As a professional landscaper, your portfolio showcases the work you do. You’ve highlighted installations of plants, grass, gravel, irrigation, pavers or retaining walls, but what about low-voltage landscape lighting? You already have the customers, it practically sells itself (with a simple visual demonstration), and it adds value to a home; so why not add landscape lighting to your scope of services?

Tap Into Existing Customers

You might be thinking, “Why would customers choose me to add lighting to their backyard?” But more often than not, customers would rather have someone they already know working at their residence than someone new.

In my experience, most people don’t like to try their hand at a new landscaper when they have already found someone with whom they have already built a relationship. Why should anyone else get business from your customer for a new landscape project when they would rather pay you? You’ve already enhanced your customer’s outdoor living area, so take the business, expand your portfolio, improve your profit, and make your customer happy. Start incorporating lighting into the bidding process for every project, because if you aren’t doing it…someone else is.

Upsell with Ease—and Earn Referrals

With a simple evening demonstration, low-voltage landscape lighting can be a relatively easy upsell. The labor is less intensive compared to many other landscape elements. Lighting wire can be buried in a relatively shallow ditch or in the same trenches as your irrigation system. A basic installation includes laying wire, connecting and installing fixtures, and connecting to the transformer.

Use landscape lighting to enhance the work you’ve already done; use it to make your landscape plantings and water features pop in the evening. Lighting can be also used to accent nearly any hardscape project, including paver pathways, garden walls, kitchen islands, seat walls, ramadas and trellis areas.

With the addition of low-voltage lighting, your client can enjoy your work 24/7, creating a perfect environment for hosting parties that can result in referral work. Referrals bring in the best business because they have seen your work, like what they see, and they are ready to pay you to do the job.

Educate Clients on Added Value

Offering a little education on the benefits and value of installing low-voltage landscape lighting can help proactively address concerns and overcome resistance.

Some benefits and advantages you might highlight include:

• A landscape lighting system essentially extends a clients’ living area, enabling them to enjoy their yard long after the sun has set.
• A well-lit home is a deterrent to criminals. A low-voltage system can help serve as a security element, offering a well-lit view of your client’s property and suggests the home is occupied.
• Adequate lighting also helps reduce accidents and liability by allowing your clients to see where they are going and what is going on.

Give It a Try!

Showcasing your projects with the addition of low-voltage lighting offers many benefits for the customer, and can help grow your bottom line. Consider offering a nighttime demo to show a glimpse of what you can do to provide some added value to your clients’ homes. Not sure where to start with a demo? Don’t worry—your Ewing branch can help you with a nighttime demo to show both you and your client exactly what the lighting will look like when it’s installed. Many branches also offer educational classes on lighting installation and troubleshooting.

So what are you waiting for? Add some pizzazz to the yard you are working on, and show off your work. And remember, Ewing can help.