How to Stay Productive On a Rainy Day

In the landscaping industry, rainy days can pose a major problem to your business but unfortunately, there is nothing you can personally do to prevent them. At the same time, there are plenty of activities and strategies that you can implement into your company’s rain-delay plans in order to stay on top of your tasks, remain productive, and prevent downtime as much as possible during these damp days!

Before getting into some of the best ways to stay productive during rainy days, we should consider client-facing policies that can ensure your communication with them is as quick, transparent, and efficient as possible:

• How to create a rainy day policy for your business:
• A rainy day policy is basically a note that should be included on your website, in emails, client quotes, agreements/contracts, and even appointment reminder messages that lets your customers know schedules, timing, and job completion can be affected by the weather.
• Build in schedule flexibility to quotes, offering a 2-day completion window. Have an understanding with employees that longer hours or even weekends might be needed to make up for the missed productivity due to the weather.
• With a rainy day policy, you can alleviate some pressure to be in immediate contact with clients and staff since the policy has already prepared them. This gives you more time to communicate a plan of action, rather than scrambling to make decisions on the fly.
• Once your policy is in place, openly share it at the beginning of every rainy season as a reminder!
• How to notify clients of rain delays:
• Use whatever communication mediums you normally use so it’s not a surprise to them when your crew isn’t there at the specified time & day.
• Send emails, texts, post on social media, or anything else that is a communicative medium for your company.
• If you use a mass messaging software to contact all of your clients, have a rainy day email ready to go so you can make these notifications simple and efficient!
• Even if you have jobs scheduled on non-rainy days, those that are delayed due to the weather might throw off your calendar, so it is wise to notify your other clients that their pre-planned service might be affected by the unpreventable schedule change.

Even if there is no way to execute your normal day-to-day landscaping duties, rainy days don’t have to slow your crew down! After you notify your clients of this weather interruption, fill your time with some of these tasks:

• Take care of any administrative or business-related duties – Handle any sort of clerical work that you don’t want to waste time doing when the weather is nice! This could include following-up on payments & invoices, sending quotes, bidding on new jobs, or anything else that might require some catching up.
• Maintain or service your equipment – Wear & tear on your equipment is only natural, so take this time to replace broken tools, organize spare parts, clean the equipment, sharpen tools, change oil, and more! Additionally, if your business works year-round, it’s a good opportunity to plan ahead and start prepping or buying equipment for the next season!
• Take inventory & restock products – Making sure you know exactly what you have on hand will help you understand the parts and tools that you have a large quantity of, as well as the items you need to get more of. This makes a rainy day the perfect time to visit your local Russo location and replenish your supply of landscaping products and equipment. Don’t forget to rotate existing stock to make sure you’re using older inventory first.
• Clean up your shop/headquarters – Making sure you have a nice, clean workspace can help make your work environment safer and more efficient! Keeping things tidy can even help boost morale, help your crew take even more pride in their work, and can contribute to productivity.
• Work on marketing your business – Marketing is such a key component of obtaining new clients while also impressing your current clientele. Take the time to update your website & social media accounts, add photos and on-the-job content you may have been collecting, share positive reviews, etc. You can even brainstorm other marketing strategies (fliers, lawn signs, and vehicle decals) and how they can be executed throughout the year.
• Train yourself and your employees – There are always new products, new ways of doing things, new regulations, and new technology to stay up to date on. When your whole team can take a day to learn together, there’s not a second wasted and the reward is immeasurable!
• Check in on your customer service methods – Without your customers, you wouldn’t be in business, so you always want them to know that you’re grateful for them and that they matter. Check in with clients to get feedback to better your execution, send thank you notes to customers, and respond to questions, comments, and concerns via email or social media. Anything to help strengthen your connection and communication with clients, so they continue to support your business, is a win!
• Give yourself some time to rest and recover – This is one of the more underrated and underutilized tips, but it can seriously go a long way for your company. Sit down, get to know coworkers/employees, take your mind off work, and build a bit of morale to keep everyone happy, connected, and on the same page!

Rain delays and bad weather can definitely put a damper on your productivity and overall workload, but that doesn’t mean you have to let it totally put your business out of commission. We know that there are a lot of ideas on this list, but depending on the size of your crew, you can divide and conquer these tasks, divvying them up amongst employees so that way you can get as much done on these days as possible. Then, when the sun starts to shine again and the last raindrop falls, you can get back out there and know that you’ve made the most of a rain day!