Start-up Company

Become “official” … when I formed my company I decided on an LLC.
Get professional liability insurance immediately. There is a reason all firms have it. In addition, if you are a sub to another firm they will most likely require it. Any design/build firm should be insured.
And always use a written contract, even if it is a one pager. It clears up potential misunderstandings.

Hey James,

Good to see you here. I’ve lost a residential client because I sent them the short version of the ASLA contract. It scared them. What can you recommend in this case?

Good advice, Glenn. For most, the hard part is getting the project, not doing the work. Barbara Faga always says “you get work from your friends.” I think that is very true. Word of mouth is essential, especially with residential work. One of the best things you can do is be involved with neighborhood groups, “beautification” groups, and the like. The more people see you and hear your name, the more likely they are to hire you.

I like “Guerrila Marketing Handbook” a lot.

write up contracts or agreements even if its a $600 job. Many people have learned that lesson for us and its not worth it. Best of luck at getting your name out there. Another thing to do is develop a plant list and a set of CAD standards and blocks that you will plan to use and a nice title block.

You’ll need to at least go to your town hall and fill out a d/b/a (doing business as) in order to legally use a company name.

You’ll probably be fine operating as a sole proprietorship since it is unlikely that you have a ton of assetts to protect and the grand it costs to register an LLC in MA is probably not in your curent budget.

Liability insurance is not mandatory in Massachusetts, but both practical and not having it makes you look like a fly-by-nighter – you should be able to get that for about a grand per year.

If you are going to mark up any product, you are legally required to collect sales tax on them and are required to have a vendor’slicense in Massachusetts (pretty cheap – like a one time hundred dollar fee) and then you have to set up a business bank account and register with the Mass Dept. of Revenue to report and pay your sales tax on-line (very easy and costs nothing).

Errors & Omissions insurance is unnecessary if you are the installer as well as the designer and would likely be very cost prohibitive to you (at least $5k if you can get it at all).

If you hire anyone you need to register with both the Mass. DOR and the IRS. Don’t make the mistake of thinking yu can pay your help as “subcontractors” – a lot of people do this and it catches up to them years later in very big and bad ways (I know people who lost their asses years later).

You should have contracts for everything, even if it is just a piece of notebook paper that lists what you’ll do and what it will cost. You’ll learn to write better contracts as time goes by.

Didt they have a professional office practice class at UMASS?

The danger in what you are doing is that when you start your own business you will never get the internship done in order to get registered (if that is your goal). Most also tend to stay close to the level that they went into business at in terms of type of work and clientele. It is much faster to climb to a higher market by working for someone else first and “stepping off” on your own at their level rather than climbing up on your own. You’ll find that out one way or another.

No, you can’t use ASLA until you are licensed. If you use the term ‘landscape architect’ in any of your work you could have a complaint lodged against you and lose the ability to become licensed. Careful!

“The danger in what you are doing is that when you start your own business you will never get the internship done in order to get registered (if that is your goal). Most also tend to stay close to the level that they went into business at in terms of type of work and clientele. It is much faster to climb to a higher market by working for someone else first and “stepping off” on your own at their level rather than climbing up on your own. You’ll find that out one way or another.”

Andrew,

I agree with your thoughts entirely, but for those who are recent grads and looking for any way to get their hands dirty, would you say this is better than nothing? I find myself in the same spot of wanting to improve my employment status, but must instead settle for whatever I can do to support my family and maintain some, if any, of my design skills.