How to a Write Landscaping and Lawn Care Business Plan to Get Financing

Creating a business plan for your landscaping company is important if you want to apply for funding or have a roadmap that will guide your operations. The landscaping industry continues to grow year after year with the increase in the housing market and commercial real estate development, it is estimated the industry is worth around 105 billion dollars.

When deciding the type of landscaping company, you want to start, it’s important to consider if you have the skills or can employ people who have the technical knowledge, otherwise, you can go the franchise route and get trained before starting your business.

A typical landscaping business plan will include the following sections.

Executive Summary

Summarize your business plan in this section by writing a brief description of your business, the operating model, business structure, a summary of your products and services, and your target market and summarize your financial needs and your growth plans. Ideally, the executive summary should not be more than two pages.

Company Description

Describe your company in detail including the vision, mission, and goals of your business. Highlight reasons why you went for the location of your choice. Explain why you will stand out from the competition and highlight your unique selling proposition.

Market and Industry Analysis

In this section of your business plan, you will identify your target market, size and demographic. Also, list down your competitors in your location including their strengths and weaknesses. Indicate the trends in your landscaping niche, the growth opportunities, and potential threats, you can put this in a swot analysis. Some of the industry trends include using sustainable landscaping practices, using eco-friendly products, smart irrigation and plants that don’t require a lot of water to thrive, modern energy-saving outdoor lighting, and current landscaping design trends.

Organization Structure

List down the key people in your business and the organization structure, you can include their resumes in the appendix section to showcase their skills, experience, and qualifications. Indicate how decisions will be made and the role of each person.

Services and Products

Your landscaping business plan target audience will want to know what products and services you will offer. First, you will need to decide what type of landscaping business you will start, some examples include:

• Commercial landscaping targeting properties like hotels, office buildings, and malls
• Residential landscaping targeting homeowners including caring for lawns, and designing and landscaping new houses.
• Maintenance landscaping that offers ongoing maintenance like lawn mowing, pruning, etc.

Identify your suppliers and how you plan to acquire your equipment, materials, and as well as the technology you will adopt to ensure your operations are efficient. With the increasing labor shortage, ensure you analyze the labor market in your area, the average wage, and how you will recruit and retain your employees.

Sales and Marketing Strategy

Describe how you plan to put your business in front of customers including coming up with a market strategy that includes methods of marketing your business i.e., flyers, social media advertising, partnering with other businesses, door-to-door, website, directories, community events, and networking with realtors. Provide a strategy for pricing your products or services factoring in your cost and profit margin. Conduct an industry analysis to understand the landscaping industry trends.

Funding Requirements

Indicate how much funding you need to start your business and where the money will go i.e., operational expenses and start-up costs, you will go into detail when creating your financial statements. Indicate where you plan to acquire the funds and how much you will put into the business out of pocket.

Financial Projections

You will need to create a comprehensive financial forecast for at least 3 to 5 years. The main financial documents to create are the balance sheet, cash flow statement, and income statement. Kindly note that this is the most important part of your business plan because the financial projects will reveal if the business is viable.

Risk Analysis

Identify your risks and the strategies you will implement to mitigate the risks.  The risks include labor shortages, environmental impacts, seasonality, etc.

Exit Strategy (optional)

What is the end goal of your business, will you be scaling it and selling it or passing it on to family members? This section is where you inform the financial institution of your long-term plan for your landscaping company.

At Axis Business Plans, we support our clients by creating comprehensive funding-ready business plans that will impress lenders. Call us today for more information.

Picture by Dele Oke Unsplash