Employees

[DELTA]

This year in southern Ohio the spring had an usually high rainfall follwed by a very hot, humid and DRY summer. I have a small operation and only had one guy to worry about and he didn't last the summer. In the spring I asked myself and am now asking you, "What do your employees do when it rains all day? When the heat index is so hight he Health Dept. sends out warnings and when it so dry nothing grows for over a month"? I know you may answer contracts to the latter questions but I've been reading that a lotof you don't have contracts with residential customers and neither do I. none of them would pay to run over their dried up dead grass in August.Advice on those three issues of kkeping employees working please?

[kutnkru]

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The best way to insure you are able to maintain your hired help when the grass won’t co-operate, is to span out your other services. This way even if you don’t have grass to cut you will have other services that need tending to.

Everyone touches up the shearing at the beginning of the season to make the property look presentable. For those whom only want it done once a year wait until the first week of July to begin your shearing schedule if possible. You could also think about offering a program consisting of every six weeks. Odds are good there will probably only be two cuttings this month anyhow and this can give those additional hours your looking for.

Another alternative is to apply your mulches in mid-late August. This will not only benefit your landscapes, but allow your guys hours they may not have gotten otherwise. When clients request a fresh mulching in the spring simply mention that you will “re-fluff” it while cleaning up the winter debris to enhance the properties appearance and then apply the new product mid-summer so the plants can benefit from the nutrient value during the winter months. This is also a GREAT way to reduce their spring invoicing – Don’t Forget To Mention It!!!

In September offer your Aeration Services. You can up-sell them on an overseeding that’s not beneficial in the spring making yet even more money!!! If you have any clients who signed on later in the year you could offer to power rake them as well instead of bulking up the workload in the springtime.

[DELTA]

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By shearing do you mean hedge trimming, bushes etc.? If so I have read a lot of differnt pricing methods. The dollar a minute plan, the $3 a bush plan and then some say bill your help at $20 an hour. If my partner and I are "the help" do we bill at $20 and hour or $60, that's a big spread?

[qualitylandscaping]

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I usually charge $1-$10 per bush, depending on size. A $1 bush is something like a small Boxwood. And the $10 bushes are the large Forsythia and Evergreens that require a ladder to trim.. The dollar per minute is about on line with the way I charge. I can do a 8' tall Fiesta Forsythia in about 9-10 minutes.

Hope that helps!

[kutnkru]

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<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><b>Originally posted by DELTA</b>
<i>By shearing do you mean hedge trimming, bushes etc.? ... The dollar a minute plan, the $3 a bush plan ... do we bill at $20 and hour or $60 ...</i><hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">To answer the shearing question:
Yes, this is in reference to shrubbery. I prefer to shear shrubs and prune trees - just my prefernce when addressing these services to clients.

To answer the billing question:
This is up to you. If you have an idea of how long it will take you to do a job you can decide if its better to bid by the site (per plant). Otherwise, I would use the hourly rate. You need to decide what best suites your overall needs. Can you recover your costs and meet your profit margins at $25/hr, $30/hr, or do you need $60/hr or more.

[Scaper-S2k]

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Delta, I live in your area, probably pretty close too. We didn't have too many days that we got rained out. Yes, we had buckets of the liquid, but most seemed to be at night. Thinking back, we only got totally rained out a few days. Some of my guys will still work in moderate rain.

I'm anxious to hear how everything is turning out for you this year. If you could use it, I can pass alot of work your way if needed. Hope all is going well.