Landscaping
Landscaping Pricing Calculator
Set a price from crew cost, material and the route the job sits on.
Result
Overhead and margin are taken as shares of the selling price, which is why the cost is divided rather than multiplied. Adding 15% to cost does not produce a 15% margin. Gross profit is what is left after the cost of doing the job. Overhead comes out of that: the building, the office wages, the vans, insurance, software and advertising. A healthy gross margin still loses money if overhead is larger.
Get a Free Business AuditWhat moves the number
- Crew hours at burdened cost including travel between properties.
- Material at landed cost including delivery, which on bulk material is significant.
- Equipment cost per hour, since landscaping is equipment-heavy.
Where this one goes wrong
Pricing maintenance work without allocating equipment cost. Mowers, blowers, trailers and trucks wear in proportion to use, and a maintenance price that only covers labour and fuel is not covering the equipment replacing itself.
Questions
About this calculator
How should equipment be priced into a job?
As an hourly cost from annual equipment spend divided by operating hours. Treating it as overhead hides which work is wearing the machines out.
Should maintenance and installation be priced differently?
Yes. They have different cost structures entirely: maintenance is travel and equipment heavy with low material, installation is the reverse.
Flat monthly or per visit?
Monthly smooths cash for both sides and requires the annual visit count to be right. Per visit is transparent and makes winter income uncertain.
The formula
price = direct cost / (1 - overhead% - margin%)
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How to use this calculator
- Labour cost ($). Burdened: wages plus tax, insurance and the vehicle, not the hourly wage.
- Materials cost ($). Enter your own figure; the page starts at $95.
- Other direct costs ($). Permits, disposal, equipment hire, subcontractors.
- Overhead rate (%). Overhead as a share of revenue. Work it out from last year's accounts.
- Target net margin (%). Enter your own figure; the page starts at 15%.
The result updates as you type, so you can try a figure, see what it does to price to quote, and change it back. Nothing you enter is sent anywhere or saved.
A worked example
These are the figures the calculator opens with. Every number in the results column below is produced by the same calculation the page runs, so you can follow it through before putting your own figures in.
What goes in
| Input | Value |
|---|---|
| Labour cost | $180 |
| Materials cost | $95 |
| Other direct costs | $0 |
| Overhead rate | 22% |
| Target net margin | 15% |
What comes out
| Result | Value |
|---|---|
| Price to quote main result | $436.51 |
| Direct cost | $275 |
| Overhead recovered | $96.03 |
| Net profit | $65.48 |
| Gross margin | 37.0% |
| Markup on direct cost | 58.7% |
Quote $436.51 to cover $275 of direct cost, recover $96.03 of overhead and leave $65.48 of net profit. That is a 58.7% markup on cost.
How sensitive the answer is
Holding everything else steady and changing only labour cost, this is what happens to price to quote. It is worth knowing which of your inputs the answer actually hinges on, and which barely move it.
| Labour cost ($) | Price to quote |
|---|---|
| $90 | $293.65 |
| $135 | $365.08 |
| $180 example above | $436.51 |
| $270 | $579.37 |
| $360 | $722.22 |
Every other input is held at the example value while this one changes, which is not how a real job behaves. Treat it as a guide to which number matters most, not as five separate quotes.
What each figure means
- Labour cost ($)
- Burdened: wages plus tax, insurance and the vehicle, not the hourly wage.
- Materials cost ($)
- A money amount, starting at $95.
- Other direct costs ($)
- Permits, disposal, equipment hire, subcontractors.
- Overhead rate (%)
- Overhead as a share of revenue. Work it out from last year's accounts.
- Target net margin (%)
- A percentage, between 0 and 80, starting at 15%.
What the results tell you
| Result | What it is |
|---|---|
| Price to quote | The headline result. A money figure. |
| Direct cost | A money figure. |
| Overhead recovered | A money figure. |
| Net profit | A money figure. |
| Gross margin | A percentage. |
| Markup on direct cost | A percentage. |
Seasonality is not in this
Coverage and material figures assume the area you enter. Slope, access for machinery, existing growth and the time of year all affect both quantity and labour, and none of them appear in a calculation like this.
Estimating is the easy part
The jobs you never hear about cost more than the ones you mis-measure. BDEVY builds the marketing, systems and automation that bring them in.