Above Par Lawn Services

[aboveparlawnservices]

What's up guys my name is Jason. I started my business only 3 months ago after being laid off for the year at the golf course I work at. I've been working grounds crew for a few years now mowing golf greens, fairways and tees. I absolutely love working out doors and love this industry. I earned a degree in Agribusiness/Turf Management from my local community college and am furthering my education with a degree in horticulture. I am working on building my client base right now for the 2013 mowing season but have a feeling I'll be returning back to the golf course March 1st for another year there and running my business on the side to see how this first year goes. Promoting myself and the business next year I feel will help me a lot. I didn't have business cards made up before my last day at the golf course last year so I felt I really missed out on some potential clients. I know at least 50 names of golfers that go in there. I work a 5-1 shift at the course and feel I'd still have plenty of time afterwards to handle all of my accounts. I have 13 service agreements made as of now but I'm nowhere near the number I would need to feel I could make it my only job. I'm needing some help on trying to determine what my business is worth at what I should sell my time at. I don't want to just set an hourly rate based off of what someone else is doing, I want to know what my EXACT number needed is. I know what I want to make per year, I know what I've invested already, I know how much it is to drive per mile in my truck, but I'm having a hard time trying to determine things such as how much gas I'll use, cost of oil and routine maintenance, and totally confused about depreciation values and how to mesh it all together to find my magic number. I don't really have an accountant or anyone I could talk to on how to put this all into perspective and I can't really afford to spend money on finding out at the moment!

[Steve]

Welcome to our forum!

I love your business name and you got a great logo! Nice work on all that.

Have you figured out how much you are spending for gas, maintenance, and equipment for the customers you have now? Can yo scale that up to the level of customers you want to see a projection of what it might cost you?

Then you could add things like license and insurance costs plus any other overhead you have that isn't going to rise with more customers.

[aboveparlawnservices]

gas, maintenance, and equipment for the customers you have now? Can yo scale that up to the level of customers you want to see a projection of what it might cost you?

That is what I'm working on tonight. It's tough though for me because since I just started up a few months ago all I've really done is leaf cleanups and a few small snow removal jobs. I haven't actually been out there mowing for anyone yet. I have around 15 customers as of now that I'll be cutting for this Spring but I have no clue how much gas I'd go through.

With all the other numbers plugged in so far my hourly rate is right around $45 per hour. I may just bump it to $50 to cover everything I may be missing and use that for my first year or so. I am good about keeping money in the right places and plan to just take certain percentages of monthly income and put into it's necessary account. I figure by this time next year I'll have a better grip on things. I just don't want to sell myself short.

[Steve]

That sounds like a great starting point. Now once you get rolling this spring, keep us posted on how the gas usage changes and how it effects what you need to charge per hour.