www.gopherforum.com – Buying used outdoor power equipment can be a great way to save money but it can also open a can of worms and end up costing if repairs are needed. How do you know if a used lawn mower is going to be a good deal? Thats what one of our forum members asked when he wrote no the Gopher Lawn Care Business Forum I have found a deal on a 2007 ExMark LZ25KC604 60″ with 25 HP Kohler with 240 Hours. I have been offered this for $3000.00. It appears to be in great shape. This is my first zero turn and I have been looking at Scags and Exmarks. What should I look for before I decide? I think this is a good deal. Any comments or suggestions appreciated. Thankfully one of our forum members is a outdoor power equipment dealer and he knows his stuff. He responded First, are you buying this from a Dealer or from an individual? If from a dealer, will they give you any warranty? Since you have been looking at new mowers of the same brand, how much would a similar one cost you new? Assuming it has no warranty and passes the test as follows below, I would pay no more than about 60-70% of the new price of a similar piece of equipment. Do you know if $3000 is the lowest price you can get on it? Have you tried to get a lower price? Here are some questions you should ask the seller before you buy a used mower. 1. If you are buying from an individual, why are they selling it? 2. Was it used to mow their own yard only? or was it used for commercial use (to mow more than their …
Posts Tagged ‘GopherHaul’
How to inspect a used mower before you buy it. GopherHaul 43 Lawn Care Business Software Show.
Recession marketing ideas – GopherHaul Lawn Care Business Marketing Forum Show
www.gopherforum.com We had a great conversation on the Gopher Lawn Care Business Forum that I wanted to share with you. Feel free to jump on it and offer your views as well. Luna joined up on the forum and wrote Hello! Just joined here and was looking to get opinions on a couple of truck…
Being a good landscaper is not enough. – GopherHaul 58 Lawn Care Forum Show
www.gopherforum.com – Its fascinating the lessons learned by new lawn care business owners who leave their full time jobs to go off on their own and start their own business. A member of the Gopher Lawn Care Business Forum shared with us some of the issues he ran into when he got started. He wrote Its one thing to manage a business for someone but its definitely another to own a business. I thought that because I was a great landscaper people would just call. I thought wrong. I now have an interactive website and advertise locally in the community papers. I am trying to make the community aware of the services that I offer. I think many employees of lawn care businesses tend to not realize how difficult it is to find work. They are normally told where the job is and what they need to do when they get there but rarely are the involved with the sales process. That tends to be where the magic happens. A lawn care business owner who is a good salesman, can find much success in the industry where a quiet more introverted business owner may struggle a lot more to get attention. When I asked this lawn care business owner to share more of the lessons he learned as he started his own business and how it differed from working for another lawn care company he responded I learned that in order to grow I need to have systems in place that allow any person with reasonable landscape experience to deliver the same results every time the customer was visited. By this I mean an employee …
How to win home owner association lawn jobs – GopherHaul 49 lawn care business training show.
www.gopherforum.com – Trying to crack open customers that live within certain homeowner associations can be tough to do. Especially if the HOA is a gated community. One lawn care business owner figured out a way to get their foot in the door with a interesting marketing tip. They shared with us their lawn care marketing secret on the Gopher Lawn Care Business Forum, where you can download the newsletter and they wrote we are sponsoring a neighborhood association newsletter that reaches 86 homes. Currently, we take care of two customers in this sub-division. Ifyou are in need of free lawn care marketing material for your lawn care business, please visit our site at http We have hundreds of free lawn care logo, flyer, door hanger and web templates you can download and use for your lawn care business. We also have free lawn care business contracts, estimate and proposal forms. Download our trial version of Gopher Lawn Care Business Software. Gopher will help your lawn care business schedule and invoice more customers in less time, allowing you more time to grow or enjoy your life. Check out my lawn care business blog at www.lawnchat.com and my lawn care business forum at http
Lawn care business growth of 200% – GopherHaul 60 Lawn Care Forum Show
www.gopherforum.com – What would you do if you received a phone call from a local landscaping company and they offered to give you all their lawn care customers? Would you find this to be a curse or a blessing? At first glance it may seem like a fantastic opportunity to jump on, however there are many issues to consider. This is a situation a member of the Gopher Lawn Care Business Forum was facing when he wrote us about it. How much growth is helpful and how much is too much? He wrote “I just got a call from another landscaping company in town who has been doing yard care as well as landscaping. He wanted to know if I would be interested in taking on his yard care clients as he has decided to concentrate on landscaping only. He is willing to turn them over to me, however I am not in the position of being able to handle them all. It would increase my client base by 200%, which would require hiring guys. The extra work would be awesome, but here are my issues. Ifyou are in need of free lawn care marketing material for your lawn care business, please visit our site at http We have hundreds of free lawn care logo, flyer, door hanger and web templates you can download and use for your lawn care business. We also have free lawn care business contracts, estimate and proposal forms. Download our trial version of Gopher Lawn Care Business Software. Gopher will help your lawn care business schedule and invoice more customers in less time, allowing you more time to grow or enjoy …
Improve your chances of selling more. GopherHaul 44 Lawn Care Business Forum Show.
www.gopherforum.com – With many small lawn care businesses, the owners tend to feel there is more money when you get in and get out fast. However as we will see in this discussion, offering more services than simply lawn mowing can help you be on the job site longer. The longer you are on the job site, the better your chances are of meeting neighbors and others driving by. These meetings can lead to adding new customers. One of the members of the Gopher Lawn Care Business Forum asked a question that kicked off this discussion I thought of a neat idea for all of us. Everyone will state what services we offer & explain how you go about doing them if you want. This will give everyone a clear idea on what services they might add to their business. Ill start. Services I Offered. Gutter Cleaning Weeding Spring Cleanups Topsoil/Fertilizer/Grass Seed Hedge Trimming Branch Cutting THE SERVICES I WANT TO START: Grub Eliminating Aeration, $50.00 a yard is the cost around here. Driveway Crack Sealing (id add dye to the sealant to create the aged color) THE SERVICES I DONT WANT TO START: Gardening, planting Tree Removal Anything that keeps me in the same spot for the entire day. I dont like to stay in one spot doing a big job, which could bring me really nice income. I like lawn mowing because its quick & keeps me moving, I tackle a lot more & it feels great. I do weeding, but personally I hate at a job site for even more than 5 minutes. As for landscaping in general, even if Im good …
GopherHaul 14 – Lawn Care Business Entrepreneur Show part 2.
Hello everyone and welcome to Gopherhaul! If you don’t start your business this year, you’ll be at least 1 year older when you do so get started today! GopherHaul is a show for entrepreneurs and new business owners. In it we discuss business tips and tricks we have learned over the years and share with you some real world experiences on how to help your lawn care business or any other business grow. Thanks for watching. Our lawn care entrepreneur business forum has just been jam packed with amazing business and marketing ideas since our last show and I am in no way going to be able to cover it all now but I do hope to cover a bunch of it. If you want to read more get on the forum at www.getgopher.com In this episode we will be talking about: * How you can make money in the fall with Halloween decorations. * How to use myspace to market your lawn care business and your holiday decoration service. * I put up a couple new free lawn care business door hanger templates you can download and edit to fit your needs. * Advice on estimating leaf cleanups from our friend Keith of startalawncarebusiness.com We will announce the winner of our previous shows Door Hanger and Postcard giveaway thanks to plan-itgraphics.com * We will also be letting you know of a new free giveaway of vinyl signs from Tony of amw-graphics.com If you are in need of free marketing material for your lawn care business, please visit our site at www.gophersoftware.com. We have hundreds of free lawn care logo …
How to estimate gutter cleaning – GopherHaul Lawn Care Business Marketing Podcast
www.gopherforum.com If you are looking to submit some bids this season to clean leaves out of your customers gutters make sure you read this article first. John got on the Gopher Lawn Care Business Forum and asked his gutter cleaning question. He wrote I have been asked by a neighbor to do a gutter cleanup. She has gutter shields in place but wants to make sure everything is cleaned out and down spouts are good. Her house is 2200sq. and about half of the home has gutters. I do not think this job will take over 1.5 hours but have no idea what to charge her. I have never done this for money just on my own and folks house. Any help would be appreciated. One of our forum members responded by saying I charge $1.00 per foot for a single story and $2.00 per foot on a 2 story. For people I have lawn contracts with I do it free Spring and Fall. I found that a 2 liter soda bottle (cut down) works well for cleaning the gutters. Its pliable enough to get down into the gutter. Take a bucket with you to but the debris in. If you just dump it on the ground, the mess is harder to clean up than the gutters are. I have been doing a national survey with those who provide gutter cleaning services and the charge of $1 to $2 per linear ft seems to be standard across the country. You would charge more for gutters that are higher up or more difficult to get to than lower ones. Here are some common beginner pitfalls lawn care business owners find when offering gutter cleaning. * On my first job …
The fear of getting too many lawn care customers – GopherHaul 41 Lawn care Business Software Show.
www.gopherforum.com – Fear is an interesting topic. It is amazing how the fears we have can effect how we see the world and what we do in the world. A member of the Gopher Lawn Care Business Forum brought up a great topic that has popped up in the past, leading me to think many lawn care business owners may share this fear. He wrote I had a nightmare about gaining 1000 lawn care clients. The problem was, I couldnt afford to serve them. I didnt have the equipment, or the crew. In my dream I wanted to serve all of the lawn care clients, I didnt want to lose any of them. I was afraid that theyd never think of hiring me again if I said no this time, so what happens? I wake up Now imagine if the nightmare was true. In the Spring you send out 10000 flyers and BAM, everyone calls you? Wouldnt that be worse than not having enough customers to fill your schedule? I guess its good to know what your maximum number of clients is. You never know what kind of trouble youll have if you get too many. So you have to think, how many lawns can you mow (comfortably) in a day, multiplied by 5 days a week? Id say 11-12 customers a day, 5 days a week is good for ONE PERSON. If you have a partner, 20 lawns a day, 5 days a week will be a walk in the park! At first I did believe after my marketing, that everyone would call me. Though I simply said, Ill take what I can get, and leave the rest for other companies. The problem as you get bigger is, saying no to potential customers will fill me with …
Lawn care business upsell idea – pressure washing. GopherHaul Lawn Care Business Marketing Show.
www.gopherforum.com – Id like to first thank our friend Mike from the Gopher Lawn Care Business Forum for sharing with us some of the pressure washing marketing material he successfully uses. I asked him some questions on the topic of marketing that I want to share with you. Steve What advice do you have for newer lawn care business owners when it comes to successfully distributing such marketing material? How should one go about using the postcards or door hangers to get the most effective results? Mike: Just like in real estate. Its all about location, location, location. In this case, its list, list, list! Who gets your marketing material is more important than how or what they get. I dont market to folks that cant afford or shouldnt be hiring out contractors. If they cant afford it, then it is a waste of my efforts. If they shouldnt be affording it, then it too will be a waste because they will want the work cheap. As for what the marketing material should say. well, I like promoting what I sell. I stopped selling Pressure Washing once I found that is was only worth so much. I started selling something more valuable Time and convenience. Thats why the card doesnt have a mower or pressure washer on it. It has what I propose hiring me will give them Time to enjoy their free time. Steve: That is a really good point that I think a lot of new lawn care business owners miss. Do you have any advice on how a lawn care business owner can or should determine who cant afford …
