The grass just keeps growing and and someone needs to take care of it so I started mowing lawns at an early age. I didn’t realize that I should have stayed with that business and grew it instead of thinking about getting a regular job…….
I had a business of one kind or another for as long as I can remember. It all started with mowing lawns. As soon as I was old enough to push a hand mower I started promoting my business door to door. I gave everyone a good deal and before long I had a bunch of yards to mow every week for my neighbors.
Lawn mowing was a lot of work, but I loved the feeling of getting paid for the work that I did. I usually charged $1.00 to mow, rake, and edge a yard. This was a service business and I had to usually do a lot of work the first time I did a yard, but after that it would usually go pretty fast.
The yards in our neighborhood where not to big so I could do a couple of them a day and still have time to enjoy myself. I did make some bad deals and ended doing hard labor for a couple of days for a buck. This wasn’t good, but with a little experience I learned how to size up the jobs and adjusted my price. If I couldn’t maintain the yard for the agreed price I would have to work out a new deal with my client.
I was lucky to have a good manager to look out for my best interest as I learned the business. My mom would tell me if I had a customer that was taking advantage of me and give me the coaching that I needed so I could handle problems as they came up. If I didn’t have access to “my mom” the coaching I would have kept most of the problem customers and worked a lot more for less money.
My mom showed me that you have to enjoy what you are doing and earn enough from your work to feel good about putting in the time to do a good job. If a project takes too much time or energy to complete you will have to renegotiate your price for ongoing services.
One more important thing she told me was not to bite off more than I can chew. When you take a job for a neighbor you better deliver on your promises. Word of mouth marketing is what makes or breaks your business when you work for your neighbors.
Sometimes a prospect or customer will want you to do some work other than mowing. If the project requires special tools you need to tell your customer what the problem is. Negotiate some time so you can get the tool that you need to complete the job. If everything works out you can pick up a new tool with your profits and offer the additional service for all your other customers.
You usually won’t go wrong if you invest in the tools and training that you need to grow your business. Just be sure to put your assets to work and not turn them into liabilities.
