Spring season is right around the corner, and landscape companies are starting to gear up for what should be another busy year. 2021 proved to be a very profitable year for many in the landscaping industry, and 2022 should see a continued trend in landscaping services.
While some homeowners have taken the opportunity to stretch their green thumb over the last couple of years, many still want to bring in the pros to get it done right, and more efficiently. So, now is the time to start reaching a new customer base and offering services that customers may not have thought about or simply don’t want to do themselves.
Many of these services might be smaller in nature but are great ways to get your foot in the door with a new client to offer long-term lawn maintenance or, eventually, a large backyard project installation.
Let’s check out five services landscaping businesses can offer for the spring season to reward customers with a beautiful outdoor space early in the season.
Early Lawn Care Maintenance
The early season maintenance on a lawn can set the tone for the entire year. Homeowners who don’t enjoy their green space until June and into the summer months probably didn’t do any spring maintenance on their lawn and are leaving it to the elements to do for them. Applying topsoil, overseeding, and spraying spring fertilizer is just the start of an early spring lawn care maintenance program that can be packaged together to lure new customers in the door.
According to the State of the Industry Report by Lawn and Landspace Magazine, 73% of landscaping businesses surveyed provide some form of spring clean-up for their customers. Individually, 85% said they provide lawn care chemical applications, and 67% said they offer seeding services.
Packaging spring services together, such as seeding and laying topsoil, can be a great introduction to lawn care maintenance for customers who may have been doing it themselves previously. If anything, it’s an excellent service to offer to get the client to a good place before they DIY their maintenance for the rest of the year. But at least you got to show them what to do and provide essential education on lawn care.
Cleaning Out the Eavestroughs
While eavestroughs should be cleared out in the fall, the springtime is an excellent opportunity to offer those services to customers who forgot to do it or don’t want to do it themselves. People aren’t too keen on climbing up to their roof to remove leaves, and it’s one of the easily missed homeowner tasks during fall clean-up.
This service doesn’t require much knowledge, so it’s perfect for beginner landscapers on your crew who have no fear of climbing a ladder to pull leaves and limbs from the eavestroughs. This service may not seem like much, but it shows your clients that you’re willing to do the hard work they don’t want to do themselves.
Finding these types of services can be a critical part of scaling any business in the spring season. Despite homeowners wanting to get outside after a long winter, those little tasks often get forgotten for the larger ones. Pair these chores together in your spring package and sell the extra value of keeping water flowing correctly off the roof.
Decks, Hardscape Maintenance, and Damage Control
After a winter season with plenty of snow, decks, patios, pergolas, walls, and walkways typically don’t look their best. They take a beating every year, and they need to be maintained for the true colors and texture to come back. So much attention gets placed on the lawn and garden that often those areas get forgotten.
As part of spring maintenance, check for cracks and potholes in concrete or pavement, and see if any bricks, stones, or pavers have lifted or shifted over the winter. Suppose you performed the installation of the backyard. In that case, this is an excellent follow-up service to ensure your work is experienced at its max value all the time. Homeowners hire companies to open their pools each year; why shouldn’t they do it to open their backyard?
As part of this maintenance, power washing decks, siding of houses and garages, fixing minor water issues, and bringing life back to dull bricks can easily be accomplished with a good power washer. You can even go as far as offering painting services or staining for decks and wood structures to bring them back to life.
Lighting and Sound Services
More people are bringing technology outside their homes to create an experience. So, we’re seeing more light and sound systems in backyards, including projector units for family movie nights, speaker systems for gatherings, and indoor lighting brought outside.
Someone has to maintain those systems and be responsible for setting them up each year, as customers don’t want to leave electrical equipment outside during the winter months. These services can get them back quickly to using their backyard space as the entertainment zone they dreamed of. According to the Lawn and Landscaping Report, 34% of landscape businesses offer lighting installation. Those lights need to be checked to ensure they still function after the winter and replaced if needed.
Pruning and Trimming of Trees and Shrubs
The early spring is the perfect time to get trees and scrubs under control before they start growing. Most are dormant now, but they can quickly overgrow a landscape once the real spring weather hits. You don’t want to see your hard work from a landscaping project gone because a tree overgrew. Shrubs that overgrow can look unclean and leave the landscape looking rough around the edges.
In the Lawn and Landscape Report, 76% of businesses offer pruning services, while 81% offer trimming services. It can be a simple task to do, but without the right tools, a homeowner may simply forget to do it.
Prepare Your Clients Backyard for the Future Season
Lawn and landscape maintenance in the early spring is critical to enjoyment later in the summer. Especially if you were the company that installed the backyard landscape for them. The last thing you want is the customer to come back the second year and be unhappy with what they see because they didn’t take care of it.
Spring cleaning can be a simple add-on service after an installation project and a great way to scale your business. Once complete with the installation, move your customers into the next sales cycle phase and maintain the beautiful landscape you designed and built for them. Continue to make improvements and showcase the work you can do beyond just being an installation company. It’s a simple way to scale your business early in the season before diving into more extensive project work.