Small Business Mistakes I've made since starting up

It's been around 12 months since I started my lawn care business and it's safe to say I've made a number of mistakes along the way. In this article i'm hoping to discuss some of my mistakes, hoping this may help you avoid similar issues and potentially get you thinking about what you need to do to get your own business set up in the right way. Although, this is based on my experience in lawn care, some of the issues aren't lawn care specific and can be seen in a number of small business when they get started.

I haven't listed these in any particular order, only how my mind was working at the time;

• Poor planning and business case - A big no no for new business, but sadly in hindsight one I fell victim to. It wasn't necessarily the fact I didn't plan, however, I felt I would grow quicker than I actually did, and therefore once the numbers of customers was much lower than anticipated, I needed to make adjustments mid-year instead of having any risks assessed and planned for beforehand.

Lesson Learned: It's important to properly plan your year and have an ever evolving business case and risk assessment detailing potential risks to your business. I currently have a document for my outgoings, not just for the business but also my mortgage, insurance, council tax, petrol, bills etc. This tells me a monthly figure i need to be earning just to break even. I have an ever evolving business plan, based on acquiring 50, 100 or 150 additional customers in Year 2, and what this may project to moving forward. I also need to track what happens should i fail achieve these targets. I have a document for risk assessment, anything which could potentially happen which may set the business back, and finally i have a budget plan which contains my anticipated budget on marketing, stock, maintenance of machinery and car, other expenses etc. I can't stress enough to anyone when starting out to properly plan, budget and document everything you. can to avoid shocks.

• Marketing sporadically instead of a larger amount in one go - If you set up the (lawn) business through the franchise route (see my post on Franchise or Go it alone) the franchisor will usually help to get you going as part of the package, this may include a number of marketing initiatives like website, lead generation and leaflets. They'll also help with design and printing. As part of going it alone for me and setting up lawnurture.com I had to do everything by myself. I did receive a little help from one of my contacts in lawn care, however, I probably over-estimated the response rate I would receive from a relatively small amount of leaflets sent (20,000 or so). The most important aspect of small businesses is customer acquisition and the sooner you can reach your target customer base the better off you will be.

Lesson Learned: If there's one thing to learn from the franchises, even if you are not going down that route, it's to acquire business as quickly as you can, otherwise you'll be chasing your tail the whole time. In Year 2, rather than planning a scatter gun approach to marketing, i'll be blasting a particular focus area which i've researched and has a high percentage of my target audience. It's important to build up clusters of customers within a close proximity to each other, so you can treat the same day and decrease costs of petrol, and then do this repeatedly. Although i'll use a leaflet drop company in the area, I've also seen a better response rate when i've either delivered the leaflet at irregular times myself (e.g. weekend afternoons) or have wandered around local farmers markets and village/town events handing leaflets and building up a local presence.

• Over-ordering Stock - If you ever watch any shows such a Dragon's Den (Shark Tank in the US) you'll see the investors instantly cringe at would be business owners over-ordering stock, particularly stock which is perishable. Luckily in my case, my feed isn't perishable so can be used in year two, however, its important to keep costs under control, particularly with new businesses. I over-estimated the amount of customers I would pick up in the first few months of operating, by a considerable distance, however, I did manage to purchase my stock at a discounted rate (small benefit).

Lesson Learned: To keep cost under control and avoid wastage it's either better to order stock as and when you need it, initially you will pay a higher price, but you will control expenditure, and avoid throwing away perishable stock. A good idea which ties in with the networking point below - build up contacts within the industry, either similar businesses in a non-competing area or even people in different but similar verticals. A few Lawn or garden companies forming a bit of a union for purchasing will be able to buy on bulk at a lower rate. I play golf, so I have got to know the head greenkeeper at my local golf club, he currently purchases seed, feed, equipment on behalf of the golf club. Since getting to know him, he's been able to provide me with feed, seed and dressing at (the golf clubs) cost, saving me hundred's of pounds.

• Burned one of my first lawns through over-application of weedkiller or fertiliser - This mistake is more directed towards lawn care, but I guess be true of other businesses too. To ensure a good level of professionalism in any industry you need to be able to accurately assess and calibrate the materials. We'll discuss calibration of the spreader and knapsack sprayer in a different post, however, the pitfalls of inaccuracy may be under-estimating the material/feed/seed etc. required, which would mean not covering the whole lawn with the recommended dosage/application rate e.g. 3g per metre squared. Worse still would be to over-estimate and potentially damaging or scorching the lawn. Wastage occurs either by using too much product than necessary, or not enough the first time, and having to go back to the property (petrol costs too) to repeat the process to achieve the desired result. I scorched a customers' lawn by mistaking the application rates for weedkiller, I used the application rate for seaweed instead as I was tank mixing, and ended up scorching elements of my customers' lawn.
• I also scorched a lawn by not checking my equipment. The first time I used my spreader I'd calibrated it, but didn't realise it was defective after being in my van, I poured the feed into the spreader bucket and it all immediately went through the hole in my spreader onto my customers' lawn. Expensive error :(

Lesson Learned: This one is fairly simple, measure your customer's lawn accurately (I use a measuring wheel), weigh or measure the product accurately (follow the product label instructions and use measuring jugs/scales as necessary), this will allow you to calibrate your equipment accurately. The final part of the calibration is ensuring you walk an even pace otherwise you may end up with either too little product and the lawn may look patchy or too much and you may scorch the lawn.

• Tools which looked like they were useful and would save time, but unnecessary expenditure when starting out - As I made my way out into the business of lawn care a number of tools were brought to my attention which are supposed to save time, which is imperative when completing as much (quality) work as you can each day. When starting out, it's important to keep an eye on the costs and some of the items/tools. Some of the tools I purchased are not necessarily not useful, it's just they're not essential from the outset.

Lesson Learned: Although some of the equipment may save you time in the end, particularly when you have a high volume of customers, whilst you need to manage costs I'd suggest only using tools which are necessary for the job, this may be a bit more manual at the beginning, but managing costs will help you to fund other more important areas which will allow you to acquire customers. A Landzie Spreader is a great bit of kit, however, is it essential to get going? probably not. Likewise there's a number of manual Aerators which look nice and effective, however, do they work better than a garden fork? Save costs now, and once you have a nice cashflow you can then splash out a bit.

• Better online and offline profile - networking - Any small business owner as they start up should try to make as many contacts as possible, whether they are in the same line or business or not, they will be able to give advice on what has helped them, or even advise on something you may not have considered. There are loads of local networking events up and down the country for small business owners to take advantage of. On the flip side, since joining some of the industry lawn association groups who run events and conferences themselves or have Facebook/Whatsapp groups its worth while to ask any pertinent questions which may be cropping up throughout the year. I probably didn't make the most of the contacts I have or built up through these groups. No matter what industry you are in there are likely to be similar organisations designed to help independent small business owners. In terms of online presence, this happens over time although having an informative website and regular posts on socials increases exposure to other industry professionals and potential customers

Lesson Learned: There's a saying we've all heard of which goes, 'it's not what you know, but who you know' which applies here too. Building up a network of contacts either directly in your industry or indirectly in similar businesses or other small business owners will only help you to manage your business. Contacts in your business will be able to advise of any new trends they are seeing, give a different point of view or even pass business your way if they are too busy, can't make a customers' timeline. The golf club I mentioned previously has allowed me to tap into two or three new clients looking to improve the quality of their lawns, not to mention the lower stock purchasing I have been able to tap into. I've made it a mission in year two to attend lawn care conferences and collaborate in the facebook and whatsapp groups to help with knowledge acquisition which is never a bad thing.

After year one my finances are a little worse than I anticipated so i've joined a few small business networking groups which although aren't similarly lined in terms of industry, i know they can help me suggest ways to run my business more effectively or efficiently with a few suggestions here and there, and you never know some of them may need lawn care.

In terms of online presence, i now regularly post on either some of my daily activities, or something similar to this post. I have a YouTube Channel which I hope to build up in 2025, and I'm (completely not) down with the youth on Tik Tok, snap hazard, insta and facebook :). I have a drone which i never thought i'd say, and a technical selfie stick for vlogging (whatever that is)

Summary

The amount of generous people i've met have all advised they made mistakes during the first year of operating (who hasn't), and some of the people have closed their businesses down completely, only to run a different business, life is built on making mistakes and learning from them. I hope some of the points I have raised based on my own experience will either resonate with you or help you to avoid falling into these traps.

#smallbusiness #lessonslearnedsettingupasmallbusiness #dontmakethesemistakes #lawncare #lawnbusinesses

If you have any comments, would like to correct any mistakes or just ask me any questions, feel free to reach out to me at [email protected] or on socials Facebook, Instagram, Tik Tok @lawnurture and YouTube @lawns_and_vegas.