...

Hey, @Aerial Traveler!
I have no words of wisdom to impart to you, I just wanted to say that this is a really cool thread you've started, and I look forward to seeing what other folks have to say.
It just occurred to me that maybe @moss would be a good one to ask. He had a different line of work before he did tree work, I think, and might just have been a recreational climber until the economy took a hit. I think they had staff cuts at his company, and he ended up looking to tree work as an alternative.
I hope I'm getting the story right, and that I'm not disclosing more info than moss is comfortable with.
Again, great thread! I hope it picks up traction! Tim
 
I'm semi-retired. I don't have to work, but like to do some stuff to stay busy. Having a background in vertical caving and high angle rescue, I've dabbled in tree work over the past several decades. I enjoy doing it and finally got into doing it using more standard arborist techniques a few years ago. I've always been safe and conservative; just much more efficient now. I do other things besides tree work, but really enjoy the climbing and problem solving aspects of tree work. I like being able to choose the jobs I want to do and turn down the ones that are too big or not to my liking. If I was trying to earn a living (and was younger), I'd definitely consider doing trees full time. I do shrubs quite a bit too. They're good for having repeat business, the money is good, the risk is low, I'm good at it, but it's not as satisfying. When the heat index is through the roof, you're unlikely to find me in a tree. It's much nicer doing electrical work, appliance repair or some other indoor work in brutal weather.

I don't really know how I'd stack up against a production climber. The few I've seen weren't doing anything I can't do and maybe doing some things not as well as I can. I tend to work myself hard, but I'm under no pressure to work faster than I'm comfortable with, which is huge to me. I think I have less risk tolerance than many production climbers, both for personal safety and property damage. That may be because my area is probably not a hot spot for great climbers.
 
Last edited:
Great post, @Dan Cobb! Thanks a bunch for chiming in! I love the way you think about the prospects of climbing as a profession at your time in life and with your background. Safety first. Tim
 
TimBr said:
Hey, @Aerial Traveler!
I have no words of wisdom to impart to you, I just wanted to say that this is a really cool thread you've started, and I look forward to seeing what other folks have to say.
It just occurred to me that maybe @moss would be a good one to ask. He had a different line of work before he did tree work, I think, and might just have been a recreational climber until the economy took a hit. I think they had staff cuts at his company, and he ended up looking to tree work as an alternative.
I hope I'm getting the story right, and that I'm not disclosing more info than moss is comfortable with.
Again, great thread! I hope it picks up traction! Tim
Click to expand...

You more or less got it, was laid off by IBM 2013 after 15 years there. We used to beg to get laid off, worked too hard, never took vacation, all-nighters, weekends, software development coal mine labor ;-) That layoff was 20,000 people, a drop in the bucket for a global hardware/software company. Got rid of people like me making "too much" money and getting older, by the actuarial tables I was going to cost them more in medical benefits. It is a very common layoff scenario for publicly traded tech companies, makes quarterly numbers look better, keeps the stock up.

I wasn't up for becoming a late 50's year-old "striver" in a new company, I'd been rec climbing hard for years, and doing side jobs gradually learning how to use a saw safely in a tree and basic rigging strategies. Switched immediately to tree climbing as my main gig. Lot's of growing pains, learned that yes I'm a good climber but had A LOT to learn about working in trees and on the ground. Got a lot of positive support from my local tree worker community and on the 'Buzz which is greatly appreciated.

Fast forward to now, tree work still my main gig. I've also got heavily in to woody shrub pruning which I really enjoy. I've also become a specialist at handling the worst hung trees over trails that my land conservation trust customers can come up with. Really interesting figuring out how to get every weird hung tree down safely. I piece it all together with teaching climbing, natural history and art teacher gigs, natural history book illustration, some rustic furniture commissions, boardwalks and bridges, trail and river clearance for land trusts, conservation land managers etc., whatever works for my customers and interests me. None of it is easy but I'm always outside using my mind and body, couldn't be better.

It's good to find a niche. My niche is I go where buckets and cranes can't go (or the customer can't afford for a crane to go there). I do pruning and removals, the full range. I choose my battles and refer customers to the appropriate tree service when that makes the most sense for me and the customer. I talk people out of cutting down trees as much as possible. A lot of tree work is based on customer fear that may or may not be based on anything real. Unfortunately some tree services in my area will stoke customer fear. The trend, as many of you know is to crane everything and the numbers don't usually work to come in and crane one tree out so... up-sell, why take out one when you can take out eight? I've saved a lot of trees by convincing a customer to prune instead of remove. Can't win every battle but I try. I live in a world of mutual respect for tree workers in general but I'm at odds with the impacts of some tree service's business practices. That's life everywhere.

History and current conditions aside I do want to talk about quoting jobs for "micro operators" like me. I have very low equipment overhead. My value to a customer is my mind, ability to climb and work hard, and whatever extra I bring with my tree assessment and natural history knowledge. I do not work against fixed quotes. I'm not covering a note on a bucket truck or chipper or crane etc. I need to cover my labor, basic insurance, gear, saws, vehicle etc expenses. I write up an estimate, usually a multi-day job for me, divide work into logical modules with an estimated time and expense per module. This is all clarified up front with the customer. If any given "module" threatens to go over the estimate "Holy shiite this red oak has way more deadwood than was visible from the ground!" I notify the customer and ask if I can re-scope the job based on new information. They can control their costs that way, for example "Ok, continue and prioritize the most obvious/dangerous deadwood and stop when you hit the estimate price". Or, "Ok, continue until you got all of it". The idea here is to prevent myself from getting completely toasted trying to meet a quote. Any of us can get a job done in 4 hours when we're standing on the ground looking at it for the first time ;-) Reality is it's very difficult to do a good job stating up front how much time a job will actually take. This approach lowers the stress for me and the customer, we're not pitted against each other by the quote. I now work primarily for repeat customers and we have a good understanding and trust around costs. If people are just trying to cheap me down pitting me against other tree service's quotes I simply say: "Thanks but no thanks, looks like you have some great tree services to choose from who will do an excellent job for you!".

Accessing the tree to start a job is often the first stress point a climber meets when working against a quote. Sure, if you get the first throw in exactly where you want it, awesome. Reality is for SRT climbing (my main approach) it can take upfront time to get a good setting that will create very productive efficiencies once the aerial work starts. If I end up throwing and line setting for an hour (it happens) I let the customer know I don't charge more than a half-hour for rope setting. I make many adjustments like that as I log my work day, keep things fair for the customer and lowers the stress for me. If I need to take an hour to set lines I will do so in the most mentally relaxed way possible for the given situation. There's no need to create stress or make tree work harder, it will already do that with out you or me piling it on top.

Hope that's helpful,
-AJ
 
Last edited:
Just want to mention... I understand that most tree workers have to work under a "fixed quote" paradigm per job. This shapes the entire "culture" of tree work, how climbers think about climbing, trees in general etc. etc. I can't work that way, it would crush me. Mileage varies per tree service, business model, size of company, etc. It's no different than many industry/business models across all categories out there: use younger/cheaper or illegal immigrant labor, push hard, if people get chewed up and spit out so be it, get someone else. It's really tough to build human sustainability into business models, takes a strong desire to do so and long-term commitment on the part of business owners and managers.
-AJ
 
Hello, @moss!
Thanks so much for post #6. Your very detailed and enlightening description of your niche in the tree work world is really appreciated. The variety of different scenarios you get to work in sounds like a lot of fun. I'm glad that you've found a way to succeed in making your own conditions. It was an inspiring read. Take care. Tim
 
Aerial Traveler said:
So far a little bit of everything...
Removals that require climbing and rigging
Ground based removals
Storm cleanup jobs including hung limb removals and hung up/leaning trees
Tree swing installs (gasp)
and bit of pruning and deadwooding (but not much)

I have absolutely no experience with bucket trucks, aerial lifts or crane removals.

My understanding of basic in tree rigging is there but I still have so much to learn, so I default to taking small pieces which usually adds time to a job. This is probably the biggest thing that is holding me back and slowing me down when working with crew from the established tree company.

I grew up on a large forestry track of land in southeast Ohio (the foothills of Appalachia) so I've always had a close relationship with trees and the forest. My family heated their homes with wood so I was running a chainsaw, sharpening chain, driving a tractor, running a log splitter, skidding logs and loading trailers at 12 years old. We cleared land for buildings, tapped maple trees for syrup, cut locust fence posts, and felled walnut and oak trees to be milled for interior trim. We felled standing dead trees for firewood when possible, cut grape vines and maintained old logging roads for land access. I learned a healthy respect for running chainsaws and built up knowledge and confidence to safely make cuts in the tree and on the ground.

@Dan Cobb thanks for the information. I like your philosophy of being able to pick the jobs you want to do. This may fit with what I'm doing now alone. I've already said no thanks to a couple of jobs that were just too big for me to do alone or the rigging required equipment and another set of hands I didn't have.

@Moss thanks so much for the long write up and information (which I'm still reading over). I like how you have keyed together several different jobs/tasks to match your knowledge and talents and keep busy.

Fixed price estimates are customary in my area. Must homeowners or businesses expect the same. You would have to be an excellent salesperson to get locals to accept a bid that had a cost range or lots of contingencies. My experience is that 70 year old Mrs. Smith wants to know exactly how much all this is going to cost and that the operations manager for Corp X isn't going to approve a job estimate based on hourly rates and a soft timeline.
Click to expand...
Yep, fixed quotes are standard everywhere. I’m not a salesman but through very hard lessons I decided to change the paradigm customer by customer. It’s surprising how well the majority of them wrap their head around it quickly. There are no unexpected charges for the customer, everything is worked out fairly and to their satisfaction, as well as mine.
-AJ
 
If a customer enjoys watching a tree service crushing their team against a quote they’re not a customer worth having. There is plenty of work out there.

Edit: as I mentioned, fixed quote is the best and right way for most tree services.
-AJ
 
Last edited:
Aerial Traveler said:
It sounds like you invest a good bit of time on customer education when providing estimates and talking with customers about their trees. More of a professional consultation with an estimate?

I could see where this would have value for some customers that have an interest in trees and their welfare.
Click to expand...
Yes indeed, many of my customers want me to talk to them about their trees. It's really fun when I notice a scarlet oak and/or pitch pine growing on their land. I'm able to say to them, "You have great well water, you don't have to treat it right?" Those two species on land in my part of Massachusetts indicate a subsurface pile of glacial rubble which will contain excellent water as opposed to wells drilled into the iron rich bedrock which requires treatment to not taste like rusty pipes. Customers are amazed but the geology dictates the tree species and visa versa the trees will tell you what's underground. If I'm in a backyard looking at silver maples or swamp white oaks I start looking for the sump pump outlet from the basement, tree species type will tell you where the subsurface water is on their property. Likewise I'll point out wildlife habitat and signs, and listen to their stories about their trees and nature they've observed there. Giving them a fuller picture of their land and trees is a great way to start with a new customer. As much as they want to know I'll do my best to fill in the puzzle pieces.
-AJ
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.

New threads New posts

Kask Stihl NORTHEASTERN Arborists Wesspur TreeStuff.com Teufelberger Westminster X-Rigging Teufelberger
Back
Top Bottom