Know your Numbers
The Herring Group landscape Industry Benchmark ReportWelcome to The Herring Group’s Annual Landscape Industry Benchmark Report, a trusted source for financial information to celebrate your victories, identify opportunities, and inspire your team. Get notified to be the first to know about the next report, coming October 2023.
Greg Herring
Founder & CEO of The Herring Group
If you’ve participated in past years, you know the more participants the better. Share this info with any landscape business owners who would benefit from knowing their numbers.
We look forward to you joining us this year!
-Greg
a Message from Greg
What’s New in 2022
Wow, what a year!
We had just learned to manage COVID19 and the labor shortages and then we get hit with a massive increase in fuel, fertilizer, and PVC pipe expenses – just to name a few. After being assured that inflation is transitory, we now know that it is not.
Think about it: Virtually no one doing business today has experience making decisions in an inflationary environment.
Did someone say inflation?
We have been working with our clients on inflation since February. Every month, we see how our clients are managing through this inflationary environment. Now, I am looking forward to seeing the financial results from the rest of the industry.
I bet you are eager to see how your company’s results compare with other companies that are similar to yours. With that information, you will see what numbers you should celebrate and what numbers need more attention. I find reviewing benchmarks to be very persuasive and motivating for management teams. Reviewing benchmarks also creates focus.
Be sure to include two years of data so we can do a comparison with the year prior to inflation.
Why are we charging for this?
Some people are surprised that our report costs real dollars ($337 this year). At The Herring Group, we give away a lot of valuable information to help business owners increase their profit margin and life margin. Why? Because we value the industry and private business owners.
So why don’t we give away the Benchmark Report? Two reasons. First, we only want people who are serious about motivating their teams to improve performance to participate. Second, we spend dozens of hours reviewing and “coding” each company’s financial statements to make the data comparable between companies. Those two reasons make it a far more valuable product than any other benchmark report.
New High Performer Webinar
One last thing: We are going to offer a second webinar to participants which will feature the owners of some of the high-performing companies. They will describe what made their companies successful during this challenging year.
Read on below for more details about the report and the two webinars for participants.
Thank you to our sponsors
Aspire solutions help field service companies of all sizes—from lawn care and landscaping to janitorial and beyond—overcome their day-to-day challenges, operate more efficiently, and free up time to focus on what matters most for their business: profitable growth. Business management software built for landscape, snow & ice removal, and janitorial contractors by industry professionals.
With years of experience and service excellence unparalleled in the landscaping industry, Inova’s HCM solution (formerly IPS) gives you the power to better attract, hire, pay, and retain your workforce. Improve your profit margin and enhance your operational efficiency while getting a state-of-the art payroll/HR solution with unmatched personalized, knowledgeable service.
John Deere and our dealers strive to build relationships with our Professional Landscape customers in order to become their trusted partner and provide multiple solutions that make their businesses more effective, efficient, and profitable.
Special Thanks to our Media Partner, Landscape Management
Is it budget season already?
Planning is Easier with the Right Information
You may be waiting. For the economy to “settle out” or for forecasting to feel a little less uncertain. While we don’t claim to have a magic bullet, we do have a time-tested method that can bring focus to your planning and budget season – trustworthy and accurate industry benchmarking.
Currently in its 9th year, The Herring Group Industry Benchmark Report is a powerful tool that allows you to anonymously compare your financials against other companies whose size and mix of revenue are similar to your company. It gives you insight into areas of opportunity and victories to celebrate.
We make the process easy to participate in, and then present the findings in a webinar led by Greg Herring. With a knack for making numbers relevant, interesting and actionable, Greg’s financial leadership will give you the confidence to inspire your team and hone in on your focus.
The 2021 Herring Group Peer Benchmark Report represented 119 companies. That’s some serious comparison.
When Apples to Oranges Won’t Cut It
bench•mark
/’ben(t)SHmärk/
1. a standard or point of reference against which things may be compared or assesed.
2. a level of quality that can be used as a standard when comparing other things.
Other reports claim to be benchmarks, but use 2020 data. Who wants old apples?
Details
How The Report Works
Step 1: Sign Up
This step is completely risk-free. Sign up to participate in The Herring Group’s 9th Annual Peer Benchmark Report for $337 and receive a 60-day no-risk guarantee. If you don’t receive value greater than the cost, you can ask for a refund in 60-days. All the reward, none of the risk.
STEP 2: Submit Your Data
When you sign up, you will receive simple instructions to upload your income statement and balance sheet directly to a secure server. It will take fewer than 10 minutes. We ask that all data (12-months ending 9/30/22) be submitted no later than November 8, 2022.
Step 3: WAit for the magic
Our team of financial professionals reviews and “codes” the income statement and balance sheets of each company to ensure we get a true “apples to apples” comparison. The report is created so you can sort and compare to companies of similar size and revenue mix as your own.
STEP 4: Join the Webinars
You’ll receive an email invitation for two live webinars led by Greg Herring, to take place in early December. Greg will take you through the information and trends, teach you how to use the report for your own deeper analysis and answer any questions.
companies that
participated in 2021
119
total revenue of
2021 companies
$980M
Employees
Represented
10K
Companies with
Net Profit Over 10%
24%
$337 for the Report and Webinar
60-Day No-Risk Guarantee
The History of The Benchmark Report
About Greg & The Report
Greg Herring, the founder and CEO of The Herring Group, has a passion for restoring life margin to business owners and helping people live well. Greg and his team of financial leaders walk alongside landscape business executives, implementing their proprietary system, the Path to 12%, to increase profit margins and provide owners with much-needed life margin, a welcome change.
Greg created the Benchmark Report as a tool for his clients back in 2014 to help them get a more accurate picture of the landscape industry. He found that many reports claiming to be “benchmarks” could easily be skewed by companies naturally reporting their financials differently. He decided to do something about it and created a unique model where each company’s data is “coded” for maximum comparability. His model also shows each company’s data (anonymously, of course) so that participants can find companies most similar to theirs and customize the benchmark report to make it more relevant to their needs. He demonstrates how to get the most out of the report in a live webinar.
Whether your company has revenue of $1 million or $50 million, he believes this report can be a powerful tool to use with your team, and will help put you on an actionable path to real change.
New in 2022
High Performers To Share Knowledge
We Keep Adding Value
We’re always looking for new ways to bring value to the landscape industry. Valuable articles, webinars, ideas. We want the industry as a whole to grow and thrive – and we care about business owners.
As a participant in the 2022 Industry Benchmark Report, you will receive value in three ways:
- Customizable report with anonymous data from each participant and NO jumbled averages
- Webinar #1 – Learn how to use the report for your own deeper analysis
- Webinar #2 – NEW THIS YEAR! We will invite high-performing companies to join us to discuss what made their companies successful during this challenging year.*
$337 for the Report and Webinar
60-Day No-Risk Guarantee
*If you had greater than average success in 2022, you could be featured in our high-performer webinar!
People are Talking
“This Benchmark Report is unique. You see each company’s data – revenue mix as well as expenses and net income as a percentage of revenue – and it’s anonymous. I use it each year to see how my company is performing. I love it!”
Nick DiBenedetto, ND Landscape Inc.
Frequently Asked Questions
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What data is measured in the report?
With The Herring Group’s Peer Benchmark Report, we turn each company’s raw data into percentages, allowing you to anonymously compare yourself to companies of all sizes. The data is also filterable, so you can get a clear comparison to companies like yours, in terms of size and revenue mix.
That’s one of the big advantages of our report.
Here are just a few things that we measure:
- Revenue growth
- Revenue mix
- Enhancements as a % of maintenance
- Net profit margin (net profit divided by revenue)
- EBITDA margin (EBITDA is used to value landscape companies in a sale process)
- Gross margin
- Repairs and maintenance as a percentage of revenue
- Fuel as a percentage of revenue
- Overhead as a percentage of revenue
- Days in Accounts Receivable
- Debt to Equity Ratio
Does my company need to be a certain size to benefit from participating in the report?
Companies with revenue of $1 million to $50 million will benefit from the Benchmark Report. One of the best things about the report is that the data can be filtered so that you can get clear comparisons with companies like yours (both in terms of size and revenue mix). Over the years, we have seen highly profitable companies of all sizes.
Do I need to be on Aspire in order to participate in the Benchmark Report?
No. The Benchmark Report only uses data from your accounting software (e.g. QuickBooks). We provide detailed instructions on how to generate these reports. It will take less than 10 minutes.
I want to purchase the report, but my team is still working on closing out the last month. Do I need to submit my financials immediately?
No. You can purchase the report now and you will have time to submit your financials. We ask that all data (12-months ending 9/30/22) be submitted no later than November 8, 2022. We can also use data for the 12 months ended August 31, 2022 if September 2022 data is not available.
Bonus for 2022: We’re encouraging all companies to include two years of data so we can do a comparison with the year prior to inflation. This is included in the price of $337.
How will the report be delivered to me?
A link to a secure folder with your copy of the report will be provided to you by email on the day the report is released. You will get copies of the report as a PDF and as an Excel file, as well as a video recording of our two webinar presentations.
I am unable to attend the post-report webinars. Are they recorded?
The first post-report webinar is where Greg will explain both how to use the report and point out some of the interesting findings from the year’s report. The second webinar will be a panel discussion with owners from high-performing companies. Both webinars are recorded and will be available for you and your team to view after the live event.
I am currently a Herring Group client. Do I need to purchase the report?
No. All current clients of The Herring Group will receive the Benchmark Report and an invitation to the webinars as a part of our ongoing services. You do not need to register to participate.
Can you buy the report without participating?
No, the report is only available to participants. We work diligently to make sure each participating company’s numbers are comparable to the other companies. If you are in the landscape industry but not a business owner, sponsorship opportunities may be available. Contact us at [email protected].
How secure are my numbers? Do you share them with anyone?
Your data is uploaded into a secure Dropbox folder. Dropbox uses Secure Sockets Layer (SSL)/Transport Layer Security (TSL) to protect data in transit between Dropbox apps and their servers.
From there, your company’s dollars are converted to a % of revenue. Your company is assigned an ID number and your percentages are displayed in a single column in Excel, labeled only by the ID number. Your specific ID will be emailed only to the email address on file when signing up.
We take this approach to make the data more comparable and to make it easier for people to participate. Participants and sponsors will see the report with anonymous data, only. We use overall statistics to help inform the industry.
Reserve Your Spot Today
It’s all good. You can upload your financial documents (12-months ending 9/30) later.
$337 for the Report and Webinar
60-Day No-Risk Guarantee
HAVE A Question?
Do you have Questions not found in the FAQs?
ask them here.
Filling out this form does not sign you up for the report.