I am not a certified arborist. I plan to get my certification soon. However, 99% of my customers don't even know what one is. I learned initially from people who most on this forum would call hacks, and grew from there, eventually working for some companies who were better than most in my area to further my knowledge and abilities, and kept self educating from there. Still am, there is always room to grow and I strive to continue to improve. I have an excellent saftey record, I sell and do proper pruning work, often educating my customers along the way. My competition, for the most part, seem like they could care less about what the right way to trim is and just want money. I do large and "difficult" removals also. We don't damage property, everyone goes home at the end of the day. Not all of my competion can say the same all the time, but the customers don't know that. There are a few certified people in my area, but not many. I pay for proper insurance, both liability and workers comp. Most of my competition pays for landscape comp or has none, pays workers cash, ect. I compete with their prices and still make profit. Sure I would like to make more money, but I am doing alright. Our state requires a home improvement contractors licence that is $50 every 2 years. You really only need a liability policy number that is valid at the time of application or renewal. No one ever gets fined or shut down for not having a PA home improvement contractors licence. The cost of becoming and maintaining an ISA cert would not significantly impact my profit margin. As for bigger companies who are on par with regs and certs and stuff, we have Davey, Bartlett, thats about it. I do as good or better work then them at much lower prices because I compete with the mass market, not the elites. I am sure they have some great people who do great work, but they certainly have some that are not doing the best work out there. I hope to become certified soon and hope that it gets me into some more high end customers, but the majority of my work will still surely be for those who don't care about certifications, because that is most of the market. I would be happy if there was a little more required of tree services as far as regulation goes, but it is the consumers who need the most education. I don't use chemicals and don't want to. If a customer needs fert or pest and disease control, I refer them to Davey or Bartlett. I don't do this work to get rich, I do it because I love it and I can make enough to live decently. I am striving to be a company who can provide a good living for good employees too. But they are hard to find. Few people of high caliber seem interested in this work and the ones who are, are with the companies who provide heath benifits, retirement plans, ect. Its a big hurdle to get over for me to be able to offer those kind of benifits, but I will do my best to do so. More regulation could help with that, IF it drives out the bottom feeders and stabilizes prices. Not drives prices thru the roof, that is not necessary.
