Starting A Business

CanaryBoss said:
My wife and I just got a pretty good laugh out of that.
Click to expand...
I’m glad someone enjoyed it! The worst part was I reached down as one normally does when you get bagged and the same branch Charlie horsed my forearm! Dammit! I hate chipping dead trees! I just want to kill them even more!
 
I started with a Toyota Tundra with 270k miles on it February of 15’, Saws and ladder in the back. After a summer, Got a 16’ dump trailer, traded my tundra for an old f450 and hired my first guy. That was November of 2015
 
Well anyway you're bussssted on the non-antagonist bit.
As for "Owning a business is about making money. If you’re not in it to make money then it’s just a hobby. If you’re in it to support others it’s a ministry."

I'm in it to support the trees, but despite a lot of pro bono, I make more than I need doing it. So do i have a a musiness, or a binistry?
 
There is so much more to business than making a bundle of money. It’s about treating people right (and trees of course). Your clients, your staff and your family. Get any part of the equation wrong and one of these groups is going to suffer. My goal in business is not to get rich, not to have ten of everything shiny and new and to just live. As long as I have enough coin to put food on my table, keep a roof over my family’s head and maybe have a little fun every now and then... I’m happy.
 
guymayor said:
Well anyway you're bussssted on the non-antagonist bit.
As for "Owning a business is about making money. If you’re not in it to make money then it’s just a hobby. If you’re in it to support others it’s a ministry."

I'm in it to support the trees, but despite a lot of pro bono, I make more than I need doing it. So do i have a a musiness, or a binistry?
Click to expand...
He didn't say that profit and ministry were mutually exclusive. It seems to all be about intentions. I like the concept.

flyingsquirrel25 said:
There is so much more to business than making a bundle of money. It’s about treating people right (and trees of course). Your clients, your staff and your family. Get any part of the equation wrong and one of these groups is going to suffer. My goal in business is not to get rich, not to have ten of everything shiny and new and to just live. As long as I have enough coin to put food on my table, keep a roof over my family’s head and maybe have a little fun every now and then... I’m happy.
Click to expand...
I have fun almost every day. If it stops being fun, fire whoever made it not fun.
 
1. Was it hard finding a reasonably priced dump site?
We usually have clients willing to take chips. Identify farms that could use them for animal bedding or trails.
2. How do you determine if a potential employee has what it takes to work in the trees during the interview process? Interviewing is a skill. Take some courses on behavioral interviewing. It’s essentially asking for examples from past experience. Listen to their answers carefully. The words they choose and how they say them speak volumes. Watch their body language, it says even more. Have a paid work day that will allow them to demonstrate the key skills you are looking for without being overly demanding.
3. Is there a minimal amount of equipment needed to be successful; if so what are they?
It really depends on your market.


4. What were your first steps?
Obtaining insurance, identifying my market, building the marketing tools.

5. How did you arrange financing?
I didn’t. Banks want 2x collateral.
6. If you had it to do all over again what would you do differently?
I went from a sub contractor to an employee. I still have my own clients but I’d invest in the business if possible given the amount of work I’ve put into helping to grow it.

7. How large a part does creativity play in day to day operations?
Every day. All the planning is great but it’s creativity that solves the problems that crop up every day.
8. What was your best marketing technique?
Community outreach. Volunteering, seminars, etc..., lawn signs at our jobs, truck signs.
9. What portion of gross sales do you spend on advertising? Unsure. Not a good answer!

10. Did you hire more employees than you originally expected? We need more!
11. What makes your business unique?
Personal service, excellent customer service, familiarity with the community.
12. How do you use social media?
Not well. We could be doing much more with it. Watch for local online groups where people share experiences with contractors and other business. We found that we were getting a lot of buzz on one that generated quite a bit of business. We monitor to ensure the posts are positive. At one point there was a complaint about responding to calls. We adjusted our call management to address it.
13. Did you write a Business Plan? If not, do you wish you did? I did and it helped to make me think of how to grow in real terms.

14. Are gross profits what you expected them to be?
15. Would you do it again? Yes!
16. What is the key to growing multiple crews? Making sure they work well together.

17. Do you use any of the education websites like ISA or TCIA for personal and/or employee training? More workshops, conferences and seminars.
18. What are some good resources for gaining information on the tree care industry? TCIA.
19. How do you deal with mishaps on the job? Working to improve this. Mishaps are not taken out on the employee. They are reviewed and analyzed to learn from them. No judgment , just lessons for everyone including the company. It leads to confidence and growth. In the event of near misses than could’ve caused injury then it’s even more important to stop and review.
20. Is it worth hiring people to take care of my pay roll, taxes, and contracts like lawyers and accountants? Unless you are an expert in those areas it makes more sense to hire. It’s about time management. While they may charge a high hourly rate the time it will actually take you to do these tasks on your own amongst everything else is significantly higher. Administrative tasks are the first things to delegate. Always use your own time doing whatever makes the best use of your expertise.
21. What is your target market? We do only residential with a small percentage of commercial. Our target is the client who values quality work and professionalism instead of price.
22. What is the key to bidding jobs? Don’t bid, sell. Take a professional sales course geared toward selling services. The trap in bidding jobs is focusing on price instead of value.


Good on you for taking the small business management. Once you own your own business you are first a business person and secondly a tree guy.

Pick up Michael Gerber’s “The E-Myth”.
 
treehumper said:
1. Was it hard finding a reasonably priced dump site?
We usually have clients willing to take chips. Identify farms that could use them for animal bedding or trails.
2. How do you determine if a potential employee has what it takes to work in the trees during the interview process? Interviewing is a skill. Take some courses on behavioral interviewing. It’s essentially asking for examples from past experience. Listen to their answers carefully. The words they choose and how they say them speak volumes. Watch their body language, it says even more. Have a paid work day that will allow them to demonstrate the key skills you are looking for without being overly demanding.
3. Is there a minimal amount of equipment needed to be successful; if so what are they?
It really depends on your market.


4. What were your first steps?
Obtaining insurance, identifying my market, building the marketing tools.

5. How did you arrange financing?
I didn’t. Banks want 2x collateral.
6. If you had it to do all over again what would you do differently?
I went from a sub contractor to an employee. I still have my own clients but I’d invest in the business if possible given the amount of work I’ve put into helping to grow it.

7. How large a part does creativity play in day to day operations?
Every day. All the planning is great but it’s creativity that solves the problems that crop up every day.
8. What was your best marketing technique?
Community outreach. Volunteering, seminars, etc..., lawn signs at our jobs, truck signs.
9. What portion of gross sales do you spend on advertising? Unsure. Not a good answer!

10. Did you hire more employees than you originally expected? We need more!
11. What makes your business unique?
Personal service, excellent customer service, familiarity with the community.
12. How do you use social media?
Not well. We could be doing much more with it. Watch for local online groups where people share experiences with contractors and other business. We found that we were getting a lot of buzz on one that generated quite a bit of business. We monitor to ensure the posts are positive. At one point there was a complaint about responding to calls. We adjusted our call management to address it.
13. Did you write a Business Plan? If not, do you wish you did? I did and it helped to make me think of how to grow in real terms.

14. Are gross profits what you expected them to be?
15. Would you do it again? Yes!
16. What is the key to growing multiple crews? Making sure they work well together.

17. Do you use any of the education websites like ISA or TCIA for personal and/or employee training? More workshops, conferences and seminars.
18. What are some good resources for gaining information on the tree care industry? TCIA.
19. How do you deal with mishaps on the job? Working to improve this. Mishaps are not taken out on the employee. They are reviewed and analyzed to learn from them. No judgment , just lessons for everyone including the company. It leads to confidence and growth. In the event of near misses than could’ve caused injury then it’s even more important to stop and review.
20. Is it worth hiring people to take care of my pay roll, taxes, and contracts like lawyers and accountants? Unless you are an expert in those areas it makes more sense to hire. It’s about time management. While they may charge a high hourly rate the time it will actually take you to do these tasks on your own amongst everything else is significantly higher. Administrative tasks are the first things to delegate. Always use your own time doing whatever makes the best use of your expertise.
21. What is your target market? We do only residential with a small percentage of commercial. Our target is the client who values quality work and professionalism instead of price.
22. What is the key to bidding jobs? Don’t bid, sell. Take a professional sales course geared toward selling services. The trap in bidding jobs is focusing on price instead of value.


Good on you for taking the small business management. Once you own your own business you are first a business person and secondly a tree guy.

Pick up Michael Gerber’s “The E-Myth”.
Click to expand...
Thank you for taking time to answer my questions. I really do appreciate it.
 
dmbeathard said:
Thank you for taking time to answer my questions. I really do appreciate it.
Click to expand...
The thing I like about this business is being my own boss, I can choose to work or not to work.
Yesterday I was topping out a really tall skinny assed fir tree, and I got kinda scared! I realized I get off on that feeling. Being 150’ in the air while standing on a 4” stick is scary and exciting! I like it ! Feed me!
Anyhoo I digress... it’s not for everyone, and yes business by virtue of its name implies making money, but not at the expense of principals. I give a fair price and do a nice job. I enjoy my work for the most part, and when I don’t, I go fishing.
 
dmbeathard said:
Hello, new to this forum. I am an active duty Marine and currently interested in starting a tree business when I separate from the military in a year. My Father and Grandfather both owned tree service companies, my Dad currently runs a small operation in north central Oklahoma and I grew up working with him in the summers. While my Dad has given me a ton of advice I wanted to reach out to other operations to see what works and doesn't. I am currently completing my degree in Small Business Management, and yes this is actually a requirement for me to complete my business plan, but I am very interested in your responses. I will post my questions below any answers are highly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

1. Was it hard finding a reasonably priced dump site?
2. How do you determine if a potential employee has what it takes to work in the trees during the interview process?
3. Is there a minimal amount of equipment needed to be successful; if so what are they?
4. What were your first steps?
5. How did you arrange financing?
6. If you had it to do all over again what would you do differently?
7. How large a part does creativity play in day to day operations?
8. What was your best marketing technique?
9. What portion of gross sales do you spend on advertising?
10. Did you hire more employees than you originally expected?
11. What makes your business unique?
12. How do you use social media?
13. Did you write a Business Plan? If not, do you wish you did?
14. Are gross profits what you expected them to be?
15. Would you do it again?
16. What is the key to growing multiple crews?
17. Do you use any of the education websites like ISA or TCIA for personal and/or employee training?
18. What are some good resources for gaining information on the tree care industry?
19. How do you deal with mishaps on the job?
20. Is it worth hiring people to take care of my pay roll, taxes, and contracts like lawyers and accountants?
21. What is your target market?
22. What is the key to bidding jobs?
Click to expand...
1. No

2. Evaluate their disposition, not their skills.

3. There is almost no minimum. You can consult with a rod and a hammer and you will not often need either. You can sub work out.

4. I incorporated, got insurance, certified as an arborist and applicator, cast a wide net to provide ecological services, and narrowed in on what the market fed back to me - which was climbing trees to prune and remove. I read about climbing and tree care, and watched videos in all my spare time for about a year. I bought a 96" aluminum flatbed bicycle trailer, herbicides, a 30 gallon spray tank, an MS 192t saw, and climbing kit. I already had a 1978 Schwinn Le Tour II and I put continental "flat-proof" tires on it.

5. Through my bank. It was fine, but there may be other ways to go about it better. Search Treebuzz for a recent thread posted by @Reach about financing.

6. I would do what you are doing in addition to what I did.

7. It depends on me. Some says are monotonous and others involve too much creativity and should have been made simpler. I have no shortage of opportunity for creativity if I wish to have it.

8. Word of mouth and work on display. Cleaning my site in the course of my work instead of at the end of the day is my newest advertisement. A bit of advertising on paper/internet is great because it "gives you permission" to be in the market. I am not a pro-growth business model, so this may not apply to your business model. My model is to increase quality, value, and price.

9. Phone and in-person conversations, a decent website with audience-specific language that is not designed to get more hits but rather to filter incompatible clients.

10. Less than 1%.

11. No.

12. I engage in an almost complete range of arboriculture services, including plant health care, integrated pest management, niwaki pine maintenance, crane-assisted removal, selective plant killing in large natural areas, planting, tree risk assessment, ANSI-standard structural pruning, root pruning, lightning protection installation, supplemental support system installation. Along with the breadth, I believe that few companies are translating the universal principles and applied services of the Japanese garden tradition to my locale. With regards to pruning, specifically, once one can carry out an ANSI-standard reduction and/or structural prune of an emergent shade tree (a .01% rarity in my area...), one still has the opportunity in many cases to also make it look good. There are many theories and techniques that bear on making a tree look a certain way, and the pursuit seems to have no end. In developed western countries, we have access to western theory and applied techniques, but not much access to the 700-year-old Japanese garden tradition. The trick for me is to increase my access and (minimally) sort through the Japanese garden tradition information, sort through voluminous amounts of western theory that bears on aesthetic (there is no problems of accession), distill what is universal between the Japanese tradition and western thought, then let my work emanate from that base through my understanding of my specific locale. One specific and simple example: in my area, we have scaleable high wind events that range from the frequent 45 mph up to potential 100mph from an inland hurricane. Restoration pruning is thus normal and an expected opportunity for aesthetic styling. Conversely, I will normally not have the opportunity to train a "I'm on a wall" niwaki because the only opportunity to do so are on the edges of infrequent sinkholes. Whatever I train on my best days, I'm considering how much my client values prospect and/or refuge, how the work looks from frequently-occupied places inside their house, whether the tree feels/looks climbable, what level of austereness, tranquility, or client attribute my work will elicit. Those types of considerations layered atop structural considerations as necessary result in a pre-work mental photograph of what the tree and its surroundings will be when I am done. Yesterday I intook a client whose landscape architect often targets a "Charleston" aesthetic. I have to subordinate my thoughts to that to a fair degree, including a disclosure of my bias against crepe myrtles and my inability to design or maintain english-style topiary because of the great cognitive dissonance with the Japanese garden topiary tradition (that I prefer on universal grounds). But I could prune the shade trees for structure (one of the two for aesthetic as well...), five of the the ornamentals for aesthetic, and a junked up multistem holly for interior tree climbing for the kid. I can apply some phc and ipm to the ornamentals. It is useful to have a single word like "Charleston" to describe what you are up to, whether you share that or not. I do.

12. I use it sparingly. I want people on Facebook to know that I am working in a diverse and sensible manner. I want people to see that I am on Yelp with better pics that everyone else. I want them to see that I exist on several platforms.

13. There is no single business plan. I need to know what I am doing, what I am emphasizing, and in what order I need to develop. A financier needs to know something different. Just feed whoever needs it whatever they need.

14. I had no expectation, so this does not apply.

15. Yes.

16. Dealing with employee retention by planning for not having retention or coming up with a brilliant way to have it (e.g. paying very high wages and benefits).

17. Yes. Treebuzz and varied reading/scouring is the best for me, but not for crew.

18. TreeBuzz and the other forums. Online Continuing Education. Specific mentors.

19. With clients, when I bow, I bow low. With employees, I make us each take responsibility for our part. If my part is hiring them in the first place, I long ago made sure that our relationship has the best exit strategy possible for both of us. If my part is not providing adequate resources or training, I work on that. If the employee has a part in it that they share, I do my best to listen, hear, and respond constructively. A healthy workplace is one where everyone can leave or remain and change it up and be in good community with each other no matter what.

20. Yes, as part of your incorporation and thenceforward.

21. Good people, with discretionary income, who tell me what they want, give me space to reinterpret it and speak it back to them, and permit me latitude to carry out my work.

22. Recognizing which pricing model applies to each circumstance. Removals are usually competitive with other companies, so you just have to bid them with that knowledge in mind. Most of my work has no competitor, so my pricing is based on whether I like working with them/their trees, and how much they will pay before deciding they would rather take a vacay in Oaxaca.
 
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