Actual Podcast

Ken Hathaway started his own landscaping company to have more time with his family. He initially found employees through a young man he met at Home Depot. Having family members as employees had its challenges but also meant they were always there. Ken faced difficulties with attendance and substance abuse among other employees. Despite financial struggles, he enjoyed the freedom of setting his own rules and spending time with his family. The profit varied but averaged around $35,000 per month. He took jobs both big and small, but had to be cautious of picky customers. He started with just a truck and shovel, but quickly expanded and purchased larger equipment. He paid for most of it out of pocket, with some loans. Paying back the loans was not an issue. Ken tried to be hands-off and hired good people to run the jobs. If he could start over, he might consider having a partner. The company lasted for about 13 years, but Ken pursued another job and eventually decided to semi-retire due All right, hello, this is my podcast. I'm here with Ken Hathaway who used to own alternative landscaping And we're going to be talking about his experience owning his previous company. So getting into it What were the reasons behind why you started your landscaping company? I worked for another company while my son was being born and my boss Wanted to know how quickly I could get back to the job and I said I think I can do this for myself So I started my own company so I could spend time with my family Okay, so when you started this company, how did you initially find employees for it? Originally, I was doing it by myself I actually met a young man at Home Depot that asked me for a job he eventually brought in a relative and Kind of expanded in that same kind of mode okay, so Seeing that the employee had you know brought his family into the company alongside him Did that make creating a positive workplace culture easier or maybe a bit more difficult on your end a Little of both obviously because they usually rode together. So if one missed they usually both missed but on the other hand They were generally always there together As I started hiring other employees from elsewhere, I ran into other Difficulties over some of those difficulties attendance drugs alcohol Okay, and how did you try to respond to those I've had to fire a couple people I tried to work with several because I understand the difficulties of drug and alcohol Okay, and kind of moving past that a little bit what were a little more positive though What were some of the high points of your company? to be able to make my own rules and Set my own time so that I can spend time with my family and take care of family needs along with the company needs Okay, and besides just the some of the bad experiences with some of the employees over some of the low points of the company oh, we just struggle financially to make payroll and Keep things on track. But for the most part I Really enjoyed working for myself making my own schedule. How much profit did you on average make per month? That obviously varied depending on the jobs and the size of the jobs I believe I kind of averaged like thirty five thousand dollars a month Okay Were there specific kind of things you're looking for when you're trying to like? Find a job to do or did you just kind of take anything that was available? You got to watch out for all the different people and what their expectations are. Usually if people are really picky in the quote stage that meant they were going to be extremely picky and hard to please in the Construction phase but for the most part I took jobs small and large alike And what are some of the difficulties that you would have seen in the quote stage? Like what does that entail obviously you got to make sure that your your costs are in line with what you're bidding Customers and that you have the employees to do the size jobs that you choose to do Okay, and going back a little bit to talk about the landscaping company at the start of it What were some of the things you kind of needed to get it off the ground to get it going? Basically was working by myself. I needed a truck and a shovel, but I expanded extremely fast Buying bigger equipment Trailers Bobcat, you know tractors and trucks and snow plows and so forth Did you have to take out loans to get a lot of those tools? Or were you able to pay for them out of pocket for the most part? I paid for them out of pocket or my family helped me I did take some loans to buy the bigger equipment, but I tried to pay cash as I expanded Okay, and for those loans you did take out Did you have a hard time paying them back or did you pay them back relatively quickly? No paying them back usually was not an issue. Okay, and what was the interest rates if you remember on some of them? I really don't recall at this point, but I would assume around five to ten percent Okay, okay And would you say that was maybe with higher than higher or lower than the average one might be or just pretty typical? I'm assuming typical okay for the age and also once again going back a little bit to something I should have asked at the start. When did you found this company in? 2003 2003 okay, and how long did the company last how long did you I? Ran it for approximately 13 years Give or take a little like pursued a job in bus driving But I tried to run the company for another couple years at the same time What was that experience like trying to work two jobs while running a company? It wasn't all that bad But it did take a little Maneuvering to get the employees where they needed to be and then me Meet them on the job site as soon as I got done with the bus driving So by the nature of this being a small business and obviously a small business that you really wanted the most control in Did you think it was best for you to always be on the site on the job to be directing everybody and you didn't really? Like to give too much lead way. No quite the opposite actually I was at a vendor Conference and a guy had told me that if I was babysitting my employees, then I wasn't doing my job so I Hired good people that could run the job as a foreman and tried to deliver materials myself and do The quote process on my own, okay So you kind of tried taking an equal load to everybody else and not trying to be a king or a dictator within the business That is very true. Okay. Um Kind of shifting a little bit if you were to let's go back a few years Let's say we went back in time and you were going to restart this company. You're going to start it again What are some changes you would have made to the process? How you started it how you ran it just some of the general differences or regrets you had and set things you change Possibly trying to go into it with a partner, but that creates its own Set of difficulties for the most part it accomplished exactly what I needed it to do at the time that I needed Okay, that's good. Were there any points where you had major financial hardships within this job? Or was it basically smooth sailing the entire way a little bit of in-between? Okay, obviously having to meet payrolls on a weekly basis regardless of whether jobs were done or not, but I did try and structure the payment from the jobs to accommodate that kind of Flexibility. Okay, and with being a small landscaping company, how did you kind of get your name out there? How did you market your service to people and how did you bring in new customers? Before I opened my own company I worked with a guy that was kind of a mentor and he owned some local trade papers that were Reasonable rates so I managed to get my name out through You know local mailers and I went down the road of trying to put ads in the yellow pages Which had pluses and minuses, um, what were some of those pluses and minuses The fine print. Yeah, and over that fine print, but like an example If they weren't working for me you could not really get out of the contract, okay I can see how that could be an issue So When when you started the company were you looking to kind of just Work the company a little bit in your local area and just kind of have it be just a Small time business the whole time or were you did you ever have ambitions of expanding further? as far as where we worked I Basically had put my name out there in several different papers and phone books. So ended up Working in a vast area of the Denver metropolitan area and mountain range I never really considered Expanding bigger than than the growth. I was doing at the time because I would take everything on so by the time that I was Sort of at the end I'd owned a concrete curving company a landscape construction company a snowplow company Which kept me fairly busy Out of all the companies you were taking part in which one was the most profitable. Was it the landscaping company? I believe it was the landscaping and it was the landscape escaping company that will and that also had the most in terms of cost and it just made up for it by its pure like revenue or That's an interesting question and this may not sound like a very good manager of a company But I mostly just worked with what I had in front of me and did not really Run sheets to tell me which which division was working best at the time I just kind of put them all in together to make my monthly, okay, and Obviously you said you own the company for about 13 years over that, you know more than a decade Did you see significant changes of how you interacted with technology over that period to help you run the company? Or did you kind of just use what you had available in 2003 the whole way through? I pretty much used what I had in 2003 all the way through and what were some of the challenges maybe from that? I did not use a computer a whole lot in the Managing and quoting as a company, which I believe now there are all all kinds of Apps and whatnot to do that kind of thing Okay, so Would you say overall that your tenure of owning the company was a successful one? Did you think you? When you left or you know sold it when we'll get into that in a second But do you would you say it was a successful time period for you and that you met your goals? Yes, I do Okay, um and kind of compounding on what I just said there What made you what was the end of the company or did you sell it did it just end what was the ending like in 2008 there was a financial downturn in the United States and people were racing to the bottom to lower their bids to Undercut other competitors and I realized that I would not Participate in that practice that you know, it cost as much for on-competition as it did for the end Much for on company on one day as I did the next and that you couldn't just take money out of my pocket just to keep working so I Downsized a little bit. You got a second job and Eventually just decided to semi retire. Okay. Um, once again going back a little more With the employees that you already said you had some ups and downs with did you over the course of owning the company? Did you really just maintain the same employees the whole way through? Consistent or was there like a high turnover rate or was it mostly consistent? I would not say I had a high turnover rate there was some people that came and go overall, but I think for the most part I Started and finished with the majority of the same employees and with your employees. Did you pay them an hourly rate? Did you pay them by commission? How did how did how did you pay them? At the beginning everything was hourly I'd taken on some subcontracts from some other companies that did more piece piece work the employees didn't like it too much because They had to work a little heart harder and faster to maintain the same pay scale But for the most part just hourly Okay And did you were you were you able to offer any benefits or is it kind of just? On the job just you paid them the wage and that was kind of it. I could not afford to offer benefits at the time Okay, um So kind of moving on to a different topic Did you see a lot of competition with maybe maybe other smaller or even bigger? Landscaping companies at the time or did you kind of just have a pretty easy time just finding Consumers and not having to worry about competition. I feel I was pretty lucky in the bid process That usually when I bid a job I could sell it Obviously not you can't sell every job But for the most part it seemed like work came to me as I needed work Okay, and did you primarily work with businesses with more homeowners? What were your primary types of? consumers depending on the Divisions of the company all the snowplow stuff was for other businesses Not too much money in individual snow removal All those landscaping for the most part was all residential a couple actual Bigger jobs that I took on for local businesses, okay Did you Well, I know you said you didn't really have too much in the way of competition. Just you know with how things worked out But did you try to maybe offer maybe lower rates to consumers than maybe other people would have at the time No, I figured it cost exactly what it costs to do a job if they Liked me and my presentation and the quote I gave them. I felt that that was a fair deal. I did not try to Work with any other you know with anybody else's boundaries did consumers try to Would the consumers often try to haggle the price get lower prices and how would you respond to that? I always laughed at myself because people would always ask if they paid cash if they could get a better price and The job cost me the exact same rather they paid cash or with a credit card So no, I usually told them that the price was the price that did not matter whether it was cash or not Okay, and even with saying that did you still prefer a specific payment method or did you not really care? I had a payment plan of a third third down when we signed the contract a third when we started and the remainder when we finished and any additional Things that they asked me to do during the project would be due at the end Okay I think that really covers most of the basis of the business is there anything that you think? Could be added to you know the story of your business, or do you think that's about it? I believe that it kind of applied what I needed I in many ways would have liked to have continued on but Circumstances both with my control and beyond my control kind of just made it a Time to retire and I believe everything worked out just fine One more question it has obviously been a while since you've owned the company But obviously 2024 is a lot different than you know a decade ago or two decades ago And I know you said you didn't really update your business practices too much along with the advancements in technology, but Hypothetically let's say you've owned the company to today Do you think it would have been necessary to make a lot of updates to how you? Interacted with technology to really maintain any kind of I want to say competitive advantage But to be able to sell your product and to get it out there and to actually get work Do you think you'd have to update that? Yes, I do okay And do you think you'd also have to maybe interact with employees differently now than you used to or do you think you'd interact? With them mostly in the same way I think if the employees in that particular field would be fairly similar to today as it was Back when I founded the company I'm sure there are more laws and rules that would make me have to interact a little bit differently But for the most part, I think you could still get along. Did you ever have any problems? Legality wise any issues ever pop up or is it mostly mostly smooth sailing on that front. Oh, no, there's always the Somebody that wants to sue you because of this or that But for the most part they were nuisance lawsuits and everything went okay, so nothing major Okay, that's good. All right. Well. I think that covers all the bases. Thank you This was Ken Hathaway, and that was him talking about his company alternative landscaping. Thank you. Thank you very much Thank you.