Small Business Challenges of a Landscaper
GROWING A SMALL BUSINESS
Prologue: For the background of this career story, see the separate career story: TRADE – LANDSCAPER involving JM, an older brother who opted for an outdoor career and was joined by his younger brother, TM, to form a partnership, which they formalized in a written partnership agreement drafted by an attorney who advised them of typical family and small business issues and how to hopefully avoid major problems.
The brothers grew their small landscaping business slowly, one neighbor at a time, without the early necessity to invest in major equipment or an extensive workforce. Each brother attended and graduated from a different four-year college at different times, thus permitting the business to be managed by one of the brothers while the other was in college. Between the brothers, their respective college educations proved valuable for both the business side (e.g. keeping proper records of income and expense for profitability analysis and tax preparation plus controlling payroll and business loans) and the services side (horticultural knowledge and landscape design).
Of course, the key factor to growing any business is hard work – and for landscaping, literally physical hard work. The brothers found that their combined hard work and dedication to each customer’s landscaping project provided sufficient income for each of them plus the best (best = most persuasive at no cost) advertising: recommendations from existing clients to their friends and neighbors.
From the outset of their growing business, the brothers had to deal with multiple challenges, most of them common to any small business. A threshold issue is whether – and to what extent – to provide or limit the extent of a landscaper’s services. For example, does the business want to invest in trucks with the capacity to take down huge trees or limit services to light tree trimming?
MEETING COMMON SMALL BUSINESS CHALLENGES
(1) Financial challenge: Create more income than expense; the result is “profit.” This takes time and usually requires a loan (from family or a bank) to get started because “start-up” costs may have to be spent before there is sufficient income.
(2) Key management must remain healthy, especially when a significant part of their job responsibilities require physical labor. When was the last time anyone saw an obese landscaper? Probably never! JM and TM were non-smokers, avoided excess alcohol and led essentially quiet lives but were not immune from – and had to work through – colds and flu. When JM was diagnosed with skin cancer (not unusual for outdoor workers) and later, prostate cancer (which required extended absence from all physical activities), fortunately his brother was able to carry on the business until JM felt well enough and was cleared by his oncologist to return.
(3) Finding and maintaining a reliable workforce. At the outset of the brothers’ business, they could employ friends and children (when sufficiently grown and then not to operate dangerous equipment), as needed. But as the customer base grew, the business required a full-time workforce of adults who would reliably appear for work and then work hard, follow instructions, and need increasingly less supervision. Proof of citizenship or approved immigration status must be verified. Even without a virus pandemic, finding and maintaining a reliable workforce is a constant challenge.
(4) Obtaining and maintaining sufficient financial credit to purchase necessary equipment. Basic landscaping can be done with an old, walk-behind mower plus a wheelbarrow, shovels, and a rake. But large projects require more than a pick-up truck. Special, heavy digging and hauling equipment costs many thousands of dollars. Constant use requires maintenance and every piece of equipment, from mowers to trimmers to back-hoes and trucks, has a limited lifespan.
(5) Plan for eventual departure of key management. This issue is addressed in a sophisticated, written partnership agreement. Important issues to be resolved include the amount of advance notice of intent to withdraw from the partnership, how to value the ownership interests and the procedure to pay the departing partner for their ownership interest.
For JM and TM, this issue is closer to reality, as TM has advised JM that he (TM) will eventually (within the next several years) exit the business and the local area to move his residence close to a child who has moved to a different area of the country.
(6) Consider how to bring family members into the business IF there is mutual interest between current owners and their relatives. Fortunately for family dynamics, both JM and TM avoided any pressure on their respective children to enter the family business. So, for the brothers, this has never developed into an actual issue since none of their children indicated a desire to enter the family business after brief, part-time involvement during their high school vacations.
CHALLENGES UNIQUE TO OUTDOOR, SEASONAL BUSINESSES
(1) Weather is a potential issue all 12 months. Rain happens. And so does a lot worse weather develop (e.g. hurricanes, tornados) as climate change evolves across the entire world. At the least, weather can disrupt outdoor work schedules. At the most, weather can provide extra work activities for landscapers when yard cleanup becomes too overwhelming for the average homeowner.
(2) Winter months render most outdoor projects impossible. This means zero or diminished income available to pay the owners. And of course, workers must – by law – be paid promptly. Typical solutions involve maintaining income through snow removal (itself weather dependent and requiring special plowing equipment) and reducing expense during the work-prohibitive, freezing weather months, by laying off the hired help. But once gone, will they return for warm weather work to meet customer demands? The brothers have continued to cope successfully with this business challenge, but solutions are often impacted by outside circumstances such as the national economy, changing immigration status requirements and worldwide pandemics.
CAREER SATISFACTION
JM continues to enjoy working outdoors with constant access to blue skies (when available), green grass and multiple flowers (in season). As one of two partner owners of the business, he and his brother can arrange their work schedules by mutual agreement. They can please their own eyes and the mood of their customers by creating beautiful landscaping projects. And their physical work keeps them fit. Their dedicated, hard work over several decades, will provide the opportunity to save enough money, when combined with Social Security, to enable comfortable retirements, during which they can sit with their family, out of the sun, lemonade in hand and watch hired landscapers cut their grass and weed their gardens.
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Editor’s note: See also another career story within TRADES – LANDSCAPER
