Landscaping is a job with many benefits. 2 of the biggest benefits are making a lot of money during the summer months and being able to work outdoors. Although there is a lot of money to be made during the summer, for many landscapers the money virtually stops flowing during the winter months. This means landscape contractors have to find other ways of making money. Here are some ideas for winter time income for landscape contractors.

There are a few different ways landscape contractors can make money during the offseason. One of the best ways is by installing Christmas lights for people. This can be done for both residents and businesses. It actually fits right in with a landscaping business because the landscape contractor can use the same work crews and already has a large client base to market to.

Believe it or not, installing Christmas lights is very profitable. There are a lot of people who love to have their home or business decorated for the holidays but they don’t have the time, the will or the skill needed to do it well. These are people who are more than willing to pay to have their Christmas lights installed for them. They’re also people who hire a landscaper to get their lawn done. And that’s why installing Christmas lights is the perfect add-on service for landscapers.

Landscape contractors do need to begin to market and plan their Christmas light installation service early in the summer. They should start with the existing clients that they have. For example, a landscape contractor could have a basic brochure printed and pass it out to every customer. With the brochure could be a coupon for a percentage off for existing clients who sign-up to have their Christmas lights installed before September 15th.

Not only should the marketing be done early, everything involved with the Christmas light installation business should be done as soon as possible This includes retaining or even hiring employees and ordering materials such as Christmas lights and decorations. Most Christmas light distributors raise their prices as the holidays get closer. So landscape contractors can save themselves a lot of money by ordering their lights and materials early.

Landscaping and installing Christmas lights really do fit together very well. They are both jobs that involve outdoor work yet they need to be done at different times of the year. Most importantly, many of the same people who hire landscapers are also interested in hiring someone to install their Christmas lights. So, any landscape contractors that decide to install Christmas lights will find that the transition is very smooth as well as profitable.

There are many benefits to being a landscape contractor. However, there is a major drawback too. That drawback is the fact that during the winter months there is usually no work to be done and most companies are forced to lay of most of their employees. That’s why the perfect business for landscape contractors is installing Christmas lights. Landscape contractors just have to make sure they start planning the business in the early on and that all the plans are done by late September. Then the landscaper can begin to install lights sometime around Halloween. This will allow the landscape contractor to make a lot of money during the winter time.

Download FREE Report on how to earn over $200,000 hanging Christmas Lights.

Are you an outdoorsy person? Or do you dream of traveling for months at a time? Or maybe just someone who appreciates long periods of down time. Whatever the reason, starting a holiday lighting business may be the answer you’ve been looking for.

While working only 3 months out of the year might seem like a pie in the sky dream, it is in fact more attainable than you probably think. Some people have done it, as have many other professional christmas light installers from around the world.

In most parts of the world, the holiday lighting markets boom for a little less than 3 months leading up to Christmas and then die off for the rest of the year before picking up again after Halloween. Therefore by operating a holiday lighting business you have roughly 9 months (or more in some places) of free time before your work season begins.

But can we really make enough money in 3 months to live on for the full year?

The answer is a resounding YES! Of course, knowing how to live within your means is required. Let’s look at some basic numbers to explain how it is possible to only work for 3 months out of the year.

Most people in the US could live quite comfortably on $50,000 a year, in fact a large percentage of the population would kill to earn this much in 12 months, much less 8. So we will use $50,000 as our required income for the example.

Nobody wants to work 24/7 at any job, no matter how much you love it. Most good paying jobs require you to work 5 or 6 days a week, so we will use these numbers in our example.

Full-time solo christmas light installers typically earn between $800 and $1500 a day. Sometimes they may earn as much as $2000 per day working by themselves. Simply by hiring a laborer to work with you can jump your daily income by 80% or more.

Now that we’ve got all of our criteria nailed down, let’s see how it all breaks down in our 3 month time frame:

- Working 6 days a week for 3 months, means you would be working a total of 72 days per year. And with our required income of $50,000, that means that you would need to earn an average of $694.44 per day.

Looking at the above example, the goal of working only 3 months out of 12 is looking more tangible by the minute and considering that the average residential window cleaning job is around $1400, and the average 4-mand work crew brings in $3,800 per day, earning $50,000 in three months could easily become a reality.

Of all the home businesses out there, Christmas Light Installation businesses may be one of the best kept secrets around. Most people think of hanging Christmas lights as a low paying, low potential, grunt work job, and therefore they never give it a closer look. But, in reality installing lights and decorations is a highly profitable, low overhead, easy to start and run business.

Let’s take a look at what makes holiday lighting such a great business to start:

-Low Startup Cost – You can literally get your business up and running for $2500.00 or less.

-Low Overhead – For many light installers the only expenses they have are gas, and replacement lights and materials. The only other expense you may have is liability insurance. Insurance is not required, but is nice to have. Insurance for christmas light installers runs $1000 to $2000 per year.

-Extremely Profitable – Christmas light installers average between $1500 to $2000 dollars per day depending upon the job and the speed of the installer. It is very easy for a one or two person holiday lighting crew to bring in $60,000 to $100,000 during the holiday season.

-High Demand for Services – Peoples lives continue to become more busy and hectic on a daily basis, and they just don’t have time to install their own lights, therefore they pay to have them installed, even people who do have time to hang their own lights often would rather pay to have them professionally installed.

-Unlimited Growth Potential – The population is booming, new homes and businesses are being built by the thousands, and so instead of your market becoming saturated, it is instead growing larger each and every year.

-Easy Work – Installing christmas lights is very easy to do; anyone from a teenager to a senior citizen can do it. It is also very easy to train new employees.

There you have just a few of the top reasons why Christmas light installation is profitable and why starting your own holiday lighting business is such a good idea.