Start A Lawn Care Business

Make money with a lawn care and landscaping business.

Archive for October, 2010

On our way home from GIE-Expo

Oct 30

Posted by Lawn Care Business in lawn equipment, lawn mowers | No Comments

by: Start A Lawn Care Business

If you read yesterday’s blog post you know that the staff of Start A Lawn Care Business took the weekend to drive to Louisville, KY to attend the annual Lawn Care Equipment expo.

We just want to give a huge thanks to the GIE-Expo staff, organizers, vendors, and participants.  We met lots of great people and learned a tremendous amount about the new lines of lawn care equipment product that will be on the market in 2011. 

If we did not get a chance to make it by your booth, please take a minute to drop us a line to make contact with us.  We are always interested in learning about the newest lawn care equipment products and passing the information onto the new (and old) lawn care business owners that visit our site daily.

If you are a vendor with new and interesting lawn care equipment products, we would love to demo your products for the coming lawn care season. 

Thanks again and we will see you next year:

Sincerely:

The Staff at Start A Lawn Care Business
http://www.StartALawnCareBusiness.com

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New Lawn Care Equipment (GIE-Expo)

Oct 29

Posted by Lawn Care Business in lawn equipment, lawn mowers, lawn product development | 3 Comments

Hello from Louisville, KY at the GIE-Expo

One of our jobs at Start A Lawn Care Business is to bring you information on the latest trends in the lawn care industry. Lawn care equipment (mowers, blowers, and string trimmers) will be very much on your mind during the next few months as you make purchasing decisions for your lawn care equipment needs for the coming season.

We drove up to Kentucky early this morning to attent the lawn care expo. There are hundreds of vendors and we have been lucky to speak with some very innovative companies that are developing the new trends in the lawn care industry.

In the days and weeks ahead we will be able to provide you with information that will help you purchase your new lawn equipment. Keep an eye on this blog and if you haven’t purchased our Lawn Care Business training course, visit our main web homepage to learn more about what we offer.

One of the funnest pieces of equipment at this year’s trade show is the Spyder radio controlled slope mower. This company has been at the expo the last few years and their slope mower is always fun to watch. Too bad I’ve yet to be able to talk the operator into letting me drive it. I’ll include a picture below.

Spyder Slope Lawn Mower

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Tanaka TBL-7800R 65cc 4-2/7 HP 2-Stroke Backpack Blower with Tube-Mounted Throttle

Oct 28

Posted by Lawn Care Business in lawn equipment, leaf blowers | No Comments

Hi Everyone:

I just ran across this deal on Amazon.com and want to throw it your way in case you are looking for a new leaf blower. According to Amazon there are only 4 of these units left. They are selling them for $525 with free Super Saver shipping. Buying from Amazon means you (probably) don’t have to pay sales tax. I am not in the market for a new leaf blower right now but if I were, I would buy this today. I will include the link for you below. Also, while you’re looking, don’t forget to purchase your sight and hearing protection. If you buy this leaf blower, let us know how it works out for you.

Lawn Care in Florida

Oct 28

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

While the Tennessee days get shorter and the nights get cooler, I took a late October weekend and flew to southern Florida for a few days to learn more about lawn care in the southernmost of the 48 contiguous states. From a business standpoint I am envious of the seasons Florida lawn care professionals enjoy. It is still toasty warm in southern Florida and lawn care crews aren’t missing a beat mowing, blowing, and picking up palm fronds.

Though much of my writing on this blog has focused on leaf pickup and autumn lawn care projects. While leaf pickup is not the most prevalent chore to be done on Florida lawns (if you exclude palm fronds) there are many aspects of the lawn care business that Florida lawn care professional need to focus.

Our lawn care business package has a tremendous amount of information on how (and when) to bid commercial lawn care contracts. Florida’s lawn care season is extended far beyond what many of the northern states experience. I believe contract bidding is distributed more evenly throughout the 12 months than it is for the rest of us further north. Because of this dispersal of lawn care contract bidding times, it is very important for lawn care professionals in Florida to learn proper bidding procedures.

If you are in Florida (or any other area of the country with an year-round mowing season) it is very important for you to learn how to bid contracts and price your services effectively. Missing even 1 or 2 contracts can cost your company thousands of dollars in lost revenue.

For those of us in more temperate climates, we also need to be keenly aware of the importance of proper contract bidding. None of us want to miss out on a large scale contract because we didn’t follow the bidding guidelines or because we improperly priced our services causing our bids to be dismissed.

If you are in Florida (or any part of the country) and want to bid lawn care contracts next year. We encourage you to purchase a copy of our Start A Lawn Care Business training course. There is a tremendous amount of information on how to bid large scale lawn mowing contracts. The price of the program is under $50 and you should easily be able to pay for the course with just one successful bid on a lawn care contract.

For more information, visit our main website at:
http://www.StartALawnCareBusiness.com
Start A Lawn Care Business

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October 15, 2010 – Tax Extension Deadline for your Lawn Care Business taxes.

Oct 15

Posted by Lawn Care Business in Lawn Care Business Taxes | No Comments

by: Start A Lawn Care Business

Heads Up: today, Friday October 15, 2010 is a Tax Filing Deadline.

Though it has been 6 months since most of us filed our 2009 income taxes, many busy lawn care business owners filed for extensions in April. Well, today is the day of reckoning for those extension filers.

If this task is still looming over your head, you’re not alone. Thousands of “late” filers are expected to complete their forms today. I wonder how many people filed for the extension because they just needed a little more time to get their paperwork in order. Today, six months later, how many of them are still rushing around trying to find receipts and tally up their income from 2009. If that describes you, we wish you best of luck today.

Organization is an important step in operating a successful lawn care business. If you want to learn more about making your lawn care business a success, be sure to check out our Lawn Care Business training package. It is PACKED with very helpful information and business tools.

Learn more on our main website: www.StartALawnCareBusiness.com

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Instantaneous Profitability with your Lawn Care Business?

Oct 14

Posted by Lawn Care Business in lawn business strategies, start a lawn care business, Uncategorized | 2 Comments

by: Start A Lawn Care Business

My good friend Steve with the LawnChat.com lawn care blog recently asked how long it takes before a lawn care business becomes profitable.

I remember taking business classes when I was in school. The professors often lectured that many businesses take up to 5 years before they ever turn a profit. “An entrepreneur should have a minimum of 6 months working capital before starting any small business” they would preach. I remember sitting in those classes thinking that I wanted to be profitable within 6 DAYS of starting my business (whatever it was going to be at that time) not 6 months. “Were they crazy?” I would think to myself, “6 months is an eternity.” Well, as I get older I realize that 6 months is not an eternity but I still believe it is certainly too long to wait to become profitable in a small lawn care business.

When we finally started our lawn care business in 1992, I was lucky that we did, indeed, have 6 months working capital. However, we did not feel that was an excuse to waste time and money trying to become profitable. Listen, we’re talking grass mowing here. We’re not designing the next super computer or building an automotive factory complex with billion dollar financing.

We are big believers in steady controlled growth of a new business concept. We have truly never understood lawn care business owners that borrow $10,000 (or more) to purchase great lawn equipment before they’ve ever even cut their first lawn. There are benefits of starting with $10,000 in business loans but it’s just not our style. Look at the huge success stories in the business world today. Microsoft, Google, Walgreens have never had any significant debt and they are at the top of their industries.

I personally believe lawn care is one of those businesses you can start with practically no debt. A smart LCO can grow his equipment list as his client list grows. Starting small and growing steadily is preferable, to me anyway, than having a constant worry of mortgaged equipment. Starting at this level means you can, practically, be profitable with your first few lawns. “Yeah, well, what about advertising” my professors would say. Do you know what I say to that? Get off the couch, hit the street and start meeting your potential customers face to face. It’s the best advertising you will ever have…and it’s FREE.

Can you imagine starting your own company on Monday and turning your first profit by Thursday? Though this might not be practical for all lawn care business owners, my old business professors’ ears are likely burning when I say such things.

In the Start A Lawn Care Business training course, we show you methods of starting your own lawn care business with the idea of becoming profitable almost immediately. We can’t promise that you will be profitable by Thursday. However, we show you principles of the lawn care industry that will have you up and running, and hopefully profitable, than you would have ever thought possible.

To learn more about the lawn care business training course and estimating software,
please visit our website: http://www.StartALawnCareBusiness.com

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LOUD LEAF BLOWER? Protect your hearing!

Oct 14

Posted by Lawn Care Business in equipment, hearing protection, lawn care health, leaf blowers, Uncategorized | 1 Comment

by: Start A Lawn Care Business

Any of us that have been in the lawn care business for any period of time know what it’s like to be a newbie. You are young, eager, and excited about your business. You have constant thoughts about getting new clients, buying new equipment, and making money all year long. You are on the precipice of making a new life for yourself and you are enjoying the freedom owning your own lawn care business affords you.

Although all those things should excite you, they should never stand in the way of being a responsible business owner. And, being a responsible business owner means you must pay attention to the health of your business as well as your own physical health.

We at StartALawnCareBusiness.com have long been proponents of proper safety equipment and business practices of lawn care business owners. One of the necessities of operating lawn care equipment is functional noise reduction hearing protection. I remember my first year in business. I do not always like wearing hearing protection but I always wear it. It’s hot, makes my head sweat, and is uncomfortable. If you wear it religiously proper lawn care equipment hearing protection will quickly become an everyday part of your work life.

According the the CDC: while noise-induced hearing loss is 100 percent preventable, once acquired, hearing loss is permanent and irreversible.

This morning, as I passed a city lawn care crew working on a leaf job, I was surprised to see none of the crew member had any sort of hearing protection. They did not even have basic hearing protection afforded by the small foam ear inserts. Leaf blowers are so loud that I cannot imagine the long-term hearing damage these workers were experiencing.

If you are a lawn care business owner, we urge you to pay attention to your overall health. This includes utilizing hearing protection with the proper Noise Reduction Rating (NRR) necessary for your equipment and your working conditions. We have spend a lot of time extolling the virtues of starting a lawn care business this fall. There is lots of money to be made raking leaves and operating leaf blowers. Please take a few of those dollars you are making and buy the protection you need.

And, as always, if you want to operate a better lawn care company, take a look at our lawn care business training course.
It’s well worth the current low sale’s price: www.StartALawnCareBusiness.com

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20% Time For Lawn Care Innovation

Oct 12

Posted by Lawn Care Business in employees, lawn business strategies, lawn product development | 1 Comment

If you read this blog consistently, you have surely noticed that I am a big fan of analyzing successful, non-lawn care, companies. We can learn from other industries and apply their successes to our own personal lawn care businesses.

Google is one company I am constantly impressed with. Today, Google announced plans to help develop an off-shore wind farm to generate electricity for up to 1.9 million homes. If you live in a part of the country that does not have wind turbines, I encourage you to visit a wind farm. Last year I drove from Tennessee to Seattle and was amazed at the number of wind turbines along the way. Kansas seems to have thousands of windmills and the Hood River region of Oregon and Washington seem to have millions of windmills.

Windmills are beside the point I want to make today but they just brought to mind an impressive feature of Google and how they constantly innovate in their product offerings. Google allows their engineers to spend up to 20% of their time working on their own projects within the Google infrastructure. An engineer with an idea how one of Google’s products can work better or be more productive can spend 1 day per week innovating and redesigning the product. If his/her project is approved, it will be included in Google’s offerings. In fact, Gmail, one of Google best features, started out as a 20% time project by one of it’s engineers. Today, Gmail boasts nearly 200 million users.

So, how does this relate to your lawn care business?

What products could you develop for your lawn care business if you (and / or your employees) took the incentive to devote 1 day per week to innovation? Yes, I can already hear your answers and I can’t imagine giving lawn care employees free reign over 20 percent of their time. However, what if it was a supervised 20%? And, what if it wasn’t 1 day per week but 1 hour per day instead? For those of you who think 1 hour per day is still too much, what if you dropped it to 1 hour per week? I can completely imagine that your employees, or you, would respect the 1 hour per week of innovation time. I can only imagine the developments of creative employees and lawn care business owners being creative within our industry spending 1 hour per week on innovation.

Granted, lawn care is a different business model than developing a search engine. We have to be out there sweating through customers lawns before we make any money. On the other hand, can you imagine the profit increase if you develop a better method of weedeating a customer’s ditch or edging a customers driveway?

As we move into the winter months, I would like to challenge each lawn care business owner to devote 1 hour each week toward innovation within their business. You might work on a new tool to pick up trash in customers’ lawns without having to stop your lawn mower or you might develop better, more efficient, mowing patterns for your biggest clients.

Don’t expect results immediately because it might take you a couple weeks before your creative juices start flowing. Once the idea hits you please check back in with us here to let us know your progress.

We believe in innovation within the lawn care industry. If you are just getting started with your lawn care business or if you are trying to make more money in 2011 than you did in 2010, you probably just need some simple help with your business plan and your pricing strategy.

We have developed a comprehensive Lawn Care Business course that will help you start and operate a successful lawn care business. This is a huge business tool that also includes the estimating software so you will know how much to charge your customers for lawn care work.

You can learn more about the Lawn Care Business course on our main website: http://www.StartALawnCareBusiness.com

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Australia Lawn Care Business Startup Guide

Oct 11

Posted by Lawn Care Business in bidding lawn care, Lawn Care Advertising, lawn care contracts, lawn care estimating, start a lawn care business | 1 Comment

While we, in the Northern Hemisphere, are knee deep in leaf raking jobs, our counterparts in Australia and New Zealand are just getting started with their spring lawn care season. I have never been to the land down under but I hope to visit one day in the near future.

When I visit OF COURSE the first thing I’m going to do is visit a bathroom to flush a toilet just to see for myself which way the water swirls. 🙂 Seriously though; when I visit I will be interested in learning more, first hand, about horticultural and business practices south of the equator.

If you are reading this blog posting from Australia, New Zealand, or any country in the Southern Hemisphere and you are thinking of starting your own lawn care business, this blog is for you.

We are asked many times from people in Australia and New Zealand if we ship our lawn care guidebooks and software package internationally. The simple answer is “YES!” Though we developed the lawn care business course specifically for new lawn care business owners in the United States, many of the business principles apply to your country. A large part of the business program is devoted to teaching you: how to do the work properly, how to bid jobs, how to buy equipment, how to acquire the “right” type of customers, how to make money in the winter, and how to beat out your competition.

Since nearly everything within the business course is customizable (including the estimating software) it works perfectly across international boarders. As long as you live in a country that fosters an entrepreneurial spirit this lawn care business package is for you.

The only thing we ask is that you pay a few dollars more for shipping and that you pay via paypal (credit card or paypal account). That’s all we ask and we will ship the entire lawn care business course to you within 1 business day. Normal shipping time is about 7 to 10 business days to most countries.

So, if you are thinking about starting a Lawn Care & Landscaping business, review the entire description on our home page and then return here to make your purchase with the button below.

Thank you and best of luck to you….where ever you are. 🙂





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