You are correct, it is weather dependant, and at times unpredictable, storms happen. It can also be stressful and demanding. Overall one must enjoy the outdoors.

 

Throw customers into both categories. I have some great ones and I have (had) some real PITA’s.

 

I didn’t listen to the video.

but Missing from your list is as the largest con -
“Do customers place a value on the service that overcomes all the other cons.

in other words. Some business have lots of Cons to them. Lots of issues and challenges to overcome….. but then their product or service sells for a much higher amount.

I don’t think lawn care is valued by our customers

 

I didn’t listen to the video.

but Missing from your list is as the largest con -
“Do customers place a value on the service that overcomes all the other cons.

in other words. Some business have lots of Cons to them. Lots of issues and challenges to overcome….. but then their product or service sells for a much higher amount.

I don’t think lawn care is valued by our customers

i think that the value to a customer all depends on what outcome they are achieving..

 

Excellent business to work 7 days a week sun up to sun down. Chasing the American dream they say.

 

lawn mowing paid for my house, well almost. Couple of years left. I don’t work weekends.

 

The repetition is what I love. While other industries may get higher $ on a per hour basis, if you tighten your routes, revenue shouldn’t be an issue…that plumber, electrician, tree company is coming to your house once per year. Me? 30-40 and chances are there’s chances for upsells that I don’t offer half the time because we’re busy.

 

The repetition is what I love. While other industries may get higher $ on a per hour basis, if you tighten your routes, revenue shouldn’t be an issue…that plumber, electrician, tree company is coming to your house once per year. Me? 30-40 and chances are there’s chances for upsells that I don’t offer half the time because we’re busy.

This is huge when mowing. We have turned down a lot of business due to people who live on the Tuesday route wanting a Friday cut. At the end of the day I wont spend the extra gas or man hours driving back to another part of town to mow 1 yard.

My insurance agent has a son who started a business 5 years ago. He ran with it and after 4 seasons had around 80 yards. As he started to get a little burned out he decided to hire. It didnt go well so he decided to sell.

Long story short I received a call the other day from one of their customers wanting service for this year. I found out the guy who bought the company lives 40 miles from here! He lives in an area called North Kansas City which consists of about 6 decent size cities where there is plenty of business. Why drive all the way here????? It makes no sense to me.

 

Let me specifically address cons 4 and 5.

my original comment was that the customer pays you enough to overcome 4 and 5 and in such a way that your business is “great”

A crappy business is one where you pay everyone off at the end of the year and you have no idea if those guys will come back. And for some people - besides owner/operators - Some people actually run their business this way.

But to be great, These are your two options.

A) you charge so much, that even in your off season you do not lay anyone off. You made so much money that you keep them on normal full time hours

B) you do lay them off, but you pay them so well that there is zero chance that they wouldn’t consider returning. So your pay scale is so high, that no competitor could match what you pay, and your guys make so much they couldn’t imagine doing anything else. So coming back to work becomes a no brained.


AND after that issue is figured out, Managment/ownership still makes so much money during the season that they too are making more than a job which did not contain seasonality. That you’re being paid so well, that it makes sense to be in a job/industry which has seasonality risk vs one that does not.

you see it’s not just that you make money, it’s that your making significantly more money than a different business which doesn’t have that risk.

 

Let me specifically address cons 4 and 5.

my original comment was that the customer pays you enough to overcome 4 and 5 and in such a way that your business is “great”

A crappy business is one where you pay everyone off at the end of the year and you have no idea if those guys will come back. And for some people - besides owner/operators - Some people actually run their business this way.

But to be great, These are your two options.

A) you charge so much, that even in your off season you do not lay anyone off. You made so much money that you keep them on normal full time hours

B) you do lay them off, but you pay them so well that there is zero chance that they wouldn’t consider returning. So your pay scale is so high, that no competitor could match what you pay, and your guys make so much they couldn’t imagine doing anything else. So coming back to work becomes a no brained.


AND after that issue is figured out, Managment/ownership still makes so much money during the season that they too are making more than a job which did not contain seasonality. That you’re being paid so well, that it makes sense to be in a job/industry which has seasonality risk vs one that does not.

you see it’s not just that you make money, it’s that your making significantly more money than a different business which doesn’t have that risk.

I think the seasonality of the work is the biggest hurdle in growing a business.

 

Let’s talk about number 3. The weather.

weather impacts business in two ways. One positive and one negative. On the positive side, it can create a demand. Nice days with ample rainfall keep things growing. Just as an auto body shop wants rainy or icy weather to drive up business. Or hot weather will drive HVAC repairs.

but on the negative side we are one of few industries that shuts down because of weather. That’s are days lost where you make no money. And I get it … work the weekends to make up for it … yes that’s the industry standard but that doesn’t change the fact that you lost your day. You could work the weekends regardless.

Out of 22 working days per month, so if it rains 2 days per month that shut you down. You have to make enough money in the other 20 days, you literally do not care. You could just not do the work, rather than be forced to work the weekend.

now we are not the only industry with this type of issues. There are others. Road construction as an example….. but I bet they pay their guys more, and they profit more than we do. Hence their ability to overcome con number 3 is much easier.

 

I’m hoping all these companies that bailed on maintenance work the last few years to pursue hardscaping, pools, etc don’t jump back in with the economy changing. I thought people were getting tight with money the last year or 2, but I think reality is setting in this season, with a lot of people realizing they need to tighten things in their budgets.

 

I remember when this happened in 2008. I hired a guy that had worked at an install company that had gone bankrupt. I had a job listing on Craigslist that received over 100 applications.

 

They always do.

 

My weather post - only talked about rain days. Never mind the days that we do provide work but it’s just cold/hot/windy/ misty or terrible to work in. The days where the person with an indoor job is the clear winner.

here is a pretty simple way to know if your being compensated enough to deal with the weather.

if you did the exact same amount of work, But you had the choice of doing exactly what You are now. Or reduce your prices by 10% and in trade your weather will be perfect 75 daily, mild sun and light rain at night. Everything stays green, you loose zero days due to weather. Never need a jacket.

would you take that trade ? 10% for perfect weather. If your answer is YES then you’re not being compensated enough to deal with the weather.

 

To answer my original question, I would say yes, lawn care is a great business.

 

In answer to your question.

Yes.

But its not what most people think it is.

 

And personally, I hate selling…I am an operations guy…so if I can fill hundreds of hours per week for 30 weeks of the year on April 1st, that’s a load off my mind…now I fill holes in the schedule, sell landscaping, etc…I’m guessing a lot of guys are opposite and don’t want to be in the field.

 

Same

 

Please share your thoughts.

It's da 💣

 

Down in swfl HVAC is a massive business. Tons of work year round, people will pay whatever or put it on a credit card when the ac goes out.

 

In my area there are tons of ppl who can't afford air conditioning repairs so some purchase window units and most of them do without AC completely.

 

If it was year round imo it would be a very good business. One of the few “recurring service” industries you can basically figure out your customer acquisition cost and grow as much as you want (if your market allows).
For the owner it’s a good business. 3-4 months off in winter to spend with my 1 year old is absolutely priceless. For me it’s like a way to extend time. Lots of men work so hard for to have a family and then only seeing them an hour or so per day between dinner and bed.
Other businesses are so unpredictable yet still consume all the owners time and $. Once you figure out your #s it’s literally just up to you to motivate yourself to stay consistent & grow. The employee problem isn’t as bad as we like to think . lcos are usually just way too ocd about mowing and end up dropping the idea of employees over little details that customers probably don’t even care about or notice.

 

Skill up and get a license for irrigation or pesticide app...mowing is a low margin endeavor...

 

I don't have time to read all the previous replies. But my thoughts on the subject - after 29 years of building a pretty large business from starting in lawn care only - is: Landscape Maintenance itself is really only very profitable if you stay small with little overhead. But then you can't ever really make the big bucks. After that point it becomes very difficult to maintain profitability if all you're doing is lawn care, unless you come into it with a ton of experience and understanding of how to manage the books the right way, are very savvy about business/financial analysis, already have really good systems you've used in the past, have the experience to avoid all the many pitfalls, etc. There are just so many pitfalls in growing a maintenance-only business and the risk/reward isn't really worth it vs. other industries you could go into.

That said, I know you can eventually make really good money if you can get past all the pitfalls, get really good systems in place, are really good at managing cashflow, finances, and accounts receivables, know how to build a killer team AND diversify into the more profitable parts of the industry - namely design/build.

One of the biggest pitfalls of the industry is the seasonality of it. Even in areas of the country where you can work year-round (like we can in the Portland area) it's still very very difficult to land jobs in the winter and most winters are not profitable. So you're struggling every winter and have to have systems in place to mitigate that and keep you afloat until next season comes. I think there are plenty of other industries that don't have those seasonal demands and where demand for services stays constant year-round. I sometimes wish I had gone into a different industry that didn't have this problem.

But over a long period of time we found ways to migitate all of these problems and make really good money. But it was such a struggle to get there I sometimes wonder if it was worth all of the sacrifice. I don't believe most people would have ever gone through what we went through to get to the place where we are now. Now, as it is, I love our business, it's really dialed in and we make good regular profit. But there are so many other industries where I could have gotten to the same place with much less struggle.

I think the other biggest problem we have is that due to the ease of entry into the industry, you don't have to be good at business management to get into the industry. But you DO have to get really good at it if you want to grow it to become a large profitable company. And I think a lot of the people in this industry get into it because they're good at mowing, etc. but probably won't ever be able to acquire the skills, knowledge and experience to really make it big. There's just so much you have to learn to get to that level.

Also, profit margins for our industry are pretty low compared to many other industries. Which just adds to how hard it makes it to grow and become a big very profitable business. The fact that other industries have much bigger profit margins gives them a huge advantage because even if you don't run things perfectly, the profit margins are so high that you can still do pretty well.

 

I agree with everything you said. And often wonder if we would be better off in another industry

 

Yah, knowing what I know now, I would have liked to build a software company or a marketing agency. Once I sell my business and move to another state I think my plan at that point will be to build an Outdoor Lighting Only company. Just a few part-time employees, really good profit margins and you don't have to work full time to bring in good money.

 

This video is on topic.

 

Excellent video. Everyone in our industry who cares about building a profitable business should watch that. Nice post, JFGLN!

 

Lawn care can definitely be a solid business if you're consistent and build a good client base. I started small in my neighborhood and it grew mostly through word of mouth. One tip: use good quality products and tools. I had to contact scotts customer service once for a product issue, and they were super helpful. Having reliable support like that makes a big difference when you're out there every day.