What a business angle!

[Steve]

I think this is a killer application. WOW. An all electric lawn care operation! What a marketing angle they will have over other companies. What's your take on this? Good, bad? Would you like to do it? Does it give you ideas? Lawn care company goes all electric - There's a new lawn care service in Fort Collins that is quietly and cleanly cutting its way into the competition. Clean Air Lawn Care uses electric riding mowers, push mowers, trimmers and blowers to help their customers feel as good about themselves as they do about their lawns. All of the company's equipment is cordless and is recharged with electricity generated by the city of Fort Collins' wind power program. AND they use a Toyota Highlander hybrid to serve as the company vehicle!!!!!

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They will be in business for a long time. I have been thinking about start changing over some of my equipment to electric. Think of the gas that you would save. My biggest worry, is the life of the equipment and power

[Steve]

I think this is going to be huge in the future.

Do you have anyone selling such electric equipment in your area? Are these mowers professional grade?

I personally have not seen a mower that you can ride on in the area. Lots of small push mowers though

[Steve]

I think I found the vendor.

http://www.electrictractor.com/

[Steve]

Here is another site that may be of use.

http://www.electrictractor.net/

[Steve]

Troy, can you imagine getting your hands on one of the electric tractors and then writing a product review for a trade publication?

[Steve]

Just as an update i wrote to ngingerich@electrictractor.com of electrictractor.com and I am hoping one of their staff can pop onto the forum to tell us more about their product!

Originally Posted by [b

Quote[/b] (Team Gopher @ July 11 2006,4:47)]Troy, can you imagine getting your hands on one of the electric tractors and then writing a product review for a trade publication?

I think that would be a blast to do product reviews for companies. If that was my job, I would definetly do it

[electricox]

Thank you to all for your interest in Electric Tractors. My name is Trevor Parker and I am a management consultant for the Electric Tractor Corporation. We are located about an hour and a half outside Toronto, Ontario, CANADA.
We are the only production facility in the world for Battery powered lawn tractors.
The Electric OX above is able to cut up to four acres of grass on about $1.50 CDN worth of electricity. It will plow snow for up to five hours and pull up to 7500 pounds. The OX is comparable to a 23 hp gas tractor but with considerable more torque.
We presently produce up to 5 tractors a week and are working at doubling our production capacity to 10 a week.
Every day that gas prices go up, we get more emails and telephone calls. We are frantically trying to keep up with the interest from around the world. We ship to the US, latin america, england, france, mexico. You name it.
As well as being a consultant for The Electric Tractor Corporation, I am also the owner of Canada's First Zero Emission Lawn Care company. My company is called icLECTRIC.
www.iclectric.com. Please excuse my primitive website. It will be overhauled shortly.
All the equipment I use in my business are powered by electricity. Cordless and corded.
I have been in business for almost five years and love what I do. My business certainly draws attention. I have been featured in a national newspaper and a Toronto daily.
My business is centred around the Electric OX. I love this machine. The primary reason I came to work at Electric Tractor for a period of time.
As well as the OX, my other cordless mowers, trimmers, leaf blowers, and hedge trimmers are all products that are readily available in most major retail outlets across north america.
For anyone considering this type of business model, I would strongly suggest it. With one disclaimer. It takes a certain level of patience in your equipment to make this technology work. If you run out of battery charge, you need to have a backup battery or machine to finish jobs.
When cutting long or wet grass (residential), I would suggest using a corded mower. I use a black and decker. For the rest of the time, use cordless.
Can you make money at this type of venture? Absolutely! One of the things you will notice is you will get a fair bit of free publicity. Just by advertising your company as a zero emission lawn care company, you will find journalists contacting you to do stories on your venture. Free publicity is the best kind of publicity possible.
You will have customers wanting your services just because you are environmentally friendly.
As for commercial grade cordless equipment. I have spent years contacting many of the major equipment manufacturers about producing cordless lines. The usual response is they haven't looked at. The reality is this type of technology is very controversial. The politics of oil. There are a great many people out there that don't want our technologies in the marketplace. Maintenance on the OX is minimal which means it is a threat to mechanics jobs (especially unionized parks staff). This is a major myth as there are maintenance things to do on the OX. Not much, but there are things that a mechanic could do. It is all about mindsets. Some people are scared of change and scared of new technologies.
That is all for now. I have to go build tractors. I will post again soon.
Sincerely,
Trevor Parker
president - icLECTRIC
www.iclectric.com (please excuse the primitive website. I am doing an overhaul on it shortly)
iclectric@rogers.com
and management consultant for the Electric Tractor Corporation
www.electrictractor.com
electrictractorcda@yahoo.com

PS. The other electric tractor pictured above is a conversion done by a fellow member of the Electric Vehicle Society in Toronto. His name is Brian Edmunds.