A way to go broke fast in the tree service business.

[Daren]

I saw a new guy had an ad in the paper a month or so ago for a tree service. I gave him a call and introduced myself, told him I had a little mill, and that I had bought logs from guys like him before. I said he wouldn't get alot from the yard logs, but no sense hauling everything to the burn pile. If he got something good give me a call, if nothing else I would help him get them out of the yard after he sawed got them down for free to save him some labor.
He called me back today and asked if I wanted some walnut. I said probably, what do you have? He said "Well here is the deal, I had a guy contact me the other day (from 50+ miles away) and he had a couple walnuts he wants removed, but he said he knows the logs are worth money so he said he won't pay me to do it. I get the logs for the labor, I am thinking about doing it, what do you think?"
I couldn't believe that. The customer, didn't offer a compromise, or want a bid. He just said he wasn't paying. I told him I bet the guy has tried everyone else within the 50 miles and they all told him to shove it. If the logs are worth so much, pay the guy to harvest them and find a buyer yourself and "get rich". I also said I recently bought a walnut from a tree service ( a pretty nice one 28" x 21'), the guy is a buddy of mine and he wanted $200 for it. I gladly paid him that, he bring nice logs. I told the new guy that my buddy charges $100 hour for his service and equipment, THEN sells the logs. If the trees are like ones I get calls on to remove for lumber, they are 12" and crooked as a dogs hind leg. I wonder how long he will be around?

[chet]

Over the years I've had a few people under bid me by offering to cut trees for the firewood. Usually both the the firewood guy and the homeowner wised up quick.  :D  ;D

[Daren]

This poor fella doesn't know squat about trees. He just bought a boomtruck at auction and a chainsaw, then put an ad in the paper. I am afraid he is going to get hurt (and or drop one on a house). I talked to a buddy this evening and mentioned the conversation and he said he saw him the other day in the boom UNDER a big limb just sawing away. The new guy e-mailed me wanting links on tree I.D. and current local mill pricing. He doesn't know enough to be a logger (or have the permits or equipment), and I think cutting trees for free is not the way to get into the tree service business.

[boboak]

   I agree...this guy won't be around long.  Lets hope he just goes broke and gives up before he hurts himself or someone else..  If hes your buddy  talk some sense into him before something tragic happens

[Ironwood]

Way too many wood butchers out there that's for sure. Reid

[etat]

I saw a guy up in one of them boom trucks one time cutting some limbs on a big ole post oak tree.  I happend to look at him just as a BIG dead limb up above him came unhinged and fell.   It didn't hit him but the big part of the limb brushed against his bucket as it came down.   Scared me and everybody that saw it.  He had never even realized what danger he was in.  He came down and left and didn't come back for over a week to finish the job, but eventually he did come back and was careful not to get under any dead limbs.  He was real lucky and that's a fact.

I sure hope yer guy doesn't get killed or kill somebody. 

[Fraxinus]

Sounds like a wise plan for this guy would be to go to work for a reputable tree outfit and get some experience before striking out on his own.

[crtreedude]

Yes - there are somethings you just don't get a second chance at.   :(

[sawguy21]

I frequently see this. People come in looking for commercial lawn care equipment wanting to make a quick buck on the side, particularily students. Does not take long to learn that they have no idea what they are doing (and don't have any money). I suggest they hook up with a reputable company to learn the ropes but they want to make the big bucks doing it on their own. I agree with the rest of you, a tree service is not the place to learn by trial and error. That error may well be his last.

[Mike_Barcaskey]

I straddle both sides of that fence and keep it seperate at all costs (otherwise it'll cost me!)

The tree service charge is what it costs me to do that business, which includes hauling the wood out if that's what the customer wants
Logging/sawmill charges start after the tree service contract is complete
and never shall the two meet.

I recently had a job taking down a white pine and Norway Spruce where I left three logs on the property (tree service)
the next day I came back and milled them for the customer (milling charge)
two seperate contracts.

every time I mix the two, whether to get the job or satisfy the customer, I loose money

I've had lots of folks hit me up for the "free tree" for firewood or logs. I just say "no thanks"

[ARKANSAWYER]

   Once I got a deal to remove four walnut trees for the wood.   Nice trees and lots of room to drop them into a field by just taking down a barbed wire fence.   So I dropped the trees and cut out the logs and hauled off the firewood and brought the mill in to saw the logs into lumber.  They sawed up just fine with only one nail.   While I was loading the lumber into the trailer all I heard was how I had ripped the guy off and done him wrong.   This was the deal he made and he called me after the tree service said they would charge $350 a tree.
  Now when they call with deals like the one your buddy is into I tell them to charge to drop the trees and I will charge to saw up the lumber and the homeowner can sell the lumber and get rich and pay for it all.  You can never win with them fellows.
   I was buying logs from one tree service and would only pay after I sawed up the log to see if it was any good or full of metal and would deduct the cost of blades from what was owed the tree service.  He was dumping everything on me and I took it all and paid him fair price for what was good.   So he thought I was getting rich off of him so he bought a Super WM mill to saw his own log and get rich.   Hired a kid at $6.00 an hour to run the saw and got ready to go to the bank with all the money.   The mill is broken now and not used so he is trying to sell it to me.   Wants me to buy logs again but I told him I had plenty right now. (teaching him good)  Remember when walking in a cow pasture to watch your step as the green slippery rocks will stain your boots.

[Cedarman]

Why do so many home owners think profit is a 4 letter word?

[crtreedude]

One of my broken records down here to people is: DON'T LOOK AT MY NUMBERS AND THINK YOU WILL MAKE IT IF YOU DO IT YOURSELF!

Teak is valuable wood - but you wouldn't know it to talk to the loggers.  : Also, if you don't have a lot of trees - the cost of gettng there and setting up will eat a lot of profit.

If I can sell someone wood direct (which I do) I can make a lot - but I don't have anyplace to sell wood and I have to have one person cut, another turn into boards, another dry, another move to the store, another sell it ... you get the picture. I won't get near as much.

Way too many people throw trees into the ground and expect to come back in 6 to 8 years and be rich. The truth is - unless you are maintaining those trees - you will be coming back to something nearly worthless.

One of the keys in any business is to have a market - no market, no sales, no sales and you are working for free.

[crtreedude]

Well - the homeowner considers the tree their asset, not the logger. If they have been led to believe that tree is worth tons of money, they want some.

And of course a neighbor who has read an article somewhere  tells them that there is gold in them there trees.

Which is true if you know how to process it, dry it and sell it.

[Daren]

The problem with some homeowners, and I am sure it has been stated here before, is all they know is the finished product. They go into the lumber yard and see what one little walnut, teak, cherry...whatever board sells for and they look at the tree in thier yard and start adding up the boards. They just have no clue of the process behind it. The board they looked at was prime quality, which their tree with the birdhouse, squirrel feeder, thermometer and clothes line nailed to it, may or may not even contain to begin with. If it does have any good lumber in there it is a long way from the stump to market. This stuff (sawmilling and processing) is fun, but there ain't nothing easy about it and it takes expensive tools to get the job done. I have done alot of different things for a living, and you really meet all kinds doing anything if you deal with the public. Some treat you great and things work out for everyone... then there are the rest.

[crtreedude]

Yes - the initial investment thing. If someone wants to do what I am doing I tell them...

"Do you have a quarter million to start with?"

There is a reason the stuff costs so much - it cost a lot to produce and to harvest, and to ship and to stock, and to...

[Saki]

Its a fact that you do run into all kinds. Many folks do not understand the intense work and considerable investment required for even a modest operation. Your time and effort, the truck to pull the mill, the mill itself, equipment for handling the logs, insurance for all of it, the costs go on and on. It can be a challenge. I guess all you can do is the best you can do. Size up whether or not a job will make it worthwhile amd go on that basis. Isn't always easy to do.

[crtreedude]

Not that I think it takes that much to do a tree trimming operation - I have plantations which is a different ball of wax.

[Cedarman]

With our whole cedar tree mulching business in Ok now off and running and people seeing us send out truckloads of mulch, landowners are now asking us if we will pay to take their cedars that until now they had to pay to have pushed up and burned. A few are incensed that we wont pay for them and say they will just push them up and burn them.  Fine with us.  There is so much cedar and so many other owners that see a good deal for them they cant wait to get on the list.

Also other people come and want us to tell them every detail and guarantee them a profit so they can start their own mulching operation.
They want to start out on a $50,000 shoestring when it will cost them 10 times that amount.

Also another truism.  The closer people live to you the more they begrudge you the money you make from your business and will drive 30 miles just  so they wont let you make money off them.

[Daren]

Also another truism.  The closer people live to you the more they begrudge you the money you make from your business and will drive 30 miles just  so they wont let you make money off them.

That was a real biggy when I was doing plumbing and heating service (I am trying like heck to get out of it, if this wood thing works out). I live in a small town, and %75 of the people thought "Well he is from here he has to be as dumb as us" I think and didn't want to pay the going rate. I went to 5 years of trade school and had 15 years experience with some of the best master plumbers in the state to learn by skills. Sure when the toilet is running over in the upstairs bathroom at 10:00 at night, the phone rang. But 2 months later when they are adding a bathroom, putting in a whole new furnace .... spending some real money. I would not even get a call to bid it, and more often than not I would have been cheaper and live within 10 blocks for any warranty issues. I would just see a truck from out of town there for a week. I know all the contractor within 50 miles and most of their men, just about every one of them are "hardware store plumbers" no formal training, just carried an apprentice license for 4 years and when they can't pass the test got fired and the hardware store hired another apprentice. (It is state health code law in Illinois to have a license, you can work with an apprentice license for 5 years if you are working with a master plumber. Then you have to take the test, if you can't pass the test you can't LEGALLY do plumbing)
I really got off on a tangent there. I was going to agree with Cedarman. We have 2 general contractors in this town. 1 is mainly a roofing contractor, but is able and will do remodels, additions and new construction if he wants to, but prefers just roofing. The other contractor is mainly new construction and additions, but is capable and will do a roof if he has to keep his men working. Last year the "roofing contractor" bought a bigger boat and a Corvette for his wife. That was all the talk at the coffee shop. "That guy is making too much money off these roofs, look at him rub it in our faces". So to make a long story short the "roofing contractor" couldn't get many roofs and the other guy who didn't really want them (and bid them that way, the "roofing contractor" was always lower) had more than he could do. He actually hired 1/2 the "roofing contractor"s guy he had to lay off to get them done.

[ohsoloco]

I come across some people that are happy to see a nice log end up as lumber instead of firewood, and others that would rather chunk it up than have someone "get rich" from it  :-\