Why Bi-Weekly Mowing is Putting You Out of Business

For nearly half of the lawn and landscape industry, a 10% profit margin is being both accepted and expected. This may be acceptable to you, but it doesn’t leave much room for error. The difference between making money and losing money is such a fine line for a lot of companies in this industry and a lot of companies aren’t helping themselves out by being smart and efficient. One of the biggest ways companies are losing their margin is by doing bi-weekly mowing. Some people will disagree with me on my viewpoint of bi-weekly mowing, but based on my 40 years of experience running a lawn and landscape business and consulting for nearly 30 years, I see this as a downfall to a lot of potentially great companies. There are so many places bi-weekly mowing can go wrong and I will highlight a few now.

One obvious issue with bi-weekly mowing is the extra time that it takes because of the extra length of the grass. The answer to this problem you may be thinking is to simply increase the price. Well, if you though this and would actually implement it, you would be thinking correctly but there are still issues with that solution. Maybe you do charge a little more, but is that enough to cover the extra time? One way to know is by knowing your cost which a lot of companies do not know. At the end of the day, it doesn’t make sense to the customer to pay 2,3, or 4 times the price to make your desired profit margin on the job. If they are being charged double or more the original price, why not just get it done every week? Maybe there are reasons why they only want it cut bi-weekly, but maybe they’re not the right customer for you. You don’t have to accept every potential customer that comes your way especially if they are going to cost you money.

Another reason I dislike bi-weekly mowing is the quality of job on a bi-weekly mowing is going to be worse than that of a weekly mowing service. Because the grass has grown at least 2-3 times as high, it will simply not look as good and will take a long time to even make it look decent. Do you want your company to be associated with bad looking properties? This does not help you build a professional image with people who know nothing about your company except the properties they see you do. It will typically make the customer unhappy as well because they are paying for a service that does not make their property look good. By mowing every week, you can make the property look professional and keep your image professional and your customers satisfied.

These are 2 big reasons I do not like bi-weekly mowing. There are several more I mention in our YouTube video “Why Bi-Weekly Mowing is Putting You Out of Business.” Check out the video for more information and subscribe to our YouTube channel while you are at it!