Whats up with ChemLawn?

[thelawnguy]

ChemLawn has been aggressively pursuing new accounts in my area. One of my customers, 20,000 sq ft lot, was quoted $30 per application, quote was given while there was snow on the ground, how the heck do they know what they are bidding on? I told the cust if they wanted the lawn ruined then go with chemlawn, I will not/can not meet the quote (lesco 24-5-11 50% scu is $14/12k bag, if I stretch it out no way am I to schlep around the lawn for 16 bucks before expenses etc).<p>Is there an angle here that Im missing, or is it that they buy in such large quantities their cost for material is considerably lower than mine? I know that local chemlawn has used lesco in the past, I wonder if they switched to landscaper supply brand ($8 a bag my cost).<p>Bill<p>----------<br>&quot;...half my brain tied behind my back, just to make it fair.&quot; R.L.<br>

[lawrence stone]

Chemski lawn loses on a nationwide average 40% of thier customer base on a yearly basis.<p>The average chemski customer lasts just 3 years. At that time the bluegrass lawns are<br>so full of thatch from the customers over watering and the application of liquid urea<br>they need complete renovation. <p>The chemski lawn corporate line to the customer is that core aeration will take care of the thatch problem (that they helped<br>cause). They don't remove thatch do to they<br>don't have the proper equipment and don't want to deal with the &quot;waste&quot; product.<p>I was talking to a chemski lawn tech during<br>the height of last seasons brutal summer.<br>He was down to about 135 lbs from pushing<br>a non-powered lesco spreader all day in<br>95 degree temps with 80% humidity.<p>He told me that he was just going to finish out the rest of the season so he could collect unemployment compensation.<br>I offered him $20 cash to copy his customer list for that day and he accepted my offer.<p>I copied the names and address on that run<br>($250K+ homes) and I sent them all a letter<br>of introdction and I closed on 5 of those<br>accounts last fall. They bought my non-mowing<br>package which includes a complete spring (march) power raking, two aerations/year, a<br>five step lawn, and a tree application in June/July or whenever the mowing slows down.<p><br>On the cutting edge of <br>lawn care marketing. L.S.<br>

[NateinAtl]

Lawn Guy,<p>As a former Trugreen Sales Rep, I can give you a guess at what has happened. TruGreen loses sales reps just as uickly as they lose customers. Because of this, they hire a large number of guys as sales reps at the begining of the year. In turn, they throw these guys out to the wolves, so to speak. Even if the new rep knows absolutely nothing about lawn service, they are expected to produce. It always seems to happen that these new guys are either untrained or are feeling the pressure to make a sale. So they quote outrageously low prices. When the tech gets to the customers lawn, he most likely won't do the work and will make whomever sold the account re measure and resale the customer. I would suggest that you have the customer give you a call if he is looking for a change. I would bet money you will be hering from him:))

[MWHC]

Stone is correct about the thatch problems this type of high nitrogen fertilization creates. (I won't go into the other problems this causes) They use a liquid based urea where I live. I can tell when I get there and the grass is so tall in one weeks growth that I have to mow it twice. Especially on bluegrass type lawns (the predominant species in my area). You take that high nitrogen fertilizer and combine it with a guy who waters every day, day in day out and you get a real nice mess. I power rake a lot of these yards and the thatch content is unbelievable. <p>Core aeration will help combat the problem, but not fast enough.

[snake1040]

Because they suck at least where i live<br>

[PLS]

An old ex Chemlawn guy told me they call it drive by estimating. Yep, Uh Huh that looks like a $30 yard to me. I've had it done to me also, back several years ago, The yard measured 13K and the home owner said the <br>O mighty Chemlawn said it was 10K, So I measured it again, still 13K. Thats when I asked my friend, how they do that?<p>I got a peek at there fert program one time a few years ago, it was for bermuda, can't remember for sure but it was something like 1.5 or 1.75 lbs per app. I remember it was a hot one. The hottest I had ever seen, before or since. Hey they don't have to cut it, just make it green.

[peacedog]

This must happen nationwide. It is ridiculous that this kind of unethical work is going on.<p>As easy it is to bad mouth them, I must thank them. I pick up many of their unstatisfied customers. I lose a few each year to them, but will pick them up by the end of the year or by the beginning of the next year, and never lose them again.<p>Another common unethical practice is their dishonest telemarketing. When someone says they belong to another company, they are told that they (T-G/C-L) bought them out so they will service their property anyway.<p>Has anyone else experienced this?<p><p>----------<br>Blake<br>www.fertalawn.com

[JimLewis]

Wow. It's weird to hear all this negative stuff about chemlawn. In my area at least, they are the best. Or at least they are perceived that way. All I know is that there liquid fertilizers are more productive than any other company in the region. I can barely produce similar results with our granular fertilizers. The lawns that chemlawn maintains in our area always look killer. Still, a lot of people only use them for chemical applications, even though they do offer lawn mowing too. I suspect they are REALLY high priced for lawn mowing. <p>Jim <p>----------<br>Jim Lewis - Lewis Landscape Services<br>http://www.lewislandscape.com

[bdemir]

Chemlawn called my home soliciting work. They had sprayed our lawn three years ago and the sales guy was so desperate as to try to sell me fertilizer. He siad that it would save me the time of having to go and buy it. I think that they are desperate enough to make money so they can spread as many chemicals and to commercialize this world and only care about money. Sorry but I dont think chemicals are good period.

[peacedog]

They called my home also, and when I told them I do my own lawn, they tried to sell me fertilizer. I asked what preemergent came with it, and he couldn't give me the name. He said, &quot;it is a long scientific word that I can't pronounce.&quot; I said, &quot;have a good night&quot; and hung up.<p>bdemir, what do you consider &quot;chemicals&quot; and why are they all bad?<p>----------<br>Blake<br>www.fertalawn.com

[bdemir]

what do you think chemicals are made out of hummus. I highly doubt it. I live close to a lake and many people know why we still have green stuff that floats in our lake. I would apply fertilizer but i would not try to get the whole market to use it because i feel it is a man made product to synthetically alter a natural thing and the long term affect is destructive to the environment. <br>

[moonarrow]

chemlawn is lik many other large corps. in this country trying to put the small guy out. in many large metro areas they are buying out all the lawn maint. companies they can get their hands on as far as they are great I've made lawns look just as great or better using an organic program with less weed problems and poisining the earth just my opinion ( doing things the natural way) people use them because of their advertisement and then find out it was a mistake ond go back to the real guys in the market that know what they are doing organic or synthetic.<p>----------<br>Dale moonarrow@hotmail.com<br>Southern lawn and Landscape

[SLSNursery]

Bill - I don't think there is any special angle you are missing. Like others have mentioned, I think the Chemlawn and other similar types are not actually figuring out the job costs when selling. They consistently end up with high employee turnover and ultimately lose out. I wouldn't lose any sleep over it, just keep steady on your price and product use. We did that and snagged back way more square feet than they ever took from us. In fact we ended up getting lawn maintenance bids on several acre properties that they screwed up.<p>In addition, I know one of the guys who direct sells chemicals from Lesco to Chemlawn. They (Lesco) have purchased several fertilizer plants around the country and do cater to Chemlawn. The same products I used to buy from local plants before Lesco took over now would cost me more to buy at high volume pricing levels. I have since found other sources. For instance, I have the same 24-5-11 (SCU, Iron, and Micros) product with my own label. The price starts out at 13.75 per bag and goes down with quantity purchases. I uses tons of it every year and don't lose money. If you switch to cheaper products you might lose out on consistency in an effort to compete with them. Its not worth the hassle. They will end up getting the fertilizer for a lower price, but they are taking trailer loads of it. How often do you think they calibrate or check the amount of product actually used on a lawn?<p>----------<br>Phil Grande - Soundview Landscape Supply - http://members.aol.com/slsnursery<br>Ivy League Landscaping - http://members.aol.com/scagrider

[jeffclc]

One thing that I have noticed with ChemLawn is the lasc of consistency. I have some customers that have ChemLawn service the lawn, and the grass looks great, and others that look pretty bad. <p>Now, I don't know if I am comparing apples to apples, one may be on a better program than the others. <p>Has anyone else noticed a lack of consistency with ChemLAwn?

[slagerlawncare]

i noticed it last summer.i had one customer who kept sharing the info that they where giving him with me, they kept telling him to tell me to mow high..well i never mowed under 2 1/2 inches..it was like they wrote something down just for the fact of writing it. that's why i decided to go after a peice of their pie.i heard many complaints about them ..most of them where about telemarketing calls.<br>

[Lazer]

jeff,<br>The problem with inconsistant results is that Chemlawn doesn't treat each lawn differently. Because of all differing factors like soil, grass species, watering/drainage and mowing, etc. every lawn has different needs.<p>A trained/experienced applicator (something Chemlawn has very few of) can pick-up visual cues on what a lawn needs and adjust for them. <p>Furthermore if a lawn ins't responding properly to a treament, an experienced applicator will figure it out and do something about it. <p>A Chemlawn applicator (with their 1.3 years average experience) is really only interested in meeting their weekly income production target and getting their college tuition paid.

[Lazer]

To answer the original post:<p>1.) Chemlawn is TruGreen-Chemlawn, division of ServiceMaster, Inc. Some original Chemlawn branches are still run as Chemlawn (No TruGreen brand name) A FEW (very few) Chemlawn branches (mostly in FLA, I think) were franchised and are independatly owned.<p>2.) They generally price based on neighborhood. Almost never will they actually measure. If you customer has a larger lawn than most in that area, the telemarketer will most always be low on the quote.