Frequently Asked Questions

GreenMargins is a job costing and quoting software built specifically for landscaping contractors. It calculates your true job costs including labor burden, travel time, materials, disposal, and overhead — then shows your exact profit margin before you send the quote.

Unlike general estimating tools, GreenMargins accounts for the hidden costs that eat into landscaping profits. Most landscapers discover they've been underpricing jobs by $500 or more.

Yes! GreenMargins offers a 14-day free trial with full access to all features. No credit card required to start.

You can create unlimited quotes, set up your labor rates, build custom services, and see your real profit margins. Many users know within the first quote whether GreenMargins will work for them.

Most users complete GreenMargins setup in 15-30 minutes. The onboarding wizard walks you through:

• Entering your labor rates and burden percentages
• Setting your overhead costs
• Configuring travel/vehicle costs
• Selecting which prebuilt services you offer

You can create your first accurate quote the same day.

Absolutely. GreenMargins works great for solo operators and one-person crews. The Starter plan ($59/month) is designed for single users.

Even solo landscapers need to account for their true labor cost (including self-employment taxes, insurance, retirement contributions), vehicle expenses, and overhead. GreenMargins ensures you're charging enough to actually pay yourself a profit, not just covering expenses.

GreenMargins offers four pricing tiers:

• Free Trial: 14 days, full access
• Starter: $59/month — 1 user, unlimited quotes
• Team: $99/month — up to 5 users, priority support
• Pro: $149/month — unlimited users, API access, white-label quotes

All plans include the full job costing calculator, materials library, and customer management.

If you cancel your GreenMargins subscription, you have 30 days to export your data (quotes, customers, services) via CSV download. After 30 days, your account data is permanently deleted.

Alternatively, you can hibernate your account for $15/month during the off-season — your data stays intact and you can reactivate instantly when busy season returns.

GreenMargins calculates true labor burden by adding employer costs to base wages:

• Payroll taxes (typically 7.65% for Social Security/Medicare)
• Workers compensation insurance (varies by state, often 5-15% for landscaping)
• Health insurance contributions
• Paid time off costs
• Any other benefits

For example, a $25/hour employee might actually cost $35-40/hour when fully burdened. GreenMargins applies this automatically to every quote so you never underprice labor.

A healthy profit margin for landscaping jobs is typically 15-25% net profit after all costs:

• Maintenance work: 10-20%
• Hardscaping and installation: 20-35%

However, many landscapers unknowingly operate at 5-10% or even negative margins because they don't account for labor burden, travel time, and overhead. GreenMargins shows your actual margin on every quote so you can hit your target consistently.

GreenMargins shows your exact profit margin in real-time as you build each quote. It calculates:

• Revenue: What you'll charge
• Direct costs: Labor burden × hours, materials, disposal, subcontractors
• Indirect costs: Travel time, overhead allocation
• Net profit: In dollars and percentage

If a job shows 8% margin when you need 20%, you know to adjust pricing before sending the quote.

GreenMargins calculates travel time costs automatically. Enter your shop address and the job site — it uses Google Maps to calculate distance and drive time.

Then it applies your crew's burdened labor rate for travel time, plus vehicle costs per mile. For a 30-minute drive with a 3-person crew at $35/hour burdened rate, that's $52.50 in labor plus fuel — costs most landscapers forget to include.

GreenMargins calculates overhead automatically. Enter your monthly fixed costs (truck payments, insurance, software, storage, phone, marketing) and your estimated billable hours per month.

GreenMargins divides total overhead by billable hours to get your overhead rate, then applies it to every quote. For example: $3,000/month overhead ÷ 160 billable hours = $18.75 overhead per hour worked.

Yes! GreenMargins includes closed-loop profitability tracking. After completing a job, enter your actual hours worked and materials used.

GreenMargins compares actuals vs estimates, showing where you were accurate and where you need to adjust future quotes. This feedback loop helps you improve estimating accuracy over time and identify which services are most (and least) profitable.

For small landscaping businesses (1-10 employees), GreenMargins is the best quoting software because it's specifically designed for job costing — not just scheduling or CRM.

It shows your real profit margin on every quote, includes prebuilt service templates for common landscaping work, and costs significantly less than enterprise solutions like Aspire or LMN. The 14-day free trial lets you test it with your actual jobs.

Jobber is primarily scheduling and CRM software with basic quoting. GreenMargins is purpose-built for job costing and profitability.

Key differences:

• GreenMargins calculates true labor burden (Jobber doesn't)
• Tracks travel time costs per job
• Shows real-time profit margins on every quote
• Includes overhead allocation
• Has landscaping-specific prebuilt service templates

Many contractors use both — Jobber for scheduling and GreenMargins for accurate quoting.

LMN is an enterprise solution designed for larger landscaping companies with complex operations. GreenMargins is built for small to mid-size contractors who need accurate job costing without the complexity or cost.

LMN starts at $297/month and requires extensive setup. GreenMargins starts at $59/month, takes 15 minutes to set up, and focuses specifically on the quoting and profitability features most contractors actually need.

Yes! GreenMargins replaces landscaping quote spreadsheets with significant advantages:

• Automatic labor burden calculation
• Real-time profit margin display
• Travel time and distance costing
• Materials markup tracking
• Professional quote PDF generation
• Customer management

Unlike spreadsheets, GreenMargins prevents formula errors, saves your service templates, and tracks quote history. Most users report saving 2-3 hours per week on quoting.

GreenMargins includes prebuilt service templates covering:

• Lawn care: Mowing, edging, fertilization
• Landscaping: Planting, mulching, bed maintenance
• Hardscaping: Patios, walkways, retaining walls
• Seasonal work: Spring cleanup, fall cleanup, snow removal
• Specialty: Irrigation, lighting, tree care

You can also create unlimited custom services with your own pricing formulas, labor estimates, and material requirements.

Yes! GreenMargins supports customer import via CSV file. Export your customer list from your current system (name, address, email, phone), upload to GreenMargins, and map the columns.

Your customers are ready for quoting immediately. GreenMargins also integrates addresses with Google Maps for automatic travel time calculation on future quotes.

GreenMargins is a web application that works on any device with a browser — desktop, tablet, or phone. The interface is responsive and optimized for mobile use in the field.

You can create quotes, check customer history, and view your schedule from your phone. There's no separate app to download; just log in at app.greenmargins.com.

GreenMargins Pro plan includes full REST API access for custom integrations. You can connect GreenMargins to your CRM, accounting software (QuickBooks, Xero), or build custom workflows with Zapier.

The API supports reading and writing quotes, customers, and services. Documentation is available at app.greenmargins.com/api-docs.