Hello Im new to the board here and thanks for all of the information(probably take me a year to read it all). My question was if any of you had dealt with or had considered, or own a US Lawns franchise. Im considering it waiting on their information packet. I was farming until 2001 just got sick of making 3 dollars an hour lol. any ideas or input would be greatly appreciated. thanks Cole
I would not waste your time or money with a franchise. You can use the web and this site to do enough research to start your own bus. To me it seeams like a lot of money for what you get from them. You could take the investment money for a franchise and build it yourself.
Heres the deal with US Lawns. Give them 30,000.00 they tell you how much to charge and the get a % of that.
Mowing is to easy to get into without going the franchise route. How do you know once you get into it you will like mowing and their goes your franchise investment if you don't like it. Start reading on this site and start asking questions, Oh ya use the SEARCH feature on the site and you will have plenty to keep you busy with reading. Now be careful some will lie about how much money they make per hour,etc. and other exaggerations to take what you read with a grain of salt but I would think most of the information is good.
Lawn & Landscape magazine printed a good article about green industry franchises just recently. U.S. Lawns is one of the bigger and better of those which were listed. The major benefit to a lawn care franchise is a business system that is suppose to be able to take much of the guesswork and startup problems out of the way. Their systems have all the marketing tools in place, the record keeping and time management, the tax withholding and employee benefits stuff (workman’s comp, soc security, etc). With the franchise you have a corporate support group dedicated to each aspect of the lawn care business. I’m assuming that a franchise in lawn care is for those who want to let others make decisions so that the business can grow and expand quickly. It’s only going to be an advantage to someone who wants to grow a very large business. It’s also only going to be an advantage if the franchise is successful. I guess micro management may consume enough of my time to prevent my business from growing large. I also may not be an expert in all areas of managing the business. I’m still going to wait until I become senile or brain dead before I let someone else make my decisions for me.
There is a guy that bought one around here , good looking truck and trailer , sits in his driveway everytime I go by .
Are you willing to spend $30K to get generic information and "discounts" on mowers that I can get by being a stand up guy and buying equipment through the same dealer. US lawns is a rip off. If you want a franchise, buy a Subway or McDonald's.
If you have $30,000 to pay to someone else to start your business for you, then you should just use that money to buy a couple of good mowers and misc equipment, then buy a massive ad campaign and get to work. I think a person who is determined and reasonably smart could start an LCO on their own and be successful.
