Spring Rush: Surviving and Making Money as a Pet Waste Removal Business

Once all the snow starts to melt and there’s an entire winter’s worth of poop on the ground, this is typically the time of the year where our businesses see the most amount of growth and new customers reaching out.

 

I learned a lot during the Spring Rush and by the end of this blog I’m going to share my best practices so you can prepare for the busiest time of the year and maximize how much money you make.

 

The Spring Rush usually starts around the time the snow starts to melt in your area. Between the end of February to the end of April, you’ll have a good 6-8 weeks of heavy workload and a lot of new customers reaching out for your services. You’ll find that many of the customers who reach out for a “winter clean up” or “spring cleaning” also did not do a fall clean up to pick up the leaves in their yard.

 

Because of this, you’ll find many yards that have poop, leaves and twigs all mixed together which will make your job significantly harder. You can also imagine how soggy, packed down and mushy these poops are after weeks or months of snow and rain falling on them.

 

Since these are the conditions you should anticipate when performing a spring cleaning as a Pet Waste Removal Business, do NOT be afraid to charge extra for your services during this time period. I implemented a new change in how much I charge for these types of scoops, but more on that later in this blog.

 

Spring time is for growth, so make sure you have everything ready to best succeed with your business. With the influx of customers, you will need additional time to send out quotes, follow up on any potential customer requests, send out new invoices while also managing your current weekly maintenance customers.

 

With all of the extra work you will run into, there are many things to keep in mind that you’ll want to try and automate within your business and personal life.

 

 

Make sure you have your schedule cleared of any obligations that does not benefit your business during these 2 months. This is a personal choice, but try not to host or schedule any parties or get togethers with friends and family if you don’t have to. Sometimes sacrifices are necessary and within reason, but be very picky with the use of your time. You can work as much or as little as you want, this is YOUR business so do what makes you happy and pushes you forward in your goals.

 

You should work with your partner and family to ensure house duties are delegated appropriately to the rest of the household. You should not be responsible for all of the laundry, cooking, cleaning etc if you have a significant other or children that can lend a hand during the busiest time for your business.

 

You will not have the same amount of time as you usually do, especially if you’re being serious about growing this business. If you can afford to delegate some of your duties like answering emails, returning calls or sending quotes/invoice, take the opportunity to do so.

 

If you cannot, Set expectations to your customers via your voicemail and your auto message and tell them how many days or weeks in advanced you’re booked out so they know how long it’ll be until you can service them.

 

 

Maybe consider having your groceries and supplies delivered to your house instead of you going out to the store to buy them. You’ll want to have a lot of snacks in the car with you, anything like trail mix that has both carbohydrates and proteins to keep your body moving throughout the day. And make sure you drink plenty of water to stay hydrated because you will work up a sweat with how much poop you’ll be scooping.

 

 

Supplies like extra buckets, rakes, plastic bags and cleaning products you think you might need over the next few weeks. Have everything handy so you don’t have to stress about going to the store at the last minute in between all of your scooping appointments. Ease of mind will be one of the main themes throughout this blog because the less time needed to worry about stuff, the more time you’ll have to be out on the field scooping and acquiring more business.

 

 

During the spring rush, you will feel extremely sore and tired because of how much physical work you’ll be doing. In the coming weeks, I plan on scheduling several massages to help me keep my body as good as it can be.

 

Something that I’m starting to experience for the first time as a pooper scooper is trigger finger on my scooping hand. There are times where my ring finger is very tight or feels locked and doesn’t open at the same speed as my other fingers. This is something that happens when you overuse your hands gripping for long periods of time and the only way to take care of it is to rest your hand. It’s definitely worse in the mornings when my hands haven’t moved for a couple of hours.

 

I’m going to implement some stretching exercises in my daily routine to ensure my hands are as strong as they can be. You should also considering filling up a container with hot water and putting epsom salt in the water to soak your hands and feet. The magnesium in the epsom salt gets absorbed into your body and may provide relief with muscle cramps, inflammation and soreness.

 

Now that your home and body is in order, it’s time to pivot to your business.

 

 

Your marketing material should be simple, either a before/after picture of a scoop you did, or a cute/funny picture of a dog with your contact information. Be prepared to get all kinds of messages on your posts, especially on facebook. You’ll find plenty of people reaching out being angry that they see poop on their social feed, or talking ill about dog owners needing to hire someone to assist on poop removal.

 

Don’t worry about the negative comments, make it an opportunity to “kill them with kindness” and explain that our services are just like other services people contract work for, like landscaping, cleaning services, etc. You should NOT be ashamed or afraid that you are offering this service, and if you defend your business in a professional manner, you may sway potential client’s who were on the fence about hiring you to actually sign up. You’ll also find many of your own clients defending your business and replying to those negative comments and it feels good that when you take care of your clients, they will take care of you. Regardless, each comment is more engagement on your post, which will increase the visibility of that post.

 

 

If you have too many areas to check you may feel overwhelmed and all over the place having to juggle the different leads being routed to you from all the social platforms. I’m not saying you shouldn’t use Yelp, instagram  or whatever other social platforms to grow your business. It’s important that regardless of what platform you try to advertise your pet waste removal business on, that they all have the same funnel to get in contact with you.

 

For me, on Google, Facebook and my website, whenever someone clicks to sign up for a quote, they are immediately routed to my intake form created by Jobber. I use this intake form as a way to “pre-screen” any potential customer, since I do require a little bit of time for the form to be filled out.

 

This helps me filter out the customers who do not have a vested interest in hiring me for my scooping services, if someone can’t take 5 minutes to fill out my form, I’m not going to waste 5 minutes of my time answering their questions when I have a plethora of other customers who are eagerly signing up.

 

If you have frequently asked questions, consider creating canned responses on Facebook, a PDF document you can send to any potential clients or set up a specific page on your website for this FAQ that you can point them to.

 

Questions like

 

 

How many scoops do you expect to do during the day, whether it’s during the weekdays after your day job, or all day during the weekends? You must be realistic on how many appointments you can actually do in a given day. Don’t schedule too many appointments in one day where you might have to reschedule or push them back. This will cause you to feel like you’re falling behind and it may overwhelm you on top of the other responsibilities you have as a small business owner.

 

Personally, I like to set at most 2 new winter clean ups each day during the week and maybe 3 during the weekends, but this will change depending on what other obligations you’re responsible for outside of your Pet Waste Removal Business as well as the customer’s you’re currently scooping for. You truly do not know how long a winter clean up can take, sometimes it’ll be an hour and a half and other times it’ll take you 4+ hours.

 

Because of this, You’ll want to focus on the customers who are closer to you, depending on how wide a range you set with your marketing campaigns. You should have a general idea of how big yards can potentially be in the towns around you, and you’ll want to prioritize the yards that can give you the most bang for your buck if you have a lot of customers reaching out to you for services.

 

This will allow you to maximize how many clients you can do in a general area as well as minimize how much gas you spend driving between appointments. For my business, I try to keep a service area around 10-15 miles. When you do spring clean ups, expect to take at least 1 hour at each appointment (not including driving) depending on the nature of their yard and how much waste you have to scoop up.

 

As I mentioned earlier in this blog, I changed how I price initial and winter clean ups and it’s been one of the most positive changes I’ve implemented for my Pet Waste Removal Business.

 

 

A customer might tell you that they last cleaned a couple of weeks ago, only for you to find out that their idea of clean and your idea of clean are the complete opposite. You are a professional pooper scooper, and your standard of quality will be significantly higher than what a customer will think.

 

Since I started charging by the bag with my initial cleanings, I can say that I’ve been making significantly more money than last year’s spring rush, averaging around 30-40% more per appointment. I might have been under charging myself too much last year and I got burned many times by clients under estimating how much waste was in their yard and not having the courage to speak up for myself to raise the price I initially gave them.

 

 

I had one yard earlier this year where I scooped out 18 total bags after around 4 and a half hours. The customer said it was 3-4 months worth of waste, but in reality it was closer to a whole year. How much would you have charged them for this service? Last year, I probably would have said between $200-250 and be really worried that I was charging too high.

 

 

Using this method, you could charge between $30-50 dollars for the first bag, and then tell the customer you’ll cut them a deal for $20-40 dollars for each additional bag. You may need to play around with these prices depending on the size of your bucket and plastic bags as well as the rates other Pet Waste Removal Businesses in your area are charging but don’t be afraid to charge what you think is right for your services.

 

When you finish the appointment, line up all the bags in the front of their yard, take a picture and send it to them. That way a customer will not be surprised when you tell them how many bags you removed from their yard or try to fight you about their final invoice.

 

Some people may have concerns that charging by the bag can be a detriment if you have to scoop really small poops or if you have to explore a really large yard. When you run into these scenarios, you should consider charging extra for the first bag because of the amount of time it may take for these kinds of appointments. At least with my own experience, I rarely had a yard where I didn’t scoop at least 2+ bags during their initial or winter cleaning.

 

I’ve had a lot of success changing to this pricing structure, but do whichever prices you are happy with, whether its a flat rate or charging by the amount of time. The cool thing about our industry is that we can all charge whatever we like and still find success. Don’t be afraid to take a chance and adapt what’s not working for your business. I added charging by the bag on my Poop Scooping Calculator to show you how much you can potentially make with this pricing structure. If you want access to my Poop Scooping Calculator, click the link!

 

Regardless of what price you set, do NOT offer any specials or deals. I do not recommend offering any deals like a discounted winter clean up rate if the customer signs up for weekly services. What ends up happening most of the time is that you’ll finish the winter clean up, and by the time the following week comes for the weekly appointment, they end up canceling services or ghosting you.

 

You’re throwing money away if you start discounting your scooping services, especially when there WILL be people out there that just want the job done and won’t care how much you charge them as long as you do a great job. Maybe later in the year when business slows down, you’ll want to incorporate specials to entice new business, but when it’s the busiest time of the year for this industry, make the opportunity yourself and charge what you’re worth.

 

It also comes down to the pre-screening that I mentioned earlier in the blog. It’s okay if someone is trying to haggle you on the price, everyone wants something a little cheaper if they can get it. But this should be an indication to you that they may become a “trouble client” in the future. What happens if you have to reschedule an appointment because of the rain and snow, do you think this customer might be the type that will complain and want a refund because you didn’t go? This is your business and it’s okay to fire a customer if they cause you more headaches than they’re worth.

 

Since this is your Pet Waste Removal Business, one of the biggest decisions you need to make is whether you should haul away the waste or leave it in your customer’s dumpster. Be prepared to haul 100s of pounds worth of dog poop in the back of your car or on your truck bed, which adds significant wear and tear on your vehicle. I know this is a source of contention within our industry, some businesses are starting to move away from hauling the waste or not taking any waste with them for spring cleanings, and others say taking the waste is part of the service we provide.

 

Personally, I am in the Pet Waste REMOVAL Business, so I haul the waste away with me. This is part of my service, and I can charge a little extra because of it. Do you haul the waste with you or do you throw it away at their house? Leave a comment below with your thoughts as I’m very interested to hear if this is a trend that more Pet Waste Removal Businesses are considering.

 

With all of these things you have to keep in mind, you may be wondering if it’s too late to start your own Pet Waste Removal Business. So make sure you click to the next blog and find out more!

 

And I’ll see you on the next scoop!

 

And As Always, Acknowledge The Now. Bye!