9 mos vs 12 mos clients

[Sunrise]

some clients are not gonna want you for the 3 slow montsh during the year. what do you say to someone when they say they want to go 9mos??? are you charging these two clients the same??? if so..how do you explain to them that they are getting billed the same amount no matter whther they do 9 or 12mos??? lotsa advice needed.

[Extreme Lawns]

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I charge the 9 month customers a little bit more. I over seed the 12 month customer with rye grass. So I am at there house every 2 weeks in the winter time. I also offer a discount if they want 12 months of sevice if they pay in advance. Some customer will go for that. And I told some customers that I told them that they will get charged the same no matter if its 9 or 12. But then I lost alot of bids by doing that. Tell them you can offer some discounts on some services like fall clean ups or something that will get them to go with a 12 month contract. When they hear the word "discount", most of them say yes. But dont go to low on there discount, you still need to make money.

[Scott]

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I offer free winter rye to my customers and keep the fees the same. If it's a small yard I also toss in some winterizing ferts w/pre-m. Medium to large yards I charge accordingly.

[kutnkru]

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Im going to take anb educated guess at the fact your down south because a snow factor would have you shut down for 3 months -LOL!!!

What I would do is take the total cost of services for mowing, edging, etc. that they request for lawn care and simply divide that number by the total number of months they wish to pay. It doesnt seem to me that the bill should be increased or decreased based solely on which method of payment they are choosing.

If their bill is $1500 for the year then its $125 month for 12 monthly installments or $166.67 for 9 monthly payments. The better alternative to a client paying you over a 12 month span is A- YOU will have a guaranteed income of X dollars per month from each client and B- THEY will have a lower payment each time they cut you a check making it easier on their billfolds -LOL!!!

[Sunrise]

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<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by Scott</i>
<br />I offer free winter rye to my customers and keep the fees the same. If it's a small yard I also toss in some winterizing ferts w/pre-m. Medium to large yards I charge accordingly.
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

you are offering something for free. you are not raising your price based on the fact that you have to aerate and then overseed with rye(which takes time). i know you don't have to aerate, but your seed gets better soil contact when you do this. I was thinking of offering this as well, but not free....that way i really do look like i'm doing something for 12 mos.

[Sunrise]

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<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by kutnkru</i>
<br />Im going to take anb educated guess at the fact your down south because a snow factor would have you shut down for 3 months -LOL!!!

What I would do is take the total cost of services for mowing, edging, etc. that they request for lawn care and simply divide that number by the total number of months they wish to pay. It doesnt seem to me that the bill should be increased or decreased based solely on which method of payment they are choosing.

If their bill is $1500 for the year then its $125 month for 12 monthly installments or $166.67 for 9 monthly payments. The better alternative to a client paying you over a 12 month span is A- YOU will have a guaranteed income of X dollars per month from each client and B- THEY will have a lower payment each time they cut you a check making it easier on their billfolds -LOL!!!
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

yep, I am down south.[:p]

when or if someone ever asks why they are getting charged the same for 12 mos vs 9 mos what do you tell them? they aren't getting as much bang for the buck in the winter than in the spring. I understand what you are saying and I agree.

I just wanna be prepared in case someone asks me this(who knows...i may never have this problem).

[Scott]

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Sunrise I do offer aeration but it's not free. I can buy 50lb bags of annual rye for $16 which covers something like 15k if the birds don't feast on it. Perinnial is $32 but takes 1/2 as much. If I wasn't to offer this for free my residentials would say, "See ya next year". The minimal cost of seed is compensated by having lawns to mow all year. Otherwise I'd be done mowing mid Oct to early Nov, then not start up again until late March.
On yards that pay me per visit I use annual and ones that pay me monthly, ie; commercial, I use perinnial(sp?) seed.

[Sunrise]

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scott- okay. i see....if you had 50 clients and you seeded all their lawns for free that'd be at least $800 outta pocket. assuming all wanted that of course. thanks for the info....it is nice to see what others are doing.

[Scott]

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Most yards here are 50-70ft across and 80-150ft deep which equates out to 4000-10500sq ft. I average one bag per two yards, so if I had 50 clients I'd be only spending $400 out of pocket which would generate $35 on the average yard times 50 which comes out to $1750 per cutting cycle compared to $0. I think that's another fair trade off I can live with since it's only once a year.

[Green Giant]

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Good God already!
40 services per year @ 25.00 per cut....$1000.
Over 12 months.....$83.33 per month.
They are spreading out what service they get for the "busy" season over the course of 12 months. You are "financing" them!
They will still be getting some kind of service during the slow months,right?Maybe 30 services during the peak? There are always things to do during the slow months.
If they want to go 9 they'll pay more and the property will look like crap by the time the next busy season rolls around again.
I'm busy 12 months. Only once or twice a month during the winter months doing just maintenance BUT I still make the same money. More even because of landscaping and mulch jobs.