300 to 3,000 Customers in Three Years: How Yard Guard Grew 10X With RealGreen
The Company:
Montana-based Yard Guard offers lawn and tree care services, holiday light installation, and sprinkler blowouts. They have locations in Belgrade, Bozeman, and Livingston. Yard Guard was founded in 1993; they became a RealGreen customer in 2020.
The Problem:
When Yard Guard’s current owner Colin Engstrom purchased the company from its founder in 2020, the entire operation was still run using pen and paper. This old-school approach wasn’t going to work for a forward-thinking, growth-minded company in a booming location. “We have a really great market in Bozeman – it’s growing like crazy. People are moving here, and a lot of people have second homes here, too. It has created great growth opportunities for us,” said Yard Guard Office Manager Sidne Gardner.
The Solution:
“The previous owner had done a great job with the company. He had 300 very loyal customers that he serviced, which is great for a one-man operation but not at the scale where we wanted to grow,” continued Gardner. It was also immediately clear that the previous owner’s old-school style of running the business wasn’t going to work as the business scaled. “After Colin purchased Yard Guard, he moved all of our operations to RealGreen immediately – Colin learned from a previous experience that getting on the right software from the beginning will allow the business to scale with it rather than trying to add software later when operations are more complicated.
According to Gardner, Engstrom did research other potential software, comparing the strengths and drawbacks of each before ultimately selecting RealGreen because of its robust routing, customer management features, reporting capabilities, integrations, and overall functionality. “I don’t know of another software that can fully do what RealGreen does.”
The Results:
Booming growth in a booming town. In just three short years, Yard Guard has grown tenfold – in terms of customers, employees, and total revenue. Engstrom started with a team of three; the team now numbers upwards of 20, including CSRs, management, and technicians. The original 300 customers have increased to 3,000. And revenue, which stood at $200,000, has grown to $2 million.
“At the end of the day, it’s all about what your goals are for your business,” Gardner said. “We’ve seen other companies choose different software and then end up with false promises and less-than-stellar results. Picking a CRM for your business is a huge deal. The wrong one can put a strain on your team and your customer experience – but the right one will more than pay for itself. For lawn care businesses, RealGreen is the way to go!”
