When Simon Padgett moved to Marco Island, Florida, from England to start Multiskill Lawn and Garden Services, he had a few surprises in store. Back home, landscapes are not bombarded by hurricane salt spray, and spiral white flies couldn’t infest palm trees that don’t grow there. He didn’t expect to see so much competition in the marketplace. And doing business here? Well, in his words, “You have an incredible bureaucracy that creates all sorts of obstacles.”

Maintaining a cemetery can be one of the toughest applications for any mower. It not only has to maneuver in between and around headstones, but cemetery grounds are notoriously bumpy as graves deteriorate over time. When the cemetery is located in Montana where winters can be difficult, having mowers that can do double-duty snow removal is important as well.

One way to grow is to offer a standard service to all customers, one that saves both time and money. This strategy, however, holds little appeal to Brad Paton, owner of Shades of Summer Landscaping in Hamilton, ON, Canada. In business for only five years, his approach is to adapt service offerings to properties.

As a Walker Mower user and reader of Walker Talk magazine, you’ve lived the story and read about others who’ve done the same. Chances are you started out mowing lawns very early in life. Your first customers were your neighbors. Obtaining a driver’s license allowed you to branch out of the neighborhood while in high school, and later, after graduation, you may have immediately hung your own shingle.

There are several ways and reasons to mow a lawn. At the very least, lawns can be mowed to control weeds or tame turfgrass in outlying areas. At the other end of the spectrum are lawns designed and maintained to look almost like golf greens. In between lie a variety of properties and mowing strategies that can be placed into one of two broadly defined categories: high-production mowing and quality mowing.

Dennis Jontos, owner of Cutzgras, Inc., in Port Charlotte, Florida, says: “Our philosophy is relatively simple. We’re dedicated to providing quality work, period.”