Hire A Customer Care Team
Do you remember that almost all on-demand apps like Uber have customer support features? In case of disputes or controversies between user and service provider, the team helps resolve all problems encountered. That is what your app should have a support team.
The number of employees will depend on the app size. But you must keep in mind that users dont like to wait they want to get the assistance right away. Thus, ensure instant help to your audience in case it needs one.
Why Does It Become Trendy
As noted above, yard work is not the favorite thing people strive to do after a tiring week. Previously, it was much more challenging to find a lawnmower. Newspapers ads that is everything lawn owners could rely on. But times are changing, and digital technologies run the show. And on-demand mowing app development was just a matter of time.
Where theres demand, theres supply, you know. Today people are ready to pay for making their lawns clean and good-looking. Other people are willing to mow lawns and get money for it. Lawn care apps help connect both parties. So starting a lawn mowing business is far from being a bad idea.
Why Should I Start A Lawn Care Business
A lawn care business could be the best and easiest step towards self-employment you could ever make. With a lot of businesses you require vast amounts of capital wheres with a lawn care business, you could start with as little as a pickup and a used lawnmower and line trimmer and a blower. In fact, you could lower your costs even more by using the line trimmer as a blower. When I first started mowing lawns, there were no blowers so for the first ten years, or so I used to turn the line trimmer on its side to blow grass off paths and such. Using a line trimmer for this can work but it is not easy to do, and you can only do small areas.
One of the best things is that lawn care is a low entry-level business. You can start off with very little money invested. The low entry cost will turn out to be a blessing and a curse for you. The good news is that this will enable you to get started very quickly. The bad news is that everyone else can do that too. If you stick around for a while, you will get used to seeing people come and go.
Another great thing about this industry is that the cash flow is consistent. When you start off with any business cash flow can be a worry. However, in this industry, you get a reoccurring income from day one. You book a lawn, and you turn up every week or fortnight to cut it. A regular income like this is the nearest thing to a regular pay packet you can get being self-employment.
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Establish Your Pricing Structure
Most lawn care companies base prices on the size of a lawn.
To come up with a competitive rate, calculate the total square footage of your lawn. Then, get estimates from a bunch of companies in your area. Have family and friends do this too so you can set your prices that arent too high or low.
Make sure you factor in the cost of materials, labor, equipment, and business overhead.
Are Lawn Care Businesses Profitable
Whether your lawn care business is successful depends on what you put into it. To have a successful lawn care business, you should focus on:
- Targeting certain customers
- Marketing through advertisements, social media, referral programs, etc.
- Providing accurate quotes to clients
- Tracking your revenue and profit accurately
Aside from making an effort with marketing, youll also need to keep an eye on your numbers, like the cost of goods, overhead, and cashflow.
A key aspect of your potential success is to strike a healthy balance between growth and profit.
In other words, if you can scale and grow your business strategically and carefully, then you can run a profitable lawn care business.
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Get Your Business Financials In Order
When you’re starting a landscaping business, it’s crucial that you keep your finances on track. And we’re probably past the days of using a pen and paper to keep track of all your business expenses, schedules, and accounts. Even spreadsheet applications, though capable of handling large quantities of information, are a bit outdated.
Luckily, there are plenty of business apps out there that can help your landscaping business operate more smoothly. There are apps and software to help with everything from inventory management and payroll to employee timesheets so you can focus on the important things like actual landscaping work.
Clayton also recommends accounting software for new landscape contractors. You’ll be able to manage invoices and, depending on the program, even automate fixed asset management.
S To Starting A Lawn Care Business With No Money
1. Understand the Industry
In a recent publication released by a Professional Land-care Network , an international association serving landscaping professionals, lawn care professionals, exterior maintenance contractors, installation/design/building professionals, and interior scapers, there are an estimated 10,000 individual lawn care service providers and approximately 12,000 landscapers in the united states of America.
This statistics covers independent operators, franchises and large corporate chains. They also stated that the number of professional gardeners could actually be considerably higher because there are so many people doing lawn and landscape maintenance on part time and on a pay as you go basis.
Lastly, according to the Occupational Outlook Handbook, published in 2006-2007 , is that almost 1 out of every 4 landscaping, grounds keeping, nursery, greenhouse and lawn service workers is self-employed and provides maintenance services directly to customers on a contract basis. Of these, about 1 out of every 6 works part time.
Even though lawn care business might not be amongst the money spinning businesses in the US, but they have a very large market that is readily available for them. All they need to do is to convince property owners, corporate organizations and the government to patronize their services.
Interesting Statistics About the Industry
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Lawn Care Pricing: How Much To Charge For Your Services
Lawn care pricing strategies determine the survival of your business. Coincidentally, lawn care pricing to be the #1 thing many lawn care business owners don’t get right.
When you properly price your services, you can grow your business faster while ensuring the success of your business.
This lawn care pricing guide gives you:
- A FREE pricing calculator to fix your prices in under 10 minutes
- A complete guide to pricing your services to increase sales and improve reputation
- The best pricing strategies to maximize your profits with simple lawn care pricing strategies
After reading this article, youll know exactly how to properly price your lawn care services to kickstart your business profits and growth.
Critical: Test Your Lawn Care Pricing
This is the lawn care pricing strategy for many lawn care business owners:
- They count their operational costs
- Then, they add 5% or 10%, depending on how they feel
Thats it.
Many of your competitors never test their prices, which is why it feels like the green industry constantly undercuts itself.
People are afraid to try anything… They’re afraid to talk to their clients, and nobody tracks data to figure out where they can make more money.
However, you can do better.
Make pricing part of your culture!
- Get regular pricing feedback from your clients
- Evaluate your prices on a set basis
- Keep the value you can give to your clients at the forefront of your mind
Do all of these things, and you’ll be well on your way to becoming a richer, happier lawn care business owner.
Now, comes the next part… the hard part the part that makes so many lawn care business owners squirm in their seats
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Cost Of Starting A Lawn Care Business
7 min read
Starting a lawn care business can be a rewarding, lucrative profession if you can get it off the ground. But as the saying goes, you typically do need to spend some money in order to make money.
How much money do I need to start a lawn care company? The cost of starting a lawn care business can be as low as $500, but a successful business requires some investing for equipment, marketing and sometimes hiring additional staff. You can start your business as a solo endeavor where you do all the work yourself, or you can hire part-time, full-time or on-demand labor.
Most lawn care businesses typically range from $5,000 – $8,000 in order to get started .
When planning your business, you may want to consider the following types of cost:
- Business structure
- How to impress potential clients without a lot of cash
Are Lawn Mowing Businesses Profitable
They say that money doesn’t grow on trees, but perhaps it does in grass. There’s no denying that lawn care is a growing sector.
Plenty of middle to high income households these love their lawn to look great, but don’t have the time or the inclination to get out there themselves. And there’s plenty in it for the lawn mowing entrepreneur too. Work your own hours, get fit and tanned in the great outdoors, start a business quickly with few overheads and low risk, and get out there as an active member of your local community.
The pros of running a lawn mowing business are obvious. But what about that big worry – profitability? Plenty of fly-by-night ‘entrepreneurs’ will tell you mowing lawns can make you $50,000 a month, but they’re almost certainly full of grass clippings.
Crewcut operators can earn anywhere upward of $1,200 a fortnight. But you get out what you put in. If you start that business right, run it diligently and grow it intelligently, the sky is pretty much the limit when it comes to income.
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Getting Your First 10 Clients
Itâs time to get down to brass tacks: finding people to give us money.
Who is our target audience?
The first thing we need to do is understand WHO needs our service. There are really only two necessary characteristics:
The best place for us to start is by using our existing network. Social media is an extremely powerful way to get information out there. If youâre not on any social media platforms, just twist your friendâs arm to help you out.
Post on Social Media
A simple post on a few platforms, such as Facebook and Instagram, is sure to get us a few clients. Letâs copy the paragraph below and fill in the blanks.
Hey, everyone! Iâm starting a lawn care company called and would love the chance to service your property. Iâm offering and estimates are completely free! Shoot me a message and we can go from there.
If youâre willing, please share this with anyone you know who you might be interested!
Thanks,
Simple, but effective! You could also use that as a script for a video if you feel comfortable with that.
Using Other Websites
There are a few other great options out there to help us get the word out about our business such as Craigslist and Nextdoor. The Nextdoor app allows people in the same area to talk about relevant topics to their neighborhood. Many people use it to request services such as lawn care. Weâll keep an eye on these.
Protect Your Intellectual Property With Trademark Copyrights Patents
If you are considering starting a landscaping and lawn care business, you will not have need to apply for intellectual property protection. But if you just want to secure an intellectual property protection for your companys logo and brand statement, then you should go all the way. But the truth is that most landscaping and lawn care business owners do not consider it a priority hence they dont have any intellectual property protection.
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Research And Apply For Financing
Starting a lawn care business can get expensive, especially if you have to start from scratch when buying equipment. Several financing options exist, from business lines of credit to using your retirement funds as capital without tax penalties . Evaluate your available options and choose the one that make the most sense for you.
Have A Startup Budget For Your Lawn Care Business
Work out in advance how much you want to invest in your new business and how long it will take to generate the income you need to cover your living expenses. Do remember that it is a sliding scale as well. The more income you make at the beginning, the less of your savings it will cost you to cover living expenses. I will give you an example here.
I am assuming that you already have a vehicle for this scenario.
You spend $1000 on equipment to start your business. It could be new lower-end commercial equipment or slightly higher-end but second hand.
Your savings are $4000 and your living costs are $500 a week.
If you could increase the growth of your business by $50 a week and pay yourself 60% of turnover then your first few months then it would look something like this.
- Month one = Turnover $500 Income $300 Living expenses $2000 = $1700 loss
- Month two = Turnover $1300 Income $780 Living expenses $2000 = $1220 loss
- Month three = Turnover $2100 Income $1260 Living expenses $2000 = $740 loss
- Month four = Turnover $2900 Income $1740 Living expenses $2000 = $260 loss
- Month five = Turnover $3700 Income $2220 Living expenses $2000 = $220 Profit
It is going to take you five months to reach BEP , and it is going to cost you $3920 out of your savings.
If you could increase the growth of your business by $100 a week and pay yourself 60% of turnover then your first few months then it would look something like this.
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Step : Register For Taxes
You will need to register for a variety of state and federal taxes before you can open for business.
In order to register for taxes you will need to apply for an EIN. It’s really easy and free!
You can acquire your EIN for free through the IRS website, via fax, or by mail. If you would like to learn more about EINs and how they can benefit your LLC, read our article, What is an EIN?.
Learn how to get an EIN in our What is an EIN guide or find your existing EIN using our EIN lookup guide.
Small Business Taxes
Depending on which business structure you choose, you might have different options for how your business will be taxed. For example, some LLCs could benefit from being taxed as an S corporation .
You can learn more about small business taxes in these guides:
There are specific state taxes that might apply to your business. Learn more about state sales tax and franchise taxes in our state sales tax guides.
What Are Some Of The Biggest Costs
If you stay small, say around 50 customers a week, you will be able to control costs to a manageable and predicable level. However, as you scale your business and begin hiring workers to help you with the work load, costs will escalate. You will need to consider factors such as rising minimum wage issues, payroll taxes, healthcare taxes, and workmans comp insurance. You will also need to spend on administration and bookkeeping of all of these costs because they can add up to more than most people realize. Probably the most burdensome aspect of running a labor intensive landscaping or lawn care company is the rising cost of labor and everything that goes with it.
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Youre Our First Priorityevery Time
We believe everyone should be able to make financial decisions with confidence. And while our site doesnt feature every company or financial product available on the market, were proud that the guidance we offer, the information we provide and the tools we create are objective, independent, straightforward and free.
So how do we make money? Our partners compensate us. This may influence which products we review and write about , but it in no way affects our recommendations or advice, which are grounded in thousands of hours of research. Our partners cannot pay us to guarantee favorable reviews of their products or services.Here is a list of our partners.
Step : Get Business Insurance
Just as with licenses and permits, your business needs insurance in order to operate safely and lawfully. Business Insurance protects your companys financial wellbeing in the event of a covered loss.
There are several types of insurance policies created for different types of businesses with different risks. If youre unsure of the types of risks that your business may face, begin with General Liability Insurance. This is the most common coverage that small businesses need, so its a great place to start for your business.
Learn more about General Liability Insurance.
Another notable insurance policy that many businesses need is Workers Compensation Insurance. If your business will have employees, its a good chance that your state will require you to carry Workers’ Compensation Coverage.
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Financing A Lawn Care Business
Getting the necessary tools and training to start a lawn care business can be an investment. Since the majority of individuals dont have such large sums of money readily available, many choose to apply for small business financing. Good funding options for lawn care or landscaping companies include:
- Equipment leasing. With so much high-value equipment needed to start a lawn care business, equipment leasing can be a great solution. Rather than buying equipment outright and paying a large sum upfront, this option gives you access to the equipment you need by paying a monthly fee thats a fraction of the cost.
- Small business loans. The most common type of business loans is offered by the Small Business Administration. These loans boast low interest rates and long repayment terms, making them ideal for business owners, and theyre also guaranteed by the federal government, meaning banks will be repaid up to 85 percent of the loan even if it defaults.
- 401 business financing. Once a little-known method of business financing, this method is becoming more popular. It allows business owners to use funds from their 401, IRA, or other pre-tax retirement plan to start or buy a business without incurring tax penalties.
- Unsecured loans. Similar to a credit card, this option allows business owners to borrow money and repay at will, without needing to put up any personal property as collateral.
