Thank you pavingexpert.com for invaluable website! - (hope it hasn't been in vain for me...)

[romfordlandscaper]

i want to thank Tony and those behind this outstanding website. it has provided me with such invaluable information and knowledge and i'm constantly referring back to here for specifics on many different aspects of paving.

i just hope that it hasn't all been in vain and that i have to give up landscaping for the forseeable future and focus my efforts elsewhere. it's just so hard for a small business to get much work in this market right now. the kind of customers with 'smaller' jobs at the bottom end of the market who were more likely to use a smaller lesser-known company in the hope to save a bit but still get a proper job done, are the same customers who can't afford to or want to be careful with their money right now and won't spend money on such a 'luxury' as garden landscaping. the customers at the higher end of the market who have the money to spend freely or can get finance are more likely to use the larger better-known companies who are still able to find work, even if the market has shrunk considerably.

to make any serious money, we would have to be snapping up such a high amount of the limited number of smaller jobs that are still out there, when there are countless other small landscapers in the same position struggling to find work. not an easy task at all; OR, managing to get more work from higher-end customers who still have money to spare.

2007 was our best year by far. not massive earnings, sure, but probably double the income, wages, profit, etc from the next best year. 2008 was the complete opposite, with only one mediocre-sized job! 2009 is looking to go the same way so far, barring one five-figure job completed recently (which incidentally, we did at a ridiculously low price just to try and guarantee the work. i think i earnt perhaps £7.50 per hour at best for work on-site), unless action is taken. it's deja vu because i was saying the same things for the second half of last year, and spent what spare money was available on marketing.

the only good earning job we have recieved from that money so far is the one just mentioned.

this may well be the last year i'm doing this. i already have had to take up part-time unrelated work elsewhere in order to earn money, and we can't keep spending money on marketing if it doesn't bring in work. i also cannot keep working two jobs part-time like this forever as each of the two commitments compromises the other; and as a family business, it isn't just me who is binded by other commitments like that. it's always a potential problem when we can't be on-site or at hand for the same days and times. if this year doesn't improve by the end and we can find regular work, i would probably be better of financially by focusing all my efforts on one job.

in desperation to earn money, i was working 10-14 hour days for 6 days of the week during much of that recent large job, if you combine it with the other work i was doing. i could have done less hours (at the other job) instead of still taking any available overtime, during the course of the landscaping job. but a part of me won't let me rest if there is a chance to earn more much-needed money.

though i said things along similar lines over the last part of 2008, i really have to do everything within my capability to try and bring in more work if i can continue with the landscaping. i have to try different approaches and some which we used before for other purposes, and have a few ideas we haven't tried yet. some of the ideas are to attract the lower-end customers, and other to attract higher-end. it can't be anything too costly, because as stated before, we spend what little chunk of cash we had on two advertising campaigns last year and so far we've had just one big job out of one of those campaigns, and we can't keep throwing money away. aside from that, i'm also finally working on our website (www.divine-gardens.com) which i've put off for maybe a year or more. it didn't really have anything much worth viewing before. i'm "trying" to get it as professional as possible as to help with attracting the higher-end customers and stand a chance in hell at competing with some local bigger boys.

time will tell. i feel so disheartened and unproductive when things are like this, and while i hadn't been doing enough to change the situation.

[lutonlagerlout]

sorry to hear that dude, i personally feel that marketing in this climate is p**sing in the wind
recommendation is the way forward, and the way to get that is to make sure you leave every customer happy
saying that ,although we are still working ,nothing substantial is coming through
green shoots my a**e
LLL

[romfordlandscaper]

sorry to hear that dude, i personally feel that marketing in this climate is p**sing in the wind
recommendation is the way forward, and the way to get that is to make sure you leave every customer happy
saying that ,although we are still working ,nothing substantial is coming through

thanks luton. i understand that, as we certainly do have a high-level of satisfaction from our customers, but it just doesn't lead on to more work for us neither. not having built-up a large enough base of previous customers to increase the level of word-of-mouth leads before the recession has made the situation almost impossible for a small landscaping company.

the situation couldn't be more obvious really. before 2008, whenever working at residential properties, there would be countless other landscaping jobs taking place by other firms in the same streets, often within stone's throw. when i travel about now - i see almost nothing in comparison. i wish you the best of luck in maintaining your workflow. hopefully it will be a damn site easier than it is for us to find a regular workflow at all.

green shoots my a**e

true say... i'm no economist, but even i can see that things are still set to get a lot worse before they improve.

one good thing that will come out of the economic situation for me is that it will help me with some of my plans for the future. when the property market bottoms out it will make it so much easier to afford my first investment there and potentially make more profit as the economy recovers. every cloud has a silver lining... or something.

[flowjoe]

Romford

Sorry to hear your woes but its good you have an alternative game plan.

I do work in the pre-purchase market with estate agents and it has picked up in the last two months, structural engineers are talking of doing more plans for home extensions etc but the problem as you know is consumer confidence.

A good long hot summer, a flue epidemic and a few public hangings of MPs and the press will forget about the recession, and hopefully people may start spending again.

Hope things work out.