I am thinking of starting a lawn mowing company here in England

[paul30uk]

next spring I am thinking of starting a lawn mowing buisness but I have no idea of what to realisticaly charge customers

Please could you give me some idea of what to charge with out doing my self down or with out over charging

Many thanks

[Gene $immons]

Roll call for England LCO's.

What part of UK?

[paul30uk]

I am from Central England

[paul30uk]

<img src="http://i13.photobucket.com/albums/a290/paul30uk/beforeafter.jpg" alt="Image hosted by Photobucket.com">

[6'7 330]

My sister lives in Edinburgh in Scotland,I would'nt have any idea advise to offer the scots in the uk ,much less the english lol.

But i will forgive you being english lol ,just kidding ,good luck on your business endeavor Paul!

[mowmasteruk]

If you are aimimg at private householders and are running from the garage or shed at home you need to be charging a minimum of £17 per hour - it would need to be more if you have overheads such as a depot to take into account.
Smaller jobs you can charge more - set yourself a minimum charge, say £10.
Unfortunately there are lots of people out there supplementing their regular income who charge a good deal less because they are not paying for public liability insurance and very often they are not paying tax or national insurance contributions on their earnings from mowing. All you can do is try to provide a better service than those people and then if yiu are above all reliable your customers won't mind paying the extra.

[garth1967]

good luck paul even though you are a bloody pom we was robbed the ashes series to by the way

[essexboy]

wheres central paul?
im in essex, and prices range from £12.50 to £15 for mowing for me.
garth, think your confusing robbed with whupped!!!

[mowmasteruk]

im in essex, and prices range from £12.50 to £15 for mowing for me.

Can anyone seriously make a living on those rates? Have you really worked out all the costs including depreciation on your machines and all the other overheads? Maybe if you had a days work in one place for every day of the week then, yes you could get by, but not if, like us, your work is spread throughout the county.
PH

[greenpastureslc]

Just Mow It in Dallas charges like that, I think $25/ per lawn, but his route is so tight that his crews can do 4 an hour. In my area of NY I would have to charge $50 to $75 for the same size lot.

[greenpastureslc]

So his company is making $100 per hour per crew; I make $50 to $75 per hour as a one man show and always have travel time between jobs.

[mith]

Down in the south here we have generally bigger lawns.
I figure aim for £20/hour, but quote a fixed price. So I see a lawn, I think it will take me 30 mins, bid at £10-15, give a bit of a cushion if it takes longer than you expected, you can always change under what you quoted. Always decide how long you think it will take in un-ideal conditions, for example, I can do 1.25acre/hour in the dry but only 0.5 acre/hour in the damp, in the wet I dont bother, collecting is just not gunna happen. If in the middle of the year it is taking less time you either get more £per hour or you lower the price to account for it.

I have a lawn I charge at £25, lots of strimmer time, I thought it would take an hour. It takes just over an hour with the leaves but in summer I can be there and gone in 45 mins, it all evens out in the end.

What kinda lawns are you planning to do, small gardens, or acre+ properties?

Another idea would be to charge hourly for the first cut and then work out a fixed price from that rate.

Hope this helps

[essexboy]

Can anyone seriously make a living on those rates? Have you really worked out all the costs including depreciation on your machines and all the other overheads? Maybe if you had a days work in one place for every day of the week then, yes you could get by, but not if, like us, your work is spread throughout the county.
PH
every jobs whithin 5 / 10 mins drive, including 4 in my own street, only recently gone full time and make more doing hardscaping.

[mowmasteruk]

every jobs whithin 5 / 10 mins drive, including 4 in my own street, only recently gone full time and make more doing hardscaping.
If you can make more at it then stick with hardscaping. Above all don't try to do both, because you will never keep up with your regular mowing jobs if you have landscape construction jobs on the go as well. The two types of operation are fundamentally different and you will end up pleasing no one. I learned that years ago. I'm only doing garden maintenance and mowing because I'm rubbish at landscaping! Maybe you might manage to do the mowing jobs in the evenings or at the weekend if you are making good profit out of your hardscape work. On the other hand, why bother unless you really need the extra cash?