Scarifying . How much can you charge? 

I am NOT in the trade and a keen DIYer and do most things myself (I am only 73! ) but love your videos and honesty. I am a retired accountant and can see the sense you talk. Keep up your good work.

Clients do not realise the amount of time effort and waste that goes into scarifying a garden. Great video Rob. Damien from Ireland

Professional grounds maintenance operatives that are qualified & insured with all the necessary equipment such as yourself should be charging the same as the other trade's such as plumbers/joiners etc for turning up on jobs. Great content chap.

Thanks for sharing Rob. Very interesting.

I’m thinking of starting my own grass cutting business at the age of 19 just hoping everything goes well, love your videos so helpful and a joy to watch 😊

As always thanks a lot Rob, myself and others I’m sure appreciate your honestly and the general info you give out. Great stuff!

Rob thank you! thank you so much, this needs to be spoken more about in my opinion. I started out properly around a year back and I've been burnt on jobs no end of times just swinging in the dark when quoting. After a year im starting to get the feel for the jobs and what kind of price i should be charging but a video like this two years back would have just given me that platform i needed and i have no doubt you will have helped many people who are starting out with just this short 10 min vid. Obviously its not set in stone, obviously everyone has got their own overheads and everything else you hear other youtubers say, but just as a baseline as a guide, from a successful mentor as someone i look up to its nice to have that assurance. hope I make sense there. All the best mate, Cameron, Ledward's Garden Services in Chesterfield!

Thanks for your honesty Rob

Such crucial information for those of us who’re in the business planning stage, thank you so much!

Love this Rob

Magic this. Thanks Rob....you're a good man👍🏼

Great video Rob. It does help guy's starting out.

Rob, thanks for putting this video out been following for a while considering becoming self employed and this has really helped canny lad

You’ve helped me as I’m now in my second season Rob ty so much, it’s hard work scarify and your prices are spot on and you explain it so well too. Keep up the great work and ty for being honest, we need more ppl like you mate. Keith. Smiley Gardens in Hertfordshire

Honestly great way of thinking with costing. It’s a hobby for me and I get people asking me to scarifier lawn as I own a good machine to do it.

Great video Rob. I'm on my 2nd year business is good and I want to thank you. You helped and inspired me to start my own business at 19. leaving the comfort of my previous job driving digger that i had since leaving school in search of being my own boss. Your the first gardening youtuber I come across when I first had the thought of creating a gardening business. You helped me tenfold, so thank you. Keep up the great work and keep mowing 🍀

Great honest video Rob regarding pricing and clients. Always nice to read through other subscribers comments🙂 Keep up the good work & 👍 the green gold is definatly growing, too fast at the minute moment. All the best to you for the weeks ahead. I look forward to the next one😎

I’ve been going for a couple of months now Rob and I’ve been very lucky as work is coming in thick and fast. Your videos are always very good. Just wanted to say thank you for your honesty 👍

Thank you for your honesty Rob have a good rest of your week and enjoy the weekend

Thanks for the honesty think I'm to cheep 😀

Thanks for being honest Rob - sounds about right. There are so many costs that have to be covered before you even turn up to do a garden and they need to be covered.

Cheers for being honest Rob. Good to be reminded of our worth as professionals with years of knowledge and thosands of pounds of kit. Hard to know your worth sometimes when your out there on your own. All the best. Andy

Along the same lines as what you discussed. A shop suggested to me that if I suggest to the customer the scarifier is hired at £60 the customer is more likely to accept the cost/higher charge

Great video Rob, thanks a lot. I think your prices are about right for north east. I did a scarifying job this week for a regular client and she was really surprised I charged £60, similar size to your video. It was hard work and and took 1 hour 20. Grass sure is growing!! Cheers

Can you please forward this video to all of my clients! Thank you for talking about money, great video as always.

I think you did a valuable service to the gardening community. Any discussion of money is always awkward, but it is necessary. We have to pull one another up. Knowing how much it would cost to rent, is a valuable tool. Hopefully some will realize that they need to price more realistically. There will be people who cannot afford higher rates, and that is sad. But you as an individual cannot be the charity. All tradesmen must earn a living wage. As always Good Luck and enjoy the summer.

Rob, what you charge is up to you, if you get what you are asking for then everyone is happy, a fair’s day’s work deserves a fair’s day pay, the before and after pictures of the lawn you scarified is great, I look after a bowling green, and I was taught the worst it looks after it is done , the better job you have done, nice one man.

Great video Rob. I think at the beginning I was too cheap. People would say that to me, but like you mentioned about machinery plus more importantly experience. I’ve more or less doubled my prices now, I’ve probably kept 90% of my regulars. Winning probably 80% of my quotes and potential clients are happy to wait a couple of weeks for me to quote new work. I think when we love what we do, we put more effort into our work and naturally attract the right clients that don’t try to knock you down.

Great video again man. Its so tricky to know if your charging right. Better to charge more than less. I think you could afford to charge a little more sounds like your top class. 👍

spot on. pretty much my way of doing it down to a tee. I'm happy with what I take home and plan on expanding widely as I have ties in many places. You never know, could make myself a millionaire from it one day ;) never say never but if you're happy, that's all that matters.

Hi Rob, Good video im north of Manchester and for me those are my prices i do charge, New customers always ask how much do i charge a hour i dont anymore.. I just take a look and charge according without ripping them off.. Thats a cracking Weibang i have the lawnmower weibang i love it...Take care...Lee😊

As a rule of thumb, I charge 3.5x mowing charge for scarifying/lawn raking ( 2 passes with scarifier/lawn rake , 1 pick up/finish with mower ) But I only do my regular customers not one offs, so the lawns are in pretty good shape anyway. New customers only get scarifying as an option in their second season so I've had the chance to treat and feed the lawns and get the grass to be able to take the scarifier or lawn rake. I've had to have an honest discussion with a few one off clients when they ask about scarifying as they have some moss in their lawn .... No says I, you have some grass in your moss, your going to have to reseed. Lol

If youre honest about your pricing your customers always have a choice to engage you or not. You can look yourself in the eye and be happy that its a two way win win until things change. Unremarkably, change is to be welcomed. . . . ..

Thanks for making this video. Like you, I bought the Weibang Intrepid 46 at the beginning of the year, and I've been struggling to market Scarifying. I'm in my first year and successful in other areas, so it's no biggy. Don't have finished some brilliant Scarifying jobs with it, and I agree it's a bit big and far too powerful, but at least it shows your clients you mean business 😉 thanks for the help on the pricing.

Great video Rob!! Dont worry what other people think is too cheap or expensive- people live in different areas where prices differ, everyone has varying reasons for charging what they do- as long as youre happy with your price that's all that matters! One thing i would say- is try pricing off m2. That way you'll be able to work out a price that works for you for any sized lawn, rather than guestimating! Knowing the m2 you'll also be able to calculate volumes of seed and compost etc with ease. Best of luck 👍

Sounds about right to me Rob, not too high not too low….the other day I had a quote of a bit of fencing and they quoted me their labour at £57 plus VAT per hour 😮….so I done it myself

average cost a of a gardener in uk is now between 28 pound to 35 pound an hour. if we can all start say and charging that. i did a job today 50 mins it taken. got 40 pound. im starting to charge new customers 40 pound if im there an hour and 30 pound local for the hour. good video rob.

My wife keeps telling me that I don't charge enough. Now she's heard your wise words. I will have to up my rates! Great adivse, Rob. Keep it up, which I'm sure you will!

Top man ya a credit to the trade.

I think these types of jobs can be priced fairly accurately once you've done a few and get the time and materials right per m. It's the clearing jobs im still under or over on price. Cheers 👍

Hi Rob, would you consider doing a live Q&A, im thinking about starting a lawn care service and i got a few question, your videos have been gold, thanks very much!

A well known lawn company with a colourful thumb has their charges available online on an area basis. I found just undercutting them is a good starting point. I've just had a happy client have front and back lawns heavily scarified and reseeded. They were happy with £275, took me about 4 hours plus some loading, unloading etc. Taking cost of seed, compost and equipment it was about right. Particularly as I did the neighbour's straight afterwards too.

Sounds really expensive till you , have to buy the equipment, service the machinery, get there, get back, your labour, take the waste away, and the other 1 million things that you have to do and buy. I always say if you want to go elsewhere, go elsewhere. I never bargain with my pricing. And everyone's different with their overheads. If you are happy with £150 a day fine if you can get £500 a day fine. Personally I'm on £150 a day give or take.

I appreciate this mate, I'm just in the process of increasing my rates to £30 an hour, awaiting replies at the same time as I have sent out my monthly invoices. I truly feel that its the correct amount to be charging, for all that you have spoken about. Regarding scarifying, I think were on the same mark but go about it a different way. From my increase it may add up different, but I'll continue the same model this september and next year too unless it doesn't reflect the value properly. But last year, as an example, I would do scarifying on my hourly rate at £22 and charge the scarifier that I own out at about 80% the local rate for hire, plus waste, seed and compost that I make a markup on, albeit small, just to account for the time spent sourcing the materials or taking the waste away. You're doing a grand job it seems. Only recently come across your videos, hence the comment on one from a few months back! But they're great just to see what people are charging The downside to gardening is there are a lot of people who do it for pocket money/beer money or to get out of the house now that they've retired. They're charging about £15 an hour and some customers don't see the difference between gardeners when hiring. It's only after they see the end results, that they understand what thousands of pounds of equipment achieve, when used by people who have the knowledge and muscle to do this job professionally.

A lot of interesting points on this video Rob. The longer you are in this game the more I believe you realise it is about a minimum charge for a job rather than how long it takes. If you have a thousand pound scarifier, it takes a lot of five pound profits to pay for that machine, and they only get a few tens of hours use each year. Machinery can help to keep you busy but takes a hell of a paying for - it can be many years. I suggest your thinking about the charge rate is absolutely bang on but I personally think you were very slightly on the cheap side - even for the tiny little lawn. Think of the kit you are turning up with, its not a few thousand its many tens of thousand - van, mowers, strimmer, scarifier sprayer, fertiliser spreader etc etc. I have had such a kicking from mossy lawns this year that I have been telling customers that I will only be offering lawn mowing with scarification, aeration and fertilisation next year. I am sick of ploughing my way through horrible ugly lawns. Lets be honest, the ugly ones start growing later in the year, are most affected by drought, take the longest to dry after rain, and I suspect generate the most waste. A customers lack of interest in a nice lawn actually makes it harder for you to cut, not less demanding. Keep grinding.

Absolutely true + vat👍👍👍 0:04

Nice one Rob. I'm probably too cheap. I made more 20 years ago doing priced commercial maintenance. Nearly all domestic now, which I prefer but less ££. My cheapest lawn is £13 but small and just up road. Hedge cutting £25/hr. £20 is a good minimum, just I wouldn't like to charge the diddly ones that. £18 I charge for average 40 min lawn. Got a bit of a round which helps. But you've got a good business model.

Hi Rob, I think your pricing is right and for a minimum charge per hr. I advertise on a local neighbour app and the subject of hedge cutting came up at 4hrs work for £120. No mention of type of hedge or how high however quite a few responded saying how dear that was with one person claiming that they only pay £15 per hr and thats high!. These type of customers don't understand the cost of buying and maintaining equipment is expensive plus travel time to a job and back is still working and so unless your charging a decent amount, you're working for nothing.

Rob. You forgot to mention regional differences. Some areas there is more holding the foldin £💵💸£ than others. But on average, and it is only average. I charge 3 x what I'd charge to mow for scaryfying. If its waste away it's nearer 4 x. I've never really thought of it like this. But I guess you'd say I work part time. Usually starting around 9.30am and finishing around 1.30pm ish. But when you get home the work doesn't stop. Booking the next days customers in. Checking what I earned today. Checking who's paid, and a bit of book work. Wouldn't change it for the world tho. I love being self employed.

Hi Rob, I think £60 minimum charge for scarification is very reasonable. What we charge as service providers is based on the value for money exchange of goods and services based on supply and demand. The problem some people have, is that they feel aggrieved to pay for something they can do themselves, and don't understand that service providers have overheads, but bring along experience, high quality professional equipment, have insurance and are reliable. Wealthy people understand the value of their time, and thats why they pay people good money to service providers to do their windows, gardens, and look after their cars. Sorry for the long comment. Peace and love brother

sounds about what i charge for scarifiying also if it one off mayby bit more than if they are a regular customer. people are demanding hourly rates i try avoid it unless its a weekly and theres winter work. Have agreed to a 40 min fortnightly talked the customer down from the hour as its just a small garden customer is clock watcher lol took a load of waste one week for free then she complained the next time as i left 5mins early.

sometimes wish there were set prices across the board rob 🤔it would save a lot of frustration & head scratching 🥴

Nice one mate, hard to price them sometimes depending on how thatchy they are and how many passes it needs. My regulars get it a bit cheaper than the 1 off jobs. Absolutely no lower than £50 though. You're pricing fairly, just dont go too cheap on the bigger lawns. 👍

Good video Rob. You` re pricing is there or thereabout. Honest pricing is always the key ...

Hi I see you just got a shout out from extensive gardens on one of his lives Thought id take a look and its a brilliant channel you have Have watched extensive for a few years. Only for the comedy factor really 😂😂😂

Like your style. Money is an issue. I think you are about on the tape with your prices.

Slightly too cheap. But.... that's just my opinion. I'm in the east Midlands. My minimum is £40. Great video. Thanks for sharing.

Hi Rob, I really appreciate your effort to helping us who are just starting up the business. I was thinking to do scarifing too as my customers are keep asking for this. What scarifier have you got and what can you recommend for me.

i dont think there is a right or wrong price rob it the right or wrong customer you can have the £35 lawn two plot one will say thats a bit steep the other thats great thanks. same with the hedges its more for that work i have put some cheeky prices in at times price it as a job not the hourly as we have said in the past the hourly you cant do really. i have had people to ask me how i come to price A B or C on job i say the cost to hire my kit, van me removal of waste etc very costly they would need to hire all the kit and van and their weekend then we are a bargain for them all the best mate Shane

Hi rob, Can you do a video review on you scarifier, i'm thinking if getting one but there doesn't seem to be much info about them.

It’s still cheap I have half acre of lawn I scarifier and have my own aerator It’s bloody hard work I over seed and compost as well It’s bloody hard work So basically just pay a man like him to do it It’s v cheap

From my own business perspective and I say this very respectfully-you are quoting too cheap and could certainly be getting a lot more but as long as you are happy with what you are getting that’s fine .

Hi Rob, hope you are well. Which one of the Clover Professional Compost range would you recommend. I see a lot use the Field Compost No4, but it is crazy money.

Rob why charge the same as the hire company? If i hired the machine, put the petrol in, payed for delivery or pick up in the van this would come close to £80 Then my time to do the job on top of that. I would charge dependent on how much thatch and moss was in as well. So probably £115 I would also charge for compost and seed as well its not cheap now. I suppose if i hired it for the day i could do both my front and back lawns but this would take 6 hours I would be happy for you to do mine for £210 well cheap. I would certainly say your under charging for your professional service. Just tread water at first and when people start noticing your work they will call you, then up your pricing. Great vid by the way.

A professional job needs a professional price. Pricing to cheap just makes you look not confident in doing the work and quality of the work being poor. Sound like you’ve priced it right and fairly given the costs involved in running a business.

Pricing is all about being competative in your area an makin a few quid to survive isnt it...

What do you look to average per day

I’d say too cheap, charge more next year

Great video Rob, very interesting. Keep up the good work