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Women Landscapers?

30K views 87 replies 44 participants last post by  Patriot Services 
#1 ·
I am one. Any others out there?

Do you hire women workers?

If you were a customer would you hire a self-employed female landscaper?

Any other comments?

Please be truthful, but not rude. Thanks for your input.
 
#3 ·
Hi, I've always hired women rather than men / boys, customers luv women!!!!!!!!! You're generally nicer, friendly, dont use rough talk, work with your shirts on?.......Consider this 98% of the people home during the day are?....."Women"!!!!!!!!!!....How can you go wrong......"Perennials, native plants, rock gardens, should go very well in your neck of the woods"....Best of Luck & dont be a stranger- Regards Saxon :cool2:
 
#6 ·
Thanks for your input. This is one of my biggest fears.

Thanks for the welcome too. I guess I should introduce myself. My name is Lisa and I am 21, in my 2nd year as an Engineering Student, and have just moved away from my wonderful boss of 3 summers. I wasn't going to landscape this summer but I just cant stay away from it, so here I am trying to go on my own for the first time at the last minute. I don't have anything ready yet...no cards, no fliers, no truck yet either. But I will get it all done and quick as I can too. I guess the biggest thing holding me back is a name. The obvious is "Lisa's Landscapes" and I like it, but I'm scared they wont call just because I'm a woman. I dont want to use my last name, no real reason, it just doesn't feel right. So, any thoughts? I also have "day-mares" (nightmares) about customers calling and hanging up immediately when they hear my 12 year old girly voice(This is not unfounded. I really do have a childish voice!). My other day-mare is that they wont rent me a bobcat because they dont trust me with it! Rediculous, I know, it's just cold feet. Any thoughts, comments are welcome.
 
#10 ·
You bet! I have an all female crew this year so far and it is going extremely well!!

Customers really respond positively to women on site, the truck stays cleaner and smells fantastic day in and day out.

I really like to see women in the trades and encourage it in every regard. I do realize there are some physical differences between men and women that prevent women from doing some of the work in the same fashion as men, however I find that the pros far outweigh the cons.


-Reuben
 
#11 ·
There are a few women I see doing landscaping around here, mostly mowing. One landscape company has a couple crews of women Ive seen and they get rite with it. I think it take quite a determined and tough woman to take on the heat, dirty conditions and physically demanding work. I often thought a female crew would be good for us as far as attention to detail and trust worthyness so I tried a few last season for my mowing crews, but had little luck. Two of them lasted 1/2 day and the other one lasted 3 days. I mostly have 21 year aged guys and we bust butt mowing subdivisions and such. Its very hard work, but we landscape as well. I would still keep trying females for the reasons I mentioned, maybe I jusy havent found the rite ones yet. If your ever my way, give me a ring :)
 
#14 ·
my lead landscape designer/project mgr is a female. and for my exterior remodeling company, my absolute best siding installer is a woman.
 
#15 ·
I am a female Landscaper and have run my own biz for 12 years now,started out doing maintenance,weedeating,mowing,cleaning,blowing,Planting ,anything they wanted me to do.did that for first few years then broke into Landscaping.I have never had a problem getting jobs,or keeping them because I am a woman.People are willing to give you a chance,you just gotta prove yourself worthy and reliable.I always have felt that if they are gonna put their money on me,I'm not going to let them down and ruin things for the next woman who comes along.Nice to meet you. Sheshovel :waving:
 
#17 ·
Lifesaverbuddy, I would hire a woman in a minute. I hate to say it but woman are generally friendlier than men (and I like the girly voice)LOL. We have a lady here who does nothing but landscaping, no mowing, and her work is great and she is expensive too! Good luck to you. BTW, you may find your clients wife not so friendly expecially if thier hubby watches you out the window the whole time. I would recommend wearing comfortable clothing(not daisy dukes, I cant believe Im saying this) and just do good work and your reputation should carry you. Good luck!
 
#18 ·
Welcome to Lawnsite! If you haven't discovered this yet, there is a wealth of information here. If you spend alot of time reading posts here and learning, you WILL succeed. That being said...

I don't think being a woman should hold you back at all. It could be a very important charachteristic to set you apart from the competition. I think people will generally trust a woman easier than they will trust a man. People have trusted me for the past couple years since I am a "kid" (I'm 19 now), but as I get older more and more people think I am trying to swindle them or something. Were I a female, I don't think this would be as much of a problem.

GOOD LUCK! :waving:
 
#19 ·
Lisa, Welcome to Lawnsite.
As far as women go, I am the only man in the house with 3 daughters and my wife. I work with her in the field and she also takes care of all the books. I have had my daughters help us with mulch jobs. Ages are 15, 14 and 9 at their request.
Women in general ( no stereotypes) are very detail oriented and my wife is a self proclaimed perfectionist. That is a good balance for me. Give yourself a pat on the back and gain some confidence, you can do whatever you want and make good money also. Many of the landscape companies have women as designers but also installers. Time is wasting, get your advertising out there as there will be a major push for work starting yesterday. Once your foot is in the door, word of mouth will take over and you will do fine. Good Luck and keep us posted.
 
#20 ·
We hire a few for both maintenance and construction .... have this new kid on a construction crew (around 22) . She is an absolute joy to have around ... full of enthusiasm and working really hard. She jumped in the bobcat and did OK with very little instruction(had some experience on a paving crew before).
Her last words to me before she left the shop last night were .... "Thank-you Kris, I just love this job!" Who could ask for more.
 
#21 ·
A company I used to work for had 3 women running with them, 2 mowed and 1 did just landscaping. They worked well with the guys and yes customers loved them. I had the pleasure of working with the landscaping crew and a lot of the time it was just her and I and she never stopped! she was like the Energizer Bunny kept going and going. The comment in another post about clothing is true, the girl I worked with was very, well lets say she was very top heavy, and one day she tied her shirt in the front and when reaching for a shovel well "they" fell out. I didn't mind,LOL but the lady watching us (customer) thought it was very unprofessional and called to complain. :cry:
 
#22 ·
Thanks so much for all your input!

I am very professional and burn like a lobster, so no need to worry about inappropriate clothing here. Plus my old bosses wife loved me, and we worked alone a lot, so no troubles there. I should be okay that way. Dont want to give off the wrong vibe and put myself at risk when I'm working alone anyhow.

I will be designing my doorhanger today while doing laundry and will get most of them out on Sunday so I can chat with potential customers while they're more likely to be home.

Hope you're all having great weather and business is going smooth.

P.S. I also wanted to say that I will admit in a heart beat that I am not as strong as a man, but that means I just have to do things a little different to be as efficient. I've never had a complaint from coworkers, or my old boss either.
 
#23 ·
"Lisa's Landscapes", sounds like a stright forward name, 1 of my company names is "Floral Designs By Saxon" [ Saxon is my 1st name], This works for Me!!!!!....Being a woman, havein a different name, sets you aside from everybody else.......About mowin, when I started I had a 32" troybilt dedicated mulch mower, my assistant [ a woman, 5ft tall, easily handled that mower [ self propelled ] & we ramped it into our pk-up on 2 -2x6's w/ ramp parts [ ramp ends], since it was a mulcher we didnt need a big truck or a trailer to haul that waste.[ in fact 2 of those mowers fit into a 8ft pick-up]....A few full service accounts wouldnt kill you, and will help maintain a solid cash flow.....We used weekly maintance to get us a start, only did 20 accounts at $20-30 per cut, we did these in 2-days [ not 2 - kick-ass days either[...But it helped get us exposure, we'd put out flyers where we were working [ 5-10 ], and being a woman, if somebody smiles or says "Hello", take it from there, promote yourself & your Bizness....Bein small you can take any small job to start?.....Move that 3-4ft shrub- $ 40-60 bucks, feed those landscape planting $25-75...these prices work for properties 3-5000sq,ft...."Best Advice"....find yourself a good perennial grower [ most are women in my area], get flats of 4" pots, usally 12 to a flat, avg cost is $2.25 per plant [ now very easy for you to double its cost and charge a fair labor rate to install ]....You may want to do a summer special, a 5ft x 5ft bed [ pre-exsisting], offer 30-40 perennials installed for $175.00, plant in bunchs of 7's to get "Bursts of color"......Of course weeding, mulching, edgeing is all extra, soooooooo on the basic job you end up makein $100.00 for an hour & ahalf......[ far more than a grass cutter?]-.....So dont worry, Regards Saxon payup :cool2:
 
#24 ·
I am a 25 year old woman. I have been landscaping since I was eighteen and this is my third year of owning my business with my "little" brother. There are times when I am very glad to have him, like when pulling out 40 year old junipers. But, for the most part, I am capable of doing anything I need to. We hire women almost exclusively (sorry guys) because they work harder consistently and pay attention to detail. But we specialize in working in existing landscapes doing maintenance (beds only, no mowing), renovations, installs, etc. We focus on quality, like not piling mulch up against a tree trunk, and women pay better attention to those details. I prefer not to do new landscapes at this point. My knees are already getting blown out from crouching to pull weeds for the last seven years, and my wrists hurt from deadheading flowers with pruners. I work hard enough, new landscapes would be too much at this point. Repetitive stress injuries are a real issue in the landscape industry.
I totally understand the young voice issue. I also sound like a twelve year old. I look young too, so I have to emphasize my experience and expertise. I have more of a problem with being shy! I am naturally shy, so I have to concentrate hard on talking to people. Usually I'm okay once I start talking about plants.
My best advice is to buy quality tools and find the most efficient way to do things. Steel shovels and Felco #2 pruners are required.
Good luck. You'll do fine.
 
#25 ·
My wife actually owns our business. On paper anyway. She does everything I do out there and loves it. There are somethings I can do qwiker or easier so it's no different then any other crew. You let who is more efficient at one thing do that one thing mainly. Some yards I'm qwiker at mowing or edging or vise-versa. One landscaping we just jump in and do it. I usually have the idea and tell her what to do. She sees what I'm getting at then takes it from there. We also get great response from our customers. She's a great people person and really helps to sell our work. Wouldn't have it any other way.
 
#26 ·
My girlfriend works for my company, and she works harder then anyother employee i have, she has more incentive, but she works very hard, she doesn't get the most work done but she puts forth so much effort, it is truely amazing
 
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