Forum

I’ve been reading this forum for a while but this is my first post, so I’ll introduce myself properly.
I’m Max, I run Mini Acres Garden Co covering North London and Hertfordshire — mix of maintenance rounds and hard landscaping projects. Been in the trade for years.

Like a lot of people here, I’ve tried most of the job management software that’s available. Jobber, Tradify, ServiceM8, Powered Now. They all do the basics reasonably well, but I kept running into problems that none of them solved.
The big one was profit visibility. Not a report at the end of the month — I wanted to see the real margin on each visit before it happened. That means logging your monthly running costs (van, insurance, fuel, dump fees, tools, phone, the lot) and spreading them across your actual working days — whether that’s 5 or 6 days a week. That overhead figure then sits against every visit in your schedule, alongside labour and materials, so you can see what you’re actually keeping on each job. Not what you’re charging — what you’re keeping. None of the existing apps do this.
The other thing that drove me mad was the patchwork. Enquiry comes in on one app, quote goes out from another, you win the job and schedule it somewhere else, then invoice from Xero or QuickBooks at the end. Four systems for what should be one workflow. I wanted the whole journey — enquiry through to quote, quote accepted into a scheduled job, job completed into an invoice — all in one place, on my phone. No re-entering information, no switching between apps, no Sunday evening catching up on invoices because you forgot to send them during the week.
I couldn’t find what I needed, so I built it. The app is called CANOPY. It covers that full workflow plus staff time tracking, job photos, project management with phased materials, and MTD-compliant tax reporting built in — no need for separate accounting software.
I should be completely transparent: I’m the founder, so I’m obviously biased. I’m not here to sell anything. I’m here because the quality of discussion on this forum is genuinely better than anywhere else in the industry, and I’d rather get honest feedback from experienced operators than positive comments from Facebook groups.
If you’ve found software that works well for your business, I’d be interested to hear what and why. If you look at what I’ve described and think something critical is missing, I want to know that too.
Happy to answer any questions in the thread.

If anyone would like to try it and give direct feedback to the founder, drop me a message — I’m offering founding memberships to early users who want to help shape the app. 50% off for life, and a direct line to me.
thecanopyapp.com
Max​​​​​​​​​