Pre-Frost Maintenance Ideas

Winter is traditionally a slow season for maintenance-focused landscaping contractors but there are still opportunities for you to serve your clients. Enhance their experience and your repeat business by thinking ahead of the first cold front or snow event of the season. Making your customers aware of the cold-weather related services you provide will emphasize your commitment to protecting their landscaping investment and the work you put into it the remainder of the year.

Here are a few tips for actions you can take ahead of the cold:

• Offer to put out frost blankets.  There are a variety of blanket thicknesses depending on the expected temperature minimums. On average most frost blankets keep plants 3-7 degrees warmer than the true outside air temperature.
• Offer snow blowing shoveling and deicing services.  Letting customers know you provide these services gives them a resource when the time comes and also gives you the opportunity to create a priority list for customers who sign up early. 
• Mulch and water pre-frost.  Thoroughly watering plants a few days ahead of the frost can help raise the humidity in the area immediately surrounding the plant and reduce frost damage. Two to three inches of mulch around frost-sensitive plants can also insulate and reduce damage from the cold.
• Educate customers on what not to do. The intent may be good but certain actions can harm plants if performed during the winter. For example using any quick-release fertilizers or pruning during the cold season can shift plants into a growing phase that makes them more prone to damage by the cold.

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