About the Landscape Juice Network

Founded in 2008. The Landscape Juice Network (LJN) is the largest and fastest growing professional landscaping and horticultural association in the United Kingdom.

LJN's professional business forum is unrivalled and open to anyone within within the UK landscape industry

LJN's Business Objectives Group (BOG) is for any Pro serious about building their business.

For the researching visitor there's a wealth of landscaping ideas, garden design ideas, lawn advice tips and advice about garden maintenance.

Getting started.

Hello All.Just wanted to introduce myself as I have recently started my own garden maintenance business part time with a view to go go at it full time when I am established enough and have enough regular clients to fill my diary, I don't have a time limit for doing that just as and when the time right.I am based in North Hampshire with a mixture of towns and villages in all directions and very short travelling times from my home, I currently have a few regular gardens i maintain and i have also managed to land a regular job maintaining the site for a small private business centre on a fortnightly basis.Would be great to connect with others on the forum for tips on marketing and bringing in new work / opportunities.Any advice for the future is also very much appreciated.CheersJason.

You need to be a member of Landscape Juice Network to add comments!

Join Landscape Juice Network

Votes: 0
Email me when people reply –

Replies

  • Words of mouth is your best advertising. Turning up on time for every job and delivering what you have agreed with your customers is essential. While you are working part time setting up your business, I would encourage you to increase your rates with new customers while you still got your regular job. Another tip is to try to encourage your customers to develop the garden in the leaner times in late autumn. Creating a new border in late autumn to allow the soil to broken down during the winter etc... Keep looking for jobs with the winter in mind such as clearing the gutters and cleaning the patio etc.. You are in prime commuter belt territory where a lot of home owners are essentially happy to pay for someone to maintain their gardens as they would rather spend their leisure time doing something else. Good luck
  • Get a website and spend time on the SEO. Websites bring in good quality leads. And if you get to a point where you're not sure whether to quit the job or not.... do it. You won't look back. 

    • Yeah and along with that make sure it looks good on tablet/smartphone. I set mine up on a desktop and it looked crap on small tablets and smartphones till i changed it. Well over half the google adword clicks are tablet/smartphone.

      • Thanks for all the comments gents, much appreciated. Seams like online and the web is very much the way to go these days so I will spend some time on this to make sure I'm not missing a trick.
        I totally agree with you Andrew, turning up when you say you will and giving the customer a quality job is absolutely essential and sets can set us apart from the competition. I have actually picked up q of my regular jobs just because the previous garden failed to show up the last few occasions and the customer didn't know weather to carry on with him or not.
        What is your thoughts on absolute bare minimum with regards to tools and machinery. I already have a petrol mower, hedge trimmer, back pack blower and strimmer along with a selection of hand toold of course, is there anything else you would suggest may be a good Investment now or down the line?
        • I just have a strimer, mower, hedge cutter, 5-6 hand tools.Total cost of tools was about £1,700 ish. Maybe don't go too hardcore on tools as I'm messed mine up a bit just trying to maintain them. Stupid things like squirting water under the mower to clean it wasn't a great idea.Gauging the oil mix by eye, another mistake!. And other thing's lessons I learnt along the way. If I'd brought expensive to start it would be even more gauling! Anyway good luck, I'm sure you'll be great!

This reply was deleted.

LJN Sponsor

Advertising

PRO

How Do You Qualify A Sales Lead?


I don't know about you, but our phones and emails are starting to get busy with enquiries. I've learned over the years that it's all too easy to answer the phone, arrange a consultation and then spend a couple of hours with a prospective client…

Read more…
Comments: 0