Estimated Time or Duration of Jobs
How are others scheduling jobs without any duration or estimated time fields in Jobber? When creating a new job, it simply prompts us to put in the exact day and time of the job we are creating.. as if we have our entire calendar and routes memorized and can just rattle it off. So we have to mark the job as unscheduled. But when that happens, Jobber assumes all unscheduled jobs are one hour. There is no field for us to input HOW LONG the job is going to take.. thus all unscheduled jobs in history.. are one hour. $50,000 paver job? 1 hour. 1,500sq ft lawn mow? 1 hour. It seems the logical thing would be during the create a job flow, to have a field where we could put in the estimated time it’s going to take. Then Jobber knows our calendar and can say… hey.. these are some times i found that seem to work. Or if it’s unscheduled.. at least when we go to schedule it.. Jobber’s ‘find a time’ tool.. would be able to work off the actual time it’s suppose to take. So I’m asking.. how are ya’ll handling this now? I assume most of us estimate based off how long a job will take as a the main factor… but that doesn’t really transfer to jobber well. Are you writing estimated times in the description and then having your office manually adjust and mess with each visit individually each time a job is scheduled? Is there another way? Are you just scheduling all jobs for 2am on a Sunday and then manually dragging them to your 10-12 routes that week? Really looking forward any insight into this as I don’t think Jobber is going to add time as a factor for jobs anytime soon. If we did it manually and had to falsely schedule all jobs for some random time before they were moved to a correct position on the schedule.. we’d then have to turn off all our clients upcoming visits views in the portal.
How to quote materials accurately and avoid underbidding as a landscaping contractor?
Hey everyone, I’m a small landscaping contractor just starting out to use the jobber and the interface and one of the challenges. Me and my team are having is consistent quoting. Often times we find ourselves going back to clients because we underbid materials and I’m not pleased about it. What is the best way in jobber that you guys find to help quote out jobs? Do you just have a baseline markup on all your materials or do you go different each job?
How long did you work a full-time job before going all-in on your business?
I’ve been building Latiolais’ Lawn Co. on evenings and weekends while working a full-time job during the week. The business has grown a lot since I started, and I’m at the point where I’m trying to be smart about growth instead of rushing the process. For those who made the jump from side hustle to full-time business owner: What was the moment you knew it was time? Did you leave because the business could support you, or because you were missing opportunities by staying employed? Looking back, what would you have done differently? I’d love to hear some real experiences from those who’ve already been through it. Thanks in advance.
How to grow a landscaping business stuck at “owner + one crew” stage
TLDR: My spouse and I run a small landscaping business that’s stable but stuck at the owner + one crew stage. We still have to work in the field daily because we haven’t been able to develop reliable crew leaders, and hiring more staff feels unmanageable. Our maintenance model works well in a dense service area but doesn’t scale easily to nearby towns, and clients mainly see us as a maintenance company rather than landscapers. We’d like to move toward higher-value work and build a business that doesn’t rely on our physical labor long-term. For those who’ve grown service businesses: how do you break past this stage and start working on the business instead of just in it? My spouse and I run a small landscaping business that we somewhat fell into unexpectedly, and we’re looking for advice from people who have grown service businesses past this stage. The business started informally in a neighbourhood about 20 minutes outside a nearby town. Over time, several gated communities were developed nearby, adding a few hundred homes. Many are vacation properties and many residents are snowbirds, so there’s strong demand for property maintenance. Right now we operate with one truck / crew (2–4 people including us), and season that runs roughly March–December. We do have another truck and a few other trailers so have had short stints of running two crews. The business is financially stable. We pay ourselves modestly, have an accountant/bookkeeper, and use QuickBooks and Jobber. However, we feel stuck at this size. Main challenges We’re still on the tools every day. Most hires are entry-level and turnover is high, so we don’t have anyone who can reliably run a crew, quote jobs, train others, or solve problems independently. Crew leads aren’t long-term. Even when someone steps up, they still require constant support. Growth feels unmanageable. Hiring more staff means more work to manage, which already feels like full capacity. Our model relies on a dense service area. Maintenance works well in the clustered neighbourhoods we serve, but expanding into nearby towns becomes inefficient (plus there is a lot of more established competition outside our main service area). We’re stuck between models. Clients mostly see us as a maintenance company, but we’re not big enough to run separate maintenance and landscaping crews. Goals/Ideas We've Thought Of Move toward higher-end design and installation work Reduce dependence on daily physical labor Build a business that is sustainable and potentially sellable For context, I handle marketing (website, social media, Google reviews) and have a graphic design background. One of us also has an irrigation technician certificate, but we haven’t added irrigation services yet due to limited experience. Each winter we plan to work on business development, but the time usually goes toward preparing for the next season. Questions How do service businesses break past the “owner + one crew” stage? How do you develop reliable long-term crew leaders or managers? Is it better to scale maintenance crews or pivot toward higher-value landscaping work? How do you make time to work on the business when operations already take everything? Where do you start to work on the business? We’re approaching middle age and don’t want to rely on physical labor forever. I’d love to build something more sustainable than just owning a job. Neither of us have "dream" careers, but owning a landscaping business wouldn't have been on the list of contenders. We want to know how to make this work and how to figure out what to do in the future whether that is with the current business or doing something completely unrelated. If anyone has gone through this stage in a landscaping or service business, or just as a middle-aged person who still doesn't know what they want to be when they grow up, I’d really appreciate hearing what helped you gain clarity / move forward!
Additional Services-what to charge
Good morning, I am a new business, about two years old. I have mostly stuck with my basic services of Lawn Mowing, edging, trimming and blowing everything clean. However, i recently rebranded and updated a list of new service. Mulch jobs and flower bed weed clean out, so Weed and bed Maintenance. My question, how do you all quote mulch jobs or weed clean out like this? I have searched only and see so many different ways, figured i would ask here. Just looking for tips and tricks.
