Work slowing down?

How does everyone keep the momentum going through the "slow" season?

  • New services

    Votes: 3 50.0%

  • New qualifications - use this time for education

    Votes: 4 66.7%

  • New marketing platforms

    Votes: 5 83.3%
  • Total voters
    6
Angela Simpson

Angela Simpson

Location
Waskom
How does everyone keep the momentum going through the "slow" season? With the calls slowing down and work coming to an almost halt I'm looking for ideas on how to keep the paycheck coming... New services, new qualifications, new marketing platforms...

Angela
www.TreeHealthLady.com
 
Rose cutbacks and covering base with pinebark for winter protection.

Wrap trunks of trees prone to SW Disease.

Anti-dessicant sprays to select conifers and broadleaf evergreens.

Lots of winter reading and hopefully more conferences.

RCX, SGRs, and compaction work until the ground freezes.

Lots of winter pruning.

Bids, proposals, and consults.

Teach and give talks/presentations. Also talks and presentations to employees

Source new products and/or vendors for next year...and plan for next year....

Perhaps start RCA process but I have a lot on my plate.
 
Learn to sell instead of answering the phone. Target property managers, HOAs, condos, golf courses, etc... Anywhere that treework during their season would be a disruption. Forestry consultants who advise estates on farm assessment programs. Do presentations to garden clubs, rotary clubs, shade tree commissions, environmental commissions.

What we have had success in doing is throughout the year deferring certain jobs to the winter months. But that takes selling skills not estimating. Identify jobs where the client isn't in a big rush and would be willing to delay.
 
Seems like around here the slow season is around tax due dates... I generally enter the early winter with a back log of two or three months. I'm currently looking into mid Jan. Around mid Jan the phone starts ringing off the hook for fruit trees. I only get about a 1/3 of those jobs (1/3 I turn down), and the last 1/3 want it done next week. If I get down to 3-4 weeks I consider that slow, but never had to scramble for work.
 
Well, Angela, as a certified tree registered in the census of the Nisqually Wildlife Refuge, I can say that many trees are still seeking removal. Unfortunately, us treekin have no suicide hotline, so some old trees are happy to be removed by experts. I will say that some things in the tree community can really mess with our non-existent brains. A strong oak tree that grew across the lake from me was the victim of someone using his branches to hang himself. It was some pretty gruesome stuff. And of course you have young lovers vandalizing our pristine, beautiful bark by inscribing their initials. Anyway, besides the suicidal, we also have some trees who are seeking more than asexual reproduction and are into some crazy kinks and fetishes. If you ever happen to be in the Washington area, I will gladly let you saw through my trunk and chop me into planks. I will be fine as I am a quaking aspen and can just send out more shoots to regrow. In conclusion, you have many options to continue your pursuit of tree slaughter, Angela.

Sincerely, Quaking Aspen
 
Why would you want more work during the beer drinking season?

There are those wonderful, holiday traditions where eggnog, spices and all manner of strange things are used to water down the taste of large doses of cheap, Walmart booze while you stuff your face until you feel like a beached whale. I don't even wear blue clothes during this season, for fear of those Greanpeace people trying to drag me into deeper water or covering me with wet towels. There's the family tradition of getting so hammered that you stop caring that most of the assholes you're picking fights with are your relatives. This is that time of year when drunkeness is elevated to an art form, and you have to pick up a couple of tabloids each week, just to see what kind of crazy shit you did while you were too plastered to find your way home, and woke up under some bushes, in the park. This is no time to be looking for more work.
 
Tis the time of year when one takes a nine iron to the neighbor's reindeer display cuz Comet was spreading damaging (and largely true) gossip about you to all the other neighborhood elves and Germanic toy disseminating gentlemen of potential Sainthood. Trudging through the slush and mud is hard enough with a head full of booze and Tijuana happy pills without having to worry about your existing SEO. Hard times indeed, hard times.

Hallelujah... Holy shit....where's the tylenol?
 
Angela Simpson said:
How does everyone keep the momentum going through the "slow" season? With the calls slowing down and work coming to an almost halt I'm looking for ideas on how to keep the paycheck coming... New services, new qualifications, new marketing platforms...

Angela
www.TreeHealthLady.com
Click to expand...
I've found the key to staying busy in the winter is to sell work during the summer. Anytime I talk to a client I try to mention that winter is usually the best time to have tree work done. Most trees are best to be pruned in the dormant season and some can only be pruned while dormant. With frozen ground less property damage is done and time can be saved by not having to use ground protection, which also lowers the price.
 
On that topic... I do not fully understand the benefits of dormant pruning in many situations (other then maybe cutting implements spread bacteria, etc more in summer?) if the wound will still be fully open come spring time. What's your opinion, JD?
 
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We do oaks in the winter now due to oak wilt...but still do too much winter pruning in my opinion. The reality of it is that I have far, far more time in the winter to prune. If I get another new arborist we'll prune a lot more in the growing season than we do now.

I'll make a point to reduce dosage this winter though and keep removal cuts on the stem to a minimum as possible
 
IF I try to prune when it's best for the tree it is nearly always end of june-august, and if it starts raining in September I might be able to squeeze a few others in. Some trees however I won't prune at all in the summer. Stone fruit is one, due to CBT, as well as two needle pines subject to pitch moth, or Ips pini. Those get pruned only once temps reach below the ectothermic limit for the bugs.
In reality I'm about 70-80% pruning, so I just do the best I can and keep food on my plate.
 
Angela Simpson said:
How does everyone keep the momentum going through the "slow" season? With the calls slowing down and work coming to an almost halt I'm looking for ideas on how to keep the paycheck coming... New services, new qualifications, new marketing platforms...

Angela
www.TreeHealthLady.com
Click to expand...
Maybe talk to some local landscape companies. Higher end companies with high dollar clients who may need pruning down. I swear I get so much pruning work specifically for the lawn. Best part is if you get these companies to work with you, they can eve sell the work for you when talking about lawn care. No one wants to sell someone on a lawn renovation knowing the trees overhead will shade out their investment. Good luck
 
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