As a follow up to last weeks reminder that today (January 18, 2011) might be an important tax day for your lawn care business, we want to give you a final heads-up that, for many businesses, quarterly tax payments are to be postmarked by today.
If you are still struggling with your 2010 lawn care business taxes, the following tax software from Amazon.com might be very helpful to you. Click on the links below to learn more about each software title.
We occasionally post pictures and asked our readers if they can recognize the type of plant depicted.
I was just going through some of our lawn care pictures from 2010 and realized we never received a correct answer for this picture. Can you correctly answer the question of what is going on in this picture? If you are a lawn care business owner and want to take a stab at a guess please be sure to list your lawn care related website.
Good luck on your guesses. Here’s the picture:
A recent Wall Street Journal business article entitled “10 Reasons to Start a Business This Year” has piqued our interest and we want to pass the article along.
While this list of reasons to start a business contains several interesting elements such as “never getting laid off” and “giving yourself a raise”, the one item on the list that really jumps out at us is #7. Consumers and businesses have started spending again.
In our informal surveys of residential lawn care customers and corporate landscaping accounts, we are finding that #7 is a trend in the need for lawn care services in 2011. Potential customers are beginning to be willing to open their wallets to have their grass and overall landscaping looking good again.
If you are a lawn care contractor (or future business owner) this should be music to your ears. And, if you haven’t started your business yet, this might be an excellent time to start your business and begin gaining contracts before the weather warms and the spring onslaught begins. Getting your customers right now means you can hit the ground running once spring arrives and you will be miles ahead of your competitors.
If you are thinking about starting your own lawn care business, we hope you will read through our home page to learn more about our lawn care business training program. This business training course contains a tremendous amount of information on how to properly acquire customers and how to bid jobs (large and small) correctly. Just one good lawn care account will easily pay for this entire course.
We have it on sale right now before spring arrives. Read more on our home page: www.StartALawnCareBusiness.com
If you operate your own Lawn Care Business and you make quarterly tax payments to satisfy your federal income tax withholding requirements, another important tax due date is only a couple days away.
The normal due date for the January payment schedule is January 15. However, since January 15 falls on a weekend this year and MLK day is January 17, the payment due date is not until Tuesday January 18. If you are like thousands of other lawn care businesss owners, I am sure you will enjoy the extra couple days to get your receipts in order.
This date may or may not affect your lawn care business. So, check with your tax professional and read the IRS guidelines on their website: http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/f1040es.pdf
It’s hard to believe it’s been 3 1/2 years since I was interviewed by the Wall Street Journal for their report on the use of Google Earth by small business owners. The reporter for the Wall Street Journal had read a brief report I wrote concerning my use of Google Earth in viewing and sizing lawn care jobs.
Though I will be the first to admit that a lawn care company should never solely use an aerial or satellite image to determine a price estimate on a lawn care or landscaping job, services such as Google Earth can give lawn care company owners a graphical overview of areas of land that need to be mowed or landscaped.
Last month, Google announced a new Google Labs product called Google Earth Engine. Google Earth Engine gives users tools to analyze environmental changes that occur over time. Understanding our environment helps all of us, as landscapers, become better stewards of the grounds we keep.
If you are interested in the ways technology can make you a more successful lawn care business owner, please subscribe to our blog and check out the Google Earth Engine at: http://earthengine.googlelabs.com/#intro
As I spend this cold January evening sitting in a drafty coffee discussing business ideas with a few friends, I am reminded that I need to nail down my business plans for the upcoming year.
Like many lawn care business owners, you are probably enjoying a little down time during the colder month. Winter is the time to recharge your personal batteries and develop your business strategies for the approaching lawn mowing season. Yes, it is still only January but warmer weather is just around the corner and before we all know it the midday sun will climb higher on the horizon and the first sprigs of wild garlic will poke through the warming ground.
As you are making your business plans for 2011, I hope you will consider adding continuing education to your agenda. I’ve been looking over many seminar schedules tonight and I realize that there many opportunities for you to learn more about lawn care strategies and general business concepts.
It really doesn’t matter where you are, either. In fact, a few minutes ago I received an email from a lawn care provider mentioning a seminar in his home town of Ontario. This lawn care seminar sounds very interesting and, if I were closer, I would surely attend.
No matter where you are in the United States (or Canada, or Australia, or England, or…) I hope you will add a education component to your “to-do” list this year.
By-the-way, we attempt to distribute a tremendous amount of lawn care business knowledge in our Lawn Care Business guidebook and training course. Read more on our main webpage: http://www.StartALawnCareBusiness.com
Hi everyone:
New years often bring new changes and this year is no different.
This year, we are continuing our efforts to continuously offer free and fresh content to our StartALawnCareBusiness.com blog. We are not the best writers or the best producers of content. However, we are sincere in our goal of making this a great website for lawn care business owners to come and learn ideas and strategies to make their lawn care companies more successful in the coming year.
To continuously make the Start A Lawn Care Business website more accessible to our readers, we have instituted a new link structure to our blog posts. We understand this is going to cause some confusion for a few weeks. Links from other websites will be broken and you will probably not be able to find your favorite articles.
Over time, link will be updated and everything will sort itself out. In the meantime, if you are looking for a particular article, please use the “SEARCH” box to the right. It will help you find your article.
We hope that everyone has had a wonderful first week of 2011. If you have any questions for us, please do not hesitate to ask for help. We are always open to share ideas with you.
Also, if you have not yet purchased the lawn care business guidebook and software package, please consider purchasing it for your company in 2011. It is a HUGE business resource to help you run a successful lawn care business this year.
Thank you and Happy New Year to all:
Jan 12
Hi Everyone: Although we are currently under a blanket of snow in the southeast, I want to take a minute to jump on the website and write a quick post about the upcoming lawn care season in 2011.
Yes, it is cold and windy and snowy and nasty right now. However, spring weather is less than 2 months away. Before long, your lawn care customers will be looking for lawn care and landscaping professionals to perform spring clean up lawn care jobs. Grass will need to be cut, leftover leaves will need to be raked, limbs and twigs will need to be picked up and other lawn care jobs will need to be done.
Though you are probably not thinking about your lawn care business right now, you should already be planning your lawn care marketing. If you wait until March to start marketing your lawn care company you will miss many customers who want to make an early start getting their lawn and landscaping into shape.
If you are just beginning to think about starting a lawn care business or if you already own a lawn care business and want to have a much better season than last year, now is the time to start.
We have developed a professionally produced lawn care business package that will teach you what you need to be doing right now BEFORE spring arrives to get great customers and assure that your business will be kicked into high gear once spring arrives.
To learn more about the lawn care business program, visit our main webpage at: http://www.StartALawnCareBusiness.com
Start A Lawn Care Business