Lawn Mowing Pricing Formula

Ways to charge lawn mowing services

There are several ways you can go about pricing lawn and landscaping services. The two most popular ways to charge for lawn mowing jobs are calculating pricing based on the size of the lawn to be mowed and by the time it takes to mow.

Let’s take a closer look at both of these pricing options.

By size

Pricing by square footage requires you to take accurate measurements of the lot, which many lawn mowing professionals find to be an inefficient pricing method.

The one exception is if you’re dealing with a larger property that spans several acres. Charging a flat fee per acreage may be more beneficial and save you time when creating an estimate. Adjusting pricing based on the frequency of mowing needed is a common consideration as well.

Otherwise, charging per hour will give you the best estimate and is the easiest method to add to your lawn mowing pricing formula.

Per hour

Many lawn care professionals prefer to price by the hour instead of lot size, as it gives a more accurate estimate of costs.

Depending on where you’re working, you can charge anywhere from $25 to $60 an hour for lawn mowing. As well as accounting for the time needed to mow the lawn, be sure to account for your travel time and equipment prep work when charging per hour.

Of course, pricing is more complicated than figuring out an hourly charge. So, let’s take a more in-depth look at how to price lawn mowing services.

How to find lawns to mow

Whether you’re just starting or have been doing this for years, the bulk of the marketing efforts for a lawn care professional should focus on finding lawns to mow.

But how do you find more lawns to mow? Here are some great ways to do so:

• Promote your business through word of mouth.
• Implement a referral program where current customers can get discounts by referring friends or family.
• Create print materials like business cards, brochures, and flyers to distribute in your area.
• Make a website for your business to showcase your work and list important information, like prices and locations.

How to price lawn mowing services

Coming up with competitive prices requires a lot of research and a thorough understanding of both your business and target customers.

However, once you find the prices that work for you, you’ll:

• Find more opportunities.
• Drive business growth.
• Retain more customers.

Follow the steps below to price your lawn mowing services efficiently and accurately every time!

Step 1: Calculate your hourly labor rate

Labor costs are most businesses ’ biggest expense. So, it’s smart to start here to figure out how much to charge for lawn mowing.

You can find your hourly labor rate per worker and per job by considering these factors:

• The average rate for lawn care services in your area.
• How much you pay your employees per hour.
• Your desired profit margin.

It’s important to note that pricing by the hour does not mean that you have to communicate your hourly charge to your customer.

You can plug your hourly rates into your lawn mowing pricing formula to help you figure out what prices make sense for your business and present the total to your customer.

Step 2: Check out the lawn in question

You should always check out your customer’s lawn before giving them a quote, regardless of whether you charge by the hour or by size.

Your customer can say they just want their lawn mowed, but once you arrive, you may notice that some extra care is required before you can mow. As a result, additional services need to be included in the estimate you offer them. Offering additional services, such as trimming or edging, for an additional fee is necessary in many cases.

For example, you might discover that what your customer may think is overgrown grass is actually weeds, requiring weed control on top of regular mowing.

You’ll want to inspect the lawn so you can assess its condition and determine what type of treatment it needs. This ensures that you deliver an accurate estimate from the beginning and avoid surprising your customer with extra charges later.

Step 3: Decide how many employees

You know that your labor rate will be the largest factor in determining your lawn care prices, so your focus should also be on what influences your labor rate. In this case, that would be your employees.

And since you wouldn’t be able to grow as quickly without your employees, pricing their labor takes skill.

When you assess a job for a potential client, determine how many workers it will take to complete the job in a reasonable amount of time.

To get your total labor rate, add each employee’s hourly rate to get your total hourly labor rate. Then multiply that by the number of hours the job will take to complete.

For example, let’s say a job takes two hours for two of your employees to complete, and you pay each of them $40 an hour.

$40 x 2 employees = $80 hourly rate$80 x 2 hours = $160 total price of the job

Remember, $160 does not include factors such as special services, a markup for profit, or overhead as labor costs are only one part of the lawn mowing pricing formula needed to create estimates.

Step 4: Consider special services and materials

Lawn care isn’t just mowing grass. As you know, a lot goes into maintaining a lawn, and therefore, a variety of services that your business could offer.

Additional lawn services include:

• Mulch and fertilizer application.
• Tree trimming.
• Weed and insect control.
• Aeration.
• Winterization.

You should price each of these additional services separately instead of putting them together in one lump sum. This ensures that you account for all elements of the job.

Not only do these services require different types of labor, but they also require different materials that affect the total price of the job.

Discuss these special services with your customer beforehand to ensure that you’re both on the same page.

Step 5: Don’t forget overhead and equipment

Once you’ve calculated the cost of labor, you will factor in overhead and other costs.

Your lawn care company’s overhead costs may include:

• Administrative staff.
• Office space.
• Vehicle maintenance.
• Other bills (phone, internet, etc.)
• Equipment.

After labor, your business’s second-largest expense is equipment. Just like labor, equipment costs money, so you have to make sure that you’re always in a position to maintain or replace it if necessary.

As a result, factoring in the cost of equipment and maintenance as part of your overhead costs is crucial. You should markup anywhere from 11 – 50% to cover your total overhead costs.

From there, add a markup for profit. Your markup should be based on how much profit you are looking to make from every job and is determined by your other expenses.

Before arriving at a final price, double-check that you’ve included every element of the job in your calculation and have priced any special factors correctly. To give your customer an idea of your prices beforehand, you can create a lawn care price sheet.

Lawn care price sheet

A lawn care price sheet lets your customer know your prices in advance and gives you a baseline to help develop accurate estimates for your customers.

To create your lawn care price sheet, you should use a lawn mowing pricing formula to determine your prices.

Here’s what your lawn mowing pricing formula will look like:

Hourly labor rate (# of hours) + overhead + profits + taxes = Total job price

By using this formula, you’ll quickly determine the price of all types of jobs to deliver the best service possible.

Why do it the hard way? Use our free invoice generator in Method to skip the calculators and manual headaches. Get paid faster and look good doing it.

Lawn care price based on size

Even though you shouldn’t price based on the square footage of the lot, knowing the size will still help you estimate the total cost of a job.

The price of lawn care is greatly affected by the size of the lawn, which will be an element you use to determine the labor that goes into it.

Now that you know what goes into the costs of lawn care services and your different pricing options let’s nail down how much to charge for your services.