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Starting your hardscaping business can be overwhelming with the number of tools that is required in order to complete a quality install. There are tools that you need to have to begin your business and then there are tools that you can acquire as you progress in your business and begin to improve cash flow. This is how we started our business. We began doing work on the side before jumping all in with our business. We did not even own anything other than a truck when we signed up our first project after starting our business. We then took the deposit and purchased what we needed to complete the install, rented what we could not afford, and banked the rest. This is how we continued in our business until we had all of the paver tools that we needed and wanted to have to help with the installation process.
Paving Tools
The more tools that you can accumulate in your business, the more efficient you will become on a job site with your installations. This will in turn make you more money because of your efficiency. When starting a season, we budget a specified amount for small tools under $500 in value. This is the maximum amount in our region that we can 100% depreciate in the first year, classifying them simply as tools. If we are budgeting for tools over $500, we write out each tool that we think we will need to purchase and budget the cost for that tool in our budget. By budgeting for these tools and pieces of equipment, we can accurately bill them out when estimating a project.
Ultimately the tools are purchased with budgeted money that is billed to the client. It is never purchased out of pocket from your salary or from the profits of the business. If you use profits to purchase tools and equipment, then that is not profit. You would be running an unprofitable business. This is fine while you are growing, but eventually you want your business to get to the point where it is profitable and you are receiving a return on your investment.
That being said, tools are an incredibly important aspect of any paver installation and you cannot complete a project without them. Here is a list of paver tools that you need to have when starting your business. This is not an all encompassing list. It is meant to be a starting point in your hardscaping business. It will help you with your organization. It will also help you set goals in your business to try and achieve. There will be tools on the list that you can go out and afford right away. There will be tools and equipment on this list that you will likely prefer to rent at first before committing to a purchase. Here are the paver tools that you should have to start your business and the tools that you should be building towards purchasing in your business.
- Personal Protective Equipment
- Basic Hand Tools for Paver Installations
- Tape Measures
- Marking Pencils
- String Line
- String Level
- Chalk Line
- Spikes or Stakes
- Rubber Mallet
- Dead Blow Hammer
- Hammer
- Shovels – Pointed and Square
- Pickaxe
- Rake
- Come Along Rake
- Hand Tamper
- Torpedo, 2′, 4′, 8′ Levels
- 3/4″ Steel Screed Bars – Long as Possible
- Push Broom
- Hose + Shower Nozzle
- Fuel Cans
- Tin Snips
- Folding Square
- Larger Tools for Paver Installations
- Leaf Blower
- Wheelbarrow
- Rotary Laser Level or Altimeter
- Equipment for Paver Installations
- Demo / Concrete Saw
- Reversible Compactor – Mid and Large Size
- Jumping Jack Compactor
- Pressure Washer
- Powered Wheelbarrow / Buggy
- Vacuum Lifting Equipment
- Track Equipment
Working through this list of tools for a paver installation will help you understand what is necessary when starting your business, but it will also help you understand what can be rented until you can either afford it or until it makes sense to purchase it because renting is actually costing you more money. This is something you can work towards as your progress in business, but the basics in your tool box needs to be covered and needs to be available to you.
Nothing hurts you more than having to run out to the hardware store while your on a project. The lost time and money that the trip to the hardware store costs you is easy to calculate. It never hurts to have multiples of each of these tools whenever possible so that if one breaks or it goes down, you have a backup so that you do not have to run out to the hardware store to get another one of them.
The next thing to have for the smaller tools would be to have an organized system where the tools can be returned to and in larger storage units that can easily be moved from the truck to the job site and have everything you will need at the step of the process in the project that you are on. This will save you additional time in the installation process and it will really add up as you continue through a project. There is no doubt that you will learn a lot of things along the way to help you with you paver installations. It is a process that you will continue to fine tune and there will no doubt be tools that you will be able to add to this list in the future as you grow and as you add more skill sets to your hardscaping business.