Start A Lawn Care Business

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Archive for September, 2010

Where did the summer go?

Sep 29

Posted by Lawn Care Business in autumn, bidding lawn care | 2 Comments

It seems like only yesterday I was complaining about 100 degree temperatures. Now, though the days are warm, I am waking to 50 degree mornings. Ah, I love Autumn. The air is crisp, the temperatures are comfortable, and the night’s sky is clear and full of stars.

Autumn is a very active time of year for most lawn care companies. In addition to leaf cleanup and gutter cleaning, important services such as core aeration, overseeding, bed maintenance, and pre-winter cleanup should be added to your list of services. Autumn is a perfect time to prepare a lawn for next spring’s growth. Aeration and overseeding is especially important during the next few weeks for cool season grasses.

Since many customers do not understand that prep. work now sets the stage for a much healthier lawn next year, it is our duty to educate customers and suggest services.

What services can you think of to add to your lawn care business?

If you are having trouble coming up with a list of services and corresponding prices, take a look at our Lawn Care Business course, it is packed with ideas to keep your lawn care business running all year long.

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Lawn Mower Problems? Change your air filter.

Sep 28

Posted by Lawn Care Business in equipment, lawn care business, lawn care training, maintenance | No Comments

by: Start A Lawn Care Business

My shoulder hurts. My fingers are blistered. The starter rope just ripped off in my hand.

If you own a pull-start lawn mower, you might have similar complaints when you pull and pull only to have your lawn mower sputter and die after each crank. You depress the primer bulb, spray a couple squirts of starter fluid and crank again. The spark plug is new, the gasoline is fresh, and the oil has recently been changed. All the controls are set correctly yet, still, your lawn mower won’t start.

Well, if you are like lots of lawn care business owners, you have probably been running your lawn mower hard all summer. We all neglect maintenance occasionally and you are paying the price for not taking proper care of your lawn mower. Proper lawn mower air filtermaintenance should be a daily chore to every lawn care business owner.  However, if your last two months have been anything like mine, you have been mowing as much dirt and dust as you have been mowing grass since the weather has been so dry.  Air filters have been the last things on your mind. Now that we are into September and early October, leaves are falling and you are trying to mulch the leaves with your lawn mower blades to avoid having to work the rake on all your customers’ lawns.

Dried out grass, dirt, and leaf dust all put tremendous particulate matter into the air. As your lawn mower operates, it sucks that same dust laden air through the airfilter and into the carburetor. After weeks of mowing in dusty conditions, your air filter is probably clogged with the dust and dirt of a thousand lawns.

Whether or not you believe a clogged air filter is your lawn mower’s problem, take a few minutes to check and perform proper maintenance on your air filter.  If your lawn mower has a multi-stage air filter, be sure to clean or replace both stages.  The benefits of fuel economy and better performance can be amazing.

For many other lawn care equipment tips that will help you have a smoother running lawn care operation, check out our lawn care business training course.  You can read the full description on our main website.  The business package is on sale right now.

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Sickness can affect your lawn care business.

Sep 27

Posted by Lawn Care Business in bidding lawn care, employees, lawn business strategies, lawn care health, lawn care safety | No Comments

by: www.StartALawnCareBusiness.com

What happens to your 1-man lawn care business when you are sick?

Especially starting out, many small lawn care businesses operate as sole proprietorships with no employees. While the freedom to call your own shots is a great benefit in running a 1-man operation, without proper planning there are pitfalls that can cause you to lose time and money when you are sick and cannot complete your scheduled lawn care work.

Although being sick is never fun there are certain steps to take while you are well to assure your business doesn’t suffer as much as your body does when illness strikes.

1) Explain the Situation to your Customers: Lawn Care Customers normally understand when situations arise that delay their lawn care work. Afterall, weather hampers your ability to do their work on a timely basis often during the year. An illness is just as unforeseeable as a sudden and lengthy rain shower. Upon first onset of an illness, take a few minutes to call your customers. Explain that you are not well and you feel the quality of your work will suffer. Give them an explanation of your expected recovery time and let them know how (and when) you plan to catch up on your schedule.

2) Stay up-to-date (or ahead) of your schedule: If you are vigilant in completing your lawn care jobs ahead of time you will be able to buffer a few unforeseen glitches in your schedule. Customers normally don’t mind if you bump them up a day to avert delays due to inclement weather. Likewise, they normally don’t mind when you bump them up a day if you feel you are getting sick or if you have a Doctor’s appointment that might run long.

3) Let a family member or friend help you. One of the best ways to recover from unexpected delays is to have someone dependable to help you out from time to time. If you have good rapport with your family, you probably know of a family member willing to pitch in. Though they may willingly help you without requesting payment, it is a very good idea to offer them payment for their time and travel expenses. Family and friends often do not mind helping you occasionally without pay. However, they will quickly tire of helping you if you don’t compensate them.

4) Hire an as-needed worker. While a helpful friend or family member can be relied up in an emergency, a dedicated part-time or as-needed worker will have more of a vested interest in keeping your customers on the roster. An employee knows your schedule and your work habits. You customers will be familiar with your employee and will not call you on the phone complaining of some strange person mowing their grass.

As unfortunate as it may be, sickness has dismantled many lawn care businesses. Without proactive plans of action schedules are thrown off, customers lose patience and find other lawn care companies, and income is lost. A few simple steps can save your business and make your recovery much quicker.

Do you want to learn how to avoid pitfalls that can damage your lawn care business? We have been associated with the industry for over 18 years. We have taken our experience and developed the Lawn Care Business training course that shows you how to start and expand a successful lawn care business.

Learn more from our main website:

www.StartALawnCareBusiness.com
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Goodbye Summer. Hello Autumn.

Sep 23

Posted by Lawn Care Business in autumn, lawn care business, leaf raking, winter | 1 Comment

I am sure many of you noticed that Wednesday, September 22, 2010 was the Autumnal Equinox. This year’s full Harvest Moon rang in the new season.

Temperature wise there was not much of a change as we are still reaching the low to mid 90’s each day. However, there is a chill in the air once the sun sets. The sky is golden and the leaves are definitely changing. Though summer is over, I hope you are weighing your options carefully for the upcoming season. Here in the southeast we have had scant showers the last 6 weeks. I am sure the lack of precipitation will change as weather patterns will alter in the near future. Autumn rains will bring bursts of growth as parched lawns rejuvenate for one last chlorophyll-laden green up before winter arrives.

Lawn care business owners who are prepared will be able to take advantage of their customers’ need for “one last mow.” In reality, one last mow can easily turn into 4 or 5 mowing cycles with plenty of leaf raking and winterizing jobs.

Though the sun is climbing lower on the horizon, there’s still money to be made, guys. Now is not a time to get lazy. If you hustle, you can put some much needed money in the bank in the months before winter.

Do you want to know how to keep your lawn care business running all winter long?  Our lawn care business training course shows you how to make money even during the cold months.

Check the program out on our website:  www.StartALawnCareBusiness.com

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Make more money in 2011 than you did in 2010 with your lawn care business.

Sep 23

Posted by Lawn Care Business in bidding lawn care, customers, lawn care business, lawn care estimating | No Comments

by: www.StartALawnCareBusiness.com

After our blog post last week warning of the tax day deadline on September 15, 2010, we received a couple comments from people who want to make more money for themselves in 2011. Like millions of other Americans, they had just finished their income tax estimating forms and were surprised how little money they made thus far in 2010. Each of them asked: “how can I make more money with my lawn care business in 2011?”

If you are like thousands of other lawn care business owners, you are probably wondering how you can become more profitable in your lawn care business next year over.

What is the secret of making more money for your lawn mowing business without significant expansion of your services and lawn equipment?

There does not have to be a complicated answer to this question. From our point-of-view, there are at least three ways to make more money with your lawn care business. We are going to briefly outline these three methods in the article below. But if you are truly interested in making more money with your lawn care business, we encourage you to get a copy of our lawn care business guidebooks, training guides, and estimating software available from our main website.

Here is a three point overview of how to make more money next year with a lawn care business without significantly adding equipment or spending significantly more time mowing grass:

1) Get More Lawn Care Customers: Getting more lawn care customers is the first and most obvious solution to making more money with your business. It’s true though; if you are currently cutting grass for 10 customers and you increase your customer count to 20 you should, effectively, make twice the amount of income as before. Actually, if you follow proper route scheduling and other business secrets outlined on our lawn care business startup guidebook, the amount of money you make with a doubling of customers should be more than double. Proper use of economies of scale, better lawn care equipment selection, efficient mowing patterns which will reduce your work time on each yard, and better route planning will combine to help you add more lawns into your already-packed schedule.

2) Make More Money from Each Lawn Care Customer: If you charge your customers only for basic mow-and-go services, you are likely missing an incredible amount of additional income you could make at each service time from each customer. Add-on selling is a great method of boosting your revenue from each customer. Customers who are paying for basic mowing services might not be aware of additional services your company offers. There is always more work to do in your clients’ lawns. Your job, as a business owner, is to advertise all your services to your customers. Keep your eyes open for all additional services you can offer your customers. If you have ladders and the capability to clean gutters mention the positive aspects of keeping gutters free from leaves and debris. Many shrubs need trimming 3 to 4 times each year. Flower beds should be mulched in the spring and fall. Leaf cleanup service is an important addition to most lawn care services during the months of September through November and again in the springtime. Addition of these services is easy and allows you to make extra money from each customer without the need to find new customers.

3) Get Better Lawn Care Customers: Too many times, a young entrepreneur buys a lawn mower and starts accepting anyone who wants their grass cut and is willing to pay any amount to have the work done. Before long, new lawn care business owners have rosters full of demanding customers unwilling to pay the going market price for grass cutting on their small lawns. These customers want to pay only minimal amounts of money to have their grass cut as short as possible every two weeks. While having a small percentage of “mow and go” customers is fine for most lawn service companies, better money can be made off clients who are serious about having their lawns professionally maintained. Weekly mowing, proper blade height adjustments, striping, and knowledge of lawn care problems all help landscaping companies successfully win contracts with better lawn care customers willing to pay a premium price to have professional maintenance of the lawns and landscapes.

Following these three ideas may sound simple but it’s far too easy to fall into the trap of accepting every customers that comes along and bidding the job low enough the make sure the customer doesn’t shake his head and find someone cheaper.

All of us here at StartALawnCareBusiness.com understand the difficulty of starting a lawn care business correctly, targeting the right customers, and pricing the jobs properly so you can afford to do excellent work for your customers and still make a decent profit for your business and yourself.

If you want to learn how to run a better lawn care business in 2011 we encourage you to purchase our lawn care business course. The program is designed to help you avoid the traps that many new lawn care business owners fall into. Instead, you will learn proven strategies for starting and running a successful lawn care business.

We’re keeping the low sale price on the program through the end of this month. Learn more on our main webpage:

www.StartALawnCareBusiness.com
Start A Lawn Care Business.com

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Quiting the lawn care business?

Sep 16

Posted by Lawn Care Business in leaf raking, start a lawn care business | No Comments

by: Start A Lawn Care Business

We received an email today from a guy who has decided to quit his lawn care business.

“It hasn’t rained in months. The grass has all dried up and I’m not making any money.”

I really feel for this guy. Anyone in the lawn care business (at least in the SouthEast) knows how difficult the last 5 – 6 weeks has been. Rain has been scarce and the only people having their grass cut are the customers who can afford to water their lawns either with a water hose or through an irrigation system.

Late August through early September is always a difficult time of year. Drought is a word weathermen like to use almost incessantly though this time of year is notoriously dry year after year.

Lawn care clients don’t want to pay for you to mow their dirt. Although there are methods of getting paid during the dry weeks of late August through early September (and our lawn care business program tells you how), you need to plan ahead. Though it’s a bit late for that this year, you can be ready for next year’s dry spell by simply taking a bit of advice from our guidebook.

Apart from the dry spell, the email this guy sent us startled me. I can’t figure out why anyone would quit his lawn care business at the END of the very worst time of year. If he was going to quit, he should have done so sometime between August 1 to August 15 immediately before the “drought” started.

So, why should this guy stick it out and continue with his lawn care business? One word…LEAVES!!!! Look outside. Look at your trees. The leaves are turning. If you are anywhere east of the Mississippi River and north of Florida the leaves on your trees are turning color and are about to dump themselves ALL OVER your lawn care clients’ yards.

Leaf fall is going to be HUGE this year. I can just feel it. And when your customers start calling in a panic because they need their yards cleaned, you will be thankful that you are in a position to profit mightily by raking their leaves and cleaning their properties.

So, if you are thinking about giving up the lawn care business since you haven’t made any money in the last few weeks, get that silly idea out of your head. Right now is the time you need to ramp up your business. Get to work making advertising flyers and handing out business cards. The money you make during the next couple months might very well rival the money you made all summer.

Also, if you haven’t started your lawn care business yet, WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR? This is a perfect time of year to start. Customers are scrambling all over themselves looking for dependable lawn care professional who will rake their leaves and clean up their yards before winter sets in.

If you don’t have a clue about charging your customers for your leaf raking services, take a look at our Lawn Care Business guidebook training package. It will help you tremendously in your efforts to operate your own successful lawn care business.

Check it out on our main page:
http://www.StartALawnCareBusiness.com
Start A Lawn Care Business

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Tax Payments for your Lawn Care Business

Sep 15

Posted by Lawn Care Business in Lawn Care Business Taxes, money, taxes | 1 Comment

Hi Everyone:

I just wanted to jot a quick note to remind you that if you own your own lawn care business and make quarterly tax payments, today (September 15, 2010) is the deadline for 3rd Quarter 2010 payments to be postmarked.

These dates always seem to sneak up on us. So, take just a few minutes to calculate your estimated tax and get that check into the mail to the IRS today.

Also, while we’re in a bit of a lull before the leaf raking season really gets into full swing, today is a good day to do some bookkeeping work. The next few months are going to be hectic with leaf raking, overseeding, and lawn aerating. So, take some free time right now to keep your accounting up-to-date.

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Lawn Care Chemicals Banned in New Jersey

Sep 10

Posted by Lawn Care Business in lawn care business, lawn chemicals | 1 Comment

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If you are a New Jersey lawn care service provider, you have probably read the headlines.

Lawn care products face ban in NJ

This “ban” doesn’t seem as restrictive as the headlines would lead you to believe. Even the lawn care providers most affected by these new regulations agree with many of the new constraints on lawn care chemical applications. All-in-all, we believe tighter regulation of lawn care chemical application will strengthen the lawn care industry as a whole.

We, at StartALawnCareBusiness, have always believed an educated lawn care business owner provides better services for his customers and rises above his competition. This is one of the reasons we developed the Lawn Care Business Training Package – to help educate new lawn care business owners.

Tell us what you think of the new regulations in New Jersey. If you are in that state, will those regulations affect you? If you are in a different state, do you think complying with similar regulations would put an undue hardship on your lawn care and landscaping business?

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Bid Next Year's Lawn Mowing Contracts Right Now

Sep 3

Posted by Lawn Care Business in bidding lawn care, estimating, lawn care contracts, lawn care proposals | No Comments

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Bidding Lawn Mowing Contracts

As the Summer lawn mowing season rolls to an end and Autumn creeps along it is time to think about next year’s grass cutting contracts.

Here is something for you to keep in mind: October 1 is the first day of the U.S. Government’s fiscal New Year. Many government lawn care contracts will be bid during the next several weeks for lawn care work to be completed during 2011. Get those bids in NOW guys. You can’t afford to miss this important time of year if you are one of our many readers who operate large lawn care companies who make their money going after Government scale grass cutting contracts.

Not all Government contracts are bid right now but many RFPs (request for proposals) are open right now and will close on, or before, September 30. Other mowing contracts will be bid in the months ahead. Much of the money you plan to make in 2011 will be determined by the contracts you successfully bid during the next few months.

If you are at all interested in bidding larger scale lawn mowing contracts (local and federal government mowing contracts, private industry grass cutting contracts, and local business lawn care work) we have included an excellent “Bidding Tutorial” guidebook in our Lawn Care Business package. It describes how to find these contracts, who to speak with in order to uncover hidden contracts, and how to price and properly bid the contracts.

Also, the estimating software is included with the lawn care business package. Many lawn care business professionals tell us that our estimating software is worth much more than the cost of the entire package.

To learn more about (and order) the lawn care business course, visit our main website at:
http://www.StartALawnCareBusiness.com

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Is September Too Late To Start A Lawn Mowing Business?

Sep 1

Posted by Lawn Care Business in bidding lawn care, lawn care estimating, leaf raking, winter | No Comments

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September is here and we are finally due for some relief from the blistering hot weather and the dry grass that August brought us. August is typically a difficult time of year for many lawn care companies. Lawn care customers who pay by-the-mow will often ask for their lawn service to be curtailed to every two weeks. Additionally, the weather is so miserably hot that it makes working outside a less-than-desirable experience. Many fly-by-night lawn care operators drop out during August thinking that the lawn care season is over for the year.

If you are a lawn care business owner or if you are thinking about starting your own lawn care business, I want to challenge you to step up to the plate right now and make a huge push forward in your lawn care business.

First off, grass in much of the country is about to surge. The cooler weather and, hopefully, rain that will come in September will cause grass to green up. In my part of the country we often mow grass all the way into December. Many customers have “one last cutting” right before Christmas. If you are in the north you probably won’t mow that long but if you are in the southern states you are going to be mowing deep into winter.

Secondly, right now is the time you better be selling core aeration, fertilizing, and overseeding. It’s a bit too early as I’m writing this to do the actual work but you should be lining up customers for those jobs right now. Customers who want beautiful lawns next spring should be made aware of the importance of work that needs to take place before winter.

Lastly, leaf raking season is in its very beginning days. There is no time like the present to ramp up your lawn care business to handle the influx of customers demanding your services over the next few months. I feel sorry for the guys who quit their lawn care businesses in August because they weren’t making money. September, October, and November is going to MORE than make up for any money lost in August.

So, if you are struggling with your lawn care business or if you thinking about starting a new lawn care business, it is a great time to get off your butt and get to work. The money and the customers are yours for the asking over the next three months.

Now, as lucrative as Autumn is, you still need to use some common sense and business smarts when doing these leaf jobs and pre-winter lawn care work. It is hyperimportant for you to know how to estimate and bid your lawn care jobs. Underbidding a leaf job will kill you.

So, if you are going to be making money raking leaves this season, I urge you to look at our Lawn Care Business startup guidebook and training package. We have developed this training package after 18 years in the industry. It will train you how to do the work, get customers, and most importantly correctly bid and price your lawn care services.

For more information about the business package visit our main website at: http://www.StartALawnCareBusiness.com

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