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How a landscaping quote is calculated
For a landscaper, the trap is never the price of the plants: it's the forgotten hours and the uncounted trips. So the method is to get everything into the cost price before adding the margin.
Plants & suppliesfor each line, the sum of the quantity × the unit purchase price excl. VAT
Labourplanned hours × all-in hourly rate
Cost priceplants & supplies + labour + travel
Selling price excl. VATcost price × (1 + target margin ÷ 100)
Price incl. VATselling price excl. VAT × (1 + VAT rate ÷ 100)
What each term means
- Plants & supplies
- The purchase price excl. VAT at the nursery or garden centre: shrubs, perennials, topsoil, compost, mulch, geotextile. The mark-up you take on them is separate from the job margin — a multiplier of 1,5 to 2,5 is common, it pays for transport, handling and the replacement guarantee.
- Planned hours
- Time on site, plus loading, unloading and the round trip to the tip for green waste. That last item is the great forgotten cost in maintenance quotes.
- All-in hourly rate
- What an hour of your business truly costs: loaded pay, petrol-powered equipment, fuel, vehicle, insurance and fixed costs brought back to the billable hour. You commonly see 25 to 45 €/h excl. VAT depending on the region and the equipment involved.
- Travel
- A flat fee per visit or a mileage cost. On recurring maintenance 20 minutes' drive away, an unbilled trip wipes out a good part of the client's annual margin.
- VAT
- In France, landscape creation falls under 20%. Small garden-maintenance jobs for private individuals may qualify for 10% as home-help services, under certain conditions — check your situation with your accountant.
A worked example: a shrub bed
A low hedge of ten shrubs to plant for a private client, mulch included. These are the calculator's pre-filled values.
- Shrubs: 10 units at 12 € excl. VAT10 × 12 = 120 €
- Mulch: 1 bag= 30 €
- Total plants & supplies120 + 30 = 150 €
- Labour: 6 h at 30 €/h all-in6 × 30 = 180 €
- Travel= 20 €
- Cost price150 + 180 + 20 = 350 €
- Target margin 30%350 × 1,30 = 455 € excl. VAT, of which 105 € margin
- VAT 20%455 × 1,20 = 546 € incl. VAT
455 € excl. VAT · 546 € incl. VAT, for 105 € of margin on the day.
Now add the classic oversight: an hour's round trip to the tip plus 20 € in disposal fees. The cost price rises to 400 € and the margin falls from 105 € to 55 €, i.e. 14% instead of 30% — at the very same price quoted to the client. Over a year's order book, that's several thousand euros. The landscaper's cost price and margin app prices every service in its own unit (m², hour, fixed price) so these items stop disappearing.
FAQ
Landscaping quote: frequently asked questions
Quotes, hourly rate, plants, travel: the landscaper's benchmarks.
How do you price a landscaping quote?
Add up the plants and supplies at their purchase price excl. VAT, the planned hours multiplied by your all-in hourly rate, and the travel: that's your cost price. Multiply it by (1 + margin). Example: 150 € of supplies + 180 € of labour + 20 € of travel = 350 € of cost, i.e. 455 € excl. VAT with a 30% margin. Count the hours for loading and disposing of green waste, otherwise the quote is wrong from the start.
What hourly rate for a gardener-landscaper?
You commonly see 25 to 45 €/h excl. VAT, depending on the region, the equipment involved and the technical skill of the job. Your figure is calculated, not copied: add up loaded pay, equipment, vehicle, fuel, insurance and fixed costs, then divide by your genuinely billable hours. Factor in seasonality: the quiet winter months have to be funded by the rate charged in peak season.
What margin should you apply on plants?
A multiplier of 1,5 to 2,5 on the nursery purchase price excl. VAT is common. It isn't a comfort margin: it covers transport, handling, watering before planting, losses and the replacement guarantee you give the client. Billing plants on at catalogue price with no multiplier means paying for any losses out of your own labour hours.
How do you bill for travel and green-waste disposal?
Travel is billed either as a flat fee per visit (the clearest for recurring maintenance) or by the mile in the quote; disposal is counted as travel hours plus the tip's disposal fee. What matters is that both show up in the cost price: on a week-long job, a daily round trip left unbilled easily comes to 10% of the quoted amount.
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