military personal. The only problem I found was they are only available part time.

In the past, I tried carpenters, roofers, and some were good until they found other work, others thought the work was to hard and the pay was to little.

Every year I bring on about 5-6 new guys. The ones that last usually just listen and show up. Sadly, the ones that work hard, who show initiative and do things the right way, always job hop.”

A second lawn care business owner responded “unfortunately the real good lawn care employees don’t last because they usually have the brains and ambition to either start their own business or move on to a better career choice.

If it makes you feel better, the problems have always been the same. Good help has always been hard to find because let’s face it, no one grows up wanting to be a landscaper especially, no one grows up wanting to be a employee of a landscaper. The only difference is there are fewer people today that even have any work ethic.

There are exceptions to the rule with all of the above but the business is not what it used to be and the economy has created a influx of excess landscapers.

I still like doing what I do but it is getting old especially with the excess baggage of employees. The sad part of being in this business is the only two things that upset me are customers and employees and the day I can make a living without either one will be the day I finally figured it all out.

I tell any new employee no smoking on the job and to leave your phone off and in the truck or it might get broken. Then one new guy I hired replied back ‘it’s ok, I am pretty good at protecting my phone.’

I said ‘ok, I thought I would just warn you so it don’t get ruined.’

Fast forwards 10 minutes, his phone was ringing and he stopped working and turned the mower off and started having a conversation. So I approached him and smacked the phone out of his hand and it went about twenty feet in the air before hitting the ground.

He said, ‘why did you do that?’

I said, ‘I told you to keep your phone in the truck or it might get broken and you didn’t and it did.’

All my employees were laughing because they knew better and this young lad found out the hard way that using a cell phone while working for me is the last thing you want to do if you want to keep a job. So he was out a phone and a job.

Even I leave my phone in the truck and if someone calls me and it is that important they can leave a message.

I have zero tolerance for this diva mentality we have today with all these kids and their phones and computers who act as if it is a constitutional right to be able to chat on the phone all day while someone is paying you to work.

I tell all my mowing clients when they hire me that I am a working boss and I am on every job at all times. If they need to contact me, to leave a message because calling me 30 times an hour is not gonna get me to respond any sooner. I don’t screen calls so if you call me and I don’t answer, it is a clear indication that I am working.”

A third shared “when I need to hire someone I do what my previous lawn care boss did when he hired me.

My first job in the lawn business started when my prior boss brought me and another guy in. On our first Monday he told us both ‘one of you will have a job at the end of the week, one of you won’t.’

I busted my butt all week while the other guy texted on his phone, took his time getting out of the truck and showed he was just not into the job.

In my opinion, you get two things from this new employee approach. You find that the guy really hires himself, and the guy you end up hiring already set his own bar and can only improve from there. He can’t really slack off because you’ve seen how he can work.”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with thislawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One new lawn care business owner asked “I have an idea of making a yard sign that says “Currently being mowed by _________” and placing that in the current yard that I am mowing at that time. On that sign I will have my phone number and email address.

Does this sound like a good idea? Would this get me more business?”

A second lawn care business owner responded “I don’t like it. You pay good money for those lawn signs so why limit their use to just that point in time? I ordered regular yard signs with all my information on them, and I just lean one up against the truck near the orange cones when I am mowing. If a potential customer is interested in your service, a regular sign will work too. I do have some that say “Maintained By: Company Info.

I always place a lawn sign out while working. Since I don’t have my truck lettered yet, this helps identify me as someone on-site doing work as opposed to just some truck parked along the street.

I have one mowing account that I underbid by about $10/cut. I still keep them because their lawn looks nice and my truck/signs get a lot of exposure to a somewhat exclusive area. I’ve picked up THREE additional mowing clients in that area as a direct result of my signs.”

A third shared “I think the lawn sign is a decent idea. Just another way to get your name out there. It would be easy enough to take it with you to every lawn and use it. Stick it right where there is the most traffic. It’s good if people get used to seeing your name out there. They may not need a service right away but when they do or if they know someone who does your name may come to them. It’s never a bad idea to get your name out any way you can.

I know another lawn guy that uses a sign that is designed like the road crew sign. It says ‘Caution Yard Work Ahead’ and it gets people to look at the work and truck when they go by.”

Read more about Lawn Care Business Bidding Tips, Upsells, And Disasters To Avoid. Learn how to improve your bidding process with thislawn care business book and be prepared before hand by knowing what you should be looking out for before a problem occurs.”

If you need help estimating lawn care or snow plowing jobs, get these lawn care and snow plowing estimation calculators.

One lawn care business owner asked “does anyone actually utilize a lawn care postcard marketing service? By that I mean paying an outside company to mail postcards for you. I have been thinking about it as a way of attracting new mowing customers this year, but I don’t know if I want to spend the money for it. Call me cheap, as I am really cautious of where I spend my cash. If you’ve done it, have you had any decent responses from it?”

A second lawn care business owner responded “I get a 1 to 2 percent response from postcards, but I do 2 to 3 mailings to the same customer within 1 to 2 weeks. I only send out about 100 postcards at a time. I design and mail them myself.”

A third shared “not everyone throws away every piece of junk mail they get.  With that said, mailing services know that the standard response rate in the business is a 98 percent fail rate…2 percent success rate.

That’s okay ok though, because almost always that 2 percent will more than pay for the cost of the mailers in that first year and every year you keep those customers from that 2 percent, you are no longer advertising to them.

So I say go for it. I’m planning on mailing out 5-10K postcards this year.

Sometimes you have to stretch your mind into the realm of the possible! Success rarely comes to those who play it safe.”

A fourth added “from my point of view, stretching into the realm of the possible would be to create your own mailing list of top tier homes in your area that actually use these services, have your own mailers made up in multiple styles, and mail them yourself at the bulk postage rate.

I feel mass mailers are a waste of time and just send out mailers to every address in every town you pay for. With mass mailers, how many die hard do it yourselfer’s get your mailer? How many competitors get your mailer? How many people with no property or non-decision makers get your mailer? I get dozens a week sent to me of my competitors mailers and not only are their mailers getting sent to a mailbox they would never get any business from, they are also showing competitors what his specials are.

With mailings, it is all about quality not quantity. You send better quality and larger size mailers on top quality card stock targeted to high end homes from a list you create rather then basic cheap run of the mill mailers to the masses and your response rate goes up.

Where I live, I can get on my county website and it will tell me a homeowners name, as well as print an address label for each one you want. This way I can target who I want sell lawn care services too.

This is a marketing method I have been using for over 10 years and it is how all the big corporate lawn care company’s do it. Outside of hard work and doing a good job managing the business, target marketing is the sole reason why I have what I have today.

No phone book, mass mailers, or web site is going to do for you what good old fashioned boots on the ground, hunting for your ideal properties, and creating a mailing list yourself will.

This is the beauty of being in the lawn care maintenance business, you go back every week and depending on the size of your company, there is the ideal threshold to how much you can do in a week and make a good profit.

If you are in the game long enough, there does comes a point when you build up the customer base you need and your job is to do a good job, keep your clients happy, and then from there just bring in some occasional new customers to increase the bottom line.

When you appeal to the masses, you get all the cheap skates, tire kickers and bare minimum crowd. In order to be successful, you need to focus on the customers that the landscape business is tailored to and mass mailers just don’t do that.”

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