Start A Lawn Care Business

Make money with a lawn care and landscaping business.

Posts Tagged landscaping

Lawn Care Businesses Watch Nature Unfold

May 4

Posted by Lawn Care Business in environment, landscaping, lawn business strategies | No Comments

by: Start A Lawn Care Business

Owning a lawn care / landscaping business means you get to enjoy the wonderment of nature more than the average person.

If you are just starting your own lawn care business you might think of it as nothing more than cutting your customers lawns as a way to make money.  After you have been in business for awhile you will begin to feel a kinship with nature.  Whether you simply cut grass to make money or you offer full-service landscaping you will increasingly notice the changes that nature provides.

StartALawnCareBusiness.com is located near the foothills of the Great Smokey Mountains.  We love watching “color creep” each spring and fall.  In early spring all deciduous trees are without leaves.  Slowly, as temperatures rise and days lengthen, trees at the base of our mountains begin to turn green.  As spring wears on, trees at ever increasing elevations gain their foliage.  On a day-to-day basis we watch the color creep up the mountain.

Spring leaf color creaps up a mountian

Spring leaf color creaps up a mountian

As photosynthesis ceases during Autumn, an opposite color creep occurs as trees at higher elevations turn golden and eventually shed their leaves followed closely by trees at lower elevations.

Color creep is just one of the millions of amazing phenomena of nature.  Lawn Care and Landscaping Business owner have special opportunities to view nature at work.  Those business owners also have special responsibilities in conducting their businesses.  The “StartALawnCareBusiness” program will help you run a successful lawn care business so you can take part in the wonderment of nature.

Learn more at our website: www.StartALawnCareBusiness.com

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Landscaping and Homeowners' Associations

Apr 27

Posted by Lawn Care Business in landscaping, lawn business strategies, Lawn Care Advertising, Real Estate Clients | 3 Comments

by: Lawn Care Business

Free Lawn Care Advertising by Landscaping a Homeowners’ Association Entryway.

Landscaping an entryway can bring many new lawn care customers. (Free Advertising)

The impact made by your landscaping work may be your best form of self advertising especially when you landscape by planting decorative shrubs and colorful perennials.

Bidding lawn care contracts within homeowners’ associations can be very profitable for your lawn care company.  Often, homeowners’ associations bid out contracts for public areas within their confines.  Pools, road right-of-way, and, most importantly, sub division entrances are included within the lawn care and landscaping arrangements.

Allowances for advertising vary from one homeowners’ association to another.  Some HOAs will allow you to place signs on completed project areas while other HOAs will place a free ad for you within their monthly newsletter and recommend you as trusted vendor within the community.

The entrance to a residential complex under the guidance of a HOA is probably the most important initial portion of your landscaping work for the HOA.  The subdivision entrance is the first impact anyone entering the subdivision experiences.  If your landscape work is dreary or unkempt it will make a negative impact on those who notice.

However, if you skillfully design your landscaping and make a spectacular impact every resident of the subdivision will notice your work and many of them will clamor to become your clients.

Free Lawn Care Advertising

Although landscape design and installation will bring you many new lawn care customers, resist the temtation to reduce your price in exchange for “Free Lawn Care  Advertising” as you might be convinced by the HOA. Great landscaping is free advertising for the HOA since residents, seeing great landscaping, will happily continue paying their HOA fees.

When landscaping for a homeowners’ association, charge fairly and do a great job.

Landscaping a subdivision entryway is free advertising for your lawn care business.

Landscaping a subdivision entryway is free advertising for your lawn care business.

Our Start A Lawn Care Business package is on sale right now for quick shipment.   For much more information about the business package, visit our website at:  http://www.StartALawnCareBusiness.com

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Lawn care business taxes. April 15.

Apr 15

Posted by Lawn Care Business in lawn business strategies, Lawn Care Business Taxes | No Comments

Tax Day – April 15, 2009

Lawn Care Business Taxes

Like thousands of other lawn care & landscaping businesses around the country today, you may still be working on your income and business taxes hoping to beat the midnight deadline.

As you are working on your taxes, there is
something else you need to keep in mind. You get a double whammy today.

While today is the day to balance out your 2008 tax bill, it is also the day to make your first quarterly estimated tax payment for 2009.

Proper tax planning today for your lawn care business will save you lots of stress at tax time next year.

For professional business tax advice, find a CPA – Accountant who is knowledgeable and has experience with lawn care and landscaping businesses.

For tips and advice for your own lawn care
business, visit out website:
Start A Lawn Care Business

 

 

 

 

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Pruning for your Landscape Business

Apr 4

Posted by Lawn Care Business in landscaping, lawn business strategies, lawn care videos, lawn equipment, pruning | 1 Comment

by:
Lawn Care Business

How to properly
prune a limb off a tree.

Small pruning jobs can bring extra money into your lawn care / landscaping business. In today’s example, we have a branch that
has been damaged. The bark is peeling away from the subwood. The entire limb is
dead and needs to be pruned off to maintain the health of the tree.  Read
the directions below the video window.

 

 


This tree limb is joined at a collared union

This limb is joined at a collared union. 
The bark of the tree poofs out as the limb come out of the tree. The poofed out
part is the collar. All cuts at a collared union should be on the branch side of
the collar. You should never cut into the collar of a tree. Cutting into a
collar can do severe damage to the tree.

If this branch were smaller, we could use a pair of anvil loppers to prune away
the branch. Since it is so large, our anvils will not produce a correct cut. For
this branch we are going to use a bow saw. A pruning saw will work too.


Proper pruning: Three Cut Method

The proper method of cutting a branch with
a saw is to use the three-cut method of pruning. If you just use the saw and cut
it at the collar, the weight of the branch will pull down and you risk tearing
the collar damaging the tree. We are going to use the three-cut method.

The first cut is made on the underside of the branch about 5 inches away from
the collar. Cut the branch about 1/4 way through.


Underside Pruning Cut

The second cut is made about 2 inches
further away from the collar than the underside cut. As you can see in the
video, while making the top cut the branch fell downward before the cut was
complete. This action tore the underside of the branch to the underside cut. If
we had not made the underside cut, the tear may have proceeded to the collar and
damaged the health wood inside. The underside cut protected the collar.

After the main branch is cut away, you can make a third cut just outside of the
collar to cut away the remaining stub to finish your pruning job.

Pruning Sealant

On some pruning cuts, you may need to use
an arborists’ sealer to protect against insects and disease. However, since we
made this pruning cut during the cold season, we are not going to seal the cut.

Lawn Care / Landscaping Pricing Guidance

For more information on how to start a lawn
care and landscaping business, check out our lawn care business program found
at:
http://www.StartALawnCareBusiness.com 

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Timing your advertising.

Mar 26

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

I was asked tonight:

“When is the right time to advertise my lawn care business? I’m sending out flyers but I want to hit the timing just right.”

That is a great question. A common mistake is to make an advertising run a one-time shot.

If you are sending out flyers, resist the temptation to send all your flyers out in one huge mailing. A smarter tactic is to ease into your advertising campaign so you can learn from your mistakes and refine your approach.

As an example, let’s say you have the budget to mail out 1000 flyers to potential lawn care clients. Do not send them all out to 1000 different addresses at the same time.

Choose 100 addresses to target in your first mailing. Give it a few days and judge your response. If you don’t receive any calls, you know you need to tweak your flyer. If you do get a few calls with this first mailing, ask them constructive questions. We discuss constructive customer questioning in our lawn care business program available at: StartALawnCareBusiness.com

The answers to these constructive questions will help you tweak your flyer to grab the attention of the recipients of the second 100 flyers. Follow the same procedure. Once you have tweaked your flyers again, mail a third hundred to the same address as the first 100 were mailed to. If you have successfully redesigned your flyer, your results for this round of mailing should be dramatically higher than the first round.

If you are pleased with your results, double your next mailing to 200 brand new addresses. As your results continue to improve, you can mail to larger numbers of recipients. Each group of potential customers should receive a minimum of two mailings. This will help you correctly judge the effectiveness of your refined flyers.

Never spent your entire advertising budget on a one-time, do-or-die advertising campaign.

Our Lawn Care Business Program includes the complete marketing guidebook to successfully advertising your lawncare / landscaping business.

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Unemployment rate at 10%. Lawn care businesses to the rescue.

Mar 13

Posted by Lawn Care Business in Lawn Care Advertising, Real Estate Clients, unemployment | No Comments

By: Start A Lawn Care Business

If you are unemployed or underemployed, a lawn care business might help you get back on your feet.

The latest job estimates are in and the federal government tells us that the unemployment rate is over 10% in serveral states according to Bloomberg.

So, how do unemployment numbers affect the lawn care industry?

In addition to our other business duties, we consult new and existing lawn care business owners. Our lawn care business office receives calls everyday from people, just like you, who want to start their own lawn care companies.

We are often asked if the global recession is affecting lawn care businesses. The recession is affecting lawn care companies but not in the way you might think.

The preliminary attitude is since people don’t have jobs, they are not paying money to have their grass cut. From speaking with hundreds of lawn care businesses around the country, this is not our experience. There are challenges with this economy but with great challenge comes great opportunity. Quite simply, you just have to know where to look for customers.

We have identified many market segments that are being underserved by the lawn care industry. I want to share one of those market segments with you right now.

Everyone knows that the housing market is in a slump right now. The real estate market’s loss is your gain. Real estate agents are scrambling to move houses and their primary concern in attracting buyers is “curb appeal.”

Real estate companies will pay you good money and ongoing income to your landscaping company if you only know how to approach them the right way. They, as well as home owners, are interested in protecting their investments and moving properties out of their inventory.

Our lawn care business program shows you how to give real estate agents what they are willing to pay for by increasing curb appeal of their properties. The lawn care package also gives a great deal of information concerning pricing guidance and how much to charge for the work you do.

If you are unemployed or if you are just looking for extra income, a lawn care / landscaping business might be the perfect business to start to get you back on your feet.

You can learn more information on what we offer at: StartALawnCareBusiness.com

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Lawn Care Business Opportunities for 2009

Feb 25

Posted by Lawn Care Business in Real Estate Clients | No Comments

There is no denying that 2009 will be a challenging year for lawn care business owners. However, never overlook the fact that challenges bring great opportunity.

Within the pages of the Lawn Care Business Program we point out many opportunities you can take advantage of as a LCO to make more money in your lawn care & landscaping business.  In today’s lawn care blog post, we want to focus on one particular aspect of the lawn care business even as other sectors of the economy suffer. 

A recent posting at the Intellectual Capital Report Real Estate Investing Guide emphasizes the importance of ‘curb appeal’ in the eyes of  real estate investors when attempting to sell properties. 

As their number 1 recommendation for increasing curb appeal they suggest mowing and edging the lawn every week:

“Mow the lawn – Mow and edge once a week during the summer and every other week during the winter (depending on climate). Pretend this is your own home (or better).”

Number two on their list is landscaping.  You have read this correctly. Lawn Care and Landscaping are the NUMBER 1 and NUMBER 2 most important considerations to increase curb appeal and ultimately sell houses and property.

This has really struck me as a very important concept for all lawn care professionals to understand.  Real Estate Agents, Investors, Banks, Mortgage Companies, and Individual House Flippers are all desperate to sell homes and property.  In this slumping economy, they are taking desperate and immediate measures.

All lawn care and landscaping business owners have tremendous opportunity this year.  It is time to pick up the phone and start calling banks and real estate investors.  Knock on the doors of mortgage companies and lawyers specializing in foreclosure.  Get your name on the list of your city’s public works department to let them know you are capable of tackling abandoned yards and properties.

In spite of the real estate market crash, 2009 might be the best year ever for your lawn care company.

If you are just starting in lawn care or you hope to increase your business this year, check out our Lawn Care Business program available at:

www.StartALawnCareBusiness.com

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