AIBU to charge £16ph...

[flowercover]

Hello everyone,

I am currently unemployed and to help myself out of this I've decided to try starting up my own gardening service in and around Norwich, and just wanted some feed back from both customers and other gardeners.

I have written a business plan and am trying to calculate what I need to charge in order to make a livable income. Would £16 p/h be too much? Would you rather employ somebody hourly or half day/full day? I can charge less for half/full as my costs would be reduced

Also, if you employ a gardener where did you find their services advertised, and what kind of service were you looking for? I am RHS trained with 5 years experience in a walked kitchen garden and a specialist nursery. Therefore I can offer from simple mowing/pruning/clearing to full garden redesign.

Anything that could help welcomed.

I'm female and 38.

Thanks so much!

I have a 2 person gardening team. They charge £20 for half an hour, £35 for an hour, £130 for 4 hours and £250 for 8 hours. They have designed bits of my garden and will also do hedge cutting, mowing, weeding etc.

I usually do half a day in spring, summer and autumn

Fuck, my window cleaner is £60!

Fucking hell! Mine only costs a fiver and only £3 if he only does the front.

Get a Facebook page up and running - I look for everything on there and businesses with a page showing their work (e.g. mobile hairdresser) really stand out to me.

My window cleaner is £25 per hour, so I think £16 is more than reasonable. We’re in Home Counties.

Minimum £20ph. I'm doing a RHS course, some of the other women have loads of practical experience and are already running their own gardening business and charging 20ph as part qualified, but will prob charge more once qualified. East Anglia also. Best of luck!

You're able to offer more than the bog standard "mow blow and hoe" that many many gardeners do. Maybe have a different rates for mow blow hoe stuff and then the skilled "proper" gardening of pruning, improving the soil, lifting and dividing and so forth? You know yourself that being able to do the special stuff is what changes a garden into something beautiful rather than functional. I'm sure people will pay for that.

We pay our gardener £16 an hour. That's cheap for him as he is quick and strong so gets loads done. I would happily pay him up to about £22. I previously had a lady who only charged £10. I got rid of her when she put her rate up to £15 per hour. She was great for weeding but we have lots of bushes and therefore more physical work required. She took too long therefore £15ph was too expensive for her.

Crikey, my gardener is £10 per hour and the window cleaner is £7. South east.

Your rate does sound on the cheaper end. I’ve been looking for a garden designer recently and the spectrum of what is offered is huge. It also seems like they charge by the job rather than hourly for design. I’ve seen ones that are mainly gardeners that can advise on planting and others that are really designers with a love of gardening that will manage projects including hard landscaping. It’s important to market clearly what you can offer and to build a portfolio. I’ve only looked at designers with online portfolios that show before/after pictures but I need a big re-design.

@Avasarala's post is excellent

In terms of a rate card of charges - don't forget to charge extra for disposal of materials, per sack! if people don't / can't compost or burn, you'll have to transport adn pay to tip and you can charge a mark up on that.
I woudl honestly recommend viewing and quoting for more complex work than cutting / tidying. It's how we've always operated, and it's a flat per month fee all year round even though they obv do more hours in the summer.
I'd also consider charges for planting schemes - you've got the qualifications to offer that and people pay hundreds for a good scheme with drawing / notes.
Your basic rate is very basic - don't undersell yourself.

Remember that when working inside the Golden Triangle you'll be dragging stuff miles due to the lack of parking.

Our gardener is £22.5 p/h - north essex, and my parents in Suffolk Pay £13.5p/h

Oops, that's £12.5 for mine not £22

I live in Norwich and think you'd do well to post on Nextdoor to advertise your services.

My window cleaner is £12 for a 3 bed house, £60

I use a Gardener that charges more than that, but he gives me a fixed price for the jobs. I'm happy for him to fit it around his better paying jobs.

That can work to your advantage because I'd happily pay £30 for a tree stump dug or £20 for a tall holly tree shaping etc. I can do most other jobs myself.

My window cleaner is £60 for a pretty big house and an orangery!

You need to check what the going rate is for gardeners in your area. If a gardener actually knows about plants, pruning, planting and has a qualification, they should get more money. If they are a "keep it tidy" and just do mowing and hedge trimming, with limited knowledge of plants, they should get less. My gardener is £18 p/h in Home Counties but has a qualification.

Also, I pay £5 for a three bed house, my Window cleaner has been doing his round for 30 years, so can be trusted. He cleans the insides for £10 for anyone old/disabled.

I think that is very reasonable. If I was advertising I would say “ £16 per hour or price by job if preferred” If I had a big job that involved a mornings work I would look to pay between £70 -£100. On the other hand a a small tiding job might be a bit cheaper.

you sound extremely qualified. Will you want to be doing basic gardening?

While we're on this subject- can anyone recommend a reliable window cleaner in south bucks? Pls

I would generally prefer a gardener, or any tradesperson really, who charges by the job rather than the hour - then you can decide a reasonable fee for you, estimating how long it will take you, and the customer knows what they will be paying.

I have realised that my wonderful gardener is clearly undercharging me (£12 per hour in the South East) so I think I'll offer her a pay rise!

To be honest, for me it would depend what sort of work you were doing and how fast you were. We tried a gardener once who had a fairly hefty hourly rate but was also very slow.

Avasarela is spot on - you need to work out your costs and target income.

Small businesses frequently under estimate costs and end up effectively providing free work - so don't let yourself end up subsidising cheap garden services for people.

The difficulty is that you may be competing with lots of people under pricing or charging 'hobby' rates. Make your qualifications and experience a key part of your offering. If you have pictures of projects so much the better. Be prepared to distinguish your skills and experience from cheaper services.

I gardened for four years, and did an RHS course too. I loved it and my usp was as a woman gardener. This was in the 90s/00s. It is a fantastic career and keeps you fit. I did have a few tricky customers who expected a magic wand approach in an hour and those who understood how much time a good gardener will take - mostly the latter were happy to garden as well but had gardens so big they couldn't do the tasks single handed.

I would advertise as starting from £16/ph and design services from £20/ph. Do you have any links with people in the trade who you trust? I'm guessing you do if you have already worked in a salaried position. Use them!

Good luck in your new venture x slightly jealous