Know Your Numbers: The Math Behind a Highly Profitable Lawn Care Business

Summary

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Podcast Summary: Green Industry Podcast

Episode: "Know Your Numbers: The Math Behind a Highly Profitable Lawn Care Business"

Host: Paul Jamison
Guest: Joey Coberly (Bookkeeper, Pensacola, FL)
Date: April 10, 2026

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Episode Overview

This episode dives deep into the critical importance of "knowing your numbers" for lawn care and landscaping business owners. Host Paul Jamison interviews his own bookkeeper, Joey Coberly, covering topics from pricing strategies to setting up business safety nets. The conversation, rich with practical advice and candid insight, aims to demystify business finances and provide actionable strategies for achieving—and sustaining—profitability in the green industry.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Technician vs. The Business Owner Mindset

[07:36 - 09:52]

• Many lawn care professionals are excellent technicians but struggle with the "language of business." They can mow lawns or lay fertilizer perfectly but are confused by pricing, taxes, and financial statements.
• Joey Coberly: "You have to learn how to do it. My whole thing is: it’s not that complex. Just talk to it like a layperson would. Then you can understand." (03:47)
• Joey emphasizes the need to make business concepts relatable and easy to grasp for those with little formal financial education.

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2. Breaking Down Business Finances: Overhead, Cost of Goods, and Profit

[08:29 - 11:05]

• Joey uses the analogy of a car to explain business finances:
  • Overhead: Your car (assets, recurring expenses)
  • Cost of Goods Sold (COGS): The fuel and labor (inputs that make the business run)
  • Destination: The vision or end goal of the business
• "If you can work on a car and build things, you can understand the language of business." (08:29)
• The big idea: Set your business vision (destination) and calculate efficient routes (operations & pricing) to get there.

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3. Pricing for Profit, Not Just for Survival

[12:42 - 13:59]

• Joey has worked with over 100 green industry businesses and sees pricing issues as the number one reason companies fail.
• Many owners start by guessing at prices or undercharging, not factoring in all costs or desired profit.
• Joey Coberly: "I really try to help guys price at the top 20% of the market because those are the guys that are actually building big businesses and stepping out and creating generational wealth." (12:42)
• Citing Alex Hormozi: "Number one reason these service businesses go out of business is pricing issues."

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4. The Emotional Reality: Breaking Even and Scaling Up

[13:59 - 16:44]

• As businesses grow, so does "break-even"—the monthly revenue needed to cover all expenses.
• Paul Jamison: "My break even is now this amount, which is just… I don’t know if stress is the right word…but it’s so high…It takes a lot of effort or I got to cut expenses." (13:59)
• Joey reflects on the journey: "You started with labor stress, and now you’re in financial and psychological stress as you scale. It’s a different type of responsibility." (14:48)
• The need to adapt and embrace each new level of business complexity and pressure is highlighted.

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5. The Importance of Retained Earnings & Emergency Buffers

[20:02 - 24:43]

• Joey advocates for maintaining two to three months of business expenses in savings:
  • For recurring maintenance companies: 2–3 months may suffice.
  • For design/build or seasonal companies: 5–6 months is safer due to income irregularity.
• Joey Coberly: "It’s all about using wisdom...for most maintenance companies, 2–3 months expenses works pretty good." (20:02)
• Paul points out the personal-business divide: You should have separate emergency funds for both.

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6. Personal and Business Finance Separation

[21:22 - 23:59]

• Paul describes advice from Dave Ramsey: self-employed individuals should have six months of personal expenses saved, in addition to business reserves.
• "Basically, you have two emergency funds, a personal one...and then one in the business. The double whammy here." (22:55)
• Joey stresses the importance of practicing what you preach: "I do two to three months in personal and two to three months in business...It gives me peace of mind at night." (23:51)

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7. Debt: Tool or Trap?

[24:43 - 27:20]

• Discussion shifts to debt, a divisive issue in entrepreneurship.
• Joey: "Personally, I don’t use debt, other than maybe a mortgage...What takes most businesses out in the first five years is using debt, or cash flow issues, or both. Especially when you don’t have a business plan and use other people’s money to experiment." (25:43)
• Joey cautions against early, unplanned borrowing for equipment, vehicles, or marketing without a proven strategy.

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8. The Discipline of Saving & Spending Habits

[27:20 - 28:21]

• Paul candidly shares his natural tendency to spend rather than save and how this creates challenges for his business goals.
• "It takes quite a bit of discipline and organization and intentionality to say, ‘here’s my plan’...and then you have to know what to say no to because you have another goal." (28:21)
• He stresses the importance of being "organized and intentional" with personal and business finances, echoing lessons from successful business leaders and financial advisors.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Joey Coberly (on the layperson and numbers):
  “If you can work on a car and build things, you can understand the language of business. Everything’s built the same way; you just need it explained in relatable terms.” (09:52)

• Joey Coberly (on pricing):
  “I try to help guys price at the top 20% of the market because those are the guys actually building big businesses and creating generational wealth. It shocks guys to find out how much they actually need to charge to stay in business.” (12:42)

• Paul Jamison (on break-even eye-opener):
  “My break even is now this amount...it’s so high. It takes a lot of effort...I either have to serve customers at the highest level and make enough money or I’ve got to cut expenses.” (13:59)

• Joey Coberly (on scaling stress):
  “You started with labor stress...then you get into financial stress...then psychological stress at the top—having people under you, the responsibility. You always go through different types of stress.” (14:48)

• Joey Coberly (on business safety nets):
  “Having at least two to three months of expenses saved up—just like Dave Ramsey and Kevin O’Leary say—protects your team and gives peace of mind.” (20:02)

• Joey Coberly (on debt):
  “I’m not anti-debt...but most businesses are taken out in the first five years by debt or cash flow issues...especially when you use other people’s money to experiment.” (25:43)

• Paul Jamison (on intentionality):
  “When the money comes in, things will come knocking that want that money. We have to already have an established plan for where the money goes—with great organization and intentionality.” (29:25–30:45)

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Key Timestamps for Segments

| Segment | Timestamps | |---------|------------| | Opening Banter & Joey’s Introduction | 01:10–06:47 | | Why “Knowing Your Numbers” Matters | 07:36–11:05 | | Simplified Financial Concepts | 08:29–11:05 | | Pricing Mistakes & Market Positioning | 12:42–13:59 | | Break-Even Math & Business Stress | 13:59–16:44 | | The Case for Emergency Funds | 20:02–24:43 | | Debt Dangers for Small Businesses | 24:43–27:20 | | Personal Challenges with Saving | 27:20–28:21 | | Organization & Intentionality in Finances | 28:21–30:45 |

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Takeaways for Listeners

• Understand and regularly review your business numbers—profit and loss, break-even, and cash flow.
• Separate business and personal finances, and create distinct emergency funds for each.
• Price your services high enough to allow for profit and future growth; underpricing is a common path to failure.
• Grow into each new level of responsibility and stress as your business expands—mental shifts are as important as financial strategies.
• Be intentional and disciplined with spending and saving—organize your finances before the money arrives.
• Avoid debt traps early in your business. Have a plan and only leverage funds after you’ve proven your business model.

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Closing

Paul and Joey will continue this essential conversation in a future episode, promising more practical insights for green industry professionals aiming to run thriving, profitable businesses.

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Transcript

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[Podcast Host/Announcer]

hello, and welcome to the green industry podcast, your go to guide for building a more profitable and thriving lawn care and landscaping business. Your host, Paul Jamison is the author of five bestselling books including cut that grass and make that cash and his latest, level up your money, all available on Amazon and Audible. Now get ready for more expert insights and practical strategies to boost your business and level up your life. Here's Paul Jameson.

[Paul Jamison]

What's up, Joey? Welcome to the show, man. I'm trying.

[Joey Coberly]

What's going on, brother?

[Paul Jamison]

I'm trying to get us connected on Instagram. We should be on YouTube, Facebook, and LinkedIn here with the.

[Joey Coberly]

There we go.

[Paul Jamison]

And on. On Instagram. All right, folks, Joey Cobley from Pensacola, Florida, joining the program. What's up, my friend?

[Joey Coberly]

What's going on, man? Tech problems as usual, huh?

[Paul Jamison]

Hey, we're figuring this out. Back at it. Back in, like, 2018, I started streaming and I was making content about Cleveland Browns football, and I had it all figured out. I was using obs. I was live streaming every day. And then the Lord convicted me to, like, stop wasting my time talking about these NFL football players, and I shut it down. I stopped my popular podcast back then, so now I'm trying to pick it all back up again, and I feel like I don't know what's going on, but how are you, my friend?

[Joey Coberly]

I'm doing good, man. How's the weather down there in Tampa?

[Paul Jamison]

Windy. It's been. We've had these unusual, like, 32 mile per hour gust yesterday. Today is like 23 mile per hour winds. And I have it dialed into, like, the specific amount because I'm going golfing.

[Joey Coberly]

So, yeah, pretty windy town in general. And they. Because you're right on the, on the coast. Is that right? I don't even know that. I don't know. South Florida. I'm panhandle.

[Paul Jamison]

Yeah, I, I, there's, there's a lot of water around this. You have the Gulf of America. You have the Tampa Bay. There's. There's all kind of wind.

[Joey Coberly]

Yeah. I don't know what's going on in Pensacola. Megan, yesterday, or I guess it was a few, it was probably a week ago, she was like, you think we could put our winter clothes up? And I was like, who am I, the weatherman? I don't know, like, and then I said, sure. And then she put them all up. And then the next day it was like, you know, 50 degrees or whatever. Which doesn't sound cold to you northerners, but best Pensacola and 50 degrees. We need a jacket, man.

[Paul Jamison]

Yeah, let us know in the comments where you're watching from, like the actual platform. Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn. And if you have a question for our expert today, Joey Koberly, about your business, you can drop those in the comments. So I'd like to get started. Joey, introducing you. You have been my bookkeeper since 2020. When I joined your team of being a client, I kind of had a shoebox of receipts, as we say, kind of disorganized, overwhelmed. And you guys have really helped me understand my numbers over the years and get me dialed in. So I'm just curious your thoughts, me as your client, what's it been like watching the transformation? Because you guys have really guided me into becoming a better businessman.

[Joey Coberly]

Dude, you've really been an ideal client because you kind of came into this curious and ready to learn. And you've always been consistent with showing up with the meetings that we do monthly. And I've liked watching you go from just kind of being able to work really hard to now you can kind of talk the language of business, you know, And I like, you're always like, what's my gross profit? What's my profit? You ask all these, you know, numbers now before you know any about that stuff, now you can read the profit and loss, the cash flow statement, the balance sheet. You can, you can see errors really fast. You know, if we, if we made a mistake and we need to correct them real quick, like you pointed out. And so it's always been fun having you really engaged. And man, I just like watching your transformation. That's what it's all about for me. It's like, I like bringing blue collar workers financial statements that they can read because I can't stand it when there's a disconnect and somebody can't quite understand because it's not. You have to learn how to do it. And maybe you've just been taught and somebody's talked over your head. My whole thing is like, it's not that complex. Just talk to it like the layperson would. Would speak and then you can understand that way. But it's been a lot of fun watching you go from basically completely clueless, if I'm being honest, to somebody that kind of, you know, you really. You stay on top of it now. It's pretty impressive.

[Paul Jamison]

I appreciate that you guys have been such a help. We have a friend, Dan Pestretto, over on LinkedIn. He asked about where, where we're abouts. Joey's on the panhandle side of Florida in beautiful Pensacola, Florida. I've been there to visit the Cobra lease and I was very impressed with Pensacola Beach. I would love to go back there one day when I could stay for longer because I was only there for like a few hours.

[Joey Coberly]

Yeah, I think it was. I think it was ranked like top 10 beaches in the world or something like that. I don't even know. Like, I take it for granted because I've been here so long, but yeah, basically we're right next to LA, lower Alabama, like for probably 20 minutes east of there. So.

[Paul Jamison]

And the people around there seem, for the most part seem very wholesome and it seemed like good people that, that live there. You come down here to South Florida and. And it's characters down here, man, they come down. Come down from like New York and New Jersey, honestly, and they think they're all that in a bag of chips and anyway, I feel like when I went to Pensacola, everyone there was kind of like wholesome folk.

[Joey Coberly]

Yeah, it's. It's kind of a melting pot because Pensacola is. I'd say it's kind of like a bunch of. It feels like random people that live here. And then west of here, like 20 minutes west, you have all the rednecks and in lower Alabama, like, that's kind of where I grew up. I'm from Seminole, Alabama. And then it's a tourist town on top of that, so you have all these random people living together and then it's a beach town on top of that. And then you have the rednecks on basically east and the west side in Milton and in Seminole. And yeah, it's, it's, it's a fun time, man. It's a good time. I like this town.

[Paul Jamison]

Yeah, I do too. Hopefully I can come back and visit one day and you guys took me out for a nice juicy steak. I had a wonderful time, Pensacola, but I live down here in Tampa, Florida.

[Joey Coberly]

So. Yeah, you're good. Seven, eight hours away. A lot of people say, did you See, the. I had some guy, one of our clients, message if we could see the. The rocket launch from. From Artemis. And I was like, man, that's. Florida's a big state. It's. I think it's like eight hours from us.

[Paul Jamison]

Yeah. And that's over on the Atlantic Ocean side.

[Joey Coberly]

Yeah.

[Paul Jamison]

Real quick, before we get into it, shout outs to Turtleson. They sent me this golf shirt here. It looks. I don't know if it looks good on camera, but it feels like I'm ready to go to the golf course today. Boy, this golf shirt is nice.

[Joey Coberly]

So golf shirts have gotten comfy over the years.

[Paul Jamison]

Yeah. This brand, they're out of Bristol, Tennessee. Turtleson. I met them at the PGA show, and they sent me their spring lineup. And I'm pumped up to head out to the golf course today.

[Joey Coberly]

That's cool, man. Yep.

[Paul Jamison]

Well, you were mentioning Joey about the language of business. And I think a lot of folks are technicians. They're good at mowing grass. They're good at running skid steer. They're good at actually doing the work, whether that's a lawn maintenance or a fertilization and weed control program. They can keep the weeds out of your yard. Like, you know, it's. It's something that they're really good at. But then when it comes time to understanding how much should I be charging my customers, how much should I be paying in taxes? Like, all the business side of things, things get cloudy and overwhelming. And you talk a lot about knowing your numbers and the language of business, but what are some of the fundamentals of the language of business that small business owners should really understand those terminologies?

[Joey Coberly]

Yes. I've always worked in lawn care, for the most part. I mean, Megan and I served some random clients whenever we first started out. For the most part, since 2020, we've been in lawn care specifically. So I'm really passionate about bringing the language of business to blue collar. Like, and there's a big disconnect there because maybe you didn't learn it in school or. Well, you probably didn't learn in school. They don't teach a lot of stuff. But even if you did, it's probably. You think it's over your head or, what can I do with this? There's no application to it. And when you get into business and you're starting to scale, you're like, well, maybe I should have really learned all these numbers. And. And I really don't know what anyone's talking about. Can somebody help me? And so I really try hard to bring the language of business to blue collar by just breaking it down in most simplistic form. So, you know, if you can work on a car and build things, you can understand the language of business because they're basically the same thing. You know, you have your overhead, which is kind of your fixed structure, and then you have your cost of goods, which you might hear people talk about all the time. That's just your inputs, like you would put into a car, like your fuel. And every business has basically those two functions. You have like the fixed part and you have the inputs that make the business go. And so, yeah, I mean, that's kind of what I try to break it down to. I can break it down further than that, but that's kind of what I try to preach to people.

[Paul Jamison]

Yeah, go ahead and break it down. Break it down further than that.

[Joey Coberly]

Yeah, yeah. So, you know, if you're, if you're going to lawn care company, you have all the things that you've bought that are kind of on a ticking time clock that would be, you know, like a car. If you just sat in the yard, you know, that would be your overhead, your car would be your overhead. And maybe you want to get the car to a destination. You want to get your business to a destination. You would put things inside of it. So that would be your cost of goods. So you put your fuel, you might put a person in the seat to drive it, to push the gas. The same with your business. You would put materials and you would put fuel and you'd put a person in to help, you know, work the, work the truck and the equipment, stuff like that. And that would actually make the business go and make the overhead start going. And then you would have to have your. Your destination, where am I going? What's your vision of the business? Just like you would need to know your gps. If you put it into the car, you need the car to go somewhere. You specifically tell the guard to go somewhere. You stay with your business. You say, hey, I want to get here in five years. I want my life to look like this. And then you point the direction of the business at that. You put the inputs in and then you figure out how to do it efficiently. Right? Like, everybody's trying to get their fuel mileage down. That's what you want to do with your business. So it's. Everything's built the same way. You just have to learn how the mechanic and the blue collar part of it fits into, you know, something that would seem kind of intangible, like a Business.

[Paul Jamison]

That's good. You're just joining us on Instagram. Welcome. S. Gonzalez Landscaping. Thanks for watching us over there. I've been trying to figure out how to live stream on Facebook and YouTube and Instagram and LinkedIn, and I think we got it figured out. We're on all four of those platforms right now. So this is a exciting, exciting day here, Joey.

[Joey Coberly]

Yeah. Yeah. I didn't know if we were going to pull it off. There it is.

[Paul Jamison]

Yes, sir. I've been doing this podcast. I started my podcast in 2018, talking about how to grow a lawn care business. And we've done, I think, close to 1700 episodes now, which is absolutely crazy. But most of them, you know, I was in. I was in just. No cameras were on or anything. I was in my pajamas, basically, just talking business and everything like that. And a lot of people are like, you need to. You need to go on video. You need to go where the people are on video. So I put this fancy Turtleson golf shirt on, and. And here we are to serve you. So if you have a question for Joey about your business, go ahead and put it in the comments and we will get to your question. My question to you, Joey, comes around pricing. I think a lot of folks are guessing when it comes to how much should I charge my customer, rather than having, you know, math as the determination of what the price is going to be. So approximately how many customers do you have in your ecosystem that. That are in the lawn care industry? And what can you teach us about how we should price our services?

[Joey Coberly]

Yeah, so I've probably worked with over a hundred over the years. And the. I think Alex Hormozi said the number one reason these service businesses go out of business is pricing issues. I've heard cash flow issues. I think they're kind of one of the same. If you don't have your pricing correct, your cash flow is going to be downstream of it. But I think when you start off, it's like you said back in 2011, when you started out, you started charging, I think, $20 an hour, because you're like, oh, that makes. I'm going to make $20 an hour straight up. And then you don't realize all the things that it actually takes to scale and step out of the business. And so I'm really passionate about helping guys start. Yeah, you got a job and you get out of your 9 to 5, but then learning how to scale that, and that's a whole completely different animal because it's something that you need to run Independently of yourself, something you can step out of. And so that's why we need to price a little higher, because you need what's, what's called profit at the end. And if you're not pricing accordingly, you're not going to have any profit. And profit is what helps you scale. So I really try to help guys price at the top 20% of the market because those are the guys that are actually building the big businesses and stepping out and creating generational wealth. And it kind of shocks guys when, when they find out how much they actually need to charge to stay in business to push the gas on this thing. Because it's completely different from what you'd expect. Expect when you start out. And you know that better than anybody.

[Paul Jamison]

Yeah, I've had eye opening moments with you, Joey. I mean, we just had a call a couple weeks ago where you were sharing with me what I need to be making per month to break even. And it's so high. I sent Naylor a voice note afterwards. I was like, my break even is now this amount, which is just. I don't know if stress is the right word or responsibility, but it's, it's so high. And so it's like I, I either have to go out there and, and crush it and serve customers at the highest level and make enough money to break even. Obviously, I want to go beyond that, but it's, it takes a lot of effort or I got to cut expenses, but I, I just don't know where to cut. You know where to cut the expenditures. I, I mean, yeah, yeah.

[Joey Coberly]

I think you're going through like a transformation in your head of responsibility, too. Like Mike Andes talks about this. He'll say that you start off with labor stress, stress on your body, and then you kind of get into financial stress as you start to scale. And then when you get to the end of it with all the eight, nine figure business owners are dealing with, it's more like psychological stress. The stress of having people under you, the responsibility of it. And so you always go through different types of stress, but it's about building your brain to be able to handle it as you move through the different layers. And I always really liked what he said about that because it's so true. I've seen it firsthand many times.

[Paul Jamison]

Yeah, it's, it's a lot of pressure and responsibility when, and I don't have necessarily a lot of W2 employees, but I have a lot of 1099s that have, you know, here's your task. They do the task. And I pay them and they have spouses and they have children and they have, you know, I just feel like I'll see their pictures on social media, their little babies and stuff, and I'm like, I feel responsibility. Like I'm, I'm the one by the grace of God paying for that kid's diet, you know, little baby's diapers and food and, and then it, it's just, I don't know, it's. My business was easier when my break, when we started working together in 2020, I think you're like, yeah, your break even is 10,500amonth. Which back then I was like, what? I got to make 10,500 every month just to break even. And I did, I went out there and I did that every month. But now my break even's a lot more higher than that. And it's just like, I don't know, I'm going through something.

[Joey Coberly]

You handled it well when I threw it out there because I didn't know it even phased you. And now talking to you, like, man,

[Paul Jamison]

well, you told me I don't want to publicly.

[Joey Coberly]

I was talking to you. I was like, oh, wow, he handled that pretty well.

[Paul Jamison]

No, I didn't, I didn't.

[Joey Coberly]

I remembered the old break even and I was putting your new one out there. I was like, wow, he's not going to handle this very well. And then on, on camera, I was like, wow, he handled that pretty well. But no, I didn't.

[Paul Jamison]

I, I, I, I, I was shocked. But like, I want to know my n, I want to know my numbers. And I don't want to publicly share what my break even is now. But it's, it's way bigger than 10,500amonth. And there's just, it's just like when I'm getting out of bed in the morning, it's like, all right, once my feet hit the floor today, I'm working until it's dark outside. And I'm doing everything I can to financially move the needle to, to surpass that break even and build up margin. And I know you said something that's been so convicting and challenging for me, but you talk about having like two months of a savings account in your business as retained earnings and go ahead and share about that for a moment because that's, that just seems so far fetched for so many of us. Foreign commercial is the only solution for commercial landscapers to convert to electric with the power of gas, no downtime, with their 8 minute charging system, and industry disrupting warranties that offer 6 years or 3000 full life cycles on the cyberpack batteries. There is no reason to not make the switch. To find out more about the free demos and how you can subscribe, start saving up to $2,000 per year per crew. Visit crest.com today to find your local dealer. Most jobs go to the first contractor that picks up the phone. But you can't answer the phone when you're on a lawnmower. So here's a solution. It's called Voice Assist by CallRail. I'm going to show you how it works. I'm going to call a pest control company that uses Voice assist. Take a listen.

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[Paul Jamison]

Hey Betty, I wanted to see if you could schedule somebody to come out, take a look at my property and give me a quote for pest control. I was looking for yearly service.

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[Paul Jamison]

What would it cost to come?

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[Paul Jamison]

Yeah, let's get one scheduled.

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[Paul Jamison]

Paul Jamison.

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[Paul Jamison]

Yeah, 10am Works.

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[Paul Jamison]

Sure. It's 1234 Main Street.

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[Paul Jamison]

Oh, that's it. Thank you so much, Betty.

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[Paul Jamison]

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[Joey Coberly]

You know, I'm all about living my life. As you know, I'm very ambitious. But I also want to decrease stress as far as I can. And so it's one way to decrease stress in my life and to make sure everything keeps running and everybody's taken care of, the team's taken care of. And you know, it's not just me saying this. I'VE pulled this from my years of experience. But also, you know, Dave Ramsey talks about this, Kevin o' Leary from Shark Tank talks about this. But just having at least two to three months of expenses saved up. And it really depends on the type of business that you're into. So if you're in kind of something with recurring revenue, so let's just say maintenance, you need fewer months saved up than you would if you were in kind of a design and build company, you know, where revenues a little more, it ebbs and flows more. Right. Like you'll hear Dave Ramsey, somebody calling to Dave Ramsey and it'll be somebody that does that works in sales. And I'll say how much expenses do I need to save up? And he'll shoot on the high side because that guy's income fluctuates. It's the same thing with a design bill versus a maintenance company. I'd shoot on the five to six months for design and build just because the invoicing so different getting paid every maybe 90 days relative to 30 days or something like that. So yeah, it's all about using wisdom. It's not like I'm going to say do exactly this. It's like what does your business need? And for most maintenance companies, you know, two to three months expenses works pretty good.

[Paul Jamison]

And just to clarify, so there's the separation of business accounts, your business and then your personal. So yeah, Dave Ramsey would teach. I was just talking with his team actually yesterday, not, not on air. So don't, don't go listen and be like Paul from Tampa. But privately I was asking them a question off air and they're like, because you're self employed, you need to have a six month personal say for your baby step three emergency fund, you, Paul, need to have six months saved. And the reason I kind of fought them back and forth on that and that because I'm like, I'm single, you know, I don't even have a wife. I don't have kids yet. I want them, but I don't have them yet. They're like, yeah, but anyone who's self employed, their personal savings in baby step three needs to be six months. And so we calculated what my personal rent is and groceries and the bare bones, you know, and then you multiply that by six and that's what you need baby step three to be. So what I hear you saying is that's just my personal emergency fund. If I really want to sleep like a baby at night or sleep peacefully. I was talking, you're talking about Business. I know. That's why I'm clarifying. So, so in addition to that. So I need to have my six months saved in my emergency fund for my personal, but now back into my business. You're talking about saving up two to three months or more. Just the business expenditures in the business. So basically, you have two emergency funds, a personal one. That's six months of your personal expenses, and then one in the business. The double. The double whammy here.

[Joey Coberly]

Yeah, they both. They both have operations to em. Your house has an operations to it, and your business has operations to it, and they each have expenses. So, yeah, I mean, that's. That's what we do. We do. I do two to three months in personal, and I do two to three months in business because we kind of have. We have pretty. Pretty steady payments inside of our business model. If I had something crazier, I'd do a little higher. But, yeah, that's what we do. We practice what we preach, and it gives me peace of mind at night, so that's what it's all about.

[Paul Jamison]

So you. You can personally testify that you have two. You mentioned two or three months.

[Joey Coberly]

Is it.

[Paul Jamison]

Is it two or three months in your personals or two or three months in your business as those savings accounts beefed up?

[Joey Coberly]

Yeah, so both. I have two to three months in personal, and I have two. Two to three months in business. Yeah, I don't. I don't give any advice that I don't take myself.

[Paul Jamison]

That's so good. Well, you. You gave that advice back at the Lawn Care Life conference, or at least I was talking about it last year at the Lawn Care Life conference. And I'm not sure who. Who all out there is trying to achieve that goal, but it's definitely a good goal to have.

[Joey Coberly]

Yeah, I remember. It was Brandon Gray. I remember you came up to me after. I guess this was a year and a half ago. Brandon Gray said that that's what their company does with Greg Crabtree. If you've read that book, simple numbers, big profits. He spoke at Jason Creel's event. And I remember you came up to me afterwards. You're like, man, I got to get on this. Because, you know, even Greg Crabtree's team's talking about this. So, yeah, it's. It's. It's a pretty. It's pretty sage business advice. I, I've. I've pulled it from a lot of different places.

[Paul Jamison]

Yeah, that's good. Well, I want you to share real quick about debt, because I'm. I'm sharing that as I talk about the Dave Ramsey program. I went through baby step one, which is you save a thousand dollars. Then I went into baby step two, where you, you label all. You list all your debts in order from the highest amount. Pardon me, from the, from the lowest amount balance to the highest amount balance. And then you pay all of those off. And I accomplished that. I paid off all my debts. So that's pretty exciting. So I'm debt free and now I'm getting into this stage of life of where it's. Now the next step is the emergency funds where you, where you beef up all of those. But I want you to share your thoughts on debt because a lot of people are loosey goosey about debt, especially who own a business. And I know we kind of come from the mindset of. Of debt equals stress. And I don't want to have stress, so I don't want to have debt. So go ahead and share it. In your. Your words, you're lower Alabama slang.

[Joey Coberly]

Yeah, yeah. Personally, I don't, I don't use debt other than, you know, maybe like a mortgage or something like that. But the. I'm not anti debt. It's just something I don't use. And I understand the good debt versus bad debt argument where I would say my company doesn't harp on people that use debt or anything like that. What I would say is what takes most businesses out in the first five years is using debt for the most part, or cash flow issues one or the other. And a lot of times those are interconnected as well. But I think what it really comes from is not really having a business plan or knowing what you're doing and then using other people's money to experiment with that money. That's when you get. That's dangerous when you're spending a bunch of marketing dollars on a business plan that doesn't really exist yet, or you don't really know your ideal customer. You don't really know proven strategies, and you're dumping money into this thing. That's when guys get into trouble and it happens more often than you would think. Or like overpaying for equipment and trucks and vehicles that you don't need. Like you go out and buy the $80,000 truck to start your business when you really only need a $10,000 truck. It's stuff like that. And so the experienced businesses aren't doing that. They don't go out and they're not gonna. They're gonna test first, see what works, and then double down on it. You Know, they're not gonna just take this big lump sum and do a big experiment with other people's money. That's a big no, no. So I think it's all about having a business plan, knowing what works, and then if you want to. If you want to leverage that strategy, I'm all for it. I'm not. I'm not against it. Um, but, yeah, just. Just get some experience under your belt before you start leveraging yourself. That's what I would say.

[Paul Jamison]

So good. If you're tuning in on Instagram, let us know where you're watching from. If you're tuning in on Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, let us know in the comments. Well, we are going to have Joey back on the program for a part two, but I just wanted to share here for a minute. This difficult thing, saving Buddy Boy. It is. It takes so much discipline. And I guess if you listen to the Dave Ramsey show, he basically talks about, like, when someone's married, there's typically. Because opposites typically attract, there's a. There's a savor in the relationship, and then there's typically a spender. And that's not always the case. It's not as cut and dry as that. But when he explains that, I kind of think, well, I'm the spender. Like, I just. When I get money, right, there's things I like to buy, right? Like, new title is Pro V1 Golf Balls.

[Joey Coberly]

I don't.

[Paul Jamison]

I don't like playing the Kirkland golf balls, which are the. Like the Costco golf balls, right? Or the. The raggedy golf ball I find in the wood right in the woods. I like to play a brand new title is Pro V1 Golf Ball. And I just. I have. I just, like, I like to go out to eat, right? Like, I like to spend money, all right? And it's a problem as a business owner because there's always something I can invest in, right? There's always. There's always a new phone, right? There's always a new podcast piece of equipment. There's always a new this, that, and the other. And it takes quite a bit of discipline and organization and intentionality to say, okay, here's my plan. I need to save money for my taxes. I need to save money for my retained earnings in my business. I need to save money for my savings account. And so because I have this savings goal, I have to know what to say no to when it comes to opportunities in this life, because I have this other goal over here. And so I just think as I study these Smart people out there that are successful in business. It's having that vision, as Joey was talking about, of this is my goal. And that goal may be different for you than it is for me. Whether it's you're saving up for a down payment on a house or you're saving up for your retained earnings in your business, or maybe you're in Dave Ramsey's baby step two and you're, you're, you're aggressively paying off debt or whatever the goal is. I personally, I have a certain amount of money I'm trying to save right now for my, in a personal account for personal goal. And it's like, okay, got a long way to go here and got a lofty goal, a big, hairy, audacious goal. Be hag. And I'm gonna have to say no to a lot in order to say yes to chunking this money towards the savings goal. And I'm gonna have to serve more customers or serve my current customers at a higher level where they pay me more money. Right there's. At the end of the day, money just doesn't grow on trees. It comes from us serving people now, typically. And I could go down the whole bunny rabbit trail thing of investing and how that makes you money and how your assets can produce money and all of that, which that's not necessarily where I'm talking about. I'm talking about like, who can I go out and serve today that's going to pay me money? Maybe not today, but maybe it's, you know, the, the farmer example of the seed, right? You plant the seed today and maybe it, it generates, you know, some, get some water and, and it gets some air and it gets some sunlight and then eventually there's a harvest. But it's like I want to constantly be planting those seeds so that in due time I reap the right harvest. And then when the harvest arrives, because I've been prepared already with a vision of when harvest time is here, the money is not going to be blown on this, that or the other. Because when the money comes in, things will come knocking on the door that's going to want the money. And we have to already have an established plan of where the money is going to go with great organization and intentionality. That's why I like listening to Dave Ramsey show. From time to time, I'll tune in and just get a reminder of how important it is to be organized and intentional. Organized and intentional. Organized and intentional. With my finances, there's an organization of what needs saved for taxes. There's a system and there's consistency and persistence in saving that money so that when the next estimated quarterly tax bill is due, I got the money to pay that there's a system in place to save money towards my savings goals. And there's a intentionality with that and you fill in the blank with your goal. I'm thankful that I'm out of debt now, but when I was in debt, there was a tenacity that I don't care what it takes, you know, legally, I'm going to kick butt, take names, make as much money as I can to pay off this debt, debt and, and just getting after it. So anyway, I just looked at the clock. I got to run, folks. Time flies when you're having fun. We'll have part two with Joey Coberly coming up on the next episode. Thanks for listening.

[Podcast Host/Announcer]

Hey, it's Marty, producer of the Green Industry podcast. This episode is over, but check the episode notes for links to products and services that you heard about during the episode. And thanks for listening.

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