#1 Tip to Grow Your Lawn Care Business: OFFENSE is the Best Defense!

Where is google maps? Okay. I'm so lost.

Good morning, everyone. Welcome to the vlog. Today is going to have a little bit the good, the bad and the ugly of running a business, per usual, basically par for the course. So today, several things are happening. Right now I'm headed to go talk to the landlord and at command center. So the problem we're running into right now is that we are, you know, not bursting at the scenes, but it's pretty busy at the command center and it's kind of there's more people in our office than the all the other offices in our complex together combined. So there's a little bit of them wanting us to get another office space, but we've made it work. We run 15, 16 hours, we have different shifts, etc. I think it's just fine. But there's other tenants complaining. So I've got to figure out how we can make them happy without us having to go pay more for rent. Because we're trying all possible to survive one more year until we have the shop, the new headquarters that we're building. So I want to make them happy and make us happy by not having to get another place to rent. Then more importantly, really, really lousy is we are having to close down kind of our first location ever. So last year we had one location that we allowed out of the franchise because of a divorce and, and it was gonna get really ugly, so we let them out of the franchise. This time though, it's kinda like where I have to step in and say, this location has to close and it stinks dramatically. The reason is because at the end of the day, if a franchisee is not holding the standard of the business, not following up with customers, not doing a good job, not showing up to appointments, not using the systems and the software, eventually it comes to the point where I have to let them go and cut them loose because it'll affect the brand and it'll affect the other franchisees. Surrounding them is a fun process. No, fortunately, the one that we having to do this with is understanding. They realize their error and they've agreed that it's the right thing that they not be allowed to continue with the franchise. This still stinks. I hate it. The whole process of having to go through this is annoying, but it has to be done to keep the brand integrity so that future franchisees, as they fill in around their territory, are not affected negatively. They started off only a couple months ago. They're actually doing pretty good, but they basically dug themselves into a very deep Hole because they were not following the systems. And now they're so far behind with work and estimates and people were calling and they were missing estimates. So we have to eventually say, look, if you're not gonna follow the systems and make stuff up on the fly, it can't be a part of the system. It's bad for the brand. So it just is lame. It's not fun process, especially. Cause every one of these people, when you know the owners that we start a location, it feels like part of me, part of my business. And I put my own blood, sweat and tears and training and we put our money into it. And it stinks to have to close one. But onward and upward. So today, just a lot of calls, emails, zoom calls, fun stuff like that. But first off is this landlord meeting. Hopefully trying to get us a little more breathing room. All right, so I think we're at our landlord's house, house office, really confused. We were lost, we thought. But this is like a house.

So just leaving the landlord's office. It went okay. It went okay. We're gonna try to move the other tenant and pay for that because there's another tent that's complaining because we have a lot of people and are growing. And so we're gonna try to make peace and have them move to their unit and pay for them to do that. Hopefully that works.

Hey, Ron, thanks for the meeting. I really appreciate it. Just kind of after our meeting, like, I just kind of decide, like, if there's. If having that second suite is gonna help her or you, please let me know and we'll go forward that that's the solution. We'll go ahead and do it. I don't know how much it'll help her, so maybe just communicate with her about that. But if having that is gonna help you or her and it's gonna solve things, I am open to that. So just let me know. We'll stay in touch. And again, I really appreciate your time.

There was a lot of cash going out and you said maybe turn down that marketing faucet, which I didn't do because I do have a fifth employee starting Thursday. He's leaving a good, secure job to come work with us. And I just wanted to make sure doing all I can to have work for everyone.

But the question is, I'm now booked out for fully through May for five employees. And we're winning more estimates that are going to be booked stop booking into June.

So I'm wondering, maybe I hire a six. I feel like I'm a little Bit out on a limb financially. But then again.

I think if I want to grow, I just got to take that leap.

And.

Like you said.

My best defense is offense. Higher, higher people.

Voice notes in the middle of an intersection.

Hey, Jeff. Yeah. So I think it's a good problem to have. Like we've talked about before, I think you can kind of do a little bit of both, and that is raise your prices, especially in the projects where you're getting booked out now. You know, even if you raised it five bucks an hour, I don't think that's going to hardly even affect your close rate, honestly. But it's going to give you a little more confidence to go out and hire that sixth person and take advantage of the growth you're experiencing. So especially, you know, I think once we get six, that's kind of where I'd say we can kind of sit for the remainder of the year, really put some cash aside. But we've grown a lot already, especially to get that six person. So at this point, where the labor economy is at, if you can find a six person, I'd go for it. Definitely have my blessing on that. And I think you could at the same time raise your hourly rate on projects by five bucks. I don't think you'd honestly hurt yourself at all. And you'd have plenty of work. And again, like you said, if that sixth person left, you'd have five solid people still. And we can turn the marketing down at that point. So that would be kind of my two cents. If you're still, from a financial standpoint, able to keep growing, I'd go for it. But I would go ahead and raise your rate just a touch and give you a little more flexibility and a little bit more confidence to do so. Let me know if you have any more questions. Okay, let's roll. The best defense is a great offense. I was talking to one of our franchisees yesterday, Thomas, and he's a great employee. His first employee is really, really good. She's amazing. And he's struggling to find more like that. And he's feeling vulnerable because he has all his eggs in one basket of another of an employee. If she left, there'd be all that weight would fall on him. And he's feeling very vulnerable. And I told him the best defense is a great offense. In football, in any sport, you've got to score enough points. And if you really focus on that, you don't need to worry so much as much about the defense. Now, obviously, we got to control costs. We can't just spend frivolously, but at the end of the day, if you feel like you are vulnerable to one of your employees leaving, that is the time to go on the offensive. Go get another hire. So that way, if someone did leave you could you have 10 employees and one person leaves, you can make up for it. It's no problem. But you could be also your greatest vulnerability. Because if you're the only person working like, well, I don't have employees because I don't want to have the vulnerability of them not showing up to work, you are your greatest vulnerability. If you get hit by a bus, if you break your leg, if you got to go to a family emergency for two weeks and something happens, the business stops. Grow out of that. Go push yourself a little bit. It's not easy. And right now, yes, there's a labor shortage. It's not easy to find people. I understand that, but don't let that be the excuse. In 2022, we had 2021. I couldn't find find anyone. It was really difficult. So I didn't really grow. I just stayed by myself. I had ambitions to grow. I had ambitions to become bigger. I had ambitions to talk about marketing and scaling the business crane systems, but I didn't because of the labor shortage of 2021. Don't let that be an excuse. Yes, it's difficult. Yes, it's hard. I get that. But at the end of the day, we cannot look back at this year and say we put our goals on pause because of a labor shortage. No one cares. When we look back in 10 years of about this year and this labor shortage, do not make excuses. Stay on the offensive. Figure out the solutions to the problems we're going through in our businesses. End of the day, we'll have more points on a scoreboard.

Hey, what's Mike here? If you're part of the 10% of people who actually got to the end of the video, congratulations. And also, you should definitely make sure you follow me on TikTok and Instagram. Always posting there every single day. And we actually show the prices of jobs that we do in short form videos. Check it out.