Working on the business, not in the business
This year has been a very tough year financially. Along with many unexpected large equipment repairs, our labor costs also rose. Along with our aggressive growth, we also made many changes which were amplified by the growth. The biggest downfall was changing the guys from commission pay to hourly. The hours got out of hand, […]
Red Flag Customers
When doing landscaping or any business, you are going to have the easy customers and then the difficult customers. The easy customers are the good ones and are the ones you want to have. The difficult customers are not worth working or. They will give you a hard time and maybe not even pay their […]
Benefits of new equipment
Since I started the company, for the most part I have always purchased used equipment. I have searched craigslist autotrader you name it. Each year I have tried to purchase one new truck for around 5 or 10,000 dollars and this worked in the beginning. The trucks would break down occasionally, but with only one […]
One, Two, or Three Man Crews
This is a common conversation in landscaping. Should I operate with one, two, or three man crews? Well there are several ways to look at it and no 100% right answer. The biggest factor is going to be drive time. For us, for example, we have some very tight routes. The less drive time you […]
Finding Help
This spring, finding help has proven to be a much larger challenge than in the past. In the past, simply putting up ads on craigslist has worked for us. This year we have had to go a little further. We have found that the quality of leads on craigslist is pretty poor. Have to filter […]
Commercial Maintenance Equipment
Currently, for each crew, we provide three different lawn mowers: 1) Primary mower Each crew has a primary mower which is a 52″ hydro Ferris. The favorites are the 52″ walk behinds (pictured above). We also have a Ferris 52″ ride on mower but the quality of cut isn’t as good. We have also used […]
Lawn Care Advertising
Through my small businesses I have tried many different approaches to advertising. I have tried the following methods: Keep in mind that using more than one method of advertising has building benefits. I have read that a customer has to see 7 of your advertisements before they act on it. For example, people may […]
Bobcat for Landscaping
Last year, we purchased our first bobcat skid steer. We purchased a 1991 753 model. We bought it for $3000 but it needed quite a bit of work. It came with a trailer as well, so we did get a great deal. However, it had leaking hydraulic lines which had to be replaced. It still […]
Safety Training
Safety is starting to become important in our company. When we were smaller with only a couple employees, it was less important as there were less people in the field to get hurt. In 2014, we had 2 workers comp claims: One was for a hurt back, and one was for an eye injury. With […]
Management structure
As a company grows, you need to have some sort of structure which has become evident. Each position needs to have clear responsibilities so there is no confusion as to who is in charge of what. As it stands now we have me, who is in charge of the company. Working under me is our […]