4 Million a Year Picking up Dog POOP? Small Business Ideas

2 years ago
89

89 million dogs in the USA generate over 66 million pounds of poop each day. Forward thinking people are taking advantage of this and some are earning millions in the process. We'll look at how to get started in this business, things you need to consider and a low investment poop scooping franchise that has owners making millions.

This model is one of the types of businesses people assume is simple to operate. You eyeball a blob of poop, flip it into a baggie, rinse and repeat until the yard is clean. This is the common misperception with so many of these service type businesses, like painting or cleaning, and the reason most businesses fail, or never rise above just creating a job for the owner. Scaling any business to the millions can be done but really has nothing to do with painting, cleaning or picking up poop.

Just because your *service* is simple, scaling and growing a business is not. There are specific questions you need to answer before you start your business.

Arguably the most important:
1. Client acquisition. Who is your target market and how do I acquire customers. This is where most people fail in a small business like this. They post some paper signs around town, get no calls and give up. Ideally your operation should focus on residential as well as commercial clients like dog parks, vet clinics, doggie daycares etc. Social media is a great venue you can advertise and pay per click and segment your customer base by pet owners within a radius around your home. You can also leave cards with vet clinics and pet stores, as well as pitch them on your services.

2. Licensing and regulations. Each state has different rules for small business. Do you need a specific license beyond just your business license? Do you need to dump the waste in a special place, and follow certain safety protocols? If you aren't following the rules you risk lawsuits, fines or having your business shut down. Should your business be an LLC or sole proprietorship? Answers to these questions will be specific to your situation.

3. Service upsells. The easiest customer to sell to is an existing customer. Once you acquire a customer for scooping you can be offering flea and tick spray, lawn repair, or even pet sitting services.

4. Obviously your startup costs are fairly low if you are staring as a sole proprietor. You need poop picking up tools and bags, a small ad budget and off you go.

So how do people get to millions of dollars in this business? Well you wont do it as a single operator you need to scale the business efficiently and effectively. Typically one weekly visit to a residential home pays between $10-$15, more if there is a lot to pick up. If you handle the logistics correctly, and this is another area where newbie business owners mess up, but if you plan effective routes you can clean 4-6 yards per hour - giving you around $60 per hour or just under $500 a day, $2500 a week. Obviously if you are booking jobs across town from each other you will make a lot less. Again dont underestimate the complexity of scaling a business. You'll need to effectively geo-target your first customers correctly which is the key to scaling a city via small quadrants at a time. Once your schedule is full you now have a $120,000 a year gig. Keep your customers happy and many will stay with you. But basically you have a high paying job picking up poop.

If you begin to scale, hiring poop scoopers under you, paying say $500-$600 a week, even after expenses you could see $1000- $1500 per vehicle per week. Multiply that by 10 or 20 employees you can begin to see how this can be a lucrative business.

If you are not confident in your business abilities of scaling, how do I get customers, advertise and everything else, yes there are franchises in this sector that show you exactly how to scale the business quickly. One of them has a 4 million dollar scooping business, the top performing franchisee earned 1.2 million, almost half of their franchisees earned over $440,000. So the system has been proven over 20 years and like any good franchise you just step in, and follow your training and operations manual. Financing is available total investment is between $70k - $80k and you'll need a minimum net worth of $250k to qualify.
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