From Side Gig to Profitable Business: The Yard Works Landscaping Finds Success Leveraging Value
The Yard Works Landscaping, Inc, a commercial and residential maintenance, landscaping, and snow removal company, had a humble beginning. A hard-working, 6th-grade schoolteacher founded the company 47 years ago as a side job to supplement his teaching income. Since then, it has grown from a single-person mowing operation to a 40-person, 11-crew business in peak season. The Yard Works has built this success by adding value to both their customers and their employees.
From the beginning, Jerry Haney, founder of The Yard Works Landscaping, used a value-added strategy to grow his business. He made himself as available as he could while push mowing “from morning until night” each summer, and he obtained several licenses to master skills and gain knowledge. Haney saw his customer base expand with the value he added. He was able to increase the number employees he had, buy more equipment and add snow removal services.
Today, the founder’s son, Chad Haney, is now President of The Yard Works, and he has continued prioritizing availability and skill mastery. He stresses to his customers that they will be well taken care of because he is personally available to answer questions 24/7 and that he can produce a long list of employees, who hold a license for their trade.
Chad involves himself as much as he can with his customers to add value. He offers to stop by his customers’ HOA meetings so that they can ask questions and voice concerns. He even purchased a golf cart so his more elderly customers can tour the whole property and thoroughly look at the work his company has done. This added-value strategy seems to be working. Many of his customers have been with him for over ten years and have never gone anywhere else.
Ultimately, Chad attributes his customers’ loyalty to his service and communication. Chad said, “We’ve seen over the years that by producing quality work backed by licenses and ensuring phenomenal customer service with things like 24/7 availability and going out of our way to make sure questions and concerns are voiced, our customers tend to stay with us.”
Adding value for customers is one key to success, but Chad believes it’s his employees that truly make his company successful, and offering them value for their dedication and hard work is vital. He offers them value in two ways: rewarding their hard work and treating them like family.
For Chad, growing up and working in a family-owned business has made treating his staff like family an easy task. The Haneys go out of their way to make employees feel valued. For instance, to help their work-family celebrate Thanksgiving, the Haneys buy each employee a gift card to purchase their own Thanksgiving turkey and provide the sides. Christmas is just as magical, with a banquet meal and presents for all staff. Even the 4th of July is not left out. Chad and his family buy all the ingredients for the staff to have their own cookout, or the company itself hosts a large cookout.
In addition to the holidays, the Haneys show their appreciation in other thoughtful ways throughout the year. Knowing the value of education and also knowing that the expense of school supplies add up, Chad’s mother contacts each employee, finds out what school supplies each employee’s child needs, and buys those school supplies for each employee’s child.
Chad adds value in the other manner, rewarding hard work, by structuring his company in a way that allows his staff to have weekends off. He believes, Monday thru Friday, you work as hard as you can, so your weekends are there for yourself and your family. On the weekends when the company just can’t make the no-weekends rule work, Chad asks for volunteers to work, instead of just assigning the shift.
Having weekends off is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to rewarding hard work. The Yard Works offers employees paid vacation on a tiered level, starting with one week paid vacation earned after one year of employment. Four holidays are also paid and the employees share in the company’s success with Cedar Point tickets and bonuses.
Like adding value for customers, adding value for employees seems to be working. Chad has team members that have worked for his company for 23, 17, and 10 years, and customers repeatedly state that his employees’ work has improved their properties.
The lesson to learn from Chad Haney and The Yard Works is that finding new ways to add value for both customers and employees is worth the effort.
To learn more about The Yard Works and the services they offer, please visit: theyardworksinc.com.
What kinds of value-added services does your lawn care company offer for customers and employees? Please share in the comments!
