mowing per hr prices/rates

[jsaunders]

What are you guys charging per hour to mow? People talk about $1 per min-$60 hr/per man. On large accounts, due you give them a deal or do you charge more per hr? I would like to know because there are a lot of people lowballing to get accounts- while I don't want to lose any if I could make more and help raise prices for everyone we can all win.

My equip.
2000 ford f-350
86 chevy 1 ton dump
85 gmc 3/4 ton pickup
ferris dd hydro 52
ferris sd hydro 48
scag hydro 48
lawn tractor 42
a couple of 21 mowers
enclosed 7x14
open 6.5x12

[tlcservices]

what does it cost you to mow?
answer that first and i'll help you

[jaybird24]

here I charge $45/hr mowing-- Trimming and pruning $50/hr adn landscape services $60 /hr. this is average here. Find out what people charge around your area and figure it around that. If you do really good work charge more ( word will get around about quality) If you just want to get in and get out charge a little less.------DON'T LOWBALL

[rodfather]

$65 per hour to mow...just mow.

[Harvestman]

I shoot for $60.00 hour mowing with a z. This includes trimming and edging. Harvestman

[strickdad]

we dont price per hour we price per square foot.

[GarPA]

Harvestman..

I think I saw an earlier post from you today on a small job that someone was asking the members to estimate...your estimate I think was around $30 and I think it was a 30 or 40 minute job.A few others had estimates similar to yours. I thought the job was worth about $45.... but we all live in different price areas.

What I'm trying to get at is do you have a bare minimum just to show up? If you dont, then setting a goal of $60 an hour for mowing seems difficult to actually attain if you're loading and unloading for $30 jobs and then driving to the next one for $30..In no way am I being critical rather I'm just trying to understand how the $60 per hour is acheived.

[landscaper3]

Mowing prices will vary from state to state!!! We are the closest to you jsaunders, we are in Maine. We get $35.00 per hr for each mower, $29.00 hr for pruning and general labor at $21.00hr, Our plowing price is at $100.00 hr. That is all the market will allow in my area! Some others can get $45 to $60.00 an hour for mowing in other states but after 9-11 we have to be careful on our costs cause alot of people are still nervous about spending $$$$$$$
I use to road race AMA & CCS motorcycles 600 & 750 super-sport and superbike at NHIS (New Hampshire International Speedway) Are you anywhere nere there?????

www.ideallandscaping.com

[strickdad]

Originally posted by landscaper3
Mowing prices will vary from state to state!!! We are the closest to you jsaunders, we are in Maine. We get $35.00 per hr for each mower, $29.00 hr for pruning and general labor at $21.00hr, Our plowing price is at $100.00 hr. That is all the market will allow in my area! Some others can get $45 to $60.00 an hour for mowing in other states but after 9-11 we have to be careful on our costs cause alot of people are still nervous about spending $$$$$$$
I use to road race AMA & CCS motorcycles 600 & 750 super-sport and superbike at NHIS (New Hampshire International Speedway) Are you anywhere nere there?????

www.ideallandscaping.com when you mow what size mower are you useing????

[David Haggerty]

I think the $60/hr is figured off of the hour meter of the ZTR. I have vastly different sizes of mowers, so I calculate different goals per hour of operation for each mower. Manual labor I calculate separately (usually by trying to avoid it:D ).

My best chance for improvement is to improve efficency when the hour meter stops. That's where lawnsite helps me a lot. With improving customer routing, or should I use a palm pilot? Is my trailer quick and easy to load? Things like that.

The cost of operating a machine was pretty well set when the mower was manufactured and sold for a set price. Of course some mowers are better than others.

Of course I don't bill by the hour, just use these price goals to quote jobs.

Dave

[jsaunders]

I'm in southern NH and just bought out a company in Concord Mass. I don't price mowing by the hour but by the size(estimate) I asked the question about prices per hr to see if it would be easier to give estimates to new customers. Last year I averaged $70 per hour to do my route- including travel. If only it had been a 40 hr week.haha

[landscaper3]

Strickdad we use these plus some walkbehind units!

[geogunn]

Originally posted by jsaunders
What are you guys charging per hour to mow? People talk about $1 per min-$60 hr/per man.

jsaunders--there are two ways to interpret your question.

one, what would I quote per hour to mow or

two, what do I have to have in a quoted price to mow for an hour.

the answer is that I would never, ever, quote a price for mowing by the hour.

that is to say unless it was so unreasonable that they would commit me to a mental hospital bed.

always quote by the job. period.

I hope this opinon matters.

GEO

[jsaunders]

Geo - what would you quote to mow for an hour?and with what equip. how many guys - just say 1

[geogunn]

Originally posted by geogunn


the answer is that I would never, ever, quote a price for mowing by the hour.

that is to say unless it was so unreasonable that they would commit me to a mental hospital bed.

GEO

jsaund..., sir..., I love it when I get to quote myself. even if I say I would never quote myself.

you asked so I'll respond, to mow by the hour it and to quote that to a customer would be in the neighborhood of $100 to $120 an hour. one man one 48" machine.

and this is what I would quote because this is approximately what I return on a few of my best cuts. bear in mind...they ARE NOT QUOTED BY THE HOUR! they are quoted by the job, mowed every week and, billed monthly.

hope this helps.

GEO

[jsaunders]

Thankyou GEO

[LAWNGODFATHER]

$60 per an hour, how many employees does that include?

11 or 12 guys?


BTW I do some brush hogging by the hour.

[strickdad]

the reason i asked what kind of mower you had is becausei think you seriously hender your production witha larger mower, that Z i see in the pic will certinally prouduce more than those walkers(bigger deck higher speed) how do you sell the idea of this too a customer?? do you say my push mowers pay 20.00hr my walk behinds pay 35.00 hr my walkers make 50.00an hour and my z pays 60.00 an hour???? im confused, we price almost every thing by the square foot... we even clean gutters by the liner foot.. if i get a buck and a quarter a thousand for a acre lot and it takes a walk behind an hour too cut it then it just made 53.75 an hour.. if you put that 60" z on the property (same one) at a buck and a quarter and you do it in half the time.( 30min) your z is making 107.50an hour you see were im going with this? i think lgf uses a simallar method as i do , each property has a grade of diffaculty and each property carries a different price per 1000 sq. ft. its then my job to put the best suited equipment and labor on the property to get the highest return....

[Aaron Klemme]

I Charge $100 per hour. Yah sounds high dosnt it. Well no one is specifing crew size, mowers, or really anything. Now this is not a lowball so I think. This is with a three man crew. Two mowers, 48 & 61, and a weedeater boy. I send out two crews this size, same everything and ussually price at this. Seems to be fair in my area. 15 min from st.louis. (not in St. louis)

[LAWNGODFATHER]

Stickdad my prices in the past are pretty close to that $1.25 per 1000 sq/ft.

I used to and at my now price of $1.25 per 1000 sq/ft times level of diffaculty is based apon a 52" eXmark Turf Tracer WB with a Velke X2. Also as the amout of sq/ft goes beond a certain limit then the times number goes below 1. (0.9-0.8-0.7)

If there is a fenced in part that we can't get a 52" in and have to use a 36" then I tack on an extra $5.

If a 60" ZTR will fit on the property, it will be used.

Since 95% plus of the lawns That we mow, a ZTR will fit. That means a higher dollar per a man hour.

Some places I am generating $60 a man hour, some as high as $150 a man hour, and vary few as low as $45 a man hour.

I am using a square footage price now to be sure I don't under bid myself. I have in the past. Always got to keep in mind employees are not as fast as you are, but give them a ZTR and watch those production rates increase.

[LAWNGODFATHER]

Originally posted by Aaron Klemme
I Charge $100 per hour. Yah sounds high dosnt it. Well no one is specifing crew size, mowers, or really anything. Now this is not a lowball so I think. This is with a three man crew. Two mowers, 48 & 61, and a weedeater boy. I send out two crews this size, same everything and ussually price at this. Seems to be fair in my area. 15 min from st.louis. (not in St. louis)

So that means you're at $33.33 per a man hour.

Pretty easy to figure.

$100 divided by 3 = $33.33 + $0.01

Your mowers could be at $40-$35 and $25 for the weed eater "person", but your CPA doesn't care still $33.33 + $0.01.

[trophytkr]

Lawn god father, you say you charge so much a square foot. Is that based on the total size of the property or do you subtract the area thats unmowable buildings, driveways large gardens. Or do you leave that in the formula because of trimming? I am thinking It should be over all area total lawn size for mowing buy not for aerating and fert. I'm just starting out and can't find a good reason to charge for fertilizing someones house. Or aerating a driveway:) But on mowing i'm thinking you have to charge for total area because even if you don't have to mow it you still have to trim around it. Am I thinking along the right lines?

Rick
A-Z Lawn Care

[LAWNGODFATHER]

I don't measure lot size.

I measure for applications first. Turf area.

Then I get to play with my numbers till the price suits the property for mowing.

That's where the $1.25 times a number comes in. Lots of trimming small sq/ft then times 3. not much trimming and real high sq/ft (like 150k) then times 0.8

[strickdad]

dont let lgf get you guys stuck on the 1.25per1000 sq.ft. (that is an example only) like he said we both have propertys that run .85 to .90 cents a thousand up to 5.00 a thousand...

[Turfdude]

It's all about the bottom line. Everyone should know their overhead. Everyone should know productivity of operator and respective machines. Since no 2 companies overhead are exactly alike, no 2 companies should have exactly the same $$ on every property. I try to gross $300/man/day. I'll settle for $250/man/day on occasional bad days. When I have a good crew who knows the route and had a routine down w/ a good foreman, much more $$ is made.

Many claim to make $x/man hour or $Y per manhour. If these people are really making upwards of $800/man/day for an 8 hour day, then I'd like to see their blue tights, red cape and large yellow S on their chests.

Face it, this type of work, unfortunately, will rarely pay as well as other trades which are viewed as having schooled professionals (plumbers, electricians, automechanics, etc). There are very few people who would pay a landscaper a higher hourly salary than any of the aforementioned.

Bob

[bobbygedd]

now ive spent alot of time here, and just this past winter, someone told me that before i can quote prices, etc. it is very important to know how much it costs us to operate our business every hr. when i did the math, i mean all the math, i got a very unpleasant surprise. dont kid yurself by saying, "that blower is paid for, that truck is paid for, it dont count". the bad news is it does count, the money came from somewhere, and it needs to be calculated into your operating costs. figure out what it costs u per hr to cut grass, then u can figure out what u need to charge. and never quote an hourly rate to customers. for example, we have some res accts that take us 15 min to cut, at $25 a cut, thats i think $100 an hour. who would hire u after quoting that?

[AielLandscaping]

everytime i read on here the rates you guys all get, and the equipment sizes you get to use it makes me jealous... here all my customers lawns are postage stamps and we only use 21" mowers, i recently changed my pricing across the board and started charging 33.4 cents per man minute... right now that's 20.00 per hour per person working, i have a 3 man crew... i also have a minimum charge of 7.50... i'm low-balling the rate just slightly for my area, but it's paying off quite well i think... this way i'm pulling in lots of new accounts, 15 so far this month alone, and it keeps coming in faster... i'm also considering raising the rate slightly once my customers become used to this new system...

[LAWNS AND MOWER]

AielLandscaping- Please expand on this $7.50 minimum. If a yard takes you 22.4 minutes or less, then you charge $7.50??? Please tell me your last post had a typo in it. If not, then please move to NC and I'll give you all the work you want and I'll pay you 39.38 cents/minute.

LAWNS AND MOWER

[Mow&Snow]

AielLandscaping
it sounds like u r charging a dollar a minute for your business. if you are on a lawn for 20 min....u charge $20.00. is this right?

If so it does seem as tho your rates are a little low, atleast they would be in my area across the country. you are making 20 bucks a man/ hour. I shoot for 35 per man hour but i sometimes miss this when i'm straight mowing.. I always make atleast 35 an hour per man when doing extras or projects. as this is where all the big bucks are for me.

as for this minium thing.....you get 7.50 for any lawn that takes u less than 7 minutes? is that how that works?

[AielLandscaping]

the way my minimum works is any time i do work for a customer, (and this happens alot) and say a lawn takes only 5 min (which happens almost every day here) i charge 7.50, if it takes me 22 min i charge 7.50... but once it gets above 23 minutes, it starts adding up...i always tell me customers when they start service that there is a minimum.. i've never had a complaint yet.

i don't exactly charge 60/hr.. i do have a crew of 3 but we''re not usually working together... where i'm at it's more profitable to have one person working by themself then to have 3 people work out of one vehicale... when you have more then one person working, at times one person may end up just standing around for a minute or two, and since my customers pay per minute, i don't want them to ever see one of my workers just standing there sucking up money for not doing anything...

[LAWNS AND MOWER]

Aiel-- Why would you have any complaints about a $7.50 minimum? Personally, I'd be a little nervous hiring a lco that only charged me $7.50. I'd be asking myself, does this guy carry any liability ins? Do you charge the customer for the minute it takes your employees to pee in the bushes? :confused: :confused:

LAWNS AND MOWER

[RYAN]

A lot of people in here talk how they get $60 per man per hour. That means a crew of 2 should get $120 per hour or around $1200 per 10 hour day. Yet whenever someone in here posts that they are making $1200 a day with a crew of 2 the whole forum freeks out and is in disbelief. I will be starting another crew this year aside from my solo work and am anticipating them making $500-$600 per day. Yes there are timeswhen we all make well over $60 per man hour but it seem like almost no one here is getting a 2 man crew making that $60 per man per hour all day. Maybe I am wrong and losing my mind but is seems like there are a lot more people in here who claim that $60/hour and over and a lot less with crews making $1200 per day. Please let me know if it is just me. I am talking about maintenence here not landscaping.

[tlcservices]

come to fl. ill hire you and you crew for .35 a minute

[tlcservices]

the big guys get on average 35.00 per hour per man. thats 560.00 a day per crew. i never have gotten close to a hundred an hour and dont see it happenning in the near future. down here it is tough to get 350.00 a day for a crew. just be realistic in your goals and realities.

[rodfather]

RYAN,

We do get $65 per hour per person mowing...but that is when they are actually mowing. No one mows straight for 10 hours...or even a regular 8 hour shift.

I figured it out once and I think I came up with an average of 5.4 hours out of a day I am billing a client(s) at $65 per hour.

Now the numbers seen a little more realistic, eh?

[dmk395]

At least 40 per hour.

[Ramsey's Lawn Care]

Stay with a $1.00 a min. If someone else can do it less than that let them have it. There are more yards out there. :blob4::blob1: :blob3:

[wayne volz]

:blob4:

There is really only one way to price your service.

Please don't anyone take this the wrong way.

You can not ask other contractors what you should charge. That is exactly why so many failures occur in this industry. All of us have different overhead and costs. The only way to know what "YOU" need to charge is to use a proven system of cost recovery. Direct, In-Direct, Overhead, and desired profit margins must be taken into consideration.

Do yourself a favor and "JUST DO IT" thanks nike!

Profits Unlimited offes a "Bidding and Contracts" book that will help you do this. 800-845-0499 That information turned our company around very quickly. We made the mistake of asking other contractors ourselves when we first got into this business. The "we need more work" concept was way out of line. Save yourself the frustrations and the school of hard knocks associated with that method of pricing your jobs. Know why you charge what you charge and sell it!


Thanks for listening,
Wayne

This information is available if you want to use it.

Thanks and good luck!

Wayne

[LAWNGODFATHER]

Originally posted by wayne volz
The only way to know what "YOU" need to charge is to use a proven system of cost recovery. Direct, In-Direct, Overhead, and desired profit margins must be taken into consideration.

Wayne that's funny:D As many time as some one writes this 5-10 more posts pop up asking the same question.

The man is correct!!! You need to learn how, and what to do to set "YOUR" costs and charges.

Go search in the archives for pricing, costing etc... It's there hundreds of times.

[bobbygedd]

ok, if that is true, what happens in this scenerio: john do starts a mowing company, now john has no business experience, but he has lots of startup money(granny willed it to him) so john goes all out, top of the line everything, all brand new, his overhead is outrageous! only problem is, being new, john doesnt have the salesmanship skills to sell alot of work, but his operating costs are huge, so does jon now sell his service at , say, $500 per cut, to satisfy his operating costs? or, would u recomend jon figure out a way to operate more eficiantly, so he can sell his service at a marketable price? what u guys r saying is that if yur operating costs are higher than the next guy, u have to charge more. im saying u have to figure out a way to lower yur operating costs so u can sell yur product at a price that will sell. what the competition is charging, IS VERY RELAVENT.

[Lawn-Scapes]

It seems more and more.. it comes down to competition in price.. and not service.

My opinion on this pricing stuff is that there should be standard rates across the board.. and if you don't know WTF you're doing.. you're gone.

Pricing for this industry is out of wack. It's not fair to us and the customer.

[HBFOXJr]

I have spread sheets from years ago. They showed we were on the job no more that 60-65% of the time. The rest was drive, sharpen blades, grease etc. So for 9 hr @ 60% efficiency that is your 5.4 hr. 8 hr @ 65% is 5.2 hr.

Interesting how when it all cooks down how the numbers are the same.

[AielLandscaping]

i'm sure there's a million other posts if i'd search, but since it's relevant to what's being talked about i'll ask anyhow...

since a 9 hour day really boils down to roughly 5.5 hours of real work, how much do you pay your employees? do you pay them for 9 hours or 5.5?

[HBFOXJr]

9 hr or from the time they punch in at my shop till the time they come back and go home.

[Russo]

Granny and John are in trouble!!!!!

[rodfather]

HBFOXJr

You're right about that one. But if they show up at 7 and work until 5, I gotta pay 'em for 10 hours...that's how it goes.

[LAWNGODFATHER]

What the compatision is charge is second to knowing what "you" have to make in order to make any type of a profit.

[Miller]

WE GET $145 PER MAN HOUR JUST FOR MOWING.

[AielLandscaping]

what on earth do you do that pulls in 145 per man hour? how much do you have to mow? ... whatever it is, i want it too... that's 7 times what i make...

[landscaper3]

Im gonna move to your area to mow at that hourly rate!!!!!!!!

[Miller]

WHAT THE HELL? HALF THE OTHER GUYS WHO POSTED RESPONSES TO THIS THREAD LIED ABOUT THEIR HOURLY RATE. I JUST FIGURED I WOULD TOO.

[Bassman]

I price by time it takes to do the job. My standard hourly rate is $30/hr. mowing and $40 to $50/hr. shrub trimming/chain saw work/cleanups plus hauling and dumping expenses. You don't want to ever low-ball unless your just starting out and absolutely have to feed your family some how if you didn't have reserve capital figured in when starting up. However, depending on your area of the country you must be somewhere in the pricing ballpark as far as what your particular market will bear considering the accustomed rates. I would like to charge $60/hr. for mowing but in my particular region it just isn't happening. You need to turn a certain degree of profit to make it long term but be realistic at the same time.
All that being said, I don't think pricing in this business is always an exact science. Example is a $450 job for a new customer that I figured should take about 3/4 of a day hard labor. I was just about right on with the time taken to do the job. Sometimes it just depends on the prospect, if mars is in alignment with saturn, intangibles, etc. It's possible to throw a bid out on occasion and see what comes back at you. Got to have some fun with this process every once in a while.

[bobbygedd]

WELL HACK, I GOT AN IDEA. since, according to some folks, we have to price according to our overhead/operating costs, and not worry about what the competition is charging, then ill do this: just buy the "mercedes version" of a landscape truck, and since this raises my operating cost, ill just charge $150 per cut, even though the "going rate" for that size lawn is only $30. im sure the customers will understand, and still hire me.

[Little Guy]

If you guys charge $1.25 per 1,00sqft. I guess i'll call you for all my 5,000sqft ($35.00) lawns a sit and drink lemonade while I make $28.50 on each and payout $6.25!!!. LOL


Just Kidding

Little Guy:blob2:

[Mow&Snow]

I can see that as this post ages, my interest in reading it goes away. I cannot help but wonder after reading some of these posts how old some of u guys are. And I don't necessarily mean age wise.

[LAWNGODFATHER]

Originally posted by Little Guy
If you guys charge $1.25 per 1,00sqft. I guess i'll call you for all my 5,000sqft ($35.00) lawns a sit and drink lemonade while I make $28.50 on each and payout $6.25!!!. LOL


Just Kidding

Little Guy:blob2:

$1.25 per 100 sq/ft like you have written is $62.50 for a 5000sq/ft lawn

5000 sq/ft is $27 that's my minimum


bobbygedd

What all this means if you charge $40 per a man hour and it costs you $40 to work, that's not going to make any money.

You have to knnow your bottom line inorder to set any kind of a price.

[David Haggerty]

Originally posted by bobbygedd
WELL HACK, I GOT AN IDEA. since, according to some folks, we have to price according to our overhead/operating costs, and not worry about what the competition is charging, then ill do this: just buy the "mercedes version" of a landscape truck, and since this raises my operating cost, ill just charge $150 per cut, even though the "going rate" for that size lawn is only $30. im sure the customers will understand, and still hire me.

I know this wasn't ment to be taken seriously. But it has a large amount of truth in it.

In the first place the old business rule that "people like to deal with people who appear successful" applies here.
You have to look successful. Good looking equipment, uniforms etc. all contribute to the "image" of your operation.
If you show up with junk that's the way they they'll try to pay you.

Secondly, anything you purchase should be driving your operating costs down, not up. Or at least making you a more competent LCO.
For instance, my old truck is an '89. I'm thinking about trading up. I'm considering the Isuzu NPR or the Mitsubishi. Which are probably the equivalent of a Mercedes medium duty truck.
If I can convince myself (and my wife) that's the most effecient and cost effective way of moving the mowers around, that's what I'll have.

What you have to charge to make a profit is a reflection of how well you managed the first two items. You'd just better not make a habit of billing below the profitability level "just to get the job" because you'll spoil the customer into believing they can get their lawn mowed for cheap, and you'll NEVER make a profit.

This probably isn't news to anybody here, but it's occupied my thinking all morning while I was trying to assemble tax receipts.
Thanks for letting me get it off my chest.


Dave

[jsaunders]

Having new equipment will cost more but I have found in my area people like to see newer or well kept machines. Many have said that they care about there lawns and want them to look good, but are very happy because they want the company(ME) that takes care of there property to also look good. This makes people happy because while having a professional looking lawn-the workers and equip. who look professional give a good apperence to the customer. Many of my customers have said there neighbors always have good things to say about the way we look and work.
Watch what you do -People are ALWAYS watching.

[OBRYANMAINT]

buying new equipment will cost you more initially but will not necessarily raise your operating cost(per hour)

many of the machines we use(generaly) are very similar in cost when comparing a scag to an exmark, etc-----given they are the similar model

so to think that all new equipment will drive up costs , makes me think a guy did not really figure his numbers the way i would

the machine will last for a certain amount of hours and that initial cost plus all maintenance and gas should be spread out over the machines lifespan

so in essence a newer machine would most likely cost LESS per hour to run than a similar machine with high hours

yes you still have the initial purchase outlay......but "playing" with these numbers and good planning and budgeting seperate the men from the boys

I would agree that in the beginning of a new business what others charge may help but to grow you must figure out your own

of course its always nice to know others can get more thats what gives you the drive to do better---if someone else can do it I gurantee I can

[olderthandirt]

I still can't figure out my operating cost becouse they vary so much from yr. to yr. When to replace truck, mower, trimmers trailor etc. So after many yrs. A came up with a way of figuring cost that works for me. I am by no way suggesting it will work for anyone else but thought I would put my 2 cents in anyway. All I do is figure out what I want to purchase for the yr. truck, vacation, kids tuition, and then I add some for the unknown such as refer breaks down, girl scout cookies whatever,Add all the above up plus living cost and that give me what I need to make for the yr. Simply so far. Now the hard part if I need to net 50,000 I need to do 80,000 in gross so I try to book that amount before the season starts. My prices start out at x amount and as I get closer to my goal for the yr. I charge more$ for the same work. Its probably the worst way to figure prices becouse some cust. are paying less$ for the same service as others but if there williing to do it so am I. I don't work from approx. 11-1 to 4-15 so I have all winter to figure what I need for the yr.This little formula is probably filled with all the things I sould not be doing but its worked for me. Comments welcome

[AGG Lawn Maintenance]

David Haggerty says "In the first place the old business rule that "people like to deal with people who appear successful" applies here.
You have to look successful. Good looking equipment, uniforms etc. all contribute to the "image" of your operation.
If you show up with junk that's the way they they'll try to pay you."
Wrong!!! Not all the time. I know a guy who has had his trucks for too many year now. He does some of the best houses in my area. I agree image helps but once you get yuor name out there it does really matter if you have brand new equipment or trucks.
I know guys who have $30,000 trucks and their work sucks. While new trucks are great they don't make or break a company. Well said TSG:
It seems more and more.. it comes down to competition in price.. and not service.Pricing for this industry is out of wack. It's not fair to us and the customer.

[David Haggerty]

Originally posted by AGG Lawn Maintenance
David Haggerty says "In the first place the old business rule that "people like to deal with people who appear successful" applies here.
You have to look successful. Good looking equipment, uniforms etc. all contribute to the "image" of your operation.
If you show up with junk that's the way they they'll try to pay you."
Wrong!!! Not all the time. I know a guy who has had his trucks for too many year now. He does some of the best houses in my area. I agree image helps but once you get yuor name out there it does really matter if you have brand new equipment or trucks.
I know guys who have $30,000 trucks and their work sucks. While new trucks are great they don't make or break a company. Well said TSG:
It seems more and more.. it comes down to competition in price.. and not service.Pricing for this industry is out of wack. It's not fair to us and the customer.

My post said APPEAR successful.

I think someone with a new diesel truck pulling a 1,000# mower around APPEARS to be someone who don't know how to invest his assets.

But thanks for your reply anyway.

Dave