Start a 6 Figure ALL ELECTRIC Lawn Care Business For UNDER $5K

Hey guys. Welcome to another episode of Zero Turn. Today we're down here in Florida talking with Vlad Lynn from Mo Eco Friendly.

So if you're wondering, oh, can electric even take all these big jobs? I mean, I have video and footage of me cutting my grass like four feet tall.

We're going to hear about how he's been running his business with residential electric equipment.

Yeah. We're much quieter. Right. We're not bothering disturbing you that you're quiet. Yeah.

I love your work. I hope you don't ever go anywhere.

Stick around though. We have a special surprise for you that you're not going to want to miss on this episode of Zero Turn.

There's big changes coming. I don't want to reel too much.

Hey everybody. Welcome to another episode of Zero Turn. Today we're here with Lalon from Moeco Friendly. We're going to be asking him questions about how he got started lean and how, how he runs a eco friendly lawn care business. Battery operated, no gasoline. Let's talk. Jared. Thanks for coming on the show. Vlad, thank you. Excited to have you on.

Nice to meet you. Yep.

How did you get started in the lawn care business? Can you give us a little bit of the background?

Yeah. So, you know, I've always like mowed my own lawn since I was a little kid and I really enjoy being outdoors and kind of being like active and everything. And you know, I got tired of what I was doing before this in a different industry and you know, I decided, hey, you know, coronavirus just kind of hit and how can I bring in like a stable, consistent income? And you know, I decided, hey, let me just this lawn care thing a shot. I thought about it before a couple years ago and I wanted to think about how can I stand out because a lot of the competition around here all, you know, using gas, you know, it's there. They look like the same guy that came before. So, you know, being a younger generation, I'm always thinking about the environment. So I thought, okay, well there's a, you know, a pretty good decent market now on all electric equipment for lawn mowing. So I did a lot of research and different brands out there that offered electric lawn care equipment. And I decided to pick on one of the ego, which is the larger ones out there. I've been happy with it overall and that's how I kind of got started with all the electric.

What did your original setup look like? Was it just a mower or did you go get like mower trimmer blower?

I pretty much had like A startup capital about $5,000. That's including getting LLC started, insurance, equipment and everything. So yeah, I started off with the 21 inch ego mower. I had the multi head which is like the string trimmer, edger, hedge trimmer and everything like that. And then a handheld blower and a couple batteries and you know, that was running me probably under $2,000 right there for equipment. And then I got a 600 DOL 4x6 trailer and I use my own personal vehicle and I got started starting moy lawns very quickly.

Do you find that it is a little bit cheaper to go electric or is there the higher price tag?

Because right now because I'm doing such a small setup, there's not really a good market for commercial 21 or 30 inch mowers right now. So I do have to stick to like the residential ones that are still pretty good. Like I said, I've been using it like full time now and they hold up to the commercial wear and tear that I'm using. So in that sense the price is a little bit cheaper because I don't need to go buy a 30x mark. That's like 12, $1300. My mower only costs like 6, $700 so I'm almost the price of half. So it does save there. Now some of the stick equipment, I would say they're about half the price that really would change is electric versus gas. Is the batteries like, you know, my most expensive battery is going to be almost $500 each, you know, and you know for a day you probably need a couple of those. So yeah, the upfront cost that you're paying for for batteries is definitely going to be higher. But of course I'm not refueling every day or every other day or even every week for my equipment. It's a more long term investment. Like we, you know, you invest now and then in the future. Like we don't have to put that much money into the maintenance and repairs and just getting the equipment to operate now.

Yeah, if you can miraculously get rid of my weeds.

Yeah, yeah, we'll work on that. Yeah.

Can you kind of run us through like you have things laid out, kind of what your workflow is in here?

Yeah, I mean, you know, I sharpen all my blades right here, so that's usually kind of the first thing I come in. I sharpen them every day just to keep a nice sharp edge. And then I have all my chargers here for my battery. So I'll charge them up and then you know, I'll Once the battery's done, I'll just put another one in that's already, you know, low on batteries, and they'll sit here and charge. The longest one usually takes about like a little over an hour to charge. And then the fastest is about like under an hour, so they get charged up pretty quickly. And then for the larger mower, I just use one of these. I plug it into the side right here and again overnight. And by the time I wake up in the morning, it's fully charged, so. And it's ready to run for, you know, six, seven hours.

Obviously you're not paying for a gas, but is your electric bill substantially higher or have you not?

I haven't noticed anything. So I tried to look online of how much it really was. You know, maybe at the end of the day, my electric bill went up maybe like 2, 3, 4, $5. Again, the expensive part was actually buying the batteries but actually keeping them charged. It's almost not noticeable.

Yeah. Better than gas prices.

Oh, yeah, definitely.

Yeah.

Yeah. Much more convenient too, because I don't have to like try to find a gas station. What's it gonna cost waiting in line, fueling everything up at just at the convenient of my own shop. Come in, charge it up. Yeah, that's it.

There you go.

And then for maintenance, do you do the your maintenance on your own?

That's the good thing about electric. I mean, there's not much for maintenance. Little WD40, sharpen a blade. You know, maybe, you know, a little screw is missing. I had to go to Lowe's once to replace the screw that fell off and I lost. But there's really hardly any maintenance. I mean, anyone that you know that doesn't know too much about working on an engine or anything, like, can definitely operate all electric equipment. You just press a button and it turns on. There's no cranking anything. Checking the spark plugs. You got to change the air filter. There's none of that to worry about. It's just pushing a button and it goes like. It's just like your phone. You press the on button or you tap the screen and it works. That's the great thing about all the electric equipment. At least with this brand, I've had any problems with it.

Well, do you want to run through your equipment? And we can see kind of how everything was priced out and what you got going on for your setup.

So we got this one new here. This is our new edger. It actually just came out with ego. Like this week it says the line iq. So you Know, we don't have to adjust the line anymore throughout the project because it just kind of adjusts. It makes the job a little more efficient instead of, you know, constantly checking the line throughout the day and then replacing. It is very easy with this equipment, too, because you just press the button. It winds up the string trimmer line all the way inside the equipment, so it's very easy. And again, starting all this is so simple, you know, you just press a button like this, and it turns on. There's no, you know, pumping up the fuel. I remember I used to have one of those string trimmers. You got to pump up the fuel, and then you got to pull the line. Oh, don't forget, is it on cold start, or is it, you know, like all that other stuff? There's none of that to worry about. You know, I just put the battery in, press the button, and it goes. And, you know, and a lot of people, I have, like, other competitors that actually stop me, and they ask me, hey, how's the equipment? Like, is it powerful like the gas equipment? I haven't had any issues, you know, I mean, we deal with Florida grass, which grows, like, in 30 minutes. It's already grown, you know, in July. So it definitely handles, I think, pretty well with some of the gas equipment that's out there. Yeah. This one here is our multi head that we got with ego. So we can just take this off here and pull this off, this bottom part piece here. And then I have a longer hedge trimmer for some of my taller bushes. It reaches, you know, about like, 10ft or so. So again, it's just a push of a button here when the battery's in, and it'll just turn on and go again. None of that, you know, pumping the fuel or, you know, cranking the start. It won't start. Why is it not starting? Like, you don't have to worry about anything like that. And then here we got the ego 6:50 blower here. So I really like this one. The reason I decided to go with the handheld blower is because we're in Florida and it gets so humid here. So having a backpack blower on, it's heavy because the commercial series backpack blowers have the batteries in the back instead of on the equipment. So, I mean, it would just make the back, like, so sweaty. It's so hot here. This one here definitely has, like, a lot of power. I think it definitely competes with some of the gas equipment when it comes to, like, how powerful it is. It does a great job. It's Easy to maneuver. And it definitely has the power to blow off everything, especially when the concrete is wet because we just had a downpour and you know, it does. It has a good enough power to take care of all the debris.

Yeah, that's crazy. How much did you pay for the blower?

It was, I think, I don't remember. It was around 2, $300 at the time. When I bought it with the battery was probably like maybe like 350. 350 bucks.

So big reveal here.

It's gonna be a game changer out here for sure.

So we walk us through this piece of equipment. What is it and how much did it cost?

All right, so, yeah, so this is the mean green WBX 33 inch mower. It's all electric at the time. When I bought it almost a year ago is about $10,500, including the charger and everything like that. So it's.

It's really good.

It's 33 inches. So the reason I got them a little smaller of, you know, they make larger mowers, I mean, green. But I bought the small one because we really primarily use our service properties under a third of an acre. So it's really good because it fits through those $0.30 gates that people have in their backyard. So this fits with no, no problem throughout. There has two blades underneath there. It has two batteries, as you can see in here, if you want to take a look. Pretty much two car size batteries. So we just plug them up right here on the side at night. And you know, the run time on these things are like six, seven hours. It's pretty good. Yeah. I mean, I can change the height on it, you can change the blade speed. So when we're doing with that thick grass that we have here in the summertime, you know, some of these clients don't mow your grass for like a month. And they're like, hey, come mow my lawn.

Wow.

So if you're wondering, oh, can electric even take like on these big jobs? I mean, I have video and footage of me cutting like grass like four feet tall, you know. Yeah. It takes time, just like it would for a gas equipment. It's not like it's running through like, you know, a vacuum on a carpet, you know, but you know, it gets the job done though. Definitely. I've been really happy with it. I definitely think it's a lot better than my other mower I have when it comes to cut quality. And it's super fast. You know, speed, it goes up to 5 mph. Which is like you're almost jogging behind this thing when you're, you know, in the lawn. So, of course, you can tone it down to, you know, turtle speed, but it does a great job. And the maintenance on thing has been pretty much very, very, very minimal. You know, I just got sharpen the blades. I do that, you know, every. Every now and then. Maybe every couple days or a week, you know, maybe greased up the wheels a little bit. That's one thing I've had a little bit of issue on these front wheels is they would get stuck. But I think just a little bit of greasing of those bolts inside the little nuts, and they're good to go. They're back in operation, you know, and then these back here, you know, you got to check the air pressure every now and then. That's it. There's nothing else to do. You know, there's no. No spark plugs, no oil filters, like I said, you know, there's no cranking anything. There's very little moving parts. I mean, when this thing is operating, all you hear is the blade spinning. That's it.

So this is the trailer, right? Yeah.

Very simple. Lean.

Yeah, very simple. Clean.

Very lean.

Very clean.

Yeah. Well, it's clean right now After a long day of work. There's bush trimming and clippings all over the place. Doesn't always look this well.

You know, what do you do if you do need hallway debris? Do you tarp over your clippings on.

Yeah, so I have a tarp in right here, and I have some ties up to tie it up so it doesn't fly away. And. Yeah, I'll cover it up. And then we have a dump right here, and I'll take it to the dump, and, you know, you pay the $6 fee.

And.

And there you go.

That's it. So this is the main mower that.

I've been using now.

This is the one.

Yeah.

How's this been working for you?

It's been good, you know. You know, obviously you want to make sure you have enough batteries for it, because with those taller grasses, the blades are gonna be moving faster, and you're gonna be draining through your battery. So definitely want to make sure you have enough batteries for it. The cut quality, it's good. It's not as good as the mean green mower. So if someone's looking for something a little larger that wants a little better cut quality. Yeah, definitely go with the other one. That's something I would say is probably the biggest negative with this mower you know, with this type of grass that we have here, mainly St. Augustine, you get a lot of stragglers, like loose hairs, almost like a mohawk going through the grass here. So there's a lot of. Sometimes you got to go back and double cut, you know, even with a gas equipment. I know that happens as well. So. But yeah, really good. I mean this mower right here with a 10amp hour battery, you know, it will cost you about $699 plus tax. A lot cheaper than some of those commercial grade gas equipment. But yeah, it's great. There's very little maintenance. You just press this button here, you pull this back and it'll up. So it's really good. Another great feature is it's very compact, especially if you're starting out, maybe out of your own garage like that. And you pop this up and it stands up. It's very, very easy to store as well. You know, it, you know, the arms fold up again to, you know, for storage and from transporting and everything like that. There is a bagging system as well for here. But you know, here in Florida we don't really do a lot of bagging, at least in this area in Florida. So I, I really don't do a lot of bagging. But there is bag if you needed to. So it's held up great for the, you know, for the commercial side of things. Like, you know, I've hit into things of course, and there's no cracking or anything on it. Yeah, it gets a little scratched up and a little dirty and stuff. But it's held up to the wear and tear and the beating that I do with it.

Yeah.

And the Florida turf. Yeah.

Have you had a time when the batteries have died out on you? Midday.

So like with no battery, like completely no battery. So I do a good job of making sure I have like working efficiently throughout the day. One of the struggles I have is bringing on employees. They're still trying to figure out how to be efficient. So sometimes they're using too much power when they don't need a lot of power. And we're draining batteries a little bit faster than we should. So it's about just coaching them and talking about how to be efficient on that, you know, and it's just, it's always important again just to make sure you have enough batteries. Like we can't just go to the gas station to fuel up more gas. So you kind of again have to have that long term investment. Okay. I gotta store extra batteries in my vehicle or my truck so that Way, I have enough for the amount of jobs that I have for that day. So I've never actually had to like die out in the middle of the day. I've been pretty close, though. But again, if. If that becomes a constant consistent thing, then maybe it's time to upgrade and get a few more batteries in my, you know, inventory. So we don't have that issue. But if it. You know, when I first started out, for example, I didn't have this so many batteries. I only had a little bit. So what do I do is, well, I would come home, have lunch, and while I'm lunch eating lunch, I would charge up the batteries and then that would give me enough juice to finish the rest of the day out. So. Yeah.

And then do they all run off of the same battery or is that different than these?

So for this, all this EGO equipment, it's all the same battery. There's different size batteries. My smallest is a 4amp hour. They also go as low as 2 and a half. But I don't think it's good for commercial use because I don't need it to die out in 20 minutes. And then they go all up to 10 for now. But yeah, they use all the same battery. And I can swap them in and out, which is great because if I'm running out of juice on my bigger batteries for my mower, I can put one of the little batteries just to get the property done so I can finish off for the day.

Come with us. We'll see how this actually works out in the field. We're gonna go out on a job with Vlad.

Let's go.

So we're gonna be mowing here today. We're gonna be mowing it at the height of four. You know, at one point. We did try at three, but we're happy with the result at four.

So pretty much, you know, the property line, you know, use the fence and right here.

So.

And then I'll edge the soft edging, like I said, like on the other side right here. And then the same thing when you get into her, like, backyard. Remember how we talked about yesterday, kind of getting those straight lines in, kind of like starting after this tree. Try to get like your lines straight right here. You know, it looks really good if you can do that. She's, you know, she really take care of her yard, as you can see, Linda does. So. And then, yeah, try to get whatever you can, the borders again, getting those lines in, because it looks really nice when it's straight here.

And then there's a Little strip on the other side right there. But you can go down there with your mower. You're not gonna hit any of those rocks at 4. The little stepping stones just go right through. Just go one time past that way. Okay. Whatever you don't get with the mower, I'll go with a weed wax.

It's simple. Not too bad yard. It's mainly more I, you know, with the stick equipment you have more work to do here. The mowing you get done pretty quickly here. Yeah. Okay, let's do it.

Obviously this property that we just did here, it's. It's a little bit more complex. It's not just like a nice square patch of turf. How do you go about rolling that into your estimate? Is there more things that you have to consider when you're doing small patches of grass in different areas throughout the entire.

It's a little bit. So one way to look at it is like, okay, so because it's such a small turf area, we're probably going to spend less time mowing and we're going to spend more time like edging and weed whacking. So that's kind of where like the balance is. Well, okay, we're doing less mowing, but we're doing less weed whack and edging. If it was like a typical yard, it probably would pretty much be the same price. It's just instead of using one equipment, we're doing the other. The way I price my yards is all about like how much time we spend on the property. So overall it's about the same amount of time I would spend on a property like a normal house with a garage in front and everything. So it's just using different equipment.

So when you're doing a property like this, you're obviously mowing, blowing, trimming. How do you lay that out on your actual estimate?

So there's a, you know, top line item there as weekly lawn care service. And then below we'll have your bi weekly rate as well. And then in the estimate description I'll put out what that includes, which will be mowing, blowing, string trimming and edging as well. So they'll have everything that we're doing. Because a lot of customers will ask does it include blowing or edging and stuff like that? Or edging the flower bed. So all that isn't going to be in the estimate description of what that includes for weekly or bi weekly mowing service.

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I love the way you edge because it's all clean lines with my dark mulch and then the edging. It just makes my yard pop. All my hard work. And you fixed that side there.

Yeah, thank you. I remember how it looked like.

Yeah, it's beautiful now. Now. Yeah. If you can miraculously get rid of my weeds.

Yeah, yeah, we'll work on that. Yeah.

I recommend you to everybody. You do a fabulous.

Thank you. Yeah, I've definitely grown here. I got like a dozen clients here now.

What's that one? First?

You were my second. Well, second in Oakland Park. Okay, well, technically second in business too, actually. Yeah, yeah. Second client. Yeah. So. And then I got Louie right here with the red car. Teresa.

Oh, you got Louie finally.

Yeah, I had him for like two months now.

Oh, good.

Yeah, yeah. And then some neighbors in the back right here. And then definitely trying to grow the noise.

Busiest crew.

Oh, Louie for every Tuesday.

Their crew.

Yeah.

And we'd be like, oh, they're getting the lawn cut.

Yeah.

Because you can hear it all the way down here.

And it was loud. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We're much quieter. Right. We're not bothering disturbing you that you're quiet. Yeah, yeah. Well, yeah, they come in, they're in and out real quick and they're bringing those big equipment on, you know. And you don't have those tire tracks, right, that show up in the yard. Yeah.

Like in bed. No.

Yeah.

I love your work. I hope you don't ever go anywhere.

No, no. We're trying to get bigger. Got our first part time employee and maybe full time soon and getting a new truck soon and everything. So there's big change coming. I don't want to reveal too much for the audience and for you. So we'll see. Yeah. Okay. Everything's good though.

As far as a customer like this, you've had her for a long time. What kind of goes into building that relationship with the customer, really making it so that they want to stick around for so long?

Well, for one thing for sure is, you know, providing value. You know, you have to make sure that you're doing a good quality service for them. And another great thing is communication. So, you know, if they need something adjusted or like an additional service or a little bit flexible on their schedule, it's good to be responsive and quickly respond back to those customers. And, you know, of course, pricing accordingly for it. So, you know, a Good thing like this is, yeah, you get their mowing as a mowing client, but then it's upselling them into additional services like bush trimming, weeding, mulching and other things like that. So, you know, being able to provide some of those additional services for them that they might need really definitely brings the value back to the customer.

And so we'll be doing a few more properties in this area. Obviously, route density is really important when it comes to this maintenance work.

Yeah.

How do you go about kind of planning out route density and what do you do to attract more customers in the same sort of area?

So for this particular neighborhood here, I do a lot of door hangers. So I'll spend, you know, maybe a couple hours every month or so and go out and just pass out door hangers. I use a lot of those Insta quote ones. So that way the client already knows what their weekly and bi weekly price will be. And that really does a great job because like I said, you get to choose which properties, which neighborhoods you want to market to. And you're already doing a lot of the neighbors in that neighborhood. So, you know, you're down one street and you do a couple houses on that same street. That's great. It's building around density. And again, just being present, you know, I've gotten clients in this neighborhood, not only have they gotten my door hanger, but they see me every week out here consistently saying hi to the neighbors that, you know, that walker by, and they just see this presentable, consistent lawn care company out here and then they're like, wow, I really want someone like this. You know, obviously they're doing a great job mowing, but it's all that other stuff that they're bringing value to.

We're here with Sameed. You're the first employee here for MOW Eco Friendly. How did you guys meet? What's kind of the story there? How was it bringing on your first time part time employee?

So it was pretty tough to find him. He was actually an old friend from pretty much middle school. I was remembering his older brother.

It's a tough to find him.

Yeah. So I've known him actually a really long time and I think that's a great way to kind of start off like a business. Like when you're by yourself, solo operator, try to find, you know, a friend or family that's someone that you can really work well with out in the field. So that's kind of why I brought Simeon on. You know, I known him for a long time. You Know I'm comfortable with be around me and he's been a great asset so far.

How has the battery powered equipment, how is that done? I know you said you maybe done a little bit of lawn care in the past.

Oh, it's much better for sure. Yeah. Because I used to use gas powered stuff and the gas powered stuff, you have to crank it, you know, it's much more tedious and these ones are like silent. You don't have to deal with the noise. You can put on your headphones and hear music clearly and you know, obviously it's environment friendly so everybody wins.

You know.

Like what are the few key things to set yourself out as like a brand compared to just another truck in a truck?

Well, one thing I definitely think is you need branded uniforms. Make sure that you and all your employees are wearing a uniform out there as well as getting your trucks labeled. Even if it's a simple like just what I have right now, which is a vistaprint car magnet at least like the client knows who's parked in front of their house, who's on their property and just you know, start off with some of the cheap, you know, online presence options. I mean you get a Google my business page for free and it takes only just a little, maybe half an hour to maybe pull it together and then consistently add photos to that. Start building branding that way, you know, get a Facebook page, any other social medias that had start make a paid a channel for that YouTube, TikTok, whatever it is. Start building brand awareness and think about the kind of content that you want to create. Are you bringing content for the industry? Are you bringing content for the customers? So think about your desired audience and how that can benefit you. If it's your clients, obviously you're educating them, you're showing them that you're the leader and you're the knowledgeable and the one in the industry and you're teaching them how to do things. And yeah, they're not always going to do it themselves. They'll come back to you and say hey, this guy knows what they're doing. You know, let's hire him to do these services.

Speaking of branding, make sure you stick around. We're going to be talking to Vlad about how he's going to be changing his branding and adapting coming into the future, so stick around for that.

What would you say to somebody that's worried that their prices are too high? They're scared to raise their prices.

Your mowing is really your entry door into getting to the clients property. So you Might have to price your mowing jobs a little bit lower than you really want to. Like your profit margin not gonna be as high. But as soon as you're a mowing client to them or they're your mowing client, you know, you can upsell them to bush trimmings, weedings, mulching, and you can mark up those services a little bit higher to make up for the loss that you have in mowing. And usually when a client of yours is already doing mowing, you know, to get bush trimming or mulching, they're not gonna go shop around again. Who's gonna give me the best bush trimming, mulch estimate? Most likely they're gonna hire the guy that already does they're mowing their company. So again, make up those lost profits and some of those not as recurring, those monthly jobs every two months or even a one time project, make up some of those losses there. So it'll help out when you're not mowing as much as profitable as you want to be, and then again as you grow, then you can raise your prices. So where you are just as profitable.

In those mowing projects with upselling, a lot of people get kind of wigged out. They're like, oh, it's kind of sleazy, like I don't want to upsell. How have you got over that bridge of like closing with your customers, selling them the extra products here and there when they need them?

So, you know, I know you mentioned a little bit, hey, we're here in Florida. You know, I think no matter where you are in the country, you can always try to find something on a property that needs to be taken care of for the client. Sometimes they're so busy with their family and their work, they just don't see some of the things they need to get done. You're kind of those second pair of eyes on the property and you know, yeah, it could be kind of like uncomfortable to go up to a client cold and say, hey, you know, do you want to get an estimate or here's an estimate for this kind of service. But I think in the long run, those customers really do appreciate when you do that. Even if they don't accept your service. You know, they're like, hey, I'm not interested. But they know that you're out there looking for their property, looking, trying to bring more value to them and increase the property value for them as well. So I think don't be so shy about it, you know, like, yeah, they're just probably not thinking about it and you coming in and saying, hey, you know, let's trim those bushes for you. Let's get you a fresh. Some fresh mulch in your landscaping. You know, like, they're going to be like, wow, like, they're not just coming on my property mowing. They're actually looking, how can I make my yard even better, you know, look more beautiful and make the other neighbors jealous, you know?

Yeah, it's really like you're helping them out by doing it.

Yeah, exactly. And again, that brings your value up, you know, so that way, when you price increase in the next couple months or whatever, you know, they're gonna be okay. Well, they're always looking out for my property, for the best thing. I don't mind paying a little bit more this year.

So big reveal here. You're gonna be joining Augusta. Yes.

What kind of push you to actually take your brand, Mojia Friendly, and transition that into the Augusta brand?

Well, you know, I follow a lot of what Mike puts out there for the public, and, you know, I really try to follow closely. I mean, he already has the systems in place, and he has a proven track record, especially with his franchisees. Like, hey, what he's producing, his systems out there is working. It's bringing in profit. It's good for the employees, and, of course, changing the level of industry and for lawn care and landscaping. So I started off doing a little bit of, you know, following a few things like that. Then I got into the landscape business course. And, you know, I like what he was, you know, showing there for landscapers and lawn care operators and, you know, and then I got lawn care web design on there, and I look at the value that he's bringing to the franchisees. You know, a lot of the things if you were to do a la carte that he provides will be greater than, you know, just joining the franchise and having the leadership that he has at Augusta there with Lee and everything, and, you know, all the franchisees there as a support and networking. I really feel that together we can really grow this company even bigger this year behind Augusta as their brand.

Totally. Yeah. Just using those systems that are, like, kind of in place is kind of like.

Yeah. You know, I really enjoy, like they say, like, creating systems on my own, but I really enjoy, like, you know, like, making money. You know, at the end of the day, that's what we're in business for. So, you know, if Augusta has these, you know, systems already in place so we can expedite the process of growing your business business successfully, then you know, I think it's definitely worth joining the. The franchise for sure.

So you went with the solo operator model, right? Because now there's growth. Solo operator. What was your thought process behind that? Because you're talking about growth. Why did the solar operator model kind of like, speak to you over the other one?

Well, definitely price is a big one. You know, if. If I could have. If I had the money, I would definitely have gone with the growth right away, but I don't have the capital. Especially now with the price increase for 2022, I definitely don't have that. But. But with just me being here with just one part timer, I think the solo operator is gonna be great. I think it's still gonna be very beneficial for us down the road. We're definitely gonna look into as we grow, of course, past 20k a month, we're definitely gonna look, most likely, yeah, definitely gonna be joining the growth model.

You've implemented. P4P. Somebody say P4P? Yeah, P4P. It's a better way to pay.

Check it out.

P4psoftware.com, send daily reports to your guys and get a scoreboard so you, as the owner, know what's going on in your business. P4P software dot com. And then you're transitioning into Augusta, which obviously we pay for P4P. What is that kind of process? What was your mindset about wanting to implement it?

Well, I definitely saw the benefits right away, even before I had my first employee. Of the benefits of having P4P. I mean, you know, you know, you send a crew out to a route, for example, the day, or even a project, you don't know if they're stopping at a million gas stations or just on their phone or sleeping in the truck. And I didn't want to have to worry about that. You know, I thought, what's the best way for the company to be efficient and for the employees to be efficient? I mean, with P4P, I'm not going to be worried about them, you know, sleeping on the job while I pay them. And as well as they have the opportunity to make more money, you know. So, yeah, our base pay is, you know, X amount, let's just say. But they have the opportunity to make more money so that way they can bring home more money. And if they can finish a job, you know, a couple hours faster and go home and spend it with their family or with their friends, like, why not? You know, even with just working with him, I see that there's, you know, inefficient times where he's waiting on me or I'm waiting on him, you know, and we're, you know, kind of losing out on efficiency. So when he's on his own, hopefully later this year, you know, he's going to make even more money than what he's waking with me right now, which he'll prefer it, you know. Yeah. So it'll be great. Sorry for the noise again. That's not our crew, you know.

And how have you liked P4P compared to like other like hourly rates? I prefer. Yeah.

Because yeah, there's more of an opportunity to make money, you know, and for people that enjoy making money in a short amount of time, it's definitely a benefit, you know, I mean, most people would agree. Some people just like the flat hourly rate. It just depends on how you work, you know. For me, like I said, I'd rather, you know, increase that minimum amount that I can get by working more efficiently. You know, it's, it's like, it's the way I like to work, you know, it's. I prefer it over a flat hourly rate no matter how hard or how little you work.

What is your goals for 2022 as you grow the company as some needs to join on what's in the future for you?

So for right now, I think with just me and him as part time, I'm looking to at least do 150k for the business. If Sammy joins in full time or if I can get another part timer I have possibly in the books maybe starting up hopefully this month or next month, we can definitely, I'm sure, hit, you know, 170, 180 maybe. Plus, you know, with my website ranking well and with the branding kind of going a little bit. I know we're switching to Augusta, but Augusta has a really strong brand on its own. I think that'll really beneficial. I mean, we, you know, being all electric, being in those yellow, bright yellow trucks and uniforms really going to stand us out compared to the competition out here. And I think that's definitely going to bring in a lot of revenue. It's gonna be a game changer out here for sure.

Totally. No, that's awesome. Well, I appreciate you having both on the show. Thank you so much for coming on. It was an absolute pleasure. Thanks so much for talking with us. That was awesome. So if somebody's in the central Florida area and they're looking for either a great place to work or great maintenance service, where can they find you guys?

Well, right now they can find me at moecofriendly.com or moecofriendlymail.com but moving forward, going to Augusta, I'll be Augusta of Winter Garden.

Gotcha. Gotcha. That's awesome. Well, check out either Augusta winter garden or moecofriendly.com if you guys are looking for a great place to work or a great lawn care service.

Guys, don't be fooled. I'm freezing. Just because we're in Florida does not mean it's warm. But you know what is warm? Our invitation to you to sign up to be on Zero Turn. Go to mikeannies.com signup and you could be on the next episode of Zero Turn. I want to see you there and be somewhere warm.

Please.

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